mr. punch in bohemia punch library of humour edited by j. a. hammerton designed to provide in a series of volumes, each complete in itself, the cream of our national humour, contributed by the masters of comic draughtsmanship and the leading wits of the age to "punch," from its beginning in 1841 to the present day. * * * * * mr. punch in bohemia [illustration] * * * * * [illustration: shakspeare illustrated "tedious as a twice-told tale, vexing the dull ear of a drowsy man." _king john._ act iii., sc. 4.] * * * * * mr. punch in bohemia or the lighter side of literary, artistic and professional life [illustration] as pictured by phil may, charles keene, george du maurier, dudley hardy, fred pegram, f. h. townsend, lewis baumer, l. raven-hill, j. bernard partridge, e. t. reed, h. m. brock, c. e. brock, tom browne, gunning king, harry furniss, a. wallis mills, g. l. stampa, and others _156 illustrations_ published by arrangement with the proprietors of "punch" the educational book co. ltd. * * * * * the punch library of humour _twenty-five volumes, crown 8vo, 192 pages fully illustrated_ life in london country life in the highlands scottish humour irish humour cockney humour in society after dinner stories in bohemia at the play mr. punch at home on the continong railway book at the seaside mr. punch afloat in the hunting field mr. punch on tour with rod and gun mr. punch awheel book of sports golf stories in wig and gown on the warpath book of love with the children [illustration] * * * * * the way to bohemia [illustration] time was when bohemianism was synonymous with soiled linen and unkempt locks. but those days of the ragged bohemia have happily passed away, and that land of unconventional life--which had finally grown conventional in its characteristics--has now become "a sphere of influence" of modern society! in a word, it is now respectable. there are those who firmly believe it has been wiped off the social map. the dress suit and the proprieties are thought by some to be incompatible with its existence. but it is not so; the new bohemia is surely no less delightful than the old. the way to it is through the doors of almost any of the well-known literary and art clubs of london. its inhabitants are our artists, our men of letters, our musicians, and, above all, our actors. in the present volume we are under the guidance of mr. punch, himself the very flower of london's bohemia, into this land of light-hearted laughter and the free-and-easy manner of living. we shall follow him chiefly through the haunts of the knights of the pen and pencil, as we have another engagement to spend some agreeable hours with him in the theatrical and musical world. it should be noted, however, that we shall not be limited to what has been called "upper bohemia", but that we shall, thanks to his vast experience, be able to peep both at the old and new. easily first amongst the artists who have depicted the humours of bohemia is phil may. keene and du maurier run him close, but their bohemia is on the whole more artistic, less breezily, raggedly, hungrily unconventional than his. it is a subject that has inspired him with some of his best jokes, and some of his finest drawings. [illustration] * * * * * [illustration] mr. punch in bohemia the invalid author.--_wife._ "why, nurse is reading a book, darling! who gave it her?" _husband._ "_i_ did, my dear." _wife._ "what book is it?" _husband._ "it's my last." _wife._ "darling! when you _knew_ how important it is that _she shouldn't go to sleep_!" * * * * * a bookworm's observation.--when a man has got turned of 70, he is in the appendix of life. * * * * * table of contents.--the dinner table. * * * * * [illustration: the grub and the butterfly i. "all right, sir. i'll just wash 'er face, sir, and then she shall come round to your stoodio, sir." ii. "here's a little girl come for you, sir!"] * * * * * punch's proverbs most sticks have two ends, and a muff gets hold of the wrong one. the good boy studies his lesson; the bad boy gets it. if sixpence were sunshine, it would never be lost in the giving. the man that is happy in all things will rejoice in potatoes. three removes are better than a dessert. dinner deferred maketh the hungry man mad. bacon without liver is food for the mind. forty winks or five million is one sleep. you don't go to the mansion house for skilligolee. three may keep counsel if they retain a barrister. what is done cannot be underdone. you can't make a pair of shoes out of a pig's tail. dinner hour is worth every other, except bedtime. no hairdresser puts grease into a wise man's head. an upright judge for a downright rogue. happiness is the hindmost horse in the derby. look before you sit. bear and forebear is bruin and tripe. believe twice as much as you hear of a lady's age. content is the conjuror that turns mock-turtle into real. there is no one who perseveres in well-doing like a thorough humbug. the loosest fish that drinks is tight. education won't polish boots. experience is the mother of gumption. half-a-crown is better than no bribe. utopia hath no law. there is no cruelty in whipping cream. care will kill a cat; carelessness a christian. he who lights his candle at both ends, spills grease. keep your jokes to yourself, and repeat other people's. * * * * * the best text-book for pugilists.--knox on anatomy. * * * * * acrobats' tipple.--champagne in tumblers. * * * * * [illustration: what our artist has to put up with.--_fond mother._ "i _do_ wish you would look over some of my little boy's sketches, and give me your candid opinion on them. they strike me as perfectly marvellous for one so young. the other day he drew a horse and cart, and, i can assure you, you could scarcely tell the difference."] * * * * * [illustration: our smoking concert _irate member._ "well, i'll take my oath i came in a hat!"] * * * * * editors ["editors, behind their officialism, are human just like other folks, for they think and they work, they laugh and they play, they marry--just as others do. the best of them are brimful of human nature, sympathetic and kindly, and full of the zest of life and its merry ways."--_round about_.] to look at, the ordinary editor is so like a human being that it takes an expert to tell the difference. when quite young they make excellent pets, but for some strange reason people never confess that they have editors in the house. marriage is not uncommon among editors, and monogamy is the rule rather than the exception. the chief hobby of an editor is the collection of stamped addressed envelopes, which are sent to him in large numbers. no one knows why he should want so many of these, but we believe he is under the impression that by collecting a million of them he will be able to get a child into some hospital. of course in these enlightened days it is illegal to shoot editors, while to destroy their young is tantamount to murder. * * * * * [illustration: _country cousin_ (_looking at index of r. a. catalogue_). "uncle, what does 1, 3, 6, 8, after a man's name, mean?" _uncle_ (_who has been dragged there much against his will_). "eh! what? 1, 3---oh, _telephone number_!"] * * * * * [illustration: in the artist's room.--_potztausend._ "my friend, it is kolossal! most remark-worthy! you remind me on rubinstein; but you are better as he." _pianist (pleased)._ "indeed! how?" _potztausend._ "in de bersbiration. my friend rubinstein could never bersbire so moch!"] * * * * * [illustration: brothers in art.--_new arrival._ "what should i charge for teaching ze pianoforte?" _old stager._ "oh, i don't know." _n. a._ "vell, tell me vot _you_ charge." _o. s._ "_i_ charge five guineas a lesson." _n. a._ "himmel! how many pupils have you got?" _o. s._ "oh, i have no pupils!"] * * * * * a division of labour ["_journalism._--gentleman (barrister) offers furnished bedroom in comfortable, cheerful chambers in temple in return for equivalent journalistic assistance, &c."--_times._] the "equivalent" is rather a nice point. _mr. punch_ suggests for other gentlemen barristers the following table of equivalence:- 1 furnished bedroom. = {1 introduction (by letter) to {sub-editor of daily paper. 1 furnished bedroom} = {1 introduction (personal) to with use of bath. } {sub-editor. {1 introduction and interview 1 bed-sitting-room. = { (five minutes guaranteed) {with editor. 2 furnished rooms.} = {1 lunch (cold) with dr. {robertson nicoll. 2 furnished rooms, with} = {1 lunch (hot) with dr. nicoll use of bath. } {and claudius clear. 1 furnished flat, with } {1 bridge night with lord all modern conveniences,} = {northcliffe, sir george electric light, } {newnes, and mr. c. a. trams to the corner, &c.} {pearson. * * * * * when is an author most likely to be sick of his own writing? when he's regularly _in the swing_. * * * * * [illustration: drink to me only with thine eyes songs and their singers] * * * * * [illustration: _little griggs_ (_to caricaturist_). "by jove, old feller, i wish you'd been with me this morning; you'd have seen such a funny looking chap!"] * * * * * [illustration: (_model wishing to say something pleasant._) "you must have painted uncommonly well when you were young!"] * * * * * dinner and dress.--full dress is not incompatible with low dress. at dinner it is not generally the roast or the boiled that are not dressed enough. if young men are raw, that does not much signify but it is not nice to see girls underdone. * * * * * a cheap bath.--a farthing dip. * * * * * "light dues."--photographers' charges. * * * * * "lettered ease."--the catalogue of the british museum. * * * * * a professional view of things.--trecalfe, our bookseller, who has recently got married, says of his wife, that he feels that her life is bound up in his. * * * * * tavern wine measure 2 sips make 1 glass. 2 glasses make 1 pint. 2 pints makes 1 quart bottle. 1 bottle makes one ill. * * * * * the boarding-out system.--dining at the club. * * * * * [illustration: _mrs. mashem._ "_bull-bull_ and i have been sitting for our photographs as 'beauty and the beast'!" _lord loreus_ (_a bit of a fancier_). "yes; he certainly _is_ a beauty, isn't he?"] * * * * * short rules for calculation.--_to find the value of a dozen articles._--send them to a magazine, and double the sum offered by the proprietor. _another way._--send them to the butterman, who will not only fix their value, but their weight, at per pound. _to find the value of a pound at any price._--try to borrow one, when you are desperately hard up. * * * * * _member of the lyceum club._ have you read tolstoi's "resurrection"? _member of the cavalry club._ no. is that the name of marie corelli's new book? * * * * * convivial toast (_for a temperance fête_) fill high: drink _l'eau_. * * * * * _first reveller_ (_on the following morning_). "i say, is it true you were the only sober man last night?" _second reveller._ "of course not!" _first reveller._ "who was, then?" * * * * * an ugly bargain.--a cheap bull-dog. * * * * * [illustration: the dumas craze _brown_ (_who, with his friends jones and robinson, is in town for a week and is "going it"_). "now, mr. costumier, we are going to this 'ere ball, and we want you to make us hup as the three musketeers!"] * * * * * [illustration: a cheerful prospect.--_jones._ "i say, miss golightly, it's awfully good of you to accompany me, you know. if i've tried this song once, i've tried it a dozen times--_and i've always broken down in the third verse!_"] * * * * * [illustration: beyond praise.--_roscius._ "but you haven't got a word of praise for anyone. i should like to know who you would consider a finished artist?" _criticus._ "a dead one, my boy--a dead one!"] * * * * * stale news freshly told.--a physician cannot obtain recovery of his fees, although he may cause the recovery of his patient. dress may be seized for rent, and a coat without cuffs may be collared by the broker. a married woman can acquire nothing, the proper tie of marriage making all she has the proper-ty of her husband. you may purchase any stamp at the stamp-office, except the stamp of a gentleman. pawnbrokers take such enormous interest in their little pledges, that if they were really pledges of affection, the interest taken could hardly be exceeded. * * * * * the authors of our own pleasures.--next to the pleasure of having done a good action, there is nothing so sweet as the pleasure of having written a good article! * * * * * change for the better.--when the organ nuisance shall have been swept away from our streets, that fearful instrument of ear-piercing torture called the hurdy-gurdy will then (thank parliament!) be known as the _un-heardy_-gurdy. * * * * * [illustration: my mother bids me bind my hair songs and their singers] * * * * * a few golden rules transmuted into brass the golden rule. 1. never put off till to-morrow what you can do to-day. 2. never trouble another for a trifle which you can do yourself. 3. never spend your money before you have it, if you would make the most of your means. 4. nothing is troublesome that we do willingly. the brazen rule. 1. put off till to-morrow the dun who won't be done to-day. 2. when another would trouble you for a trifle, never trouble yourself. 3. spend your money before you have it; and when you have it, spend it again, for by so doing you enjoy your means twice, instead of only once. 4. you have only to do a creditor willingly, and he will never be troublesome. * * * * * a literary pursuit.--chasing a newspaper in a high wind. * * * * * [illustration: the true test.-_first screever_ (_stopping before a pastel in a picture dealer's window_). "ullo 'erbert, look 'ere! chalks!" _second screever._ "ah, very tricky, i dessay. but you set that chap on the pivement alongside o' you an' me, to dror 'arf a salmon an' a nempty 'at, an' where 'ud 'e be?" _first screever._ "ah!"] [_exeunt ambo._ * * * * * musical news (noose).--we perceive from a foreign paper that a criminal who has been imprisoned for a considerable period at presburg has acquired a complete mastery over the violin. it has been announced that he will shortly make an appearance in public. doubtless, his performance will be _a solo on one string_. * * * * * _sporting prophet_ (_playing billiards_). marker, here's the tip off this cue as usual. _marker._ yes, sir. better give us one of your "tips," sir, as _they never come off_. * * * * * art dogma.--an artist's wife never admires her husband's work so much as when he is drawing her a cheque. * * * * * the united effort of six royal academicians.--what colour is it that contains several? an umber (_a number_). * * * * * mem. at burlington house.--a picture may be "capitally executed" without of necessity being "well hung." and _vice versâ_. * * * * * a schism to be approved of.--a witticism. * * * * * [illustration: excelsior!-_she._ "i didn't know you were a _musician_, herr müller." _he._ "a musician? ach, no--gott vorpit! i am a _wagnerian_!"] * * * * * an author's cry of agony (_wrung from him by the repeated calls of the printer's boy_) "oh! that devils' visits were, like angels', 'few and far between!'" * * * * * riddles by a wretch.--_q._ what is the difference between a surgeon and a wizard? _a._ the one is a cupper and the other is a sorcerer. _q._ why is america like the act of reflection? _a._ because it is a roomy-nation. _q._ why is your pretty cousin like an alabaster vase? _a._ because she is an _objet de looks_. _q._ how is it that a man born in truro can never be an irishman? _a._ because he always is a true-roman. _q._ why is my game cock like a bishop? _a._ because he has his crows here (_crozier_). * * * * * couplet by a cynic (_after reading certain press comments on the picture show_) philistine art may stand all critic shocks whilst it gives private views--of pretty frocks! * * * * * [illustration: retaliation.-_comic man_ (_to unappreciated tenor, whose song has just been received in stony silence_). "i say, you're not going to sing an encore, are you?" _unappreciated tenor_ (_firmly_). "yes, i am. _serve them right!_"] * * * * * [illustration: an inducement.-_swedish exercise instructress._ "now, ladies, if you will only follow my directions carefully, it is quite possible that you may become even as i am!"] * * * * * [illustration: more swedish instruction.-_instructress_ (_to exhausted class, who have been hopping round room for some time_). "come! come! that won't do at all. you _must_ look cheerful. keep smiling--smiling all the time!"] * * * * * a batch of proofs the proof of a pudding is in the eating: the proof of a woman is in making a pudding; and the proof of a man is in being able to dine without one. * * * * * a reflection on literature.--it is a well-authenticated fact, that the name of a book has a great deal to do with its sale and its success. how strange that titles should go for so much in the republic of letters. * * * * * motto for the rejected at the royal academy (_suggested by one of the forty_).--"hanging's too good for them!" * * * * * suggestion for a music-hall song (_to suit any lionne comique_).--"wink at _me only_ with one eye," &c., &c. * * * * * ample grounds for complaint.--finding the grounds of your coffee to consist of nothing but chicory. * * * * * a smiling countenance is "the happy mien." * * * * * [illustration: _publisher_ (_impatiently_). "well, sir, what is it?" _poet_ (_timidly_). "o--er--are you mr. jobson?" _publisher_ (_irritably_). "yes." _poet_ (_more timidly_). "mr. _george_ jobson?" _publisher_ (_excitably_). "yes, sir, that's my name." _poet_ (_more timidly still_). "of the firm of messrs. jobson and doodle?" _publisher_ (_angrily_). "yes. what do you want?" _poet_ "oh--i want to see mr. doodle!"] * * * * * [illustration: our orchestral society.--_the rector._ "oh, _piano_, mr. brown! _pi-an-o!_" _mr. brown._ "_piano_ be blowed! i've come here to enjoy myself!"] * * * * * [illustration: _customer._--"have you 'how to be happy though married'?" _bookseller._ "no, sir. we have run out at present of the work you mention; but we are selling this little book by the hundred."] * * * * * a letter to a young publisher since, my dear jones, you are good enough to ask for my advice, need i say that your success in business will depend chiefly upon judicious advertisement? you are bringing out, i understand, a thrilling story of domestic life, entitled "maria's marriage." already, i am glad to learn, you have caused a paragraph to appear in the literary journals contradicting "the widespread report that mr. kipling and the german emperor have collaborated in the production of this novel, the appearance of which is awaited with such extraordinary interest." and you have induced a number of papers to give prominence to the fact that mr. penwiper dines daily off curry and clotted cream. so far, so good. your next step will be to send out review-copies, together with ready-made laudatory criticisms; in order, as you will explain, to save the hard worked reviewers trouble. but, you will say, supposing this ingenious device to fail? supposing "maria's marriage" to be universally "slated"? well, even then you need not despair. with a little practice, you will learn the art of manufacturing an attractive advertisement column from the most unpromising material. let me give you a brief example of the method:-i.--the raw material. "mr. penwiper's latest production, 'maria's marriage,' scarcely calls for serious notice. it seems hard to believe that even the most tolerant reader will contrive to study with attention a work of which every page contains glaring errors of taste. humour, smartness, and interest are all conspicuously wanting."--_the thunderer._ "this book is undeniably third-rate--dull, badly-written, incoherent; in fine, a dismal failure."--_the wigwam._ "if 'maria's marriage' has any real merit, it is as an object-lesson to aspiring authors. here, we would say to them, is a striking example of the way in which romance should not be written. set yourself to produce a work exactly its opposite in every particular, and the chances are that you will produce, if not a masterpiece, at least, a tale free from the most glaring faults. for the terrible warning thus afforded by his volume to budding writers, mr. penwiper deserves to be heartily thanked."--_daily telephone._ "'maria's marriage' is another book that we have received in the course of the month."--_the parachute._ ii.--the result. "maria's marriage!" "maria's marriage!" gigantic success--the talk of london. the 29th edition will be issued this week if the sale of twenty-eight previous ones makes this necessary. each edition is strictly limited! "maria's marriage!" the voice of the press is simply _unanimous_. read the following extracts--taken almost at random from the reviews of leading papers. "mr. penwiper's latest production ... calls for serious notice ... the reader will ... study with attention a work of which every page contains taste, humour, smartness and interest!"--_the thunderer._ "undeniably ... fine!"--_the wigwam._ "has ... real merit ... an object lesson ... a striking example of the way in which romance ... should be written. a masterpiece ... free from faults. mr. penwiper deserves to be heartily thanked."--_daily telephone._ "the book ... of the month!"--_the parachute_, &c., &c. "maria's marriage!" a veritable triumph! order it from your bookseller to-day! that, my dear jones, is how the trick is done. i hope to give you some further hints on a future occasion. * * * * * "pray, after you," as the glass of water said to the pill. * * * * * truism for teetotalers.--when a man is _out_ of spirits--he should take wine. * * * * * a needless question.--"do you want a loan?" * * * * * the british "public."--the beer-shop. * * * * * morning envelopes.--dressing gowns. * * * * * [illustration: "_operator_" (_desperately, after half an hour's fruitless endeavour to make a successful "picture" from unpromising sitter_). "suppose, madam, we try a pose with just the _least_ suggestion of--er--_sauciness_?"] * * * * * [illustration: gushing hospitality. (time 3 p.m.).--_hospitable host._ "have c'gar, old f'lla?" _languid visitor._ "no--thanks." _h. h._ "cigarette then?" _his visitor._ "no--thanks. nevar smoke 'mejately after breakfast." _h. h._ "can't refuse a toothpick, then, old f'lla?"] * * * * * [illustration: proportions.--_buyer._ "in future, as my collection increases, and my wall-space is limited, and price no object, perhaps you would let me have a little more 'picture,' and a little less 'mount'!"] * * * * * [illustration: ingenuous!--_jones_ (_to his fair partner, after their opponents have declared "clubs"_). "shall i play to 'clubs', partner?" _fair partner_ (_who has never played bridge before_). "oh, no, please don't, mr. jones. i've only got two little ones."] * * * * * [illustration: _she._ "and are all these lovely things about which you write imaginary?" _the poet._ "oh, no, miss ethel. i have only to open my eyes and i see something beautiful before me." _she._ "oh, how i wish i could say the same!"] * * * * * [illustration: at the r.a.--_first painter._ "i've just been showing my aunt round. most amusing. invariably picks out the wrong pictures to admire and denounces the good ones!" _second painter._ "did she say anything about mine?" _first painter._ "oh, she liked yours!"] * * * * * [illustration: "i say, old man, i've invented a new drink. big success! come and try it." "what's it made of?" "well, it's something like the ordinary whisky and soda, but you put more whisky in it!"] * * * * * [illustration: a prophet in his own country _sylvia._ "i wonder whether he'll be a soldier or a sailor?" _mamma._ "wouldn't you like him to be an artist, like papa?" _sylvia._ "oh, one in the family's quite enough!"] * * * * * "the bitter end."--the last half inch of a halfpenny cigar. * * * * * the worst possible name for an author.--dr. dozy. * * * * * why oughtn't a boot and shoemaker to be trusted? because he's a slippery customer. * * * * * the race for wealth.--jews. * * * * * basso profondo.--a deep draught of bitter beer. * * * * * exercise for city clerks.--a run on a bank. * * * * * passing the time.--going by a clock. * * * * * [illustration: coming off with flying colours] * * * * * [illustration: thy face songs and their singers] * * * * * literary notes a well-known diner-out has, we learn, collected his reminiscences, and would be glad to hear from some obliging gentleman or gentlemen who would "earnestly request" him to publish them. we should add that no names would be mentioned, the preface merely opening as follows:- "although these stray gleanings of past years are of but ephemeral value, and though they were collected with no thought of publication, the writer at the earnest request of a friend" (or "many friends," if more than one) "has reluctantly consented to give his scattered reminiscences to the world." * * * * * the following volumes in "the biter bit" series are announced as shortly to appear:-"the fighter fit; or practical hints on pugilistic training." "the lighter lit: a treatise on the illumination of thames barges." "the slighter slit: or a new and economical method of cutting out." "the tighter tit: studies in the comparative inebriation of birds." [illustration: some fine form was exhibited] [illustration: a two-figure break] [illustration: a heat of 500 up] [illustration: finishing the game with a cannon] [illustration: opening with the customary miss] [illustration: spot barred] billiard notes by dumb-crambo * * * * * [illustration: sending-in-day at the r. a. "but it is impossible for you to see the president. what do you want to see him for?" "i want to show him exactly where i want my picture hung."] * * * * * [illustration: _millionaire._ "yes; i'm awful partial to picters. why, bless yer, i've got _cellars_ full of 'em!"] * * * * * [illustration: "the exhibition"] _infuriated outsider._ "r-r-r-rejected, sir!----fwanospace, sir!" (_with withering emphasis._) "'want--of--space--sir!!" * * * * * [illustration: "look here, schlumpenhagen, you must help us at our smoking concert. you play the flute, don't you?" "not ven dere ish anypotty apout." "how's that?" "dey _von't let me_!"] * * * * * rochefoucauldiana there is no sympathy in england so universally felt, so largely expressed, as for a person who is likely to catch cold. * * * * * when a person loses his reputation, the very last place where he goes to look for it is the place where he has lost it. * * * * * no gift so fatal as that of singing. the principal question asked, upon insuring a man's life, should be, "do you sing a good song?" * * * * * many of us are led by our vices, but a great many more of us follow them without any leading at all. * * * * * to show how deceptive are appearances, more gentlemen are mistaken for waiters, than waiters for gentlemen. * * * * * to a retired tradesman there can be no greater convenience than that of having a "short sight." in truth, wealth rarely improves the vision. poverty, on the contrary, strengthens it. a man, when he is poor, is able to discover objects at the greatest distance with the naked eye, which he could not see, though standing close to his elbow, when he was rich. * * * * * if you wish to set a room full of silent people off talking, get some one to sing a song. * * * * * the bore is happy enough in boring others, but is never so miserable as when left alone, when there is no one but himself to bore. * * * * * the contradictions of this life are wonderful. many a man, who hasn't the courage to say "no," never misses taking a shower-bath every morning of his life. * * * * * if you wish to borrow £5 ask for £10. * * * * * what brown said scene--_hall of the elysium club_ _enter_ smith, f.r.s., _meeting_ brown, q.c. _smith._ raw day, eh? _brown._ very _raw_. glad when it's _done_. [_exit_ brown, q.c. _exit_ smith, f.r.s., _into smoking-room, where he tells a good thing that_ brown _said_. * * * * * [illustration: at the academy _miss jones._ "how came you to think of the subject, mr. de brush?" _eccentric artist._ "oh, i have had it in my head for years!" _miss jones._ "how wonderful! what did the papers say?" _eccentric artist._ "said it was full of 'atmosphere,' and suggested 'space.'"] * * * * * [illustration: intelligent!--_artist_ (_who thinks he has found a good model for his touchstone_). "have you any sense of humour, mr. bingles?" _model._ "thank y' sir, no, sir, thank y'. i enj'ys pretty good 'ealth, sir, thank y' sir!"] * * * * * the perils of a conversazione _miss fillip_ (_to gentleman whose name she did not catch when introduced_). have you read _a modern heliogabolus_? _he._ yes, i have. _miss f._ all through? _he._ yes, from beginning to end. _miss f._ dear me! i wonder you're alive! how did you manage to get through it? _he_ (_diffidently_). unfortunately, i wrote it. [_miss f. catches a distant friend's eye._ * * * * * the sound sleeper's paradise.--snoring. * * * * * _patent_ night-lights.--stars. * * * * * epitaph on a champion billiard player.--"taking his long rest." * * * * * toned paper.--sheets of music. * * * * * item on a menu of literary pabulum.--"shakspeare and bacon." * * * * * race glasses.--champagne. * * * * * the maid of the mill.--a lady boxer. * * * * * [illustration: sentiment.--(_artistic-minded youth in midst of a fierce harangue from his father, who is growing hotter and redder_). "by jove, that's a fine bit of colour, if you like!"] * * * * * [illustration: "what an ass old brown is!" "oh, i don't know. he's got far more brains than appear on the surface."] * * * * * [illustration: _art-master_ (_who has sent for a cab, pointing to horse_). "what do you call that?" _cabby._ "an 'orse, sir." _art-master._ "a horse! rub it out, and do it again!"] * * * * * a parcel of proverbs, &c. completed take time by the forelock--to have his hair cut. follow your leader--in your daily paper. the proof of the pudding is in the eating--a great deal of it. never look a gift-horse in the mouth--lest you should find false teeth. the hare with many friends--was eaten at last. a stitch in time saves nine--or more naughty words, when a button comes off while you are dressing in a great hurry for dinner. one man's meat is another man's poison--when badly cooked. don't count your chickens before they are hatched--by the patent incubator. love is blind--and unwilling to submit to an operation. first catch your hare--then cook it with rich gravy. nil desperandum--percy vere. * * * * * [illustration: non-committal.-scene: _fashionable auction rooms. a picture sale._-_amateur collector_ (_after taking advice of expert no. 1, addresses expert no. 2_). "what do you think of the picture? i am advised to buy it. is it not a fine titian?" _expert no. 2_ (_wishing to please both parties_). "i don't think you can go far wrong, for anyhow, if it isn't a titian it's a repe-tition."] * * * * * another parcel of proverbs if the cap fits, wear it--out. six of one, and half-a-dozen of the other--make exactly twelve. none so deaf as those who won't hear--hear! hear! faint heart never won fair lady--nor dark one either. civility costs nothing--nay, is something to your credit. the best of friends must part--their hair. any port in a storm--but old port preferred. one good turn deserves another--in waltzing. youth at the prow and pleasure at the helm--very sea-sick. * * * * * "leading strings."--those of a first violin in an orchestra. * * * * * tobacco stoppers.--men who stay to smoke. * * * * * smoker's proverb.--it's an ill weed that blows nobody any good. a _tidy_ drink.--_neat_ brandy. * * * * * [illustration: _amateur_ "_minimus poet_" (_who has called at the office twice a week for three months_). "could you use a little poem of mine?" _editor_ (_ruthlessly determined that this shall be his final visit_). "oh, i think so. there are two or three broken panes of glass, and a hole in the skylight. how large is it?"] * * * * * motto for a sub-editor.--"aut _scissors_, aut nullus." * * * * * _to find the value of a cook._--divide the services rendered by the wages paid; deduct the kitchen stuff, subtract the cold meat by finding how often three policemen will go into one area, and the quotient will help you to the result. _to find the value of a friend._--ask him to put his name to a bill. _to find the value of time._--travel by a bayswater omnibus. _to find the value of eau de cologne._--walk into smithfield market. _to find the value of patience._--consult bradshaw's _guide_ to ascertain the time of starting of a railway train. * * * * * note by a social cynic.--they may abolish the "push" stroke at billiards, but they'll never do so in society. * * * * * from our own irrepressible one (_still dodging custody_).--_q._ why is a daily paper like a lamb? _a._ because it is always folded. * * * * * [illustration: duty before pleasure.--_hostess_ (_to new curate_). "we seem to be talking of nothing but horses, mr. soothern. are you much of a sportsman?" _curate._ "really, lady betty, i don't think i ought to say that i am. i used to collect butterflies; but i have to give up even _that_ now!"] * * * * * [illustration: shakspeare illustrated "the gods confound thee! dost thou hold there still?" _antony and cleopatra_, act ii., sc. 5.] * * * * * "still waters."--whiskies. * * * * * art criticism.--in too many pictures the colour is medi-ocre. * * * * * the advertiser's paradise.--puffin island. * * * * * a musical burglar.--one who breaks into a tune. * * * * * [illustration: he knew his work _proprietor of travelling menagerie._ "are you used to looking after horses and other animals?" _applicant for job._ "yessir. been used to 'orses all my life." _p. o. t. m._ "what steps would you take if a lion got loose?" _a. f. j._ "good long 'uns, mister!"] * * * * * may be heard everywhere.--"songs without words"--a remarkable performance; but perhaps a still more wonderful feat is playing upon words. * * * * * substitutes for profane swearing (_adapted to various sorts and conditions of men_) _lawyer._ tax my bill. _doctor._ dash my draughts. _soldier_. snap my stock. _parson._ starch my surplice. _bricklayer._ i'll be plastered. _bricklayer's labourer._ chop my hod. _carpenter._ saw me. _plumber and glazier._ solder my pipes. smash my panes. _painter._ i'm daubed. _brewer._ i'm mashed. _engineer._ burst my boiler. _stoker._ souse my coke. _costermonger._ rot my taturs. _dramatic author._ steal my french dictionary. _actor._ i'll be hissed. _tailor._ cut me out. cook my goose. _linendraper._ soil my silks. sell me off. _grocer._ squash my figs. sand my sugar. seize my scales. _baker._ knead my dough. scorch my muffins. _auctioneer._ knock me down. * * * * * "the players are come!"--_first player_ (_who has had a run of ill-luck_). i'm regularly haunted by the recollection of my losses at baccarat. _second player._ quite shakespearian! "banco's ghost." * * * * * something to live for.--(_from the literary club smoking-room._) _cynicus._ i'm waiting till my friends are dead, in order to write my reminiscences? _amicus._ ah, but remember. "_de mortuis nil nisi bonum._" _cynicus._ quite so. i shall tell nothing but exceedingly good stories about them. * * * * * a contradiction.--in picture exhibitions, the observant spectator is struck by the fact that works hung on the line are too often below the mark. * * * * * a "light" repast.--a feast of lanterns. * * * * * [illustration: r. a. gems.--_fair amateur_ (_to carpenter_). "my picture is quite hidden with that horrid ticket on it. can't you fix it on the frame?" _carpenter._ "why, you'll spoil the frame, mum!"] * * * * * [illustration: _jones._ "do you drink between meals?" _smith._ "no. i eat between drinks." _jones._ "which did you do last?" _smith._ "drink." _jones._ "then we'd better go and have a sandwich at once!"] * * * * * [illustration: nocturne in the old kent road] * * * * * "largest circulation in the world."--the elephant's. * * * * * the worst place in thirsty weather.--taplow. * * * * * inscription for an old clothes shop.--"nothing new." * * * * * [illustration: "just a song at twilight"] (_as sung sweetly by a public-house-baritone_) * * * * * literary announcement.--in the press--yesterday's tablecloth. * * * * * the height of economy.--a "screw" of tobacco. * * * * * [illustration: a broken melody scene i.--_street singer._ "i fear no foe in shining ar----."] [illustration: a broken melody scene ii.--enter policeman.] * * * * * the quick grub street co. the quick grub street co. beg to announce that they have opened an establishment for the supply of literature in all its branches. _every editor should send for our prices and compare them with those of other houses._ poetry department. we employ experienced poets for the supply of garden verses, war songs, &c., and undertake to fill any order within twenty-four hours of its reaching us. our mr. rhymeesi will be glad to wait upon parties requiring verse of any description, and, if the matter is at all urgent, to execute the order on the spot. drama department. actor-managers before going elsewhere should give us a call. our plays draw wherever they are presented, even if it is only bricks. _testimonial._--a manager writes: "the play you kindly supplied, _the blue bloodhound of bletchley_, is universally admitted to be _unlike anything ever before produced on the stage_." musical comedies (guaranteed absolutely free from plot) supplied on shortest notice. fiction department. for society dialogues we use the very best duchesses; while a first-class earl's daughter is retained for court and gala opera. for our new line of _vie intime_ we employ none but valets and confidential maids, who have to serve an apprenticeship with p.a.p. the kailyard department is always up-to-date, and our mr. stickit will be pleased to call on any editor on receipt of post-card. n.b.--we guarantee our scotch idyll to be absolutely unintelligible to any english reader, and undertake to refund money if it can be proved that such is not the case. our speciality, however, is our _six-shilling shocker_, as sold for serial purposes. editors with papers that won't "go" should ask for one of these. when ordering please state general idea required under one of our recognised sections, as foreign office, police, mounted infantry, cowardice, rome, &c., &c. biography. any gentleman wishing to have a biography of himself produced in anticipation of his decease should communicate with us. the work would, of course, be published with a note to the effect that the writing had been a labour of love; that moreover the subject with his usual modesty had been averse from the idea of a biography. _testimonial._--sir sunny jameson writes: "the life gives great satisfaction. no reference made, however, to my munificent gift of £50 to the referees' hospital. this should be remedied in the next edition. the work, however, has been excellently done. you have made me out to be better than even i ever thought myself." for love letters, for the elizabethan vogue, for every description of garden meditations, give the quick grub street company a trial. * * * * * [illustration: a soft answer.--_papa_ (_literary, who has given orders he is not to be disturbed_). "who is it?" _little daughter._ "scarcely anybody, dear papa!"] * * * * * [illustration: the secrets of literary composition _the fair authoress of "passionate pauline," gazing fondly at her own reflection, writes as follows_:-"i look into the glass, reader. what do i see? i see a pair of laughing, _espiègle_, forget-me-not blue eyes, saucy and defiant; a _mutine_ little rose-bud of a mouth, with its ever-mocking _moue_; a tiny shell-like ear, trying to play hide-and-seek in a tangled maze of rebellious russet gold; while, from underneath the satin folds of a _rose-thé_ dressing-gown, a dainty foot peeps coyly forth in its exquisitely-pointed gold morocco slipper", &c., &c. (_vide "passionate pauline", by parbleu._)] * * * * * [illustration: a distinction _first gourmet._ "that was mr. dobbs i just nodded to." _second gourmet._ "i know." _first g._ "he asked me to dine at his house next thursday--but i can't. ever dined at dobbs's?" _second g._ "no. never _dined_. but i've been there to dinner!"] * * * * * [illustration: _auctioneer._ "lot 52. a genuine turner. painted during the artist's lifetime. what offers, gentlemen?"] * * * * * [illustration: _millionaire_ (_who has been shown into fashionable artist's studio, and has been kept waiting a few minutes_). "shop!"] * * * * * nonsense proverbs what's in the pot mustn't be told to the pan. there's a mouth for every muffin. a clear soup and no flavour. as drunk as a daisy. all rind and no cheese. set a beggar on horseback, and he will cheat the livery-stable keeper. there's a b in every bonnet. two-and-six of one and half-a-crown of the other. the insurance officer dreads a fire. first catch your heir, then hook him. every plum has its pudding. short pipes make long smokes. it's a long lane that has no blackberries. wind and weather come together. a flower in the button-hole is worth two on the bush. round robin is a shy bird. there's a shiny lining to every hat. the longest dinner will come to an end. you must take the pips with the orange. it's a wise dentist that knows his own teeth. no rose without a gardener. better to marry in may than not to marry at all. save sovereigns, spend guineas. too many followers spoil the cook. (n.b. this is _not_ nonsense.) * * * * * [illustration: profusely decorated with cuts] * * * * * said at the academy.--_punch_ doesn't care _who_ said it. it was extremely rude to call the commission on capital punishments the hanging committee. * * * * * the grammar of art.--"art," spell it with a big or little "a," can never come first in any well-educated person's ideas. "i am" must have the place of honour; then "thou art!" so apostrophised, comes next. * * * * * [illustration: _scrumble._ "been to see the old masters?" _stippleton_ (_who has married money_). "no. fact is"--(_sotto voce_)--"i've got quite enough on my hands with the old missus!"] * * * * * [illustration: two old masters of arts] * * * * * artist's vade mecum _question._ has the anxious parent been to see his child's portrait? _answer._ he has seen it. _q._ did he approve of it? _a._ he will like it better when i have made some slight alterations. _q._ what are they? _a._ he would like the attitude of the figure altered, the position of the arms changed, the face turned the other way, the hair and eyes made a different colour, and the expression of the mouth improved. _q._ did he make any other suggestions? _a._ yes; he wishes to have the child's favourite pony and newfoundland dog put in, with an indication of the ancestral home in the back-ground. _q._ is he willing to pay anything extra for these additions? _a._ he does not consider it necessary. _q._ are you well on with your academy picture? _a._ no; but i began the charcoal sketch yesterday. _q._ have you secured the handsome model? _a._ no; the handsome model has been permanently engaged by the eminent r.a. _q._ under these circumstances, do you still expect to get finished in time? _a._ yes; i have been at this stage in february for as many years as i can remember, and have generally managed to worry through somehow. * * * * * whenever the "reduced prizefighters" take a benefit at a theatre, the play should be _the miller and his men_. * * * * * a nice man.--mr. swiggins was a sot. he was also a sloven. he never had anything neat about him but gin. * * * * * [illustration: under a great master] * * * * * [illustration: the warrior bold songs and their singers] * * * * * [illustration: the gay tom tit songs and their singers] * * * * * "hung, drawn, and quartered."--(_mr. punch's sentence on three-fourths of the academicians' work "on the line."_)--very well "hung"; very ill "drawn"; a great deal better "quartered" than it deserves. * * * * * the spirit of the age.--gin. * * * * * [illustration: "when a man does not look his best" when he magnanimously consents to go on the platform at a conjuring performance, and unwonted objects are produced from his inside pockets.] * * * * * [illustration: _celebrated minor poet._ "ah, hostess, how 'do? did you get my book i sent you yesterday?" _hostess._ "delightful! _i couldn't sleep till i'd read it!_"] * * * * * [illustration: _the infant prodigy has reached the middle of an exceedingly difficult pianoforte solo, and one of those dramatic pauses of which the celebrated composer is so fond has occurred. kindly but undiscerning old lady._ "play something you know, dearie."] * * * * * [illustration: at a fencing "at home."--_distinguished foreigner_ (_hero of a hundred duels_). "it is delightful, mademoiselle. you english are a sporting nation." _fair member._ "so glad you are enjoying it. by the way, monsieur le marquis, have they introduced fencing into france yet?"] * * * * * [illustration: in the cause of art.--_patron._ "when are yer goin' to start my wife's picture and mine? 'cause, when the 'ouse is up we're a goin'----" _artist._ "oh, i'll get the canvases at once, and----" _patron_ (_millionaire_). "canvas! 'ang it!--none o' yer canvas for me! price is no objec'! i can afford to pay for something better than canvas!!" [_tableau!_] * * * * * [illustration: gratifying!--_amateur artist_ (_to the carrier_). "did you see my picture safely delivered at the royal academy?" _carrier._ "yessir, and mighty pleased they seemed to be with it--leastways, if one may jedge, sir. they didn't say nothin'--but--lor' how they did laugh!"] * * * * * [illustration: _artist_ (_who has recommended model to a friend_). "have you been to sit to mr. jones yet?" _model._ "well, i've been to see him; but directly i got into his studio, 'why,' he said, 'you've got a head like a botticelli.' i don't know what a botticelli is, but i didn't go there to be called names, so i come away!"] * * * * * [illustration: _art student_ (_engaging rooms_). "what is that?" _landlady._ "that is a picture of our church done in wool by my daughter, sir. she's subject to art, too."] * * * * * the sub-editor's aunt "i always buy your paper my dear horace," said the old lady, "although there is much in it i cannot approve of. but there is one thing that puzzles me extremely." "yes, aunt?" said the sub-editor meekly, as he sipped his tea. "why, i notice that the contents bill invariably has one word calculated to stimulate the morbid curiosity of the reader. an adjective." "circulation depends upon adjectives," said the sub-editor. "i don't think i object to them," the old lady replied; "but what i want you to tell me is how you choose them. how do you decide whether an occurrence is 'remarkable' or 'extraordinary,' 'astounding' or 'exciting,' 'thrilling' or 'alarming,' 'sensational' or merely 'strange,' 'startling' or 'unique'? what tells you which word to use?" "well, aunt, we have a system to indicate the adjective to a nicety; but----" "my dear horace, i will never breathe a word. you should know that. no one holds the secrets of the press more sacred than i." the sub-editor settled himself more comfortably in his chair. "you see, aunt, the great thing in an evening paper is human interest. what we want to get is news to hit the man-in-the-street. everything that we do is done for the man-in-the-street. and therefore we keep safely locked up in a little room a tame man of this description. he may not be much to look at, but his sympathies are right, unerringly right. he sits there from nine till six, and has things to eat now and then. we call him the thrillometer." "how wonderful! how proud you should be horace, to be a part of this mighty mechanism, the press." "i am, aunt. well, the duties of the thrillometer are very simple. directly a piece of news comes in, it is the place of one of the sub-editors to hurry to the thrillometer's room and read it to him. i have to do this." "poor boy. you are sadly overworked, i fear." "yes, aunt. and while i read i watch his face." "long study has told me exactly what degree of interest is excited within him by the announcement. i know instantly whether his expression means 'phenomenal' or only 'remarkable,' whether 'distressing' or only 'sad,' whether----" "is there so much difference between 'distressing' and 'sad,' horace?" "oh, yes, aunt. a suicide in half moon street is 'distressing'; in the city road it is only 'sad.' again, a raid on a club in whitechapel is of no account; but a raid on a west-end club is worth three lines of large type in the bill, above fry's innings." "do you mean a club in soho when you say west-end?" "yes, aunt, as a rule." "but why do you call that the west-end?" "that was the thrillometer's doing, aunt. he fell asleep over a club raid, and a very good one too, when i said it was in soho; but when i told him of the next--also in soho, chiefly italian waiters--and said it was in the west-end, his eyes nearly came out of his head. so you see how useful the thrillometer can be." "most ingenious, horace. was this your idea?" "yes, aunt." "clever boy. and have the other papers adopted it?" "yes, aunt. all of them." "then you are growing rich, horace?" "no, no, aunt, not at all. unfortunately i lack the business instinct. other people grow rich on my ideas. in fact, so far from being rich, i was going to venture to ask you----" "tell me more about the thrillometer," said the old lady briskly. * * * * * [illustration: at the wrestling match _enthusiastic old gent._ "go on, sonny! stick 'old of 's 'ead."] * * * * * going to the bad all the way from the national gallery unto the royal academy as i walked, i was guilty of raillery, which i felt was very bad o' me. thinking of art's disasters, still sinking to deeper abysses, i said, "from the old masters why go to the new misses?" * * * * * [illustration: prehistoric peeps a visit to an artist's studio.] * * * * * [illustration: _he._ "awfully jolly concert, wasn't it? awfully jolly thing by that fellow--what's his name?--something like doorknob." _she._ "_doorknob!_ whom _do_ you mean? i only know of beethoven, mozart, wagner, handel----" _he._ "that's it! handel. i knew it was something you caught hold of!"] * * * * * [illustration: our artist "if you please, sir, here's the printer's boy called again!" "oh, bother! say i'm busy."] * * * * * [illustration: songs and their singers "'tis hard to give the hand where the heart can _never_ be!"] * * * * * [illustration: songs and their singers. "only this"] * * * * * [illustration: _horse dealer._ "did that little mare i sold you do for you, sir?" _nervous horseman._ "nearly!"] * * * * * [illustration: "optics."--_lecturer._ "now let anyone gaze steadfastly on any object--say, for instance, his wife's eye--and he'll see himself looking so exceedingly small, that----" _strong-minded lady_ (_in front row_). "hear! hear! hear!"] * * * * * [illustration: "after the fair." (_country cousin comes up in august to see the exhibition of pictures at the royal academy!_).--_porter._ "bless yer 'art, we're closed!" _country cousin._ "closed! what! didn't it pay?!!"] * * * * * [illustration: _jones._ "how is it we see you so seldom at the club now?" _old member._ "ah, well, you see, i'm not so young as i was; and i've had a good deal of worry lately; and so, what with one thing and another, i've grown rather fond of my own society." _jones._ "epicure!"] * * * * * the true inwardness of art.--photographs by the röntgen rays. * * * * * man who has a turn for music.--an organ-grinder. * * * * * [illustration: the phonograph cannot lie.--_german dealer_ "now, mein herr! you've chust heerd your lofely blaying rebroduced to berfection! won't you buy one?" _amateur flautist._ "are you sure the thing's all right?" _german dealer._ "zertainly, mein herr." _amateur flautist._ "gad, then, if that's what my playing is like, i'm done with the flute for ever."] * * * * * [illustration: private inquiry.--_surveyor of taxes_ (_to literary gent_). "but surely you can arrive at some estimate of the amount received by you during the past three years for example. don't you keep books?" _literary gent._ (_readily_). "oh dear no. i write them!" _surveyor._ "ahem--i mean you've got some sort of accounts----" _literary gent._ "oh yes, lots"--(_surveyor brightens up_)--"unpaid!"] * * * * * [illustration: "there's a boy wants to see you, sir." "has he got a bill in his hand?" "no, sir." "then he's got it in his pocket! send him away!"] * * * * * [illustration: what our artist has to put up with.--_he._ "by jove, it's the best thing i've ever painted!--and i'll tell you what; i've a good mind to give it to mary morison for her wedding present!" _his wifey._ "oh, but, my love, the morisons have always been _so_ hospitable to us! you ought to give her a _real_ present, you know--a fan, or a scent-bottle, or something of that sort!"] * * * * * [illustration: triumph _frame maker_ (_in ecstasies_). "by jove! jemima--every one of 'em on the line again!"] * * * * * how to be an author mr. punch, having read the latest book on the way to write for the press, feels that there is at least one important subject not properly explained therein: to wit, the covering letter. he therefore proceeds to supplement this and similar books.... it is, however, when your story is written that the difficulties begin. having selected a suitable editor, you send him your contribution accompanied by a covering letter. the writing of this letter is the most important part of the whole business. one story, after all, is very much like another (in your case, probably, exactly like another), but you can at least in your covering letter show that you are a person of originality. your letter must be one of three kinds: pleading, peremptory, or corruptive. i proceed to give examples of each. i.--the pleading letter. 199, _berkeley square, w._ dear mr. editor,--i have a wife and seven starving children; can you possibly help us by accepting this little story of only 18,000 (eighteen thousand) words? not only would you be doing a work of charity to one who has suffered much, but you would also, i venture to say, be conferring a real benefit upon english literature--as i have already received the thanks of no fewer than thirty-three editors for having allowed them to peruse this manuscript. yours humbly, the mchardy. p.s.--my youngest boy, aged three, pointed to his little sister's gazeka toy last night and cried "de editor!" these are literally the first words that have passed his lips for three days. can you stand by and see the children starve? ii.--the peremptory letter. sir,--kindly publish at once and oblige. yours faithfully, eugene hackenkick. p.s.--i shall be round at your office to-morrow about an advertisement for some 600 lb. bar-bells, and will look you up. iii.--the corruptive letter. _middlesex house, park lane, iv._ dear mr. smith,--can you come and dine with us quite in a _friendly_ way on thursday at eight? i want to introduce you to the princess of holdwig-schlosstein and mr. alfred austin, who are so eager to meet you. do you know i am really a little _frightened_ at the thought of meeting such a famous editor? isn't it _silly_ of me? yours very sincerely, emma middlesex. p.s.--i wonder if you could find room in your _splendid little paper_ for a silly story i am sending you. it would be such a surprise for the duke's birthday (on monday).--e. m. before concluding the question of the covering letter i must mention the sad case of my friend halibut. halibut had a series of lithographed letters of all kinds, one of which he would enclose with every story he sent out. on a certain occasion he wrote a problem story of the most advanced kind; what, in fact, the reviewers call a "strong" story. in sending this to the editor of a famous magazine his secretary carelessly slipped in the wrong letter: "dear mr. editor," it ran, "i am trying to rite you a littel story, i do hope you will like my little storey, i want to tell you about my kanary and my pussy cat, it's name is _peggy_ and it has seven kitens, have you any kitens, i will give you one if you print my story, "your loving little friend, "flossie." * * * * * proverb for the council of the royal academy.--"hanging goes by favour." * * * * * the enraged musician.--(_a duologue._) _composer._ did you stay late at lady tittup's? _friend._ yes. heard miss bang play again. i was delighted with her execution. _composer._ her execution! _that_ would have pleased _me_; she deserved it for having brutally murdered a piece of mine. [_exeunt._ * * * * * the gentility of speech.--at the music halls visitors now call for "another acrobat," when they want a second tumbler. * * * * * [illustration: the writing on the window portrait of a gentleman who proposes to say he was detained in town on important business.] * * * * * [illustration: awarding the biscuit _dingy bohemian._ "i want a bath oliver." _immaculate servitor._ "my name is _not_ oliver!"] * * * * * [illustration: "sending-in" day.--indigo brown takes his picture, entitled "peace and comfort," to the r.a. himself, as he says, "those picture carts are certain to scratch it," and, with the assistance of his cabby, adds the finishing touches on his way there!] * * * * * [illustration: an undoubted old master (_by himself_)] * * * * * [illustration: laying it on with a palette-knife.--_miss sere._ "ah, mr. brown, if you could only paint me as i was ten years ago!" _our portrait painter_ (_heroically_). "i am afraid children's portraits are not in my line."] * * * * * [illustration: after the sixth rejection by the r.a.--_the prodigal._ "well, dad, here i am, ready to go into the office to-morrow. i've given up my studio and put all my sketches in the fire." _fond father._ "that's right, 'arold. good lad! your 'art's in the right place, after all!"] * * * * * [illustration: _brown_ (_as hamlet_) _to jones_ (_as charles the second_). "'normous amount of _taste_ displayed here to-night!"] * * * * * [illustration: an art patron "i'll have it if you shorten the 'orizon, and make it quids instead of guineas!"] * * * * * [illustration: show sunday.--_brown_ (_trying to find something to admire in smudge's painting_). "by jove, old chap, those flowers are beautifully put in!" _smudge._ "yes; my old friend--thingummy--'r.a.' you know, painted them in for me."] * * * * * [illustration: envy.--scene--_miss semple and dawber, standing near his picture._ _miss semple._ "why, there's a crowd in front of madder's picture!" _dawber._ "someone fainted, i suppose!"] * * * * * an artistic episode ["incapacity for work has come to be accepted as the hall-mark of genius.... the collector wants only the thing that is rare, and therefore the artist must make his work as rare as he can."--_daily chronicle._] josephine found me stretched full length in a hammock in the garden. "why aren't you at work?" she asked; "not feeling seedy, i hope?" "never better," said i. "but i've been making myself too cheap." "we couldn't possibly help going to the joneses last night, dear." "tush," said i. "i mean there is too much of me." "i don't quite understand," she said; "but there certainly will be if you spend your mornings lolling in that hammock." the distortive wantonness of this remark left me cold. "i have made up my mind," i continued, quite seriously, "to do no more work for a considerable time." "but, my dear boy, just think----" "i'm going to make myself scarce," i insisted. "geoffrey!" she exclaimed, "i knew you weren't well!" i released myself. "josephine," i said solemnly, "those estimable persons who collect my pictures will think nothing of them if they become too common." "how do you know there are such persons?" she queried. "i must decline to answer that question," i replied; "but if there are none it is because my work is not yet sufficiently rare and precious. i propose to work no more--say, for six or seven years. by that time my reputation will be made, and there will be the fiercest competition for the smallest canvas i condescend to sign." she kissed me. "i came out for the housekeeping-money," she remarked simply. i went into the house to fetch the required sum, and, by some means i cannot explain, got to work again upon the latest potboiler. * * * * * music readily acquired.--stealing a march. * * * * * [illustration: the storm fiend songs and their singers] * * * * * [illustration: such is fame!--_duchess_ (_with every wish to encourage conversation, to gentleman just introduced_). "your name is very familiar to me indeed for the last ten years." _minor poet_ (_flattered_). "indeed, duchess! and may i ask what it was that first attracted you?" _duchess._ "well, i was staying with lady waldershaw, and she had a most indifferent cook, and whenever we found fault with any dish she always quoted _you_, and said that _you_ liked it _so much_!"] * * * * * [illustration: domestic bliss.--_wife of your bussum._ "oh! i don't want to interrupt you, dear. i only want some money for baby's socks--and to know whether you will have the mutton cold or hashed."] * * * * * in a minor key.--_hearty friend_ (_meeting operatic composer_). hallo, old man, how are you? haven't seen you for an age! what's your latest composition? _impecunious musician_ (_gloomily_). with my creditors. [_exeunt severally._ * * * * * to be sung at concert pitch.--"the tar's farewell." * * * * * [illustration: safe.--_guest_ (_after a jolly evening_). "good night, ol' fellah--i'll leave my boosh oushide 'door----" _bohemian host._ "au' right, m' boy--(_hic_)--noborry'll toussh 'em--goo' light!!" [_exeunt._] * * * * * consolations for the unhung now that the painful month of suspense in studioland is at an end, it behoves us to apply our most soothing embrocation to the wounded feelings of geniuses whose works have boomeranged their way back from burlington house. let them remember: that very few people really look at the pictures in the academy--they only go to meet their friends, or to say they have been there. that those who _do_ examine the works of art are wont to disparage the same by way of showing their superior smartness. that one picture has no chance of recognition with fourteen hundred others shouting at it. that all the best pavement-artists now give "one-man" shows. they can thus select their own "pitch," and are never ruthlessly skied. that photography in colours is coming, and then the r.a. will have to go. that rembrandt, holbein, rubens and vandyck were never hung at the summer exhibition. that botticelli, correggio and titian managed to rub along without that privilege. that the ten-guinea frame that was bought (or owed for) this spring will do splendidly next year for another masterpiece. that the painter _must_ have specimens of his best work to decorate the somewhat bare walls of his studio. that the best test of a picture is being able to live with it--or live it down--so why send it away from its most lenient critic? that probably the _chef-d'oeuvre_ sent in was shown to the hanging committee up-side down. that, supposing they saw it properly, they were afraid that its success would put the academy to the expense of having a railing placed in front. and finally, we would remind the rejected one that, after all, his bantling _has_ been exhibited in the r.a.--to the president and his colleagues engaged in the work of selection. somebody at least looked at it for quite three seconds. * * * * * art note.--_the early italian style._--an organ-grinder at five o'clock in the morning. * * * * * [illustration] * * * * * [illustration: our flat.--_extract from lady's correspondence._ "----in fact, our reception was a _complete_ success. we had some excellent musicians. i daresay you will wonder where we put them, with such a crowd of people; but we managed _capitally_!"] * * * * * [illustration: show sunday.--_vandyke browne._ "peace, my dear lady, peace and refinement, those are the two essentials in an artist's surroundings." [_enter master and miss browne. tableau!_] * * * * * [illustration: varnishing day amenities.--_little smudge._ "of course, i know perfectly well my style isn't quite developed yet, but i feel i am, if i might so express it, in a _transition_ stage, don't you know," _brother brush_ ("_skied_" _this year_). "ah! i see, _going from bad to worse_!"] * * * * * the mighty pen ["with this little instrument that rests so lightly in the hand, whole nations can be moved.... when it is poised between thumb and finger, it becomes a living thing--it moves with the pulsations of the living heart and thinking brain, and writes down, almost unconsciously, the thoughts that live--the words that burn.... it would be difficult to find a single newspaper or magazine to which we could turn for a lesson in pure and elegant english."--_miss corelli in_ "_free opinions freely expressed_."] o magic pen, what wonders lie within your little length! though small and paltry to the eye you boast a giant's strength. between my finger and my thumb a living creature you become, and to the listening world you give "the words that burn--the thoughts that live." oft, when the sacred fire glows hot, your wizard power is proved: you write till lunch, and nations not infrequently are moved; 'twixt lunch and tea perhaps you damn for good and all, some social sham, and by the time i pause to sup- behold carnegie crumpled up! through your unconscious eyes i see strange beauty, little pen! you make life exquisite to me, if not to other men. you fill me with an inward joy no outward trouble can destroy, not even when i struggle through some foolish ignorant review; nor when the press bad grammar scrawls in wild uncultured haste, and which intolerably galls one's literary taste. what are the editors about, whom one would think would edit out the shocking english and the style which every page and line defile? there is, alas! no magazine, no paper that one knows to which a man could turn for clean and graceful english prose; not even, o my pen, though you yourself may write for one or two, and lend to them a style, a tone, a grammar that is all your own. i see the shadows of decay on all sides darkly loom; massage and manicure hold sway, cosmetics fairly boom; old dowagers and budding maids alike affect complexion-aids, while middle age with anxious care dyes to restore its dwindling hair. the time is out of joint, but still i am not hopeless quite so long as you exist, my quill, once more to set it right. woman will cease from rouge, i think, man pour his hair-wash down the sink, if you will yet consent to give "the words that burn--the thoughts that live." * * * * * a hint for the publishers. as the publishing season will soon be in full play--which means that there will be plenty of work--we suggest the following as titles of books, to succeed the publication of "people i have met," by an american:-people i have taken into custody, by a policeman. people that have met me half-way, by an insolvent. people i have splashed, by a scavenger. people i have done, by a jew bill-discounter. people i have abused, by a 'bus conductor. people i have run over, by a butcher's boy. people i have run against, by a sweep. * * * * * a roaring trade.--keeping a menagerie. * * * * * [illustration: compliments one might improve on.--_mrs. mudge._ "i _do_ admire the women you draw, mr. penink. they're _so_ beautiful and _so_ refined! tell me, _who_ is your model?" [_mrs. mudge rises in mrs. penink's opinion._] _penink._ "oh, my wife always sits for me!" _mrs. mudge_ (_with great surprise_). "you don't say so! well, i think you're one of the _cleverest_ men i know!" [_mrs. penink's opinion of mrs. mudge falls below zero._] * * * * * [illustration: "the green-eyed monster."--_george_ (_itinerant punch-and-judy showman_). "i say, bill, she _do_ draw!" _bill_ (_his partner, with drum and box of puppets_). "h'm--it's more than _we_ can!"] * * * * * [illustration: "selection."--_brown_ (_as he was leaving our art conversazione, after a rattling scramble in the cloak-room_). "confound it! got my own hat, after all!"] * * * * * [illustration: _eccentric old gent_ (_whose pet aversion is a dirty child_). "go away, you dirty girl, and wash your face!" _indignant youngster._ "you go 'ome, you dirty old man, and do yer 'air!"] * * * * * musical fact.--people are apt to complain of the vile tunes that are played about the streets by grinding organs, and yet they may all be said to be the music of handle. * * * * * [illustration: is there room for mary there? songs and their singers] * * * * * [illustration: _photographer._ "i think this is an excellent portrait of your wife." _mr. smallweed._ "i don't know--sort of _repose_ about the _mouth_ that somehow doesn't seem right."] * * * * * [illustration: the great prize fight.--_johnnie_ (_who finds that his box_, £_20_, _has been appropriated by "the fancy"_). "i beg your pardon, but this is _my_ box!" _bill bashford._ "oh, is it? well, why don't you tike it?"] * * * * * [illustration: without prejudice.--_ugly man_ (_who thinks he's a privileged wag, to artist_). "now, mr. _daub_igny, draw me." _artist_ (_who doesn't like being called _daub_igny, and whose real name is smith_). "certainly. but you _won't_ be offended if it's _like_ you. eh?"] * * * * * [illustration: _scrimble._ "so sorry i've none of my work to show you. fact is, i've just sent all my pictures to the academy." _mrs. macmillions._ "what a pity! i did so much want to see them. how soon do you expect them back?"] * * * * * the young novelist's guide to medicine chloroform. invaluable to writers of sensational stories. every high-class fictionary criminal carries a bottle in his pocket. a few drops, spread on a handkerchief and waved within a yard of the hero's nose, will produce a state of complete unconsciousness lasting for several hours, within which time his pockets may be searched at leisure. this property of chloroform, familiar to every expert novelist, seems to have escaped the notice of the medical profession. consumption. the regulation illness for use in tales of mawkish pathos. very popular some years ago, when the heroine made farewell speeches in blank verse, and died to slow music. fortunately, however, the public has lost its fondness for work of this sort. consumption at its last stage is easily curable (in novels) by the reappearance of a hero supposed to be dead. two pages later the heroine will gain strength in a way which her doctors--not unnaturally--will describe as "perfectly marvellous." and in the next chapter the marriage-bells will ring. [illustration] doctor. always include a doctor among your characters. he is quite easy to manage, and invariably will belong to one of these three types: (_a_) the eminent specialist. tall, imperturbable, urbane. only comes incidentally into the story. (_b_) young, bustling, energetic. not much practice, and plenty of time to look after other people's affairs. hard-headed and practical. often the hero's college friend. should be given a pretty girl to marry in the last chapter. (_c_) the old family doctor. benevolent, genial, wise. wears gold-rimmed spectacles, which he has to take off and wipe at the pathetic parts of the book. fever. a nice, useful term for fictionary illnesses. it is best to avoid mention of specific symptoms, beyond that of "a burning brow," though, if there are any family secrets which need to be revealed, delirium is sure to supervene at a later stage. _arthur pendennis_, for instance, had fictional "fever," and baffled doctors have endeavoured ever since to find out what really was the matter with him. "brain-fever," again, is unknown to the medical faculty, but you may safely afflict your intellectual hero with it. the treatment of fictionary fever is quite simple, consisting solely of frequent doses of grapes and cooling drinks. these will be brought to the sufferer by the heroine, and these simple remedies administered in this way have never been known to fail. [illustration] fracture. after one of your characters has come a cropper in the hunting-field he will be taken on a hurdle to the nearest house: usually, by a strange coincidence, the heroine's home. and he will be said to have sustained "a compound fracture"--a vague description which will quite satisfy your readers. gout. an invaluable disease to the humorist. remember that heroes and heroines are entirely immune from it, but every rich old uncle is bound to suffer from it. the engagement of his niece to an impecunious young gentleman invariably coincides with a sharp attack of gout. the humour of it all is, perhaps, a little difficult to see, but it never fails to tickle the public. [illustration] heart disease. an excellent complaint for killing off a villain. if you wish to pave the way for it artistically, this is the recognised method: on page 100 he will falter in the middle of a sentence, grow pale, and press his hand sharply to his side. in a moment he will have recovered, and will assure his anxious friends that it is nothing. but the reader knows better. he has met the same premonitory symptoms in scores of novels, and he will not be in the least surprised when, on the middle of page 250, the villain suddenly drops dead. [illustration] * * * * * unpopular game at the royal academy.--"high-sky-high!" * * * * * a rough wine.--rude-sheimer. * * * * * nervous.--mrs. malaprop was induced to go to a music hall the other evening. she never means to set foot in one again. the extortions some of the performers threw themselves into quite upset her. * * * * * motto for a model music-hall entertainment.--"everything in its 'turn' and nothing long." * * * * * [illustration: breaking it gently.--_his cousins._ "we sent off the wire to stop your model coming. but you had put one word too many--so we struck it out." _real artist._ "oh, indeed. what word did you strike out?" _his cousins._ "you had written 'he wasn't to come, as you had only just discovered you couldn't paint to-day.' so we crossed out '_to-day_.'"] * * * * * [illustration: the state of the market.--_artist_ (_to customer_, _who has come to buy on behalf of a large furnishing firm in tottenham court road_): "how would this suit you? 'summer'!" _customer_: "h'm--'summer.' well, sir, the fact is we find there's very little demand for _green_ goods just now. if you had a line of _autumn tints_ now--that's the article we find most sale for among our customers!"] * * * * * [illustration: _our amateur romeo_ (_who has taken a cottage in the country, so as to be able to study without interruption_). "arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon----" _owner of rubicund countenance_ (_popping head over the hedge_), "beg pardon, zur! be you a talkin' to oi, zur?"] * * * * * [illustration: bitters at the club _macstodge_ (_pictor ignotus_). "who's that going out?" _o'duffer_ (_pictor ignotissimus_). "one ernest raphael sopely, who painted lady midas!" _macstodge._ "oh, the artist!" _o'duffer._ "no. _the royal academician!_"] * * * * * [illustration: la vie de bohème.--_first bohemian_ (_to second ditto_). "i can't for the life of me think why you wasted all that time haggling with that tailor chap, and beating him down, when you know, old chap, you won't be able to pay him at all." _second bohemian._ "ah, that's _it_! _i_ have a conscience. i want the poor chap to lose as little as possible!"] * * * * * [illustration: _little guttersnipe_ (_who is getting quite used to posing_). "will yer want me ter tike my bun down?"] * * * * * [illustration: _genial doctor_ (_after laughing heartily at a joke of his patient's_). "ha! ha! ha! there's not much the matter with _you_! though i do believe that if you were on your death-bed you'd make a joke!" _irrepressible patient._ "why, of course i should. it would be my last chance!"] * * * * * [illustration: _she_ (_to raphael greene_, _who paints gems for the r.a. that are never accepted_). "i _do_ hope you'll be hung this year. i'm sure you deserve to be!"] * * * * * [illustration: art intelligence _she_ (_reads_). "there are upwards of fifty english painters and sculptors now in rome----" _he_ (_british philistine--served on a late celebrated jury!_). "ah! no wonder we couldn't get that scullery white-washed!"] * * * * * [illustration: _devoted little wife_ (_to hubbie, who has been late at the club_). "now, dear, see, your breakfast is quite ready. a nice kipper, grilled chicken and mushrooms with bacon, poached eggs on toast--tea and coffee. anything else you'd like, dearie?" _victim of last night_ (_groans_). "yes--an appetite!" [_collapses._] * * * * * [illustration: after feeding-time.--_showman of travelling menagerie._ "now, ladies and gentlemen, we come to the most interesting part of the 'ole exhibition! seven different species of hanimals, in the same cage, dwellin' in 'armony. you could see them with the naked heye, only you have come too late. they are all now inside the lion!"] * * * * * to billiard players.--if you would obey the _rules_ of billiards, always attend to the _cannons_ of the game. * * * * * the suspensory act.--hanging the academy exhibition. * * * * * in the billiard room.--_major carambole._ i never give any bribes to the club servants on principle. _captain hazard._ then i suppose the marker looks on the tip of your cue without interest. [illustration] * * * * * [illustration: in a bar, newmarket.--_seedy individual_ (_to knowing one_). "d'yer want to buy a diamond pin cheap?" _knowing one._ "'ere, get out of this! what d'you take me for? a juggins?" _s. i._ "give yer my word it's worth sixty quid if it's worth a penny. and you can 'ave it for a tenner." _k. o._ "let's 'ave a look at it. where is it?" _s. i._ "in that old gent's tie. _will yer 'ave it?_"] * * * * * [illustration: songs and their singers "yew harxed me woy hoi larved when larve should be a thing hun-der-eamed hof larve twixt yew han me. yew moight hin-tereat the sun tew cease tew she-oine has seek tew sty saw deep a larve has moine."] * * * * * [illustration: shakspeare illustrated "oh, my prophetic soul! my uncle!" _hamlet_, act i., sc. 5.] * * * * * a brother artist ["we have regularly attended the academy now for many years, but never do we remember such a poor show of portraits; they cannot prove to be otherwise than the laughing-stock of tailors and their customers."--_tailor and cutter._] the tailor leaned upon his goose, and wiped away a tear: "what portraits painting-men produce," he sobbed, "from year to year! these fellows make their sitters smile in suits that do not fit, they're wrongly buttoned, and the style is not the thing a bit. "oh, artist, i'm an artist too! i bid you use restraint, and only show your sitters, do, in fitting coats of paint; in vain you crown those errant seams with smiles that look ethereal, for man may be the stuff of dreams- but dreams are not material." * * * * * medical.--a sculptor friend, who has strabismus, consoles himself with the thought that he can always keep his profession in view through having a cast in his eye. * * * * * [illustration: _frame-maker_ (_to gifted amateur, who is ordering frames for a few prints and sketches_). "ah, i suppose you want something cheap an' ordinary for _this_?" [_n.b._--_"this" was a cherished little sketch by our amateur himself._] * * * * * not quite the same.--scene: _exhibition of works of art._ _dealer_ (_to friend, indicating stout person closely examining a vandyke_). do you know who _that_ is? i so often see him about. _friend._ i know him. he's a collector. _dealer_ (_much interested_). indeed! what does he collect? pictures? _friend._ no. income tax. [_exeunt severally._ * * * * * art class.--_inspector._ what is a "landscape painter"? _student._ a painter of landscapes. _inspector._ good. what is an "animal painter"? _student._ a painter of animals. _inspector._ excellent. what is a "marine painter"? _student._ a painter of marines. _inspector._ admirable! go and tell it them. call next class. [_exeunt students._ * * * * * the best "publisher's circular."--a round dining-table. * * * * * [illustration: social agonies.--_anxious musician_ (_in a whisper_, _to mrs. lyon hunter's butler_). "where's my cello?" _butler_ (_in stentorian tones_, _to the room_). "signor weresmicello!"] * * * * * [illustration: _brown._ "pity jones has lost--his figure!" _robinson._ "not _lost_, but gone before!"] * * * * * [illustration: _enthusiastic briton_ (_to seedy american_, _who has been running down all our national monuments_). "but even if our houses of parliament 'aren't in it,' as you say, with the masonic temple of chicago, surely, sir, you will admit the thames embankment, for instance----" _seedy american._ "waal, _guess_ i don't think so durned much of your thames embankment, neither. it _rained_ all the blarmed time the night i _slep on it_."] * * * * * a professional view of things.--old paynter never neglects any opportunity for advancing art. every evening he has the cloth drawn. * * * * * beverage for a musician.--thorough bass. * * * * * poetical licence.--a music-hall's. * * * * * turf reform.--mowing your lawn. * * * * * a monster meeting..--a giant and a dwarf. * * * * * the soaker's paradise.--dropmore. * * * * * [illustration: finis] * * * * * bradbury, agnew, & co. ld., printers, london and tonbridge. provided by the internet archive bohemian paris of to-day by w. c. morrow from notes by edouard cucuel illustrated by edouard cucuel second edition philadelphia & london j. b. lippincott company 1900 [illustration: 0001] [illustration: 0008] [illustration: 0009] introduction this volume is written to show the life of the students in the paris of to-day. it has an additional interest in opening to inspection certain phases of bohemian life in paris that are shared both by the students and the public, but that are generally unfamiliar to visitors to that wonderful city, and even to a very large part of the city's population itself. it depicts the under-side of such life as the students find,--the loose, unconventional life of the humbler strugglers in literature and art, with no attempt to spare its salient features, its poverty and picturesqueness, and its lack of adherence to generally accepted standards of morals and conduct. as is told in the article describing that incomparably brilliant spectacle, the ball of the four arts, extreme care is taken to exclude the public and admit only artists and students, all of whom must be properly accredited and fully identified. it is well understood that such a spectacle would not be suitable for any but artists and students. it is given solely for their benefit, and with the high aim, fully justified by the experience of the masters who direct the students, that the event, with its marvellous brilliancy, its splendid artistic effects, and its freedom and abandon, has a stimulating and broadening effect of the greatest value to art. the artists and students see in these annual spectacles only grace, beauty, and majesty; their training in the studios, where they learn to regard models merely as tools of their craft, fits them, and them alone, for the wholesome enjoyment of the great ball. it is a student that presents the insight which this volume gives into the life of the students and other bohemians of paris. it is set forth with the frankness of a student. coming from such a source, and having such treatment, it will have a special charm and value for the wise. the students are the pets of paris. they lend to the city a picturesqueness that no other city enjoys. so long as they avoid riots aimed at a government that may now and then offend their sense of right, their ways of living, their escapades, their noisy and joyous manifestations of healthy young animal life, are good-naturedly overlooked. underneath such a life there lies, concealed from casual view, another life that they lead,--one of hard work, of hope, of aspiration, and often of pinching poverty and cruel self-denial. the stress upon them, of many kinds, is great. the utter absence of an effort to reorganize their lives upon conventional lines is from a philosophical belief that if they fail to pass unscathed through it all, they lack the fine, strong metal from which worthy artists are made. the stranger in paris will here find opened to him places in which he may study for himself the bohemian life of the city in all its careless disregard of conventions. the cafés, cabarets, and dance-halls herein described and illustrated have a charm that wholesome, well-balanced minds will enjoy. the drawings for the illustrations were all made from the actual scenes that they depict; they partake of the engaging frankness of the text and of its purpose to show bohemian life in the paris of to-day without any effort at concealment. w. c. m. bohemian paris our studio we were in wonderful paris at last--bishop and i--after a memorable passage full of interest from new york to havre. years of hard work were ahead of us, for bishop would be an artist and i a sculptor. [illustration: 8023] for two weeks we had been lodging temporarily in the top of a comfortable little hotel, called the grand something (most of the parisian hotels are grand), the window of which commanded a superb view of the great city, the vaudeville playhouse of the world. _pour la première fois_ the dazzle and glitter had burst upon us, confusing first, but now assuming form and coherence. if we and incomprehensible at could have had each a dozen eyes instead of two, or less greed to see and more patience to learn! day by day we had put off the inevitable evil of finding a studio. every night found us in the cheapest seats of some theatre, and often we lolled on the terraces of the café de la paix, watching the pretty girls as they passed, their silken skirts saucily pulled up, revealing dainty laces and ankles. from the slippery floor of the louvre galleries we had studied the masterpieces of david, rubens, rembrandt, and the rest; had visited the panthéon, the musée cluny; had climbed the eiffel tower, and traversed the bois de boulogne and the champs-elysées. then came the search for a studio and the settling to work. it would be famous to have a little home of our very own, where we could have little dinners of our very own cooking! it is with a shudder that i recall those eleven days of ceaseless studio-hunting. we dragged ourselves through miles of quartier latin streets, and up hundreds of flights of polished waxed stairs, behind puffing concierges in carpet slippers, the puffing changing to grumbling, as, dissatisfied, the concierges followed us down the stairs. the quartier abounds with placards reading, "_atelier d'artiste à louer!_" the rentals ranged from two hundred to two thousand francs a year, and the sizes from cigar-boxes to barns. but there was always something lacking. on the eleventh day we found a suitable place on the sixth (top) floor of a quaint old house in a passage off the _rue st.andré-des-arts_. there were overhead and side lights, and from the window a noble view of paris over the house-tops. [illustration: 0023] a room of fair size joined the studio, and from its vine-laced window we could look into the houses across the court, and down to the bottom of the court as well. the studio walls were delightfully dirty and low in tone, and were covered with sketches and cartoons in oil and charcoal. the price was eight hundred francs a year, and from the concierge's eloquent catalogue of its charms it seemed a great bargain. the walls settled our fate,--we took the studio. it was one thing to agree on the price and another to settle the details. our french was ailing, and the concierge's french was--concierges' french. bishop found that his pet theory that french should be spoken with the hands, head, and shoulders carried weak spots which a concierge could discover; and then, being somewhat mercurial, he began floundering in a mixture of french and english words and french and american gestures, ending in despair with the observation that the concierge was a d-----fool. at the end of an hour we had learned that we must sign an iron-bound, government-stamped contract, agreeing to occupy the studio for not less than one year, to give six months' notice of our leaving, and to pay three months' rental in advance, besides the taxes for one year on all the doors and windows, and ten francs or more to the concierge. this was all finally settled. as there was no running water in the rooms (such a luxury being unknown here), we had to supply our needs from a clumsy old iron pump in the court, and employ six flights of stairs in the process. then the studio had to be furnished, and there came endless battles with the furniture dealers in the neighborhood, who kept their stock replenished from the goods of bankrupt artists and suspended ménages. [illustration: 0025] these _marchands de meubles_ are a wily race, but bishop pursued a plan in dealing with them that worked admirably. he would enter a shop and price an article that we wanted, and then throw up his hands in horror and leave the place as though it were haunted with a plague. the dealer would always come tumbling after him and offer him the article for a half or a third of the former price. in this way bishop bought chairs, tables, a large easel, beds, a studio stove, book-shelves, linen, drapings, water pitchers and buckets, dishes, cooking utensils, and many other things, the cost of the whole being less than one hundred and fifty francs,--and thus we were established. the studio became quite a snug and hospitable retreat, in spite of the alarming arrangement that bishop adopted, "to help the composition of the room." his favorite cast, the unknown woman, occupied the place of honor over his couch, where he could see it the first thing in the morning, when the dawn, stealing through the skylight, brought out those strange and subtle features which he swore inspired him from day to day. my room was filled with brilliant posters by chéret and mucha and steinlen,--they were too bold and showy for the low tone of bishop's studio. it all made a pretty picture,--the dizzy posters, the solemn trunks, the books, the bed with its gaudy print coverings, and the little crooked-pane window hung with bright green vines that ran thither from a box in the window of an adjoining apartment. and it was all completed by the bright faces of three pretty seamstresses, who sat sewing every day at their window across the passage. under our housekeeping agreement bishop was made cook, and i chambermaid and water-carrier. it was bishop's duty to obey the alarm clock at six every morning and light the fire, while i went down for water at the pump, and for milk at the stand beside the court entrance, where fat madame gioté sold _café-au-lait_ and _lait froid ou chaud_, from a _sou_'s worth up. then, after breakfast, i did the chamber work while bishop washed the dishes. bishop could make for breakfast the most delicious coffee and flapjacks and omelette in the whole of paris. by eight o'clock all was in order; bishop was smoking his pipe and singing "down on the farm" while working on his life study, and i was off to my modelling in clay. bishop soon had the hearts of all the shop-keepers in the neighborhood. the baker's dimple-cheeked daughter never worried if the scales hung a little in his favor, at the boucherie he was served with the choicest cuts of meat, and the fried-potato women called him "_mon fils_" and fried a fresh lot of potatoes for him. even madame tonneau, the _marchande de tabac_, saw that he had the freshest packages in the shop. often, when i was returning home at night, i encountered him making cheerily for the studio, bearing bread by the yard, his pockets bulging with other material for dinner. ah, he was a wonderful cook, and we had marvellous appetites! so famous did he soon become that the models (the lady ones, of course) were eager to dine _avec nous_; and when they did they helped to set the table, they sewed buttons on our clothes, and they made themselves agreeable and perfectly at home with that charming grace which is so peculiarly french. ah, those were jolly times! the court, or, more properly, _le passage_, on which our window looked was a narrow little thoroughfare leading from the rue st.-andré-des-arts to the boulevard st.-germain. it bore little traffic, but was a busy way withal. it had iron-workers' shops, where hot iron was beaten into artistic lamps, grills, and bed-frames; a tinsmith's shop; a blanchisserie, where our shirts were made white and smooth by the pretty blanchisseuses singing all day over their work; a wine-cellar, whose barrels were eternally blocking one end of the passage; an embossed picture-card factory, where twoscore women, with little hammers and steel dies, beat pictures into cards; a furniture shop, where everything old and artistic was sold, the hôtel du passage, and a bookbinder's shop. each of the eight buildings facing the passage was ruled by a formidable concierge, who had her dark little living apartments near the entrances. these are the despots of the court, and their function is to make life miserable for their lodgers. when they are not doing that they are eternally scrubbing and polishing. they are all married. m. mayé, _le mari de notre concierge_, is a tailor. he sits at the window and mends and sews all day long, or acts as concierge when his wife is away. the husband of the concierge next door is a sergeant de ville at night, but in the early mornings as, in a soiled blouse, he empties ash-cans, he looks very unlike the personage dressed at night in a neat blue uniform and wearing a short sword another concierge's husband _fait des courses_--runs errands--for sufficient pay. [illustration: 9030] should you fail to clean your boots on the mat, and thus soil the glossy stairs, have a care!--a concierge's tongue has inherited the warlike characteristics of the caesars. rugs and carpets must not be shaken out of the windows after nine o'clock. ashes and other refuse must be thrown into the big bin of the house not later than seven. sharp at eleven in the evening the lights are extinguished and the doors locked for the night; and then all revelry must immediately cease. should you arrive _en retard_,--that is, after eleven,--you must ring the bell violently until the despot, generally after listening for an hour to the bell, unlocks the catch from her couch. then when you close the door and pass her lodge you must call out your name. if you are out often or till very late, be prepared for a lecture on the crime of breaking the rest of hard-working concierges. after the day's work the concierges draw their chairs out into the court and gossip about their tenants. the nearer the roof the lodger the less the respect he commands. would he not live on a lower floor if he were able? and then, the top floor gives small tips! it is noticeable that the entresol and premiers étages are clean and highly polished, and that the cleanliness and polish diminish steadily toward the top, where they almost disappear. ah, _les concierges!_ but what would paris be without them? directly beneath us an elderly couple have apartments. every morning at five the old gentleman starts french oaths rattling through the court by beating his rugs out of his window. at six he rouses the ire of a widow below him by watering his plants and incidentally drenching her birdcages. not long ago she rose in violent rebellion, and he hurled a flower pot at her protruding head. it smashed on her window-sill; she screamed "murder!" and the whole court was in an uproar. the concierges and the old gentleman's pacific wife finally restored order--till the next morning. next, to my room are an elderly lady and her sweet, sad-faced daughter. they are very quiet and dignified, and rarely fraternize with their neighbors. it is their vine that creeps over to my window, and it is carefully tended by the daughter. and all the doves and sparrows of the court come regularly to eat out of her hand, and a lively chatter they have over it. the ladies are the widow and daughter of a once prosperous stock-broker on the bourse, whom an unlucky turn of the wheel drove to poverty and suicide. the three seamstresses over the way are the sunshine of the court. they are not so busy sewing and singing but that they find time to send arch glances toward our window, and their blushes and smiles when bishop sends them sketches of them that he has made from memory are more than remunerative. a young scotch student from glasgow, named cameron, has a studio adjoining ours. he is a fine, jovial fellow, and we usually assist him to dispose of his excellent brew of tea at five o'clock. every thursday evening there was given a musical chez lui, in which bishop and i assisted with mandolin and guitar, while cameron played the flute. for these occasions cameron donned his breeks and kilt, and danced the sword-dance round two table-knives crossed. the american songs strike him as being strange and incomprehensible. he cannot understand the negro dialect, and wonders if america is filled with negroes and cotton plantations; but he is always delighted with bishop's "down on the farm." [illustration: 0033] life begins at five o'clock in our court. the old gentleman beats his rugs, the milk-bottles rattle, the bread-carts rumble, madame gioté opens her milkstand, and the concierges drag the ash-cans out into the court, where a drove of rag-pickers fall upon them. these gleaners are a queer lot. individuals and families pursue the quest, each with a distinct purpose. one will seek nothing but bones, glass, and crockery; another sifts the ashes for coal; another takes only paper and rags; another old shoes and hats; and so on, from can to can, none interfering with any of the others. the dogs are the first at the bins. they are regularly organized in working squads, travelling in fours and fives. they are quite adept at digging through the refuse for food, and they rarely quarrel; and they never leave one bin for another until they have searched it thoroughly. the swish of water and a coarse brush broom announces the big, strong woman who sweeps the gutters of the rue st.-andré-des-arts. with broad sweeps of the broom she spreads the water over half the street and back into the gutter, making the worn yellow stones shine. she is coarsely clad and wears black sabots; and god knows how she can swear when the gleaners scatter the refuse into the gutter! the long wail of the fish-and-mussel woman, "_j'ai des beaux maquereaux, des moules, poissons à frire, à frire!_" as she pushes her cart, means seven o'clock. the day now really begins. water-pails are clanging and sabots are clicking on the stones. the wine people set up a rumble by cleaning their casks with chains and water. the anvils of the iron-workers are ringing, and there comes the tink-tink-tink of the little hammers in the embossed-picture factory. the lumbering garbage-cart arrives to bear away the ash-bins, the lead-horse shaking his head to ring the bell on his neck in announcement of the approach. street-venders and hawkers of various comestibles, each with his or her quaint musical cry, come in numbers. "_j'ai des beaux choux-fleurs! o, comme ils sont beaux!_" the fruitand potato-women come after, and then the chair-menders. these market-women are early risers. they are at the great halles centrales at four o'clock to bargain for their wares; and besides good lungs they have a marvellous shrewdness, born of long dealings with french housewives. always near eight may be heard, "_du mouron pour les petits oiseaux!_" and all the birds in the court, familiar with the cry, pipe up for their chickweed. "_voilà le bon fromage à la crème pour trois sous!_" cries a keen-faced little woman, her three-wheeled cart loaded with cream cheeses; and she gives a soup-plate full of them, with cream poured generously over, and as she pockets the money says, "_voilà! ce que c'est bon avec des confitures!_" cream cheeses and prayer! on sunday mornings during the spring and summer the goat's-milk vender, blowing a reed-pipe, invades the passage with his living milk-cans,--a flock of eight hairy goats that know the route as well as he, and they are always willing to be milked when a customer offers a bowl. the tripe-man with his wares and bell is the last of the food-sellers of the day. the window-glass repairer, "_vitrier!_" passes at nine, and then the beggars and strolling musicians and singers put in an appearance. in the afternoon the old-clo' man comes hobbling under his load of cast-off clothes, crying, "_marchand d'habits!_" of which you can catch only "'_chand d'habits!_" and the barrel-buyer, "marchand de tonneaux!" the most musical of them all is the porcelain-mender, who cries, "_voici le raccommodeur de porcelaines, faïence, cristal, poseur de robinets!_" and then plays a fragment of a hunting-song. [illustration: 0037] the beggars and musicians also have regular routes and fixed hours. cold and stormy days are welcomed by them, for then pity lends activity tosous. a piratical old beggar has his stand near the entrance to the court, where he kneels on the stones, his faithful mongrel dog beside him. he occasionally poses for the artists when times are dull, but he prefers begging,--it is easier and more remunerative. three times a week we are treated to some really good singing by a blind old man, evidently an artist in his day. when the familiar sound of his guitar is heard all noises in the passage cease, and all windows are opened to hear. he sings arias from the operas. his little old wife gathers up the sous that ring on the flags. sometimes a strolling troupe of two actors and three musicians makes its appearance, and invariably plays to a full house. there are droves of sham singers who do not sing at all, but give mournful howls and tell their woes to deaf windows. one of them, a tattered woman with two babies, refused to pose for bishop, although he offered her five francs for the afternoon. her babies never grow older or bigger as the years pass. we all know when anybody in the passage is going to take a bath. there are no bath-tubs in these old houses, but that difficulty is surmounted by a bathing establishment on the boulevard st.-michel. it sends around a cart bearing a tank of hot water and a zinc tub. the man who pulls the cart carries the tub to the room, and fills it by carrying up the water in buckets. then he remains below until the bath is finished, to regain his tub and collect a franc. since we have been here the court entrance has been once draped in mourning. at the head of the casket of old madame courtoise, who lived across the way, stood a stately crucifix, and candles burned, and there were mourners and yellow bead wreaths. a quiet sadness sat upon the court, and the people spoke in whispers only. and there have been two weddings,--one at the blanchisserie, where the master's daughter was married to a young mechanic from the iron shop. there were glorious times at the laundry that night, for the whole court was present. it was four in the morning when the party broke up, and then our shirts were two days late. thus ran the first months of the four years of our student life in paris; in its domestic aspects it was typical of all that followed. we soon became members of the american art association, and gradually made friends in charming french homes. then there was the strange bohemian life lying outside as well as within the students' pale, and into the spirit of it all we found our way. it is to the bohemian, not the social, life of paris that these papers are devoted--a life both picturesque and pathetic, filled with the oddest contrasts and incongruities, with much suffering but more content, and spectacular and fascinating in all its phases. no one can have seen and known paris without a study of this its living, struggling artistic side, so strange, so remote from the commonplace world surging and roaring unheeded about it. on new year's day we had an overwhelming number of callers. first came the concierge, who cleaned our door-knob and wished us a prosperous and bonne année. she got ten francs,--we did not know what was coming. the chic little blanchisseuse called next with our linen. that meant two francs. then came in succession two telegraph boys, the facteur, or postman, who presented us with a cheap calendar, and another postman, who delivers only second-class mail. they got a franc each. then the _marchand de charbon_'s boy called with a clean face and received fifty centimes, and everybody else with whom we had had dealings; and our offerings had a steadily diminishing value. we could well bear all this, however, in view of the great day, but a week old, when we had celebrated christmas. bishop prepared a dinner fit for a king, giving the greater part of his time for a week to preparations for the great event. besides a great many french dishes, we had turkey and goose, cooked for us at the rôtisserie near by, and soup, oysters, american pastries, and a big, blazing plum-pudding. we and our guests (there were eight in all) donned full dress for the occasion, and a bonne, hired for the evening, brought on the surprises one after another. but why should not it have been a glorious evening high up among the chimney-pots of old paris? for did we not drink to the loved ones in a distant land, and were not our guests the prettiest among the pretty toilers of our court? [illustration: 0042] the école des beaux-arts it is about the fifteenth of october, after the long summer vacation, that the doors of the great école des beaux-arts are thrown open. [illustration: 0043] the first week, called "_la semaine des nouveaux_," is devoted to the initiation and hazing of the new students, who come mostly from foreign countries and the french provinces. these festivities can never be forgotten--by the _nouveaux_. [illustration: 0044] bishop had condescendingly decided to become _un élève de gérôme_--with some misgivings, for bishop had developed ideas of a large and free american art, while gérôme was hard and academic. one day he gathered up some of his best drawings and studies (which he regarded as masterpieces) and, climbing to the impériale of a clichy 'bus, rode over to montmartre, where gérôme had his private studio. he was politely ushered in by a manservant, and conducted to the door of the master's studio through a hall and gallery filled with wonderful marble groups. gérôme himself opened the door, and bishop found himself in the great man's workshop. for a moment bishop stood dazed in the middle of the splendid room, with its great sculptures and paintings, some still unfinished, and a famous collection of barbaric arms and costumes. a beautiful model was posing upon a rug. but most impressive of all was the white-haired master, regarding him with a thoughtful and searching, but kindly, glance. bishop presently found a tongue with which to stammer out his mission,--he would be a pupil of the great gérôme. the old man smiled, and, bidding his model retire, inspected carefully the array of drawings that bishop spread at his feet,--gérôme must have evidence of some ability for the magic of his brain and touch to develop. "_sont pas mal, mon ami_," he said, after he had studied all the drawings; "_non, pas mal_." bishop's heart bounded,--his work was not bad! "_vous êtes américain?_" continued the master. "_c'est un pays que j'aimerais bien visiter si le temps ne me manquait pas_." thus he chatted on, putting bishop more and more at his ease. he talked of america and the promising future that she has for art; then he went into his little office, and, asking bishop's name, filled out the blank that made him a happy pupil of gérôme. he handed it to bishop with this parting-advice, spoken with great earnestness: "_il faut travailler, mon ami--travailler! pour arriver, travailler toujours, sérieusement, bien entendu!_" bishop was so proud and happy that he ran all the way up the six flights of stairs to our floor, burst into the studio, and executed a war-dance that would have shamed an apache, stepping into his paint-box and nearly destroying his sacred unknown. that night we had a glorious supper, with des escargots to start with. early on the fifteenth of october, with his head erect and hope filling his soul, bishop started for the beaux-arts, which was in the rue bonaparte, quite near. that night he returned wise and saddened. he had bought a new easel and two rush-bottomed tabourets, which every new student must provide, and, loaded with these, he made for the ecole. gathered at the big gates was a great crowd of models of all sorts, men, women, and children, fat, lean, and of all possible sizes. in the courtyard, behind the gates, was a mob of long-haired students, who had a year or more ago passed the initiatory ordeal and become ancients. their business now was to yell chaff at the arriving nouveaux. the concierge conducted bishop up-stairs to the administration, where he joined a long line of other nouveaux waiting for the opening of the office at ten o'clock. then he produced his papers and was enrolled as a student of the ecole. it is only in this government school of the four arts that the typical bohemian students of paris may be found, including the genuine type of french student, with his long hair, his whiskers, his latin quarter "plug" hat, his cape, blouse, wide corduroy trousers, sash, expansive necktie, and immense cane. the ecole preserves this type more effectually than the other schools, such as julian's and colarossi's, where most of the students are foreigners in conventional dress. among the others who entered gérôme's atelier at the same time that bishop did was a turk named haidor (fresh from the ottoman capital), a hungarian, a siamese, an american from the plains of nebraska, and five frenchmen from the provinces. they all tried to speak french and be agreeable as they entered the atelier together. at the door stood a gardien, whose principal business is to mark absentees and suppress riots. then they passed to the gentle mercies of the reception committee and the _massier_ within. the _massier_ is a student who manages the studio, models, and _masse_ money. this one, a large fellow with golden whiskers (size and strength are valuable elements of the massier's efficiency), demanded twenty-five francs from each of the new-comers,--this being the _masse_ money, to pay for fixtures, turpentine, soap, and clean towels, _et pour payer à boire_. the turk refused to pay, protesting that he had but thirty francs to last him the month; but menacing stools and sticks opened his purse; his punishment was to come later. after the money had been collected from all the nouveaux the entire atelier of over sixty students, dressed in working blouses and old coats, formed in line, and with deafening shouts of "_a boire! à boire!_" placed the _nouveaux_ in front to carry the class banner, and thus marched out into the _rue bonaparte_ to the _café des deux magots_, singing songs fit only for the studio. their singing, shouting, and ridiculous capers drew a great crowd. at the café they created consternation with their shouting and howling until the arrival of great bowls of "_grog américain_," cigarettes, and _gâteaux_. rousing cheers were given to a marriage-party across the place st.-germain. the turk was forced to do a turkish dance on a table and sing turkish songs, and to submit to merciless ridicule. the timid little siamese also had to do a turn, as did bishop and w------, the american from nebraska, who had been a cowboy at home. after yelling themselves hoarse and nearly wrecking the café, the students marched back in a disorderly mob to the ecole. then the real trouble began. the gardien having conveniently disappeared, the students closed and barricaded the door. "_a poil! à poil!_" they yelled, dancing frantically about the frightened nouveaux; "_à poil les sales nouveaux! à poil!_" they seized the turk and stripped him, despite his desperate resistance; then they tied his hands behind him and with paint and brushes decorated his body in the most fantastic designs that they could conceive. his oaths were frightful. he cursed them in the name of allah, and swore to have the blood of all frenchmen for desecrating the sacred person of a moslem. he called them dogs of infidels and christians. but all this was in turkish, and the students enjoyed it immensely. "_en broche!_" they yelled, after they had made him a spectacle with the brushes; "_en broche! il faut le mettre en broche!_" this was quickly done. they forced the turk to his haunches, bound his wrists in front of his upraised knees, thrust a long pole between his elbows and knees, and thus bore him round the atelier at the head of a singing procession. four times they went round; then they placed the helpless m. haidor on the model-stand for future reference. the bad french that the victim occasionally mixed with his tirade indicated the fearful damnation that he was doubtless dealing out in turkish. a circle was then formed about him, and a solemn silence fell upon the crowd. a frenchman named joncierge, head of the reception committee, stepped forth, and in slow and impressive speech announced that it was one of the requirements of the atelier gérôme to brand all nouveaux over the heart with the name of the atelier, and that the branding of the turk would now proceed. upon hearing this, m. haidor emitted a fearful howl. but he was turned to face the red-hot studio stove and watch the branding-iron slowly redden in the coals. during this interval the students sang the national song, and followed it with a funeral march. behind the turk's back a second poker was being painted to resemble a red-hot one. the hot poker was taken from the fire, and its usefulness tested by burning a string with it. haidor grew deathly pale. an intense silence sat upon the atelier as the iron was brought near the helpless young man. in a moment, with wonderful cleverness, the painted poker was substituted for the hot one and placed quickly against his breast. when the cold iron touched him he roared like a maddened bull, and rolled quivering and moaning upon the floor. the students were frantic with delight. it was some time before haidor could realize that he was not burned to a crisp. he was then taken across the atelier and hoisted to a narrow shelf fifteen feet from the floor, where he was left to compose himself and enjoy the tortures of the other nouveaux. he dared not move, however, lest he fall; and because he refused to take anything in goodnature, but glared hatred and vengeance down at them, they pelted him at intervals with water-soaked sponges. the hungarian and one of the french nouveaux were next seized and stripped. then they were ordered to fight a duel, in this fashion: they were made to mount two stools about four feet apart. the hungarian was handed a long paint-brush dripping with prussian blue, and the frenchman a similar brush soaked with crimson lake. then the battle began. each hesitated to splash the other at first, but as they warmed to their work under the shouting of the committee they went in with a will. when the frenchman had received a broad splash on the mouth in return for a chest decoration of his adversary, his blood rose, and then the serious work began. [illustration: 0051] both quickly lost their temper. when they were unwillingly made to desist the product of their labors was startling, though not beautiful. then they were rubbed down vigorously with turpentine and soiled towels, and were given a franc each for a bath, because they had behaved so handsomely. bishop came next. he had made up his mind to stand the initiation philosophically, whatever it might be, but when he was ordered to strip he became apprehensive and then angry. nothing so delights the students as for a _nouveau_ to lose his temper. bishop squared off to face the whole atelier, and looked ugly. the students silently deployed on three sides, and with a yell rushed in, but not before three of them had gone down under his fists did they pin him to the floor and strip him. while bishop was thus being prepared, the nebraskan was being dealt with. he had the wisdom not to lose his temper, and that made his resistance all the more formidable. laughing all the time, he nevertheless dodged, tripped, wrestled, threw stools, and did so many other astonishing and baffling things that the students, though able to have conquered him in the end, were glad to make terms with him. in this arrangement he compelled them to include bishop. as a result, those two mounted the model throne naked, and sang together and danced a jig, all so cleverly that the frenchmen were frantic with delight, and welcomed them as _des bons amis_. the amazing readiness and capability of the american fist bring endless delight and perennial surprise to the french. [illustration: 0053] the rest of the nouveaux were variously treated. some, after being stripped, were grotesquely decorated with designs and pictures not suitable for general inspection. others were made to sing, to recite, or to act scenes from familiar plays, or, in default of that, to improvise scenes, some of which were exceedingly funny. others, attached to a rope depending from the ceiling, were swung at a perilous rate across the atelier, dodging easels in their flight. at half-past twelve the sport was over. the barricade was removed, the turk's clothes hidden, the turk left howling on his shelf, and the atelier abandoned. the next morning there was trouble. the director was furious, and threatened to close the atelier for a month, because the turk had not been discovered until five o'clock, when his hoarse howls attracted the attention of the gardien of the fires. his trousers and one shoe could not be found. it was three months before haidor appeared at the atelier again, and then everything had been forgotten. bishop was made miserable during the ensuing week. he would find himself roasting over paper fires kindled under his stool. paint was smeared upon his easel to stain his hands. his painting was altered and entirely re-designed in his absence. strong-smelling cheeses were placed in the lining of his "plug" hat. his stool-legs were so loosened that when he sat down he struck the floor with a crash. his painting-blouse was richly decorated inside and out with shocking coats of arms that would not wash out. one day he discovered that he had been painting for a whole hour with currant jelly from a tube that he thought contained laque. then, being a _nouveau_, he could never get a good position in which to draw from the model. every monday morning a new model is posed for the week, and the students select places according to the length of time they have been attending. the nouveaux have to take what is left. and they must be servants to the ancients,--run out for tobacco, get soap and clean towels, clean paint-brushes, and keep the studio in order. with the sculptors and architects it is worse. the sculptors must sweep the dirty, clay-grimed floor regularly, fetch clean water, mix the clay and keep it fresh and moist, and on saturdays, when the week's work is finished, must break up the forty or more clay figures, and restore them to clay for next week's operations. the architects must build heavy wooden frames, mount the projects and drawings, and cart them about paris to the different exhibition rooms. at the end of a year the _nouveau_ drops his hated title and becomes a proud ancient, to bully to his heart's content, as those before him. mondays and wednesdays are criticism days, for then m. gérôme comes down and goes over the work of his pupils. he is very early and punctual, never arriving later than half-past eight, usually before half the students are awake. the moment he enters all noises cease, and all seem desperately hard at work, although a moment before the place may have been in an uproar. gérôme plumps down upon the man nearest to him, and then visits each of his _élèves_, storming and scolding mercilessly when his pupils have failed to follow his instructions. as soon as a student's criticism is finished he rises and follows the master to hear the other criticisms, so that toward the close the procession is large. [illustration: 0057] bishop's first criticism took him all aback. "_comment!_" gasped the master, gazing at the canvas in horror. "_qu'est-ce que vous avez fait?_" he sternly demanded, glaring at the luckless student, who, in order to cultivate a striking individuality, was painting the model in broad, thick dashes of color. gérôme glanced at bishop's palette, and saw a complete absence of black upon it. "_comment, vous n'avez pas de noir?_" he roared. "_c'est très important, la partie matérielle! vous ne m'écoutez pas, mon ami,---je parle dans le désert! vous n'avez pas d'aspect général, mon ami,_" and much more, while bishop sat cold to the marrow. the students, crowded about, enjoyed his discomfiture immensely, and, behind gérôme's back, laughed in their sleeves and made faces at bishop. but many others suffered, and bishop had his inning with them. all during gérôme's tour of inspection the model must maintain his pose, however difficult and exhausting. often he is kept on a fearful strain for two hours. after the criticism the boys show gérôme sketches and studies that they have made outside the ecole, and it is in discussing them that his geniality and kindliness appear. gérôme imperiously demands two things,--that his pupils, before starting to paint, lay on a red or yellow tone, and that they keep their brushes scrupulously clean. woe to him who disobeys! after he leaves with a cheery "_bon jour, messieurs!_" pandemonium breaks loose, if the day be saturday. easels, stools, and studies are mowed down as by a whirlwind, yells shake the building, the model is released, a tattoo is beaten on the sheet-iron stove-guard, everything else capable of making a noise is brought into service, and either the model is made to do the _danse du ventre_ or a _nouveau_ is hazed. the models--what stories are there! every monday morning from ten to twenty present themselves, male and female, for inspection in _puris naturalibus_ before the critical gaze of the students of the different ateliers. one after another they mount the throne and assume such academic poses of their own choosing as they imagine will display their points to the best advantage. the students then vote upon them, for and against, by raising the hand. the massier, standing beside the model, announces the result, and, if the vote is favorable, enrols the model for a certain week to come. there is intense rivalry among the models. strange to say, most of the male models in the schools of paris are from italy, the southern part especially. as a rule, they have very good figures. they begin posing at the age of five or six, and follow the business until old age retires them. crowds of them are at the gates of the beaux-arts early on monday mornings. in the voting, a child may be preferred to his seniors, and yet the rate of payment is the same,--thirty francs a week. [illustration: 0061] many of the older models are quite proud of their profession, spending idle hours in studying the attitudes of figures in great paintings and in sculptures in the louvre or the luxembourg, and adopting these poses when exhibiting themselves to artists; but the trick is worthless. few of the women models remain long in the profession. posing is hard and fatiguing work, and the students are merciless in their criticisms of any defects of figure that the models may have,--the french are born critics. during the many years that i have studied and worked in paris i have seen scores of models begin their profession with a serious determination to make it their life-work. [illustration: 9062] they would appear regularly at the different ateliers for about two years, and would be gratified to observe endless reproductions of their graces in the prize rows on the studio walls. then their appearance would be less and less regular, and they would finally disappear altogether--whither? some become contented companions of students and artists, but the cafés along the _boul' mich'_, the cabarets of montmartre, and the dance-halls of the moulin rouge and the bal bullier have their own story to tell. some are happily married; for instance, one, noted for her beauty of face and figure, is the wife of a new york millionaire. but she was clever as well as beautiful, and few models are that. most of them are ordinaire, living the easy life of bohemian paris, and having little knowledge of _le monde propre._ but, oh, how they all love dress! and therein lies most of the story. when marcelle or hélène appears, all of a sudden, radiant in silks and creamy lace petticoats, and sweeps proudly into the crowded studios, flushed and happy, and hears the dear compliments that the students heap upon her, we know that thirty francs a week could not have changed the gray grub into a gorgeous butterfly. "_c'est mon amant qui m'a fait cadeau,_" marcelle will explain, deeming some explanation necessary. there is none to dispute you, marcelle. this vast whirlpool has seized many another like you, and will seize many another more. and to poor marcelle it seems so small a price to pay to become one of the grand ladies of paris, with their dazzling jewels and rich clothes! an odd whim may overtake one here and there. one young demoiselle, beautiful as a girl and successful as a model a year ago, may now be seen nightly at the _cabaret du soleil d'or_, frowsy and languishing, in keeping with the spirit of her confrères there, singing her famous "_le petit caporal_" to thunderous applause, and happy with the love, squalor, dirt, and hunger that she finds with the luckless poet whose fortunes she shares. it was not a matter of clothes with her. it is a short and easy step from the studio to the _café_. at the studio it is all little money, hard posing, dulness, and poor clothes; at the _cafés_ are the brilliant lights, showy clothes, tinkling money, clinking glasses, popping corks, unrestrained abandon, and midnight suppers. and the studios and the _cafés_ are but adjoining apartments, one may say, in the great house of bohemia. the studio is the introduction to the _café_; the _café_ is the burst of sunshine after the dreariness of the studio; and marcelle determines that for once she will bask in the warmth and glow.... ah, what a jolly night it was, and a louis d'or in her purse besides! marcelle's face was pretty--and new. she is late at the studio next morning, and is sleepy and cross. the students grumble. the room is stifling, and its gray walls seem ready to crush her. it is so tiresome, so stupid--and only thirty francs a week! bah!... marcelle appears no more. all the great painters have their exclusive model or models, paying them a permanent salary. these favored ones move in a special circle, into which the ordinaire may not enter, unless she becomes the favorite of some grand homme. they are never seen at the academies, and rarely or never pose in the schools, unless it was there they began their career. perhaps the most famous of the models of paris was sarah brown, whose wild and exciting life has been the talk of the world. her beautiful figure and glorious golden hair opened to her the whole field of modeldom. offers for her services as model were more numerous than she could accept, and the prices that she received were very high. she was the mistress of one great painter after another, and she lived and reigned like a queen. impulsive, headstrong, passionate, she would do the most reckless things. she would desert an artist in the middle of his masterpiece and come down to the studio to pose for the students at thirty francs a week. gorgeously apparelled, she would glide into a studio, overturn all the easels that she could reach, and then shriek with laughter over the havoc and consternation that she had created. the students would greet her with shouts and form a circle about her, while she would banteringly call them her friends. then she would jump upon the throne, dispossess the model there, and give a dance or make a speech, knocking off every hat that her parasol could reach. but no one could resist sarah. she came up to the _atelier gérôme_ one morning and demanded une semaine de femme. the _massier_ booked her for the following week. she arrived promptly on time and was posed. wednesday a whim seized her to wear her plumed hat and silk stockings. "_c'est beaucoup plus chic_," she naively explained. when gérôme entered the studio and saw her posing thus she smiled saucily at him, but he turned in a rage and left the studio without a word. thursday she tired of the pose and took one to please herself, donning a skirt. of course protests were useless, so the students had to recommence their work. the remainder of the week she sat upon the throne in full costume, refusing to pose. she amused herself with smoking cigarettes and keeping the _nouveaux_ running errands for her. it was she who was the cause of the students' riot in 1893,--a riot that came near ending in a revolution. it was all because she appeared at le bal des quat'z' arts in a costume altogether too simple and natural to suit the prefect of police, who punished her. she was always at the salon on receiving-day, and shocked the occupants of the liveried carriages on the champs-elysées with her dancing. in fact, she was always at the head of everything extraordinary and sensational among the bohemians of paris. but she aged rapidly under her wild life. her figure lost its grace, her lovers deserted her, and after her dethronement as queen of bohemia, broken-hearted and poor, she put an end to her wretched life,--and paris laughed. the breaking in of a new girl model is a joy that the students never permit themselves to miss. among the many demoiselles who come every monday morning are usually one or two that are new. the new one is accompanied by two or more of her girl friends, who give her encouragement at the terrible moment when she disrobes. as there are no dressing-rooms, there can be no privacy. the students gather about and watch the proceedings with great interest, and make whatever remarks their deviltry can suggest. this is the supreme test; all the efforts of the attendant girls are required to hold the new one to her purpose. when finally, after an inconceivable struggle with her shame, the girl plunges ahead in reckless haste to finish the job, the students applaud her roundly. [illustration: 0067] but more torture awaits her. frightened, trembling, blushing furiously, she ascends the throne, and innocently assumes the most awkward and ridiculous poses, forgetting in that terrible moment the poses that she had learned so well under the tutelage of her friends. it is then that the fiendishness of the students rises to its greatest height. dazed and numb, she hardly comprehends the ordeal through which she is now put. the students have adopted a grave and serious bearing, and solemnly ask her to assume the most outlandish and ungraceful poses. then come long and mock-earnest arguments about her figure, these arguments having been carefully learned and rehearsed beforehand. one claims that her waist is too long and her legs too heavy; another hotly takes the opposite view. then they put her through the most absurd evolutions to prove their points. at last she is made to don her hat and stockings; and the students form a ring about her and dance and shout until she is ready to faint. of course the studio has a ringleader in all this deviltry,--all studios have. joncierge is head of all the mischief in our atelier. there is no end to his ingenuity in devising new means of torture and fun. his personations are marvellous. when he imitates bernhardt, réjane, or calvé, no work can be done in the studio. gérôme himself is one of his favorite victims. but joncierge cannot remain long in one school; the authorities pass him on as soon as they find that he is really hindering the work of the students. one day, at julian's, he took the class skeleton, and with a cord let the rattling, quivering thing down into the rue du dragon, and frightened the passers out of their wits. as his father is chef d'orchestre at the grand opéra, joncierge junior learns all the operas and convulses us with imitations of the singers. [illustration: 9070] another character in the studio is le jeune siffert, only twenty-three, and one of the cleverest of the coming french painters. recently he nearly won the prix de rome. his specialty is the imitation of the cries of domestic fowls and animals, and of street venders. gérôme calls him "mon fils," and constantly implores him to be serious. i don't see why. then there is fiola, a young giant from brittany, with a wonderful facility at drawing. he will suddenly break into a roar, and for an hour sing one verse of a brittany chant, driving the other students mad. fournier is a little curly-headed fellow from the south, near valence, and wears corduroy trousers tucked into top-boots. his greatest delight is in plaguing the nouveaux. his favorite joke, if the day is dark, is to send a nouveau to the different ateliers of the ecole in search of "le grand réflecteur." the nouveau, thinking that it is a device for increasing the light, starts out bravely, and presently returns with a large, heavy box, which, upon its being opened, is found to be filled with bricks. then fournier is happy. taton is the butt of the atelier. he is an ingénu, and falls into any trap set for him. whenever anything is missing, all pounce upon taton, and he is very unhappy. haidor, the turk, suspicious and sullen, also is a butt. caricatures of him abundantly adorn the walls, together with the turkish crescent, and turkish ladies executing the _danse du ventre_. caricatures of all kinds cover the walls of the atelier, and some are magnificent, being spared the vandalism that spares nothing else. one, especially good, represents kenyon cox, who studied here. w------, the student from nebraska, created a sensation by appearing one day in the full regalia of a cowboy, including two immense revolvers, a knife, and a lariat depending from his belt. with the lariat he astonished and dismayed the dodging frenchmen by lassoing them at will, though they exercised their greatest running and dodging agility to escape. they wanted to know if all americans went about thus heeled in america. there is something uncanny about the little siamese. he is exceedingly quiet and works unceasingly. one day, when the common spirit of mischief was unusually strong among the boys, the bolder ones began to hint at fun in the direction of the siamese. he quietly shifted a pair of brass knuckles from some pocket to a more convenient one, and although it was done so unostentatiously, the act was observed. he was not disturbed, and has been left strictly alone ever since. one day the italian students took the whole atelier down to a little restaurant on the quai des grands-augustins and cooked them an excellent italian dinner, with chianti to wash it down. two italian street-singers furnished the music, and mademoiselle la modèle danced as only a model can. [illustration: 0072] taking pictures to the salon ever since new year's, when bishop began his great composition for the salon, our life at the studio had been sadly disarranged; for bishop had so completely buried himself in his work that i was compelled to combine the functions of cook with those of chambermaid. [illustration: 9073] this double work, with increasing pressure from my modelling, required longer hours at night and shorter hours in the morning. but i was satisfied, for this was to be bishop's masterpiece, and i knew from the marvellous labor and spirit that he put into the work that something good would result. the name of his great effort was "the suicide." it was like him to choose so grisly a subject, for he had a lawless nature and rebelled against the commonplace. ghastly subjects had always fascinated him. from the very beginning of our domestic partnership he had shown a taste for grim and forbidding things. often, upon returning home, i had found him making sketches of armless beggars, twisted cripples, and hunchbacks, and, worse than all, disease-marked vagabonds. a skull-faced mortal in the last stages of consumption was a joy to him. it was useless for me to protest that he was failing to find the best in him by developing his unwholesome tastes. "wait," he would answer patiently; "the thing that has suffering and character, that is out of the ordinary, it is the thing that will strike and live." the suicide was a young woman gowned in black; she was poised in the act of plunging into the seine; a babe was tightly clutched to her breast; and behind the unspeakable anguish in her eyes was a hungry hope, a veiled assurance of the peace to come. it fascinated and haunted me beyond all expression. it was infinitely sad, tragic, and terrible, for it reached with a sure touch to the very lowest depth of human agony. the scene was the dead of night, and only the dark towers of notre-dame broke the even blackness of the sky, save for a faint glow that touched the lower stretches from the distant lamps of the city. in the darkness only the face of the suicide was illuminated, and that but dimly, though sufficiently to disclose the wonderfully complex emotions that crowded upon her soul. this illumination came from three ghastly green lights on the water below. the whole tone of the picture was a black, sombre green. that was all after the painting had been finished. the making of it is a story by itself. from the first week in january to the first week in march the studio was a junk-shop of the most uncanny sort. in order to pose his model in the act of plunging into the river, bishop had rigged up a tackle, which, depending from the ceiling, caught the model at the waist, after the manner of a fire-escape belt, and thus half suspended her. he secured his green tone and night effect by covering nearly all the skylight and the window with green tissue-paper, besides covering the floor and walls with green rugs and draperies. the model behaved very well in her unusual pose, but the babe--that was the rub. the model did not happen to possess one, and bishop had not yet learned the difficulties attending the procuring and posing of infants. in the first place, he found scores of babes, but not a mother, however poor, willing to permit her babe to be used as a model, and a model for so gruesome a situation. but after he had almost begun to despair, and had well advanced with his woman model, an italian woman came one day and informed him that she could get an infant from a friend of her sister's, if he would pay her one franc a day for the use of it. bishop eagerly made the bargain. then a new series of troubles began. the babe objected most emphatically to the arrangement. it refused to nestle in the arms of a strange woman about to plunge into eternity, and the strange woman had no knack at all in soothing the infant's outraged feelings. besides, the model was unable to meet the youngster's frequent demands for what it was accustomed to have, and the mother, who was engaged elsewhere, had to be drummed up at exasperatingly frequent intervals. all this told upon both bishop and francinette, the model, and they took turns in swearing at the unruly brat, bishop in english and francinette in french. neither knew how to swear in italian, or things might have been different. i happened in upon these scenes once in a while, and my enjoyment so exasperated bishop that he threw painttubes, bottles, and everything else at me that he could reach, and once or twice locked me out of the studio, compelling me to kick my shins in the cold street for hours at a time. on such occasions i would stand in the court looking up at our window, expecting momentarily that the babe would come flying down from that direction. when bishop was not sketching and painting he was working up his inspiration; and that was worst of all. his great effort was to get himself into a suicidal mood. he would sit for hours on the floor, his face between his knees, imagining all sorts of wrongs and slights that the heartless world had put upon him. his husband had beaten him and gone off with another woman; he had tried with all his woman-heart to bear the cross; hunger came to pinch and torture him; he sought work, failed to find it; sought charity, failed to find that; his babe clutched at his empty breasts and cried piteously for food; his heart broken, all hope gone, even god forgetting him, he thought of the dark, silent river, the great cold river, that has brought everlasting peace to countless thousands of suffering young mothers like him; he went to the river; he looked back upon the faint glow of the city's lights in the distance; he cast his glance up to the grim towers of notre-dame, standing cold and pitiless against the blacker sky; he looked down upon the black seine, the great writhing python, so willing to swallow him up; he clutched his babe to his breast, gasped a prayer.... at other times he would haunt the morgue and study the faces of those who had died by felo-de-se; he would visit the hospitals and study the dying; he would watch the actions and read the disordered thoughts of lunatics; he would steal along the banks; of the river on dark nights and study the silent mystery and tragedy of it, and the lights that gave shape to its terrors. in the end i grew afraid of him. but all things have an end. bishop's great work was finished in the first days of march. slowly, but surely, his native exuberance of spirits returned. he would eat and sleep like a rational being. his eyes lost their haunted look, and his cheeks filled out and again took on their healthy hue. and then he invited his friends and some critics to inspect his composition, and gave a great supper in celebration of the completion of his task. very generous praise was given him. among the critics and masters came gérôme and laurens at his earnest supplication, and it was good to see their delight and surprise, and to note that they had no fault to find,--was not the picture finished, and would not criticism from them at this juncture have hurt the boy without accomplishing any good? well, the painting secured honorable mention in the exhibition, and five years later the french government completed the artist's happiness by buying one of his pictures for the luxembourg gallery. but about the picture: the canvas was eight by ten feet, and a frame had to be procured for it. now, frames are expensive, and bishop had impoverished himself for material and model hire. so he employed a carpenter in the court to make a frame of thick pine boards, which we painted a deep black, with a gold cornice. the whole cost was twentyfive francs. next day we hired a good-sized _voiture-à-bras_ at eight sous an hour, and proceeded to get the tableau down to the court. it was a devilish job, for the ceilings were low and the stairs narrow and crooked. the old gentleman below us was nearly decapitated by poking his head out of his door at an inopportune moment, and the lady below him almost wiped the still wet babe from the canvas with her gown as she tried to squeeze past. the entire court turned out to wish bishop good success. the last day on which pictures are admitted to the salon, there to await the merciless decision of the judges, is a memorable one. in sumptuous studios, in wretched garrets; amid affluence, amid scenes of squalor and hunger, artists of all kinds and degrees have been squeezing thousands of tubes and daubing thousands of canvases in preparation for the great day. from every corner of paris, from every quarter of france and europe, the canvases come pouring into the salon. every conceivable idea, fad, and folly is represented in the collection, and most of them are poor; but in each and every one a fond hope centres, an ambition is staked. strange as it may seem, most of these pictures are worked upon until the very last day; indeed, many of them are snatched unfinished from their easels, to receive the finishing touches in the dust and confusion and deafening noise of the great hall where they are all dumped like so much merchandise. we saw one artist who, not having finished his picture, was putting on the final touches as it was borne ahead of him along the street on the back of a commissionnaire. [illustration: 0079] and all this accounts for the endless smearing everywhere noticeable, and for the frantic endeavors of the artists to repair the damage at the last moment. one great obstacle to poor artists is the rigid rule requiring that all tableaux shall be framed. these frames are costly. as a result, some artists paint pictures of the same size year after year, so that the same frame may be used for all, and others resort to such makeshifts as bishop was compelled to employ. but these makeshifts must be artistically done, or the canvases are ignored by the judges. these efforts give rise to many startling effects. it was not very long, after an easy pull over the boulevard st.-germain, before we crossed the seine at the pont de la concorde, traversed the place de la concorde, and turned into the champs-elysées, where, not far away, loomed the palais des beaux-arts, in which the salon is annually held in march. the avenue des champs-elysées, crowded as it usually is in the afternoons, was now jammed with cabs, omnibuses, hand-carts, and all sorts of moving vans, mingling with the fashionable carriages on their way to the bois. the proletarian vehicles contained art,--art by the ton. the upper decks of the omnibuses were crowded with artists carrying their pictures because they could not afford more than the three-sous fare. and such an assortment of artists! there were some in affluent circumstances, who rolled along voluptuously in cabs on an expenditure of thirty-five francs, holding their precious tableaux and luxuriantly smoking cigarettes. [illustration: 0081] the commissionnaires had a great day of it. they are the ones usually seen asleep on the street corners, where, when awake, they varnish boots or bear loads by means of a contrivance on their backs. on this day every one of them in paris was loaded down with pictures. many were the hard-up students, like bishop, tugging hand-carts, or pairing to carry by hand pictures too large to be borne by a single person. and great fun they got out of it all. opposite the palais de glace was a perfect sea of vehicles, artists, porters, and policemen, all inextricably tangled up, all shouting or groaning, and wet pictures suffering. one artist nearly had a fit when he saw a full moon wiped off his beautiful landscape, and he would have killed the guilty porter had not the students interfered. portraits of handsome ladies with smudged noses and smeared eyes were common. expensive gold frames lost large sections of their corners. but still they were pouring in. with infinite patience and skill bishop gradually worked his _voiture-àbras_ through the maze, and soon his masterpiece was in the crushing mass at the wide entrance to the salon. there it was seized and rushed along, and bishop received in return a slip of paper bearing a number. while within the building we reconnoitred. amid the confusion of howling inspectors, straining porters bearing heavy pictures, carpenters erecting partitions, and a dust-laden atmosphere, numerous artists were working with furious haste upon their unfinished productions. some were perched upon ladders, others squatted upon the floor, and one had his model posing nude to the waist; she was indifferent to the attention that she received. thoughtful mistresses stood affectionately beside their artist amants, furnishing them with delicate edibles and lighting cigarettes for them. some of the pictures were so large that they were brought in rolled up. one artist had made himself into a carpenter to mount his mammoth picture. frightful and impossible paintings were numerous, but the painter of each expected a _première médaille d'honneur_. it was nearing six o'clock, the closing hour. chic demoiselle artistes came dashing up in cabs, bringing with them, to insure safe delivery, their everlasting still-life subjects. shortly before six the work in the building was suspended by a commotion outside. it was a contingent of students from the beaux-arts marching up the champs-elysées, yelling and dancing like maniacs and shaking their heavy sticks, the irresistible sarah brown leading as drum-maior. she was gorgeously arrayed in the most costly silks and laces, and looked a dashing amazon. then, as always, she was perfectly happy with her beloved _étudiants_, who worshipped her as a goddess. she halted them in front of the building, where they formed a circle round her, and there, as director of ceremonies, she required them to sing chansons, dance, make comic speeches, and "blaguer" the arriving artists. the last van was unloaded; the great doors closed with a bang, and the stirring day was ended. all the students, even the porters, then joined hands and went singing, howling, and skipping down the champs-elysées, and wishing one another success at the coming exhibition. at the place de la concorde we met a wild-eyed artist running frantically toward the salon with his belated picture. the howls of encouragement that greeted him lent swifter wings to his legs. the pictures finally installed, a jury composed of france's greatest masters pass upon them. the endless procession of paintings is passed before them; the raising of their hands means approval, silence means condemnation; and upon those simple acts depends the happiness or despair of thousands. but depression does not long persist, and the judgment is generally accepted in the end as just and valuable. for the students, in great part, flock to the country on sketching tours, for which arrangements had been already made; and there the most deeply depressed spirits must revive and the habit of work and hope come into play. year after year the same artists strive for recognition at the salon; and finally, when they fail at that, they reflect that there is a great world outside of the salon, where conscientious effort is acceptable. and, after all, a medal at the salon is not the only reward that life has to offer. and then, it is not always good for a student to be successful from the start. just as his social environment in paris tries his strength and determines the presence or absence of qualities that are as useful to a successful career as special artistic qualifications, so the trial by fire in the salon exhibitions hardens and toughens him for the serious work of his life ahead. too early success has ruined more artists than it has helped. it is interesting also to observe that, as a rule, the students who eventually secure the highest places in art are those whose difficulties have been greatest. the lad with the pluck to live on a crust in a garret, and work and study under conditions of poverty and self-denial that would break any but the stoutest heart, is the one from whom to expect renown in the years to come. ah, old paris is the harshest but wisest of mothers! "_h! ah! vive les quat'z' arts! au molin rouge--en route!_" the lamplit streets of paris as cab after cab and bus after 'bus went thundering across town toward montmartre, heavily freighted with brilliantly costumed revellers of les quat'z' arts. parisians ran from their dinnertables to the windows and balconies, blasé boulevardiers paused in their evening stroll or looked up from their papers at the _café_-tables, waiters and swearing cabbies and yelling newsboys stopped in the midst of their various duties, and all knowingly shook their heads, "_ah, ce sont les quat'z' arts!_"? for to-night was the great annual ball of the artists, when all artistic paris crawls from its mysterious depths to revel in a splendid carnival possible only to the arts. every spring, after the pictures have been sent to the salon, and before the students have scattered for the summer vacation, the artists of paris and the members of all the ateliers of the four arts--painting, sculpture, architecture, and engraving--combine their forces in producing a spectacle of regal splendor, seen nowhere else in the world; and long are the weeks and hard the work and vast the ingenuity devoted to preparations,--the designing of costumes and the building of gorgeous floats. during the last three weeks the _élèves_ of the _atelier gérôme_ abandoned their studies, forgot all about the concours and the prix de rome, and devoted all their energies to the construction of a colossal figure of gérôme's great war goddess, "bel-lona." it was a huge task, but the students worked it out with a will. yards of sackcloth, rags, old coats, paint rags, besides pine timbers, broken easels and stools, endless wire and rope, went into the making of the goddess's frame, and this was covered with plaster of paris dexterously moulded into shape. then it was properly tinted and painted and mounted on a chariot of gold. a grecian frieze of galloping horses, mounted, the clever work of siffert, was emblazoned on the sides of the chariot. and what a wreck the atelier was after all was finished! _sacré nom d'un chien!_ how the gardiens must have sworn when cleaning-day came round! the ateliers in the ecole are all rivals, and each had been secretly preparing its coup with which to capture the grand prix at the bal. the great day came at last. the students of our atelier were perfectly satisfied with their handiwork, and the massier made all happy by ordering a retreat to the café des deux magots, where success to the goddess was drunk in steaming "grog américain." then bellona began her perilous journey across paris to montmartre and the moulin rouge. [illustration: 0087] this was not an easy task, as she was fifteen feet high; signs and lampposts suffered, and sleepy cab-horses danced as their terrified gaze beheld the giant goddess with her uplifted sword. crowds watched the progress of bellona on the avenue de l'opéra, drawn by half a hundred students yelling the national hymn. the pull up the steep slope of montmartre was heavy, but in less than two hours from the start at the ecole the goddess was safely housed in the depths of the moulin rouge, there to await her triumphs of the night. bishop, besides doing his share in the preparation of the figure, had the equally serious task of devising a costume for his own use at the ball. it was not until the very last day that he made his final decision,--to go as a roman orator. our supply of linen was meagre, but our only two clean bed-sheets and a few towels were sufficient, and two kind american ladies who were studying music and who lived near the old church of st. sulpice did the fitting of a toga. the soles of a pair of slippers from which bishop cut the tops served as sandals, and some studio properties in the way of oriental bracelets completed his costume. i was transformed into an apache indian by a generous rubbing into my skin of burnt sienna and cadmium, which i was weeks in getting rid of; a blanket and some chicken-feathers finished my array. our friend cameron, next door, went in his scotch kilts. after supper we entered the boul' mich' and proceeded to the café de la source, where the students of the _atelier gérôme_ were to rendezvous. [illustration: 0090] the boul' was a spectacle that night. time had rolled back the curtain of centuries; ancient cemeteries had yielded up their dead; and living ghosts of the ages packed all the gay _café_s. history from the time of adam had sent forth its traditions, and eves rubbed elbows with balletgirls. there was never a jollier night in the history of the quartier latin. we found the café de la source already crowded by the gérôme contingent and their models and mistresses, all en costume and bubbling with merriment and mischief. it was ten o'clock before all the students had arrived. then we formed in procession, and yelled and danced past all the _café_s on the boul' mich' to the luxembourg palace and the théâtre de l'odéon, to take the 'buses of the montmartre line. these we quickly seized and overloaded in violation of the law, and then, dashing down the quiet streets of the rive gauche, headed for montmartre, making a noise to rouse the dead. as we neared the place blanche we found the little streets merging from different quarters crowded with people in costume, some walking and others crowding almost innumerable vehicles, and the balconies and portes-cochères packed with spectators. the place blanche fronts the moulin rouge, and it was crowded and brilliantly lighted. the façade of the moulin rouge was a blaze of electric lights and colored lanterns, and the revolving wings of the mill flamed across the sky. it was a perfect night. the stars shone, the air was warm and pleasant, and the trees were tipped with the glistening clean foliage of early spring. the bright _café_s fronting the place were crowded with gay revellers. the poets of bohemia were there, and gayly attired cocottes assisted them in their fun at the _café_ tables, extending far out into the boulevard under the trees. at one corner was gérôme's private studio, high up in the top of the house, and standing on the balcony was gérôme himself, enjoying the brilliant scene below. as the bal des quat'z' arts is not open to the public, and as none but accredited members of the four arts are admitted, the greatest precautions are taken to prevent the intrusion of outsiders; and wonderful is the ingenuity exercised to outwit the authorities. inside the vestibule of the moulin was erected a tribune (a long bar), behind which sat the massiers of the different studios of paris, all in striking costumes. it was their task not only to identify the holders of tickets, but also to pass on the suitability of the costumes of such as were otherwise eligible to admittance. the costumes must all have conspicuous merit and be thoroughly artistic. nothing black, no dominos, none in civilian dress, may pass. many and loud were the protestations that rang through the vestibule as one after another was turned back and firmly conducted to the door. once past the implacable tribunes, we entered a dazzling fairy-land, a dream of rich color and reckless abandon. from gorgeous kings and queens to wild savages, all were there; courtiers in silk, naked gladiators, nymphs with paint for clothing,--all were there; and the air was heavy with the perfume of roses. shouts, laughter, the silvery clinking of glasses, a whirling mass of life and color, a bewildering kaleidoscope, a maze of tangled visions in the soft yellow haze that filled the vast hall. there was no thought of the hardness and sordidness of life, no dream of the morrow. it was a wonderful witchery that sat upon every soul there. this splendid picture was framed by a wall of lodges, each sumptuously decorated and hung with banners, tableaux, and greens, each representing a particular atelier and adorned in harmony with the dominant ideals of their masters. the lodge of the _atelier gérôme_ was arranged to represent a grecian temple; all the decorations and accessories were pure grecian, cleverly imitated by the master's devoted pupils. that of the atelier cormon repre sented a huge caravan of the prehistoric bigmuscled men that appeal so strongly to cormon; large skeletons of extinct animals, giant ferns, skins, and stone implements were scattered about, while the students of cormon's atelier, almost naked, with bushy hair and clothed in skins, completed the picture. and so it was with all the lodges, each typifying a special subject, and carrying it out with perfect fidelity to the minutest detail. the event of the evening was the grand cortège; this, scheduled for one o'clock, was awaited with eager expectancy, for with it would come the test of supremacy,--the awarding of the prize for the best. for this was the great art centre of the world, and this night was the one in which its rivalries would strain the farthest reach of skill. meanwhile, the great hall swarmed with life and blazed with color and echoed with the din of merry voices. friends recognized one another with great difficulty. and there was gérôme himself at last, gaudily gowned in the rich green costume of a chinese mandarin, his white moustache dyed black, and his white locks hidden beneath a black skull-cap topped with a bobbing appendage. and there also was jean paul laurens, in the costume of a norman, the younger laurens as charlemagne. léandre, the caricaturist, was irresistible as a caricature of queen victoria. puech, the sculptor, made a graceful courtier of the marie antoinette régime. willett was a roman emperor. will dodge was loaded with the crown, silks, and jewels of a byzantine emperor. louis loeb was a desperate tartar bandit. castaigne made a hit as an italian jurist. steinlen, grasset, forain, rodin,--in fact, nearly all the renowned painters, sculptors, and illustrators of paris were there; and besides them were the countless students and models. [illustration: 0094] "la cavalcade! le grand cortège!" rose the cry above the crashing of the band and the noise of the revellers; and then all the dancing stopped. emerging from the gardens through the open glass door, bringing with it a pleasant blast of the cool night air, was the vanguard of the great procession. the orchestra struck up the "victor's march," and a great cry of welcome rang out. first came a band of yelling indians dancing in, waving their spears and tomahawks, and so cleaving a way for the parade. a great roar filled the glass-domed hall when the first float appeared. it was daring and unique, but a masterpiece. borne upon the shoulders of indians, who were naked but for skins about their loins, their bodies stained a dark brown and striped with paint, was a gorgeous bed of fresh flowers and trailing vines; and reclining in this bed were four of the models of paris, lying on their backs, head to head, their legs upraised to support a circular tablet of gold. [illustration: 0095] upon this, high in air, proud and superb, was the great susanne in all her peerless beauty of face and form,--simply that and nothing more. a sparkling crown of jewels glowed in her reddish golden hair; a flashing girdle of electric lights encircled her slender waist, bringing out the marvellous whiteness of her skin, and with delicate shadows and tones modelling the superb contour of her figure. she looked a goddess--and knew it. the crowd upon whom she looked down stood for a while spellbound, and then, with a waving of arms and flags, came a great shout, "susanne! susanne! la belle susanne!" susanne only smiled. was she not the queen of the models of paris? then came bellona! gérôme, when he conceived and executed the idea embodied in this wonderful figure, concentrated his efforts to produce a most terrifying, fear-inspiring image typifying the horrors of war. the straining goddess, poised upon her toes to her full height, her face uplifted, her head thrust forward, with staring eyes and screaming mouth, her short two-edged sword in position for a sweeping blow, her glittering round shield and her coat of mail, a huge angry python darting its tongue and raising its green length from the folds of her drapery,--all this terrible figure, reproduced with marvellous fidelity and magnified tenfold, overwhelmed the thousands upon whom it glowered. surrounding the golden chariot was a guard of roman and greek gladiators, emperors, warriors, and statesmen. from the staring eyes of bellona flashed green fire, whose uncanny shafts pierced the yellow haze of the ball-room. under a storm of cheers bellona went on her way past the tribune of the judges. [illustration: 0097] following bellona came a beautiful reproduction of gérôme's classical "tanagra," which adorns the sculpture gallery of the luxembourg. the figure was charmingly personated by marcelle, a lithe, slim, graceful model of immature years, who was a rage in the studios. gérôme himself applauded the grace of her pose as she swept past his point of vantage in the gallery. [illustration: 0099] behind tanagra came w------, also of the atelier gérôme, dressed as an apache warrior and mounted on a bucking broncho. he was an american, from nebraska, where he was a cowboy before he became famous as a sculptor. he received a rousing welcome from his fellow-artists. the atelier cormon came next,--a magnificent lot of brawny fellows clothed in skins, and bearing an immense litter made of tree branches bound with thongs and weighted down with strong naked women and children of a prehistoric age. it was a reproduction of cormon's masterpiece in the luxembourg gallery, and was one of the most impressive compositions in the whole parade. then came the works of the many other studios, all strong and effective, but none so fine as the three first. the atelier pascal, of architecture, made a sensation by appearing as egyptian mummies, each mummy dragging an egyptian coffin covered with ancient inscriptions and characters and containing a parisian model, all too alive and sensuous to personate the ancient dead. another atelier strove hard for the prize with eggs of heroic size, from which as many girls, as chicks, were breaking their way to freedom. after the grand cortège had paraded the hall several times it disbanded, and the ball proceeded with renewed enthusiasm. the tribune, wherein the wise judges sat, was a large and artistic affair, built up before the gallery of the orchestra and flanked by broad steps leading to its summit. it was topped with the imperial escutcheon of rome--battle-axes bound in fagots--and bore the legend, "_mort aux tyrants_," in bold letters. beneath was a row of ghastly, bloody severed heads,--those of dead tyrants. the variety and originality of the costumes were bewildering. one frenchman went as a tombstone, his back, representing a headstone, containing a suitable inscription and bearing wreaths of immortelles and colored beads. another, from the atelier bon-nat, went simply as a stink, nothing more, nothing less, but it was potent. he had saturated his skin with the juice of onions and garlic, and there was never any mistaking his proximity. many were the gay bacchantes wearing merely a bunch of grapes in their hair and a grape-leaf. at intervals during the evening the crowd would suddenly gather and form a large circle, many deep, some climbing upon the backs of others the better to see, those in front squatting or lying upon the floor to accommodate the mass behind them. the formation of these circles was the signal for the _danse du ventre_.* * the danse du ventre (literally, belly-dance) is of turkish origin, and was introduced to paris by turkish women from egypt. afterward these women exhibited it in the midway plaisance of the columbian exposition, chicago, and then at the california midwinter exposition, san francisco. as danced by turkish women it consists of astonishing control and movements of the abdominal and chest muscles (hence its other name, muscle-dance), varied with more or less graceful steps and gyrations, with adjuncts, such as castanets, scarfs, etc., and the seemingly perilous use of swords. such clothing is worn as least obscures the play of the muscles. it is danced to a particular turkish air, monotonously repeated by an orchestra of male turkish musicians, with turkish instruments, and the dance is done solus. a dance closely analogous to it, though of a wholly independent origin, is the hula-hula of the hawaiian women; but the hula-hula lacks the grace, dash, and abandon of the turkish dance. the danse du ventre, as danced by french and american women who have "picked it up," is very different from that of the turkish women--different both in form and meaning. whatever of suggestiveness it may be supposed to carry is, in the adaptation, grossly exaggerated, and whatever of grace and special muscular skill, evidently acquired by turkish women only from long and thorough drill, is eliminated. w. c. m. [illustration: 0103] the name of some favorite model would be yelled, and the orchestra would strike up the familiar oriental strain. and there was always a model to respond. then the regular dancing would be resumed until another circle was formed and another favorite goddess of the four arts would be called out. it was three o'clock when supper was announced by the appearance of two hundred white-aproned waiters carrying scores of tables, chairs, and hampers of plate and glassware. the guests fell to with a will and assisted in spreading and setting the tables; almost in a moment the vast hall was a field of snow pricked out with the brilliant costumes of the revellers. then came a frightful din of pounding on the tables for the supper. again marched in the two hundred waiters, loaded with cases of champagne, plates of creamy soup, roasts, salads, cheeses, creams, cakes, ices,--a feast of bacchus, indeed. the banquet was enjoyed with bohemian abandon. the twelve wise judges of the tribune now gravely announced their award of prizes, and each announcement was received with ringing applause. the _atelier gérôme_ received first prize,--fifty bottles of champagne, which were immediately taken possession of. the other ateliers received smaller prizes, as their merits deserved, and all were satisfied and happy. the banquet was resumed. now here was susanne, not content with her triumph of the early evening, springing upon one of the central tables, sending the crockery and glassware crashing to the floor with her dainty foot, and serenely surveying the crowd as it greeted her tumultuously, and, seizing a bottle of champagne, sending its foaming contents over as wide a circle of revellers as her strength could reach, laughing in pure glee over her feat, and then bathing her own white body with the contents of another bottle that she poured over herself. a superb bacchante she made! a general salute of popping corks and clinking glasses greeted her, and she acknowledged the compliment with the danse du ventre. susanne was so sure of the adoration and affection of the ateliers! her dance was a challenge to every other model in the chamber. one after another, and often several at a time, they mounted the tables, spurned the crockery to the floor, and gave the danse du ventre. the moulin was indeed a wild scene of joyous abandonment, and from an artistic point of view grand, a luminous point in the history of modern times. here were the life, the color, the grace of the living picture, with a noble background of surrounding temples, altars, statues,--a wonderful spectacle, that artists can understand and appreciate. [illustration: 0103 the feast wore merrily through the small hours until the cold blue dawn began to pale the lights in the ceiling. strangely beautiful was this color effect, as the blue stole downward through the thick yellow glamour of the hall, quickening the merry-makers with a new and uncanny light, putting them out of place, and warning them thence. but still the ball went rolling on. though the floor was slippery with wine and dangerous from broken glass, dancing and the cutting of capers proceeded without abatement. the favorite danse du ventre and songs and speeches filled the night to the end of the ball, and then the big orchestra, with a great flourish, played the "victor's march." this was the signal for the final procession. the vast concourse of students and artists poured forth into the cool, sweet morning air, and the bal was at an end. paris was asleep, that early april morning, save for the street-sweepers and the milkmaids and the concierges. but the place blanche was very much awake. the morning air was new wine in stale veins, and it banished fatigue. "_en cavalcade! en cavalcade!_" was the cry; and in cavalcade it was. a great procession of all the costumers was formed, to march ensemble across paris to the quartier latin. even the proud bellona was dragged along in the rear, towering as high as the lower wings of the now motionless red windmill. she seemed to partake in the revelry, for she swayed and staggered in an alarming fashion as she plunged recklessly down the steeps of montmartre. [illustration: 0107] the deserted rue blanche re-echoed the wild yells and songs of the revellers and the rattling of the string of cabs in the rear. the rows of heaped ash-cans that lined the way were overturned one after another, and the oaths and threatening brooms of the outraged concierges went for nothing. even the poor diligent ragand bone-pickers were not spared; their filled sacks, carrying the result of their whole night's hunt, were taken from them and emptied. a string of carts heavily laden with stone was captured near the rue lafayette, the drivers deposed, and the big horses sent plunging through paris, driven by roman charioteers, and making more noise than a company of artillery. when the place de l'opéra was reached a thousand revellers swarmed up the broad stairs of the grand opéra like colored ants, climbed upon the lamp-posts and candelabra, and clustered all over the groups of statuary adorning the magnificent façade. the band took up a position in the centre and played furiously, while the artists danced ring-around-arosy, to the amazement of the drowsy residents of the neighborhood. the cavalcade then re-formed and marched down the avenue de l'opéra toward the louvre, where it encountered a large squad of street-sweepers washing the avenue. in an instant the squad had been routed, and the revellers, taking the hose and brooms, fell to and cleaned an entire block, making it shine as it had never shone before. cabs were captured, the drivers decorated with roman helmets and swords, and dances executed on the tops of the vehicles. one character, with enormous india-rubber shoes, took delight in permitting cabs to run over his feet, while he emitted howls of agony that turned the hair of the drivers white. [illustration: 9110] as the immense cavalcade filed through the narrow arches of the louvre court-yard it looked like a mediaeval army returning to its citadel after a victorious campaign; the hundreds of battle-flags, spears, and battle-axes were given a fine setting by the noble architecture of the pavillon de rohan. within the court of the louvre was drawn up a regiment of the garde municipale, going through the morning drill; and they looked quite formidable with their evolutions and bayonet charges. but when the mob of greek and roman warriors flung themselves bodily upon the ranks of the guard, ousted the officers, and assumed command, there was consternation. [illustration: 0111] all the rigid military dignity of the scene disappeared, and the drill was turned into such a farce as the old louvre had never seen before. the officers, furious at first, could not resist the spirit of pure fun that filled the mob, and took their revenge by kissing the models and making them dance. the girls had already done their share of the conquering by pinning flowers to military coats and coyly putting pretty lips where they were in danger. even the tall electric-light masts in the court were scaled by adventurous students, who attached brilliant flags, banners, and crests to the mast-heads far above the crowd. to the unspeakable relief of the officers, the march was then resumed. the pont du carrousel was the next object of assault; here was performed the solemn ceremony of the annual sacrifice of the quat'z' arts to the river seine. the mighty bellona was the sacrifice. she was trundled to the centre of the bridge and drawn close to the parapet, while the disciples of the four arts gathered about with uncovered heads. the first bright flashes of the morning sun, sweeping over the towers of notre-dame, tipped bellona's upraised sword with flame. the band played a funeral march. prayers were said, and the national hymn was sung; then bellona was sent tottering and crashing over the parapet, and with a mighty plunge she sank beneath the waters of the seine. a vast shout rang through the crisp morning air. far below, poor bellona rose in stately despair, and then slowly sank forever. the parade formed again and proceeded to the beaux-arts, the last point of attack. up the narrow rue bonaparte went singing the tired procession; the gates of the ecole opened to admit it, cabs and all, and the doors were shut again. then in the historic court-yard of the government school, surrounded by remnants of the beautiful architecture of once stately chateaux and palaces, and encircled by graceful corinthian columns, the students gave a repetition of the grand ball at the moulin rouge. a strange and incongruous sight it was in the brilliant sunshine, and the neighboring windows and balconies were packed with onlookers. but by halfpast seven every trace of the bal des quat'z' arts had disappeared,--the great procession had melted away to the haunts of bohemia. [illustration: 5114] boulevard saint-michel [illustration: 0115] of course the proper name for the great thoroughfare of the quartier latin is the boulevard saint-michel, but the boulevardiers call it the boul' mich', just as the students call the quatre arts the quat'z' arts, because it is easier to say. the boul' mich' is the student's highway to relaxation. mention of it at once recalls whirling visions of brilliant _café_s, with their clattering of saucers and glasses, the shouting of their white-aproned garçons, their hordes of gay and wicked damsels dressed in the costliest and most fashionable gowns, and a multitude of riotous students howling class songs and dancing and parading to the different _café_s as only students can. this is the head-quarters of the bohemians of real bohemia, whose poets haunt the dim and quaint cabarets and read their compositions to admiring friends; of flower-girls who offer you un petit bouquet, seulement dix centimes, and pin it into your button-hole before you can refuse; of turks in picturesque native costume selling sweetmeats; of the cane man loaded down with immense sticks; of the stems a yard long; of beggars, gutter-snipes, hot-chestnut venders, pedlers, singers, actors, students, and all manner of queer characters. [illustration: 9116] the life of the boul' mich' begins at the panthéon, where repose the remains of france's great men, and ends at the seine, where the gray gothic towers and the gargoyles of notre-dame look down disdainfully upon the giddy traffic below. the eastern side of the boul' is lined with _café_s, cabarets, and brasseries. this is historic ground, for where now is the old hôtel cluny are still to be seen the ruins of roman baths, and not a great distance hence are the partly uncovered ruins of a roman arena, with its tiers of stone seats and its dens. the tomb of cardinal richelieu is in the beautiful old chapel of the sorbonne, within sound of the wickedest _café_ in paris, the café d'harcourt. [illustration: 0117] in the immediate vicinity are to be found the quaint jumbled buildings of old paris, but they are fast disappearing. and the quartier abounds in the world's greatest schools and colleges of the arts and sciences. it was often our wont on saturday evenings to saunter along the boul', and sometimes to visit the _café_s. to bishop particularly it was always a revelation and a delight, and he was forever studying and sketching the types that he found there. he was intimately acquainted in all the _café_s along the line, and with the mysterious rendezvous in the dark and narrow side streets. american beverages are to be had at many of the _café_s on the boul',--a recent and very successful experiment. the idea has captured the fancy of the parisians, so that "_bars américains_," which furnish cocktails and sours, are numerous in the _café_s. imagine a parisian serenely sucking a manhattan through a straw, and standing up at that! the boul' mich' is at its glory on saturday nights, for the students have done their week's work, and the morrow is sunday. nearly everybody goes to the bal bullier. this is separated from the crowded boul' mich' by several squares of respectable dwelling-houses and shops, and a dearth of _café_s prevails thereabout. at the upper end of the luxembourg is a long stone wall brilliantly bedecked with lamps set in clusters,--the same wall against which maréchal ney was shot (a striking monument across the way recalls the incident). at one end of this yellow wall is an arched entrée, resplendent with the glow of many rows of electric lights and lamps, which reveal the colored bas-reliefs of dancing students and gri-settes that adorn the portal. near by stands a row of voitures, and others are continually dashing up and depositing latin-quarter swells with hair parted behind and combed forward toward the ears, and dazzling visions of the demi-monde in lace, silks, and gauze. and there is a constantly arriving stream of students and gaudily dressed women on foot. big gardes municipaux stand at the door like stone images as the crowd surges past. [illustration: 0121] to-night is one-franc night. an accommodating lady at the box-office hands us each a broad card, and another, au vestiaire, takes our coats and hats and charges us fifty centimes for the honor. descending the broad flight of softly carpeted red stairs, a brilliant, tumultuous, roaring vision bursts upon us, for it is between the dances, and the visitors are laughing and talking and drinking. the ball-room opens into a generous garden filled with trees and shrubbery ingeniously devised to assure many a secluded nook, and steaming garçons are flying hither and thither serving foaming bocks and colored syrups to nymphs in bicycle bloomers, longhaired students under tam o'shanters, and the swells peculiar to le quartier latin. "_ah! monsieur beeshop, comment vas tu?_" "_tiens! le voilà, beeshop!_" "_ah, mon ange!_" and other affectionate greetings made bishop start guiltily, and then he discovered hélène and marcelle, two saucy little models who had posed at the école. there also was fannie, formerly (before she drifted to the _café_s) our blanchisseuse, leaning heavily upon the arm of son amant, who, a butcher-boy during the day, was now arrayed in a cutaway coat and other things to match, including a red cravat that fannie herself had tied; but he wore no cuffs. many other acquaintances presented themselves to bishop, somewhat to his embarrassment. one, quite a swell member of the demi-monde, for a moment deserted her infatuated companion, a gigantic martinique negro, gorgeously apparelled, and ran up to tease bishop to paint her portrait à l'oil, and also to engage him for la prochaine valse. [illustration: 0123] the musicians were now playing a schottische, but large circles would be formed here and there in the hall, where clever exhibitions of fancy dancing would be given by students and by fashionably gowned damsels with a penchant for displaying their lingerie and hosiery. the front of the band-stand was the favorite place for this. here four dashing young women were raising a whirlwind of lingerie and slippers, while the crowd applauded and tossed sous at their feet. next to us stood a fat, cheery-faced little man, bearing the unmistakable stamp of an american tourist. his hands were in his pockets, his silk hat was tipped back, and his beaming red face and bulging eyes showed the intensity of his enjoyment. without the slightest warning the slippered foot of one of these dancers found his shining tile and sent it bounding across the floor. for a moment the american was dazed by the suddenness and unearthly neatness of the feat; then he emitted a whoop of wonder and admiration, and in english exclaimed,--"you gol-darned bunch of french skirts--say, you're all right, you are, marie! bet you can't do it again!" he confided to bishop that his name was pugson and that he was from cincinnati. "why," he exclaimed, joyously, "paris is the top of the earth! you artists are an enviable lot, living over here all the time and painting-gad! look at her!" and he was pushing his way through the crowd to get a better view of an uncommonly startling dancer, who was at the moment an indeterminate fluffy bunch of skirts, linen, and hosiery. ah, what tales he will tell of paris when he returns to cincinnati, and how he will be accused of exaggerating! the four girls forming the centre of attraction were now doing all manner of astonishing things possible only to parisian feminine anatomy. in another circle near by was johnson, the american architect, stirring enthusiastic applause as he hopped about, indian fashion, with a little brunette whose face was hidden in the shadow of her immense hat, her hair en bandeau, à la de mérode. could this really be the quiet johnson of the ecole, who but a week ago had been showing his mother and charming sister over paris? and there, too, was his close friend, walden, of michigan, leading a heavy blonde to the dance! there were others whom we knew. the little siamese was flirting desperately with a vision in white standing near his friend, a japanese, who, in turn, was listening to the cooing of a clinging bloomer girl. even haidor, the turk, was there, but he was alone in the gallery. many sober fellows whom i had met at the studio were there, but they were sober now only in the sense that they were not drunk. and there were law students, too, in velveteen caps and jackets, and students in the sciences, and students in music, and négligé poets, littérateurs, and artists, and every model and cocotte who could furnish her back sufficiently well to pass the censorship of the severe critic at the door. if she be attractively dressed, she may enter free; if not, she may not enter at all. [illustration: 0125] the gayety increased as the hours lengthened; the dancing was livelier, the shouting was more vociferous, skirts swirled more freely, and thin glasses fell crashing to the floor. it was pleasanter out in the cool garden, for it was dreadfully hard to keep from dancing inside. the soft gleam of the colored lamps and lanterns was soothing, and the music was softened down to an echo. the broken rays of the lanterns embedded in the foliage laid bright patterns on the showy silks of the women, and the garçons made no noise as they flitted swiftly through the mazes of shrubbery. at one end of the garden, surrounded by an hilarious group, were four wooden rocking-horses worked on springs. 'astride of two of these were an army officer and his companion, a bloomer girl, who persistently twisted her ankles round her horse's head. the two others were ridden by a poet and a jauntily attired gri-sette. the four were as gleeful as children. [illustration: 9128] a flash-light photographer did a driving trade at a franc a flash, and there were a shooting-gallery, a fortune-teller, sou-in-the-slot machines, and wooden figures of negroes with pads on their other ends, by punching which we might see how hard we could hit. we are back in the ball-room again,--it is hard to keep out. the gayety is at its height, the bal bullier is in full swing. the tables are piled high with saucers, and the garçons are bringing more. the room is warm and suffocating, the dancing and flirting faster than ever. now and then a line is formed to "crack the whip," and woe betide anything that comes in its way! [illustration: 0131] our genial, generous new friend from cincinnati was living the most glorious hour of his life. he had not been satisfied until he found and captured the saucy little wretch who had sent his hat spinning across the room; so now she was anchored to him, and he was giving exhibitions of american grace and agility that would have amazed his friends at home. for obviously he was a person of consequence there. when he saw us his face beamed with triumph, and he proudly introduced us to his mignonette-scented conquest, mad-dem-mo-zel madeleine (which he pronounced madelyne), "the queen of the latin quarter. but blamed if i can talk the blooming lingo!" he exclaimed, ruefully. "you translate for me, won't you?" he appealed to bishop, and bishop complied. in paying compliments thus transmitted to madeleine he displayed an adeptness that likely would have astounded his good spouse, who at that moment was slumbering in a respectable part of paris. but the big black martinique negroes,--they haunted and dominated everything, and the demimonde fell down and worshipped them. they are students of law and medicine, and are sent hither from the french colonies by the government, or come on their private means. [illustration: 0132] they are all heavy swells, as only negroes can be; their well-fitted clothes are of the finest and most showy material; they wear shining silk hats, white waistcoats, white "spats," patent leathers, and very light kid gloves, not to mention a load of massive jewelry. the girls flutter about them in bevies, like doves to be fed. at exactly a quarter-past midnight the band played the last piece, the lights began to go out, and the bal bullier was closed. out into the boulevard surged the heated crowd, shouting, singing, and cutting capers as they headed for the boul' mich', there to continue the revelries of which the bal bullier was only the beginning. "a la taverne du panthéon!" "au café lorrain!" "au café d'harcourt!" were the cries that range through the streets, mingled with the singing of half a thousand people. [illustration: 0133] in this mob we again encountered our american acquaintance with his prize, and as he was bent on seeing all that he could of paris, he begged us to see him through, explaining that money was no object with him, though delicately adding that our friends must make so many calls upon our hospitality as to prove a burden at times. he had only two days more in paris, and the hours were precious, and "we will do things up in style," he declared buoyantly. he did. bishop's arm was securely held by a little lassie all in soft creamy silks. she spoke engleesh, and demurely asked bishop if "we will go to ze _café_ ensemble, n'est-ce-pas?" and bishop had not the heart to eject her from the party. and so five of us went skipping along with the rest, mr. pugson swearing by all the gods that paris was the top of the earth! when we reached the lower end of the jardin du luxembourg, at the old palais, the bright glow of the _café_s, with their warm stained windows and lighthearted throngs, stretched away before us. ah, le boul' mich' never sleeps! there are still the laughing grisettes, the singing and dancing students, the kiosks all aglow; the marchand de marrons is roasting his chestnuts over a charcoal brazier, sending out a savory aroma; the swarthy turk is offering his wares with a princely grace; the flower-girls flit about with freshly cut carnations, violets, and maréchal niel roses,--"this joli bouquet for your sweetheart," they plead so plaintively; the pipe man plies his trade; the cane man mobs us, and the sellers of the last editions of the papers cry their wares. [illustration: 9134] an old pedler works in and out among the _café_ tables with a little basket of olives, deux pour un sou. the crawfish seller, with his little red écrevisses neatly arranged on a platter; italian boys in white blouses bearing baskets filled with plaster casts of works of the old masters gewgaw pedlers,--they are still all busily at work, each adding his mite to the din. the _café_s are packed, both inside and out, but the favorite seats are those on the sidewalk under the awnings. [illustration: 0135] we halted at the café d'harcourt. here the crowd was thickest, the sidewalk a solid mass of humanity; and the noise and the waiters as they yelled their orders, they were there. and des femmes--how many! the café d'harcourt is the head-quarters of these wonderful creations of clothes, paint, wicked eyes, and graceful carriage. we worked our way into the interior. here the crowd was almost as dense as without, but a chance offered us a vacant table; no sooner had we captured it than we were compelled to retreat, because of a battle that two excited demoiselles were having at an adjoining table. in another part of the room there was singing of "les sergents sont des brave gens," and in the middle of the floor a petite cocotte, her hat rakishly pulled down over her eyes, was doing a dance very gracefully, her white legs gleaming above the short socks that she wore, and a shockingly high kick punctuating the performance at intervals. [illustration: 0137] at other tables were seated students with their friends and mistresses, playing dominoes or recounting their petites histoires. one table drew much attention by reason of a contest in drinking between two seasoned habitués, one a martinique negro and the other a delicate blond poet. the negro won, but that was only because his purse was the longer. every consommation is served with a saucer, upon which is marked the price of the drink, and the score is thus footed à la fin de ces joies. there are some heavy accounts to be settled with the garçons. "_ah! voilà beeshop!" "tiens! mon vieux!" "comment vas-tu?_" clamored a half-dozen of bishop's feminine acquaintances, as they surrounded our table, overwhelming us with their conflicting perfumes. [illustration: 0139] these denizens of the boul' have an easy way of making acquaintances, but they are so bright and mischievous withal that no offence can be taken; and they may have a stack of saucers to be paid for. among the many _café_ frequenters of this class fully half know a few words of english, italian, german, and even russian, and are so quick of perception that they can identify a foreigner at a glance. consequently our table was instantly a target, principally on account of mr. pugson, whose nationality emanated from his every pore. [illustration: 0141] "ah, milord, how do you do? i spik engleesh a few. es eet not verra a beautiful night?" is what he got. "you are si charmant, monsieur!" protested another, stroking bishop's valasquez beard; and then, archly and coaxingly, "_qu'est-ce que vous m'offrez, monsieur? payez-moi un bock?_ yes?" mr. pugson made the garçons start. he ordered "everything and the best in the house" (in english); but it was the lordliness of his manner that told, as he leaned back in his chair and smoked his londrès and eyed madeleine with intense satisfaction. in the eyes of the beholders that action gave him the unmistakable stamp of an american millionaire. "tell you, boys," he puffed, "i'm not going to forget paree in a hurry." and mademoiselle madeleine, how she revelled! mr. pugson bought her everything that the venders had to sell, besides, for himself, a wretched plaster cast of a dancing-girl that he declared was "dead swell." "i'll take it home and startle the natives," he added; but he didn't, as we shall see later. then he bought three big canes as souvenirs for friends, besides a bicycle lamp, a mammoth pipe, and other things. a hungry-looking sketch artist who presented himself was engaged on the spot to execute mr. pugson's portrait, which he made so flattering as to receive five francs instead of one, his price. at a neighboring table occupied by a group of students was bi-bi-dansla-purée, one of the most famous characters of the quartier and montmartre. with hilarious laughter the students were having fun with bi-bi by pouring the contents of their soup-plates and drinking-glasses down his back and upon his sparsely covered head; but what made them laugh more was bi-bi's wonderful skill in pulling grotesque faces. in that line he was an artist. his cavernous eyes and large, loose mouth did marvellous things, from the ridiculous to the terrible; and he could literally laugh from ear to ear. poor bi-bi-dans-la-purée! [illustration: 0143] he had been a constant companion of the great verlaine, but was that no more, since verlaine had died and left him utterly alone. you may see him any day wandering aimlessly about the quartier, wholly oblivious to the world about him, and dreaming doubtless of the great dead poet of the slums, who had loved him. here comes old madame carrot, a weazened little hunchback, anywhere between sixty and a hundred years of age. she is nearly blind, and her tattered clothes hang in strips from her wreck of a form. a few thin strands of gray hair are all that cover her head. "_bon soir, mère carrot! ma petite mignonne, viens donc qu'on t'embrasse! où sont tes ailes?_" and other mocking jests greet her as she creeps among the tables. but mère carrot scorns to beg: she would earn her money. look! with a shadowy remnant of grace she picks up the hem of her ragged skirt, and with a heart-breaking smile that discloses her toothless gums, she skips about in a dance that sends her audience into shrieks of laughter, and no end of sous are flung at her feet. she will sing, too, and caricature herself, and make pitiful attempts at high kicking and anything else that she is called upon to do for the sous that the students throw so recklessly. there are those who say that she is rich. in the rear end of the _café_ the demoiselle who had anchored herself to the martinique negro at the bal bullier was on a table kicking the negro's hat, which he held at arm's length while he stood on a chair. "_plus haut! plus haut encore!_" she cried; but each time, as he kept raising it, she tipped it with her dainty slipper; and then, with a magnificent bound, she dislodged with her toe one of the chandelier globes, which went crashing with a great noise to the floor; and then she plunged down and sought refuge in her adorer's arms. the night's excitement has reached its height now. there is a dizzy whirl of skirts, feathers, "plug" hats, and silken stockings; and there is dancing on the tables, with a smashing of glass, while lumps of sugar soaked in cognac are thrown about. a single-file march round the room is started, each dragging a chair and all singing, "_oh, la pauvre fille, elle est malade!_" mr. pugson, tightly clutching his canes and his dancing-girl, joins the procession, his shiny hat reposing on the pretty head of mademoiselle madeleine. but his heart almost breaks with regret because he cannot speak french. i began to remonstrate with bishop for his own unseemly levity, but the gloved hand of mademoiselle madeleine was laid on my lips, and her own red lips protested, "_taisez-vous donc! c'est absolument inexcusable de nous faire des sermons en ce moment! en avant!_" and we went. it was two o'clock, and the _café_s were closing, under the municipal regulation to do so at that hour, and the boul' was swarming with revellers turned out of doors. at the corner of the rue racine stands a small boulangerie, where some of the revellers were beating on the iron shutters and crying, "_voilà du bon fromage au lait!_" impatient at the tardiness of the fat baker in opening his shop; for the odor of hot rolls and croissants came up through the iron gratings of the kitchen, and the big cans of fresh milk at the door gave further comforting assurances. lumbering slowly down the boul' were ponderous carts piled high with vegetables, on their way to the great markets of paris, the halles centrales. the drivers, half asleep on the top, were greeted with demands for transportation, and a lively bidding for passengers arose among them. they charged five sous a head, or as much more as they could get, and soon the carts were carrying as many passengers as could find a safe perch on the heaped vegetables. "_aux halles! aux halles! nous allons aux halles! oh, la, la, comme ils sont bons, les choux et les potirons!_" were the cries as the carts lumbered on toward the markets. mr. pugson had positively refused to accept our resignation, and stoutly reminded us of our promise to see him through. so our party arranged with a masculine woman in a man's coat on payment of a franc a head, and we clambered upon her neatly piled load of carrots. mr. pugson, becoming impatient at the slow progress of the big normandy horses, began to pelt them with carrots. the market-woman protested vigorously at this waste of her property, and told mr. pugson that she would charge him two sous apiece for each subsequent carrot. he seized upon the bargain with true american readiness, and then flung carrots to his heart's content, the driver meanwhile keeping count in a loud and menacing voice. it was a new source of fun for the irrepressible and endlessly jovial american. along the now quiet boulevard the carts trundled in a string. all at once there burst from them all an eruption of song and laughter, which brought out numerous gendarmes from the shadows. but when they saw the crowd they said nothing but "_les étudiants_," and retreated to the shadows. as we were crossing the pont-au-change, opposite the place du châtelet, with its graceful column touched by the shimmering lights of the seine, and dominated by the towers of notre-dame, mr. pugson, in trying to hurl two carrots at once, incautiously released his hold upon the dancinggirl, which incontinently rolled off the vegetables and was shattered into a thousand fragments on the pavement of the bridge--along with mr. pugson's heart. after a moment of silent misery he started to throw the whole load of carrots into the river, but he quickly regained command of himself. for the first time, however, his wonderful spirits were dampened, and he was as moody and cross as a child, refusing to be comforted even by madeleine's cooing voice. the number of carts that we now encountered converging from many quarters warned us that we were very near the markets. then rose the subdued noise that night-workers make. there seemed to be no end of the laden carts. the great halles then came into view, with their cold glare of electric lights, and thousands of people moving about with baskets upon their backs, unloading the vegetable carts and piling the contents along the streets. the thoroughfares were literally walled and fortressed with carrots, cabbages, pumpkins, and the like, piled in neat rows as high as our heads for square after square. is it possible for paris to consume all of this in a day? every few yards were fat women seated before steaming cans of hot potage and _café_ noir, with rows of generous white bowls, which they would fill for a sou. not alone were the market workers here, for it seemed as though the boul' mich' had merely taken an adjournment after the law had closed its portals and turned it out of doors. the workers were silent and busy, but largely interspersed among them were the demi-mondaines and the singing and dancing students of the quartier, all as full of life and deviltry as ever. it was with these tireless revellers that the soupand coffee-women did their most thriving business, for fun brings a good appetite, and the soup and coffee were good; but better still was this unconventional, lawless, defiant way of taking them. mr. pugson's spirits regained their vivacity under the spell, and he was so enthusiastic that he wanted to buy out one of the pleasant-faced fat women; we had to drag him bodily away to avert the catastrophe. in the side streets leading away from the markets are _café_s and restaurants almost without number, and they are open toute la nuit, to accommodate the market people, having a special permit to do so; but as they are open to all, the revellers from all parts of paris assemble there after they have been turned out of the boulevard _café_s at two o'clock. it is not an uncommon thing early of a sunday morning to see crowds of merry-makers from a bal masqué finishing the night here, all in costume, dancing and playing ring-around-a-rosy among the stacks of vegetables and the unheeding market people. indeed, it is quite a common thing to end one's night's frivolity at the halles and their _café_s, and take the first 'buses home in the early morning. the contingent from the boul' mich', after assisting the market people to unload, and indulging in all sorts of pranks, invaded the élite _café_s, among them the _café barrette, au veau qui tête, au chien qui fume, and le caveau du cercle._ [illustration: 0149] at this last-named place, singing and recitations with music were in order, a small platform at one end of the room being reserved for the piano and the performers. part of the audience were in masquerade costume, having come from a ball at montmartre, and they lustily joined the choruses. prices are gilt-edged here,--a franc a drink, and not less than ten sous to the garçon. the contrast between the fluffy and silk-gowned demi-mondaines and the dirty, roughly clad market people was very striking at the café barrette. there the women sit in graceful poses, or saunter about and give evidence of their style, silk gowns, india laces, and handsome furs, greeting each new-comer with pleas for a sandwich or a bock; they are always hungry and thirsty, but they get a commission on all sales that they promote. a small string orchestra gave lively music, and took up collections between performances. the array of gilt-framed mirrors heightened the brilliancy of the place, already sufficiently aglow with many electric lights. the café barrette is the last stand of the gaudy women of the boulevards. with the first gray gleam of dawn they pass with the night to which they belong. it was with sincere feeling that mr. pugson bade us good-by at five o'clock that morning as he jumped into a cab to join his good spouse at the hôtel continental; but he bore triumphantly with him some sketches of the showy women at the café barrette, which bishop had made. as for madeleine, so tremendously liberal had she found mr. pugson that her protestations of affection for him were voluble and earnest. she pressed her card upon him and made him swear that he would find her again. after we had bidden her good-night, mr. pugson drew the card from his pocket, and thoughtfully remarked, as he tore it to pieces,--"i don't think it is prudent to carry such things in your pocket." [0152] bohemian cafés [illustration: 0153] very often, instead of having dinner at the studio, we saunter over to the maison dar-blay, passing the wall of the dismal cimetière du montparnasse on the way. the maison darblay is in the little rue de la gaieté, which, though only a block in length, is undoubtedly the liveliest thoroughfare in the quartier. that is because it serves as a funnel between the avenue du maine and five streets that converge into it at the upper end. particularly in the early evening the little street is crowded with people returning from their work. all sorts of boutiques are packed into this minute thoroughfare,---jewelry-shops, pork-shops, kitchens (where they cook what you bring while you wait on the sidewalk), theatres, _cafés chantants_, fried-potato stalls, snail merchants, moving vegetableand fruit-markets, and everything else. in the middle of the block, on the western side, between a millineryshop and a butcher-shop, stands the maison darblay, famous for its beans and its patrons. a modest white front, curtained windows, and a row of milk-cans give little hint of the charms of the interior. upon entering we encounter the vast m. darblay seated behind a tiny counter, upon which are heaped a pile of freshly ironed napkins, parcels of chocolate, a big dish of apple-sauce, rows of bottles containing bitters that work miracles with ailing appetites, and the tip-box. reflecting m. darblay's beamy back and the clock on the opposite wall (which is always fifteen minutes fast) hangs a long mirror resplendent in heavy gilt frame; it is the pride of the establishment, and affords comfort to the actresses when they adjust their hats and veils upon leaving. [illustration: 9154] m. darblay is manager of the establishment, and when it is reflected that he weighs two hundred and sixty pounds, it may be imagined what accurate adjustments he has to make in fitting himself behind the small counter. when a boarder finishes his meal he goes to m. darblay and tells him what he has had, including napkin and bread, and m. darblay scores it all down on a slate with chalk and foots it up. after the bill is paid, the tip-box is supposed by a current fiction to receive two sous for marie and augustine, the buxom breton maidens who serve the tables; but so rarely does the fiction materialize that, when the rattle of coins is heard in the box, the boarders all look up wonderingly to see the possible millionaire that has appeared among them, and marie and augustine shout at the top of their voices, "merci bien, monsieur!" [illustration: 8155] at the opposite end of the room, in full view, is the cuisine, with its big range and ruddy fires. here madame darblay reigns queen, her genial, motherly red face and bright eyes beaming a welcome to all. she is from lausanne, on lake geneva, switzerland, and the independent blood of her race rarely fails its offices when m. darblay incautiously seeks to interfere with her duties and prerogatives, for he retreats under an appalling volley of french from his otherwise genial spouse; on such occasions he seeks his own corner as rapidly as he can manage his bulk to that purpose. she is a famous cook. the memory of her poulets rôtis and juicy gigots will last forever. but greatest of all are her haricots blancs, cooked au beurre; it is at the shrine of her beans that her devoted followers worship. and her wonderful wisdom! she knows intuitively if you are out of sorts or have an uncertain appetite, and without a hint she will prepare a delicacy that no epicure could resist. she knows every little whim and peculiarity of her boarders, and caters to them accordingly. the steaks and chops are bought at the shop next door just when they are ordered, and are always fresh. there are eight marble-top tables lining the two walls, and each table is held sacred to its proper occupants, and likewise are the numbered hooks and napkins. an invasion of these preserves is a breech of etiquette intolerable in bohemia. even the white cat is an essential part of the establishment, for it purringly welcomes the patrons and chases out stray dogs. situated as it is, in a group of three theatres and several _café_s chantants, it is the rendezvous of the actors and actresses of the neighborhood. they hold the three tables but one from the kitchen, on one side, and they are a jolly crowd, the actresses particularly. [illustration: 0157] they are a part of the quartier and echo its spirit. although full of mischief and fun, the actresses would never be suspected of singing the naughty songs that so delight the gallery gods and so often wring a murmur of protest from the pit. there are ten who dine here, but from their incessant chatter and laughter you would think them twenty. on friday evenings, when the songs and plays are changed, they rehearse their pieces at dinner. [illustration: 0159] bishop is openly fond of mademoiselle brunerye, a sparkling little brunette singer, who scolds him tragically for drawing horrible caricatures of her when he sits before the footlights to hear her sing. but it is always she that begins the trouble at the theatre. if bishop is there, she is sure to see him and to interpolate something in her song about "_mon amant américain_," and sing it pointedly at him, to the amusement of the audience and his great discomfiture; and so he retorts with the caricatures. upon entering the restaurant the actresses remove their hats and wraps and make themselves perfectly at home. they are the life of darblay's; we couldn't possibly spare them. one of the actors is a great swell,--m. fontaine, leading man at the théâtre du montparnasse, opposite. [illustration: 9160] his salary is a hundred francs a week; this makes the smaller actors look up to him, and enables him to wear a very long coat, besides gloves, patent-leather shoes, and a shiny top-hat. he occupies the place of honor, and marie smiles when she serves him, and gives him a good measure of wine. he rewards this attention by depositing two sous in the tip-box every friday night. then there are m. marius, m. zecca, and m. dufauj who make people scream with laughter at the gaieté, and m. coppée, the heavy villain of the terrible eyes in "les deux gosses," and mademoiselle walzy, whose dark eyes sparkle mischief as she peeps over her glass, and mademoiselle minion, who kicks shockingly high to accentuate her songs, and eight other actresses just as saucy and pretty. the students of the quartier practically take charge of the theatres on saturday nights, and as they are very free with their expressions of approval or disapproval, the faces of the stage-people wear an anxious look at the restaurant on that evening. the students will throw the whole theatre into an uproar with hisses that drive an actor off the stage, or applause, recalls, and the throwing of two-sous bouquets and kisses to an actress who has made a hit. promptly at six-forty-five every night the venerable m. corneau enters darblay's, bringing a copy of _le journal_. he is extremely methodical, so that any interruption of his established routine upsets him badly. one evening he found a stranger in his seat, occupying the identical chair that had been sacred to his use every evening for six years. m. corneau was so astonished that he hung his hat on the wrong hook, stepped on the cat's tail, sulked in a corner, and refused to eat until his seat had been vacated, and then he looked as though he wished it could be fumigated. he has a very simple meal. one evening he invited me--a rare distinction--to his room, which was in the top floor of one of those quaint old buildings in the rue du moulin de beurre. it could then be seen what a devoted scientist and student he was. his room was packed with books, chemicals, mineral specimens, and scientific instruments. he was very genial, and brewed excellent tea over an alcohol-stove of his own manufacture. twenty years ago he was a professor at the ecole des mines, where he had served many years; but he had now grown too old for that, and was living his quiet, studious, laborious life on a meagre pension. at one table sit a sculptor, an artist, and a blind musician and his wife. the sculptor is slender, delicate, and nervous, and is continually rolling and smoking cigarettes. his blond hair falls in ringlets over his collar, and he looks more the poet than the sculptor, for he is dreamy and distrait, and seems to be looking within himself rather than upon the world about him. augustine serves him with an absinthe pernod au sucre, which he slowly sips while he smokes several cigarettes before he is ready for his dinner. [illustration: 0162] the artist is his opposite,--a big, bluff, hearty fellow, loud of voice and full of life. and he is successful, for he has received a medal and several honorable mentions at the salon des champs-élysées, and has a fine twilight effect in the luxembourg gallery. after dinner he and m. darblay play piquet for the coffee, and m. darblay is generally loser. [illustration: 0163] the blind musician is a kindly old man with a benevolent face and a jovial spirit. he is the head professor of music at the institution des aveugles, on the boulevard des invalides. his wife is very attentive to him, taking his hat and cane, tucking his napkin under his chin, placing the dishes where he knows how to find them, and reading the papers to him. he knows where everybody sits, and he addresses each by name, and passes many brisk sallies about the room. one poet is vivacious, not at all like the dreamy species to which he belongs. true, he wears long hair and a quartier latin "plug," but his eyes are not vague, and he is immensely fond of madame darblay's beans, of which he has been known to stow away five platefuls at a meal. often he brings in a copy of _gil bias_, containing a poem by himself in the middle of the page and with illustrations by steinlen. a strange, solitary figure used to sit in one corner, speaking to no one, and never ordering more than a bowl of chocolate and two sous of bread. it was known merely that he was an hungarian and an artist, and from his patched and frayed clothes and meagre fare it was surmised that he was poor. but he had a wonderful face. want was plainly stamped upon it, but behind it shone a determination and a hope that nothing could repress. there was not a soul among the boarders but that would have been glad to assist in easing whatever burden sat upon him, and no doubt it was his suspicion of that fact and his dread of its manifestation that made him hold absolutely aloof. madame darblay once or twice made efforts to get nearer to him, but he gently and firmly repulsed her. he was a pitiable figure, but his pride was invincible, and with eyes looking straight forward, he held up his head and walked like a king. he came and went as a shadow. none knew where he had a room. there were many stories and conjectures about him, but he wrapped his mantle of mystery and solitude about him and was wholly inaccessible. it was clear to see that he lived in another world,--a world of hopes, filled with bright images of peace and renown. after a time his seat became vacant, and i shall presently tell how it happened. these will suffice as types of the maison darblay, though i might mention old m. decamp, eighty-four years of age, and as hearty and jovial a man as one would care to see. in his younger days he had been an actor, having had a fame during the empire of napoléon iii. and there were a professor of languages, who gave lessons at fifteen sous an hour, a journalist of the _figaro_, and two pretty milliner girls from the shop next door. the great event at the maison darblay came not long ago, when m. darblay's two charming daughters had a double wedding, each with a comfortable dot, for m. darblay had grown quite rich out of his restaurant, owning several new houses. the girls were married twice,--once at the mairie on the rue gassendi, and again at the eglise st. pierre, on the avenue du maine. then came the great wedding-dinner at the maison darblay, to which all the boarders were invited. the tables were all connected, so as to make two long rows. the bridal-party were seated at the end next the kitchen, and the front door was locked to exclude strangers. m. darblay was elegant in a new dress suit and white shirt, but his tailor, in trying to give him a trim figure, made the situation embarrassing, as m. darblay's girth steadily increased during the progress of the banquet. he made a very fine speech, which was uproariously cheered. [illustration: 9166] madame darblay was remarkably handsome in a red satin gown, and bore so distinguished an air, and looked so transformed from her usual kitchen appearance, that we could only marvel and admire. then came the kissing of the brides, a duty that was performed most heartily. madame darblay was very happy and proud, and her dinner was a triumph to have lived for. bishop sat opposite the wicked mademoiselle brunerye, and he and she made violent love, and behaved with conspicuous lack of dignity. m. fontaine, the great, had one of the chic milliners for partner. old m. decamp told some racy stories of the old régime. when the coffee and liqueurs came on, the big artist brought out a guitar and the poet a mandolin, and we had music. then the poet read a poem that he had written for the occasion. the actresses sang their sprightliest songs. mademoiselle brunerye sang "_ça fait toujours plaisir_" to bishop. m. fontaine gave in a dramatic manner a scene from "_les deux gosses_," the heavy villain assisting, the cook's aprons and towels serving to make the costumes. bishop sang "down on the farm." in short, it was a splendid evening in bohemia, of a kind that bohemians enjoy and know how to make the most of. [illustration: 0167] there was one silent guest, the strange young hungarian artist. he ate with a ravenous appetite, openly and unashamed. after he had had his fill (and madame darblay saw to it that he found his plate always replenished), he smiled occasionally at the bright sallies of the other guests, but for the most part he sat constrained, and would speak only when addressed,--he protested that his french was too imperfect. it was so evident that he wished to escape notice entirely that no serious effort was made to draw him out. that was a hard winter. a few weeks after the wedding the hungarian's visits to the maison dar-blay suddenly ceased. the haunted look had been deepening in his eyes, his gaunt cheeks had grown thinner, and he looked like a hunted man. after his disappearance the gendarmes came to the restaurant to make inquiries about him. bishop and i were present. they wanted to know if the young man had any friends there. we told them that we would be his friends. "then you will take charge of his body?" they asked. we followed them to the rue perceval, where they turned us over to the concierge of an old building. she was very glad we had come, as the lad seemed not to have had a friend in the world. she led us up to the sixth floor, and then pointed to a ladder leading up to the roof. we ascended it, and found a box built on the roof. it gave a splendid view of paris. the door of the box was closed. we opened it, and the young artist lay before us dead. there were two articles of furniture in the room. one was the bare mattress on the floor, upon which he lay, and the other was an old dresser, from which some of the drawers were missing. the young man lay drawn up, fully dressed, his coat-collar turned up about his ears. thus he had fallen asleep, and thus hunger and cold had slain him as he slept. there was one thing else in the room, all besides, including the stove and the bed-covering, having gone for the purchase of painting material. it was an unfinished oil-painting of the crucifixion. had he lived to finish it, i am sure it would have made him famous, if for nothing else than the wonderful expression of agony in the saviour's face, an agony infinitely worse than the physical pain of the crucifixion could have produced. there was still one thing more,--a white rat that was, hunting industriously for food, nibbling desiccated cheese-rinds that it found on the shelves against the wall. it had been the artist's one friend and companion in life. and all that, too, is a part of life in bohemian paris. on the rue marie, not far from the gare montparnasse, is the "club," a small and artistically dirty wine-shop and restaurant, patronized by a select crowd of musketeers of the brush. the warm, dark tones of the anciently papered walls are hidden beneath a cloud of oil sketches, charcoal drawings, and caricatures of everything and everybody that the fancies of the bohemians could devise. madame annaie is mistress of the establishment, and her cook, m. annaie, wears his cap rakishly on one side, and attends to his business; and he makes very good potages and rôtis, considering the small prices that are charged. yet even the prices, though the main attraction, are paid with difficulty by a majority of the habitués, who sometimes fall months in arrears. madame annaie keeps a big book of accounts. of the members of the club, four are americans, two spaniards, one an italian, one a welshman, one a pole, one a turk, one a swiss, and the rest french,--just fifteen in all, and all sculptors and painters except one of the americans, who is correspondent of a new york paper. at seven o'clock every evening the roll is called by the pole, who acts as president, secretary, and treasurer of the club. a fine of two sous is imposed for every absence; this goes to the "smoker" fund. joanskouie, the multiple officer, has not many burdensome duties, but even these few are a severe tax upon his highly nervous temperament. besides collecting the fines he must gather up also the dues, which are a franc a month. all the members are black-listed, including the president himself, and the names of the delinquents are posted on the wall. the marble-top tables are black with pencil sketches done at the expense of giles, the welshman, who is the butt of the club. he is a very tall and amazingly lean welshman, with a bewhiskered face, a hooked nose, and a frightful accent when he speaks either english or french. he is an animal sculptor, but leaves his art carefully alone. he is very clever at drawing horses, dogs, and funny cows all over the walls; but he is so droll and stupid, so incredibly stupid, that "giles" is the byword of the club. every month he receives a remittance of two hundred and fifty francs, and immediately starts out to get the full worth of it in the kinds of enjoyment that he finds on the boul' mich', where regularly once a month he is a great favorite with the feminine habitués of the _café_s. when his funds run low, he lies perdu till mid-day; then he appears at madame annaie's, heavy-eyed and stupid, staying until midnight. sometimes he varies this routine by visiting his friends at their studios, where he is made to pose in ridiculous attitudes. the "smoker" is held on the last saturday night of each month, and all the members are present. long clay pipes are provided, and a big bowl of steaming punch, highly seasoned, comes from madame annaie's kitchen. mutually laudatory speeches and toasts, playing musical instruments, and singing songs are in order. the spaniard, with castanets, skilfully executes the fandango on a table. bishop does the danse du ventre. joncierge gives marvellous imitations of sarah bernhardt and other celebrities, including giles, whose drawl and stupidity he makes irresistibly funny. nor do gérôme, bouguereau, and benjamin constant escape his mimicry. haidor, the turk, drawls a turkish song all out of tune, and is rapturously encored. the swiss and the italian render a terrific duo from "aida," and the spaniards sing the "bullfighters' song" superbly. sketches are dashed off continually. they are so clever that it is a pity madame annaie has to wipe them from the tables. on thanksgiving-day the americans gave the club a thanksgiving dinner. it was a great mystery and novelty to the other members, but they enjoyed it hugely. the turkeys were found without much trouble, but the whole city had to be searched for cranberries. at last they were found in a small grocery-shop in the american quarter, on the avenue wagram. bishop superintended the cooking, m. annaie serving as first assistant. how m. annaie stared when he beheld the queer american mixtures that bishop was concocting! "mon dieu! not sugar with meat!" he cried, aghast, seeing bishop serve the turkey with cranberry sauce. a dozen delicious pumpkin-pies that formed part of the menu staggered the old cook. the italian cooked a pot of macaroni with mushroom sauce, and it was superb. "the hole in the wall" eminently deserves its name. it is on the boulevard du montparnasse, within two blocks of the bal bullier. a small iron sign projecting over the door depicts two students looking down at the passers-by over bowls of coffee, rolls also being shown. it was painted by an austrian student in payment of a month's board. the hole is a tiny place, just sufficiently large for its two tables and eight stools, fat madame morel, the proprietress, and a miniature zinc bar filled with absinthe and cognac bottles and drinking glasses. the ceiling is so low that you must bend should you be very tall, for overhead is the sleeping-room of madame morel and her niece; it is reached by a small spiral stair. [illustration: 0173] a narrow slit in the floor against the wall, where the napkin-box hangs, leads down to the dark little kitchen. it is a tight squeeze for madame morel to serve her customers, but she has infinite patience and geniality, and discharges her numerous duties and bears her hardships with unfailing good-nature. it is no easy task to cook a halfdozen orders at once, wait on the tables, run out to the butcher-shop for a chop or a steak, and take in the cash. but she does all this, and much more, having no assistant. the old concierge next door, madame mariolde, runs in to help her occasionally, when she can spare a moment from her own multifarious duties. madame morel's toil-worn hands are not bien propre, but she has a kind heart. for seven years she has lived in this little hole, and during that time has never been farther away than to the grocery-shop on the opposite corner. her niece leaves at seven o'clock in the morning to sew all day on the other side of town, returning at eight at night, tired and listless, but always with a half-sad smile. so we see little of her. many nights i have seen her come in drenched and cold, her faded straw hat limp and askew, and her dark hair clinging to her wet face. for she has walked in the rain all the way from the avenue de l'opéra, unable to afford omnibus fare. she usually earns from two to two and half francs a day, sewing twelve hours. the most interesting of the frequenters of the hole is a slav from trieste, on the adriatic. he is a genius in his way, and full of energy and business sense. his vocation is that of a "lightning-sketch artist," performing at the theatres. he has travelled all over america and europe, and is thoroughly hardened to the ways of the world. whenever he runs out of money he goes up to the rue de la gaieté and gives exhibitions for a week or two at one of the theatres there, receiving from fifty to sixty francs a week. the students all go to see him, and make such a noise and throw so many bouquets (which he returns for the next night) that the theatrical managers, thinking he is a great drawing-card, generally raise his salary as an inducement to make him prolong his stay when he threatens to leave. but he is too thoroughly a bohemian to remain long in a place. last week he suddenly was taken with a desire to visit vienna. soon after he had gone four pretty parisiennes called and wanted to know what had become of their amant. d------, another of the habitués of the hole, is a german musical student. strangers would likely think him mentally deranged, so odd is his conduct. [illustration: 8175] he has two other peculiarities,--extreme sensitiveness and indefatigable industry. he brings his shabby violin-case every evening, takes out his violin after dinner, and at once becomes wholly absorbed in his practice. if he would play something more sprightly and pleasing the other habitués of the hole would not object; but he insists on practising the dreariest, heaviest, and most wearing exercises, the most difficult études, and the finest compositions of the masters. all this is more than the others can bear with patience always; so they wound his sensibilities by throwing bread and napkin-rings at him. i hen he retires to the kitchen, where, sitting on the cooler end of the range, he practises diligently under madame morel's benevolent protection. this is all because he has never found a concierge willing to permit him to study in his room, so tireless is his industry. if i do not mistake, this strange young man will be heard from some day. then there is w------, a student in sculpture, with exceptionally fine talent. he had been an american cowboy, and no trooper could swear more eloquently. he has been making headway, for the salon has given him honorable mention for a strong bronze group of fighting tigers. his social specialty is poker-playing, and he has brought the entire hole under the spell of that magic game. herr prell, from munich, takes delight in torturing the other habitués with accounts of dissections, as he is a medical student at the académie de médecine. the swede, who drinks fourteen absinthes a day, throws stools at herr prell, and tries in other ways to make him fight; but herr prell only laughs, and gives another turn of the dissection-screw. the glee club is one of the features of the hole. it sings every night, but its supreme effort comes when one of the patrons of the hole departs for home. on such occasions the departing comrade has to stand the dinner for all, after which, with its speeches and toasts, he is escorted to the railway station with great éclat, and given a hearty farewell, the glee club singing the parting song at the station. bishop is leading tenor of the glee club. le cabaret du soleil d'or it is only the name of the cabaret of the golden sun that suggests the glorious luminary of day. and yet it is really brilliant in its own queer way, though that brilliancy shines when all else in paris is dark and dead,--at night, and in the latest hours of the night at that. [illustration: 8177] my acquaintance with the golden sun began one foggy night in a cold november, under the guidance of bishop. lured by the fascinations of nocturnal life in the quartier latin, and by its opportunities for the study of life in its strangest phases, bishop had become an habitual nighthawk, leaving the studio nearly every evening about ten o'clock, after he had read a few hours from treasured books gleaned from the stalls along the river, to prowl about with a sketchbook, in quest of queer characters and queer places, where strange lives were lived in the dark half of the day. his knowledge of obscure retreats and their peculiar habitués seemed unlimited. and what an infinite study they offer! the tourist, "doing" bohemian paris as he would the famous art galleries, or notre-dame, or the madeleine, or the _café_s on the boulevards, may, under the guidance of a wise and discerning student, visit one after another of these out-of-the-way resorts where the endless tragedy of human life is working out its mysteries; he may see that one place is dirtier or noisier than another, that the men and women are better dressed and livelier here than there, that the crowd is bigger, or the lights brighter; but he cannot see, except in their meaningless outer aspects, those subtle differences which constitute the heart of the matter. in distance it is not far from the moulin rouge to the cabaret du soleil d'or, but in descending from the dazzling brilliancy and frothy abandon of the red mill to the smoke and grime of the golden sun, we drop from the summit of the tour eiffel to the rat-holes under the bridges of the seine; and yet it is in such as the cabaret of the golden sun that the true student finds the deeper, the more lastingly charming, the strangely saddening spell that lends to the wonderful quartier latin its distinctive character and everlasting fascination. though bishop spoke to me very little of his midnight adventures, i being very busy with my own work, i began to have grave apprehensions on the score of his tastes in that direction; for during the afternoons ridiculous-looking, long-haired, but gentlemannered persons in shabby attire, well-seasoned with the aroma of absinthe and cigarettes, would favor our studio with a call, undoubtedly at bishop's invitation. they brought with them black portfolios or rolls of paper tied with black string, containing verses,--their masterpieces, which were to startle paris, or new songs, which, god favoring, were to be sung at la scala or the ambassadeurs, and thus bring them immortal fame and put abundant fat upon their lean ribs! ah, the deathless hope that makes hunger a welcome companion here! bishop would cleverly entertain these aspiring geniuses with shop talk concerning literature and music, and he had a charming way of dwelling upon the finish and subtlety of their work and comparing it with that of the masters. it usually ended with their posing for him in different attitudes of his suggesting. why waste money on professional models? as bishop's acquaintances became more numerous among this class, we finally set aside tuesday afternoons for their reception. then they would come in generous numbers and enjoy themselves unreservedly with our cognac and biscuits. but ah, the rare pleasures of those afternoons,--as much for the good it did us to see their thin blood warmed with brandy and food as for their delightful entertainment of us and one another. the studio was warm and cheerful on the night when bishop invited me to accompany him out. i had been at work, and presently, when i had finished, i flung myself on the divan for a rest and a smoke, and then became aware of bishop's presence. he was comfortably ensconced in the steamer-chair, propped up with pillows. "aren't you going out to-night?" i inquired. "why, yes. let's see the time. a little after eleven. that's good. you are finished, aren't you? now, if you want a little recreation and wish to see one of the queerest places in paris, come with me." i looked out the window. a cold, dreary night it was. the chimney-pots were dimmed by the thick mist, and the street lamps shone murkily far below. it was a saddening, soaking, dripping night, still, melancholy, and depressing,--the kind of night that lends a strange zest to in-door enjoyment, as though it were a duty to keep the mist and the dreariness out of the house and the heart. but the studio had worn me out, and i was eager to escape from its pleasant coziness. and this was a saturday night, which means something, even in paris. to-morrow there would be rest. so i cheerfully assented. we donned our heaviest top-coats and mufflers, crammed the stove full of coal, and then sallied out into the dripping fog. oh, but it was cold and dismal in the streets! the mist was no longer the obscuring, suggestive, mysterious factor that it had been when seen from the window, but was now a tangible and formidable thing, with a manifest purpose. it struck through our wraps as though they had been cheesecloth. it had swept the streets clear, for not a soul was to be seen except a couple of sergents de ville, all hooded in capes, and a cab that came rattling through the murk with horses a-steam. occasionally a flux of warm light from some _café_ would melt a tunnel through the monotonous opaque haze, but the empty chairs and tables upon the sidewalks facing the _café_s offered no invitation. [illustration: 0181] in front of one of these _café_s, in a sheltered corner made by a glass screen, sat a solitary young woman, dressed stylishly in black, the light catching one of her dainty slippers perched coquettishly upon a foot-rest. a large black hat, tilted wickedly down over her face, cast her eyes in deep shadow and lent her that air of alluring mystery which the women of her class know so well how to cultivate. her neck and chin were buried deep in the collar of her sealskin cape. a gleam of limp white gauze at her throat lent a pleasing relief to the monotone of her attire. upon the table in front of her stood an empty glass and two saucers. as we passed she peered at us from beneath her big hat, and smiled coquettishly, revealing glistening white teeth. the atmosphere of loneliness and desolation that encompassed her gave a singularly pathetic character to her vigil. thus she sat, a picture for an artist, a text for a moralist, pretty, dainty, abandoned. it happened not to be her fortune that her loneliness should be relieved by us.... but other men might be coming afterwards.... all this at a glance through the cold november fog. as we proceeded up the boul' mich' the _café_s grew more numerous and passers-by more frequent, but all these were silent and in a hurry, prodded on by the nipping cold fangs of the night. among the tables outside the _café d'harcourt_ crouched and prowled an old man, bundled in ill-fitting rags, searching for remnants of cigars and cigarettes on the sanded sidewalk. from his glittering eyes, full of suspicion, he turned an angry glance upon us as we paused a moment to observe him, and growled,--"_allons, tu n' peux donc pas laisser un pauv' malheureux?_" bishop tossed him a sou, which he greedily snatched without a word of thanks. [illustration: 8183] at the corner, under the gas-lamps, stood shivering newspaper venders trying to sell their few remaining copies of la dernière édition de la presse. buyers were scarce. we had now reached the place st.-michel and the left bank of the river. we turned to the right, following the river wall toward notre-dame, whose towers were not discernible through the fog. here there was an unbounded wilderness of desolation and solitude. the black seine flowed silently past dark masses that were resolved into big canal-boats, with their sickly green lights reflected in the writhing ink of the river. notre-dame now pushed its massive bulk through the fog, but its towers were lost in the sky. near by a few dim lights shone forth through the slatted windows of the morgue. but its lights never go out. and how significantly close to the river it stands! peering under the arches of the bridges, we found some of the social dregs that sleep there with the rats. it was not difficult to imagine the pretty girl in black whom we had passed coming at last through dissipation and wrinkles and broken health to take refuge with the rats under the bridges, and it is a short step thence to the black waters of the river; and that the scheme of the tragedy might be perfect in all its parts, adjustments, and relations, behold the morgue so near, with its lights that never go out, and boatmen so skilled in dragging the river! and the old man who was gathering the refuse and waste of smokers, it was not impossible that he should find himself taking this route when his joints had grown stiffer, though it would more likely end under the bridges. the streets are very narrow and crooked around notre-dame, and their emanations are as various as the capacity of the human nose for evil odors. the lamps, stuck into the walls of the houses, only make the terrors of such a night more formidable; for while one may feel a certain security in absolute darkness, the shadows to which the lamps lend life have a baffling elusiveness and weirdness, and a habit of movement that makes one instinctively dodge. but that is all the trick of the wind. however that may be, it is wonderful how much more vividly one remembers on such a night the stories of the murders, suicides, and other crimes that lend a particular grewsomeness to the vicinity of the morgue and notre-dame. we again turned to the right, into a narrow, dirty street,--the rue du haut-pavé,--whose windings brought us into a similar street,--the rue galande. bishop halted in front of a low arched door-way, which blazed sombrely in its coat of blood-red paint. a twisted gas-lamp, demoralized and askew, depended overhead, and upon the glass enclosing it was painted, with artistic flourishes,--"au soleil d'or." this was the cabaret of the golden sun,--all unconscious of the mockery of its name, another of those whimsical disjointings in which the shadowy side of paris is so prolific. from the interior of the luminary came faintly the notes of a song, with piano accompaniment. the archway opened into a small court paved with ill-fitted flint blocks. at the farther end of it another gas-lamp flickered at the head of a flight of stairs leading underground. as we approached the steps a woman sprang from the shadow, and with a cry, half of fear and half of anger, fled to the street. at that moment memories of the cosiness of our studio became doubly enticing,--one cannot always approach unfamiliar underground paris with perfect courage. but bishop's coolness was reassuring. he had already descended the steps, and there was nothing left for me but to follow. at the foot of the stairs were half-glass doors curtained with cheap red cloth. a warm, thick, suffocating gust of air, heavy with the fumes of beer, wine, and tobacco, assailed our cold faces as we pushed open the doors and entered the room. for a moment it was difficult to see clearly, so dense was the smoke. it was packed against the ceiling like a bank of fog, diminishing in density downward, and shot through with long banner-like streamers of smoke freshly emitted. the human atmosphere of the place could not be caught at once. a stranger would not have known for the moment whether he was with thieves or artists. but very soon its distinctive spirit made its presence and character manifest. the room--which was not a large one--was well filled with an assortment of those queer and interesting people some of whom bishop had entertained at the studio, only here their characteristics were more pronounced, for they were in their natural element, depressed and hampered by no constraints except of their own devising. a great many were women, although it could be seen at a glance that they were not of the nymphs who flitted among the glittering _café_s, gowned in delicate laces and sheeny sculptured silks, the essence of mignonette pervading their environment. no; these were different. [illustration:0187] here one finds, not the student life of paris, but its most unconventional bohemian life. here, in this underground rendezvous, a dirty old hole about twenty feet below the street level, gather nightly the happy-go-lucky poets, musicians, and singers for whom the great busy world has no use, and who, in their unrelaxing poverty, live in the tobacco clouds of their own construction, caring nothing for social canons, obeyers of the civil law because of their scorn of meanness, injustice, and crime, suffering unceasingly for the poorest comforts of life, ambitious without energy, hopeful without effort, cheerful under the direst pressure of need, kindly, simple, proud, and pitiful. all were seated at little round tables, as are the habitués of the _café_s, and their attention was directed upon a slim young fellow with curling yellow hair and a faint moustache, who was singing, leaning meanwhile upon a piano that stood on a low platform in one corner of the room. their attention was respectful, delicate, sympathetic, and, as might be supposed, brought out the best in the lad. it was evident that he had not long been a member of the sacred circle. his voice was a smooth, velvety tenor, and under proper instruction might have been useful to its possessor as a means of earning a livelihood. but it was clear that he had already fallen under the spell of the associations to which accident or his inclination had brought him; and this meant that henceforth he would live in this strange no-world of dreams, hopes, sufferings, and idleness, and that likely he would in time come to gather cigar-stumps on the sanded pavement of the café d'harcourt, and after that sleep with the rats under the bridges of the seine. at this moment, however, he lived in the clouds; he breathed and glowed with the spirit of shiftless, proud, starving bohemianism as it is lived in paris, benignantly disdainful of the great moiling, money-grubbing world that roared around him, and perhaps already the adoration of some girl of poetic or artistic tastes and aspirations, who was serving him as only the church gives a woman the right. there was time to look about while he was singing, though that was difficult, so strange and pathetic a picture he made. the walls of the room were dirty and bare, though relieved at rare intervals by sketches and signs. the light came from three gas-burners, and was reflected by a long mirror at one end of the room. no attention had been paid to our entrance, except by the garçon, a heavy-set, bull-necked fellow, who, with a sign, bade us make no noise. when the song had finished the audience broke into uproarious applause, shouting, "_bravo, mon vieux!" "bien fait, marquis!_" and the clapping of hands and beating of glasses on the marble-topped tables and pounding of canes on the floor made a mighty din. the young singer, his cheeks glowing and his eyes blazing, modestly rolled up his music and sought his seat. we were now piloted to seats by the garçon, who, when we had settled ourselves, demanded to know what we would drink. "_deux bocks!_" he yelled across the room. "_deux bocks!_" came echoing back from the counter, where a fat woman presided--knitting. several long-haired littérateurs--friends of bishop's--came up and saluted him and shook his hand, all with a certain elegance and dignity. he, in turn, introduced me, and the conversation at once turned to art, music, and poetry. whatever the sensational news of the day, whatever the crisis in the cabinet, whatever anything might have been that was stirring the people in the great outside commonplace world, these men and women gave it no heed whatever. what was the gross, hard, eager world to them? did not the glories of the golden sun lend sufficient warmth to their hearts, and were not their vague aspirations and idle hopes ample stimulants to their minds and spirits? they quickly found a responsive mood in us, and this so delighted them that they ordered the drinks. the presiding genius at the piano was a whitehaired, spiritual-looking man, whose snowy locks gave the only indication of his age; for his face was filled with the eternal youthfulness of a careless and contented heart. his slender, delicate fingers told of his temperament, his thin cheeks of his poverty, and his splendid dreamy eyes of the separate life that he lived. standing on the platform beside him was a man of a very different type. it was' the pianist's function to be merely a musician; but the other man--the musical director--was one from whom judgment, decision, and authority were required. therefore he was large, powerful, and bigstomached, and had a pumpkin head, and fat, baggy eyes that shone through narrow slits. he now stepped forward and rang a little bell, upon which all talking was instantly hushed. "_mesdames et messieurs_," he said, in a large, capable voice, "_j'ai l'honneur de vous annoncer que madame louise leroux, nous lira ses dernières oeuvres--une faveur que nous apprécierons tous_." [illustration: 8192] a young woman--about twenty-three, i should judge--arose from one of the tables where she had been sitting talking with an insipid-looking gentleman adorned with a blond moustache and vacant, staring-eyes; he wore a heavy coat trimmed with astrachan collar and cuffs, which, being open at the throat, revealed the absence of a shirt from his body. a latin quarter top-hat was pushed back on his head, and his long, greasy hair hung down over his collar. madame leroux smiled affectionately at him as she daintily flicked the ashes from her cigarette and laid it upon the table, and moistened her thin red lips with a yellow liqueur from her glass. he responded with a condescending jerk of his head, and, diving into one of the inner pockets of his coat, brought forth a roll of paper, which she took. a great clapping of hands and loud cries of her name greeted her as she stepped upon the platform, but it was clearly to be seen from her indifferent air that she had been long accustomed to this attention. the big musical director again rang his bell. "_il était une fois,_" she said, simply. the pianist fingered the keys softly, and she began to recite. [illustration: 0193] the room was as still as a chapel. every one listened in profound absorption; even the stolid bull-necked waiter leaned against the wall, his gaze fastened upon her with respectful interest. she spoke slowly, in a low, sweet tone, the soft accompaniment of the piano following the rhythm of her voice with wonderful effectiveness. she seemed to forget her surroundings,--the hot, close room, crowded with shabby, eccentric geniuses who lived from hand to mouth, the poverty that evidently was her lot,--even her lover, who sat watching her with a cold, critical, half-disdainful air, making notes upon a slip of paper, now nodding his head approvingly, now frowning, when pleased or displeased with her performance. she was a rare picture as she thus stood and recited, a charming swing to her trim figure, half reclining upon the piano, her black hair falling loosely and caressing her forehead and casting her dark eyes in deeper shadow, and all her soul going forth in the low, soft, subdued passion of her verses. she reminded one greatly of bernhardt, and might have been as great. during her whole rendering of this beautiful and pathetic tale of "other times" she scarcely moved, save for some slight gesture that suggested worlds. how well the lines suited her own history and condition only she could have told. who was she? what had she been? surely this strange woman, hardly more than a mere girl, capable of such feelings and of rendering them with so subtle force and beauty, had lived another life,-no one knew, no one cared. loud shouts of admiration and long applause rang through the room as she slowly and with infinite tenderness uttered the last line with bowed head and a choking voice. she stood for a moment while the room thundered, and then the noise seemed to recall her, to drag her back from some haunting memory to the squalor of her present condition, and then her eyes eagerly sought the gentleman of the fur-collared coat. it was an anxious glance that she cast upon him. he carelessly nodded once or twice, and she instantly became transfigured. the melancholy of her eyes and the wretched dejection of her pose disappeared, and her sad face lit up with a beaming, happy smile. she was starting to return to him, all the woman in her awaking to affection and a yearning for the refuge of his love, when the vociferous cries of the crowd for an encore, and the waving of her lover's hand as a signal for her to comply, sent her back on guard to the piano again. her smile was very sweet and her voice full of trippling melody when she now recited a gay little ballad,--also her own composition,--"_amours joyeux_,"--in so entirely different a spirit that it was almost impossible to believe her the same mortal. every fibre of her being participated in the rollicking abandon of the piece, and her eyes were flooded with the mellow radiance of supreme love satisfied and victorious. upon regaining her seat she was immediately surrounded by a praisegiving crowd, who shook hands with her and heartily congratulated her; but it was clear that she could think only of him of the fur collar, and that no word of praise or blame would weigh with her the smallest fraction of a feather's weight unless this one man uttered it. she disengaged her hand from her crowding admirers and deftly donned her little white alpine hat, all the while looking into the face of the one man who could break her heart or send her to heaven. he sat looking at his boot, indifferent, bored. presently he looked up into her anxious eyes, gazed at her a moment, and then leaned forward and spoke a word. it sent her to heaven. her face all aglow and her eyes shining with happiness, she called the garçon, paid for the four saucers upon the table, and left the room upon the arm of her lover. "how she does adore that dog!" exclaimed my friend the musician. "what does he do?" i asked. "do?" he echoed. "nothing. it is she who does all. without her he would starve. he is a writer of some ability, but too much of a socialist to work seriously. in her eyes he is the greatest writer in the world. she would sacrifice everything to please him. without him her life would fall into a complete blank, and her recklessness would quickly send her into the lowermost ranks. when a woman like that loves, she loves--ah, _les femmes sont difficiles à comprendre!_" my friend sighed, burying his moustaches in a foaming bock. individual definition grew clearer as i became more and more accustomed to the place and its habitués. it seemed that nearly all of them were absinthe-drinkers, and that they drank a great deal,--all they could get, i was made to understand. they care little about their dress and the other accessories of their personal appearance, though here and there they exhibit the oddest finery, into whose possession they fall by means which casual investigation could not discover, and which is singularly out of harmony with the other articles of their attire and with the environment which they choose. as a rule, the men wear their hair very long and in heavy, shaggy masses over their ears and faces. they continually roll and smoke cigarettes, though there are many pipes, and big ones at that. but though they constitute a strange crowd, there is about them a distinct air of refinement, a certain dignity and pride that never fail, and withal a gentleness that renders any approach to ruffianism impossible. the women take a little more pride in their appearance than the men. even in their carelessness and seeming indifference there abides with nearly all of them the power to lend themselves some single touch of grace that is wonderfully redeeming, and that is infinitely finer and more elusive than the showy daintiness of the women of the _café_s. as a rule, these bohemians all sleep during the day, as that is the best way to keep warm; at night they can find warmth in the cabarets. in the afternoon they may write a few lines, which they sell in some way for a pittance, wherewithal to buy them a meal and a night's vigil in one of these resorts. this is the life of lower bohemia plain and simple,--not the life of the students, but of the misfit geniuses who drift, who have neither place nor part in the world, who live from hand to mouth, and who shudder when the morgue is mentioned,--and it is so near, and its lights never go out! they are merely protestants against the formalism of life, rebels against its necessities. they seek no following, they desire to exercise no influence. they lead their vacant lives without the slightest restraint, bear their poverty without a murmur, and go to their dreary end without a sigh. these are the true bohemians of paris. other visitors came into the soleil d'or and sought seats among their friends at the tables, while others kept leaving, bound for other rendezvous, many staying just sufficiently long to hear a song or two. they were all of the same class, very negligently and poorly attired, some displaying their odd pieces of finery with an exquisite assumption of unconsciousness on its account, as though they were millionaires and cared nothing for such trivial things. and the whimsical incongruities of it! if one wore a shining tile he either had no shirt (or perhaps a very badly soiled one), or wore a frayed coat and disreputable shoes. in fact, no complete respectable dress made its appearance in the room that night, though each visitor had his distinctive specialty,--one a burnished top hat, another a gorgeous cravat, another a rich velvet jacket, and so on. but they all wore their hair as long as it would grow. that is the bohemian mark. the little bell again rang, and the heavy director announced that "monsieur léon décarmeau will sing one of his newest songs." monsieur léon décarmeau was a lean, half-starved appearing man of about forty, whose eyes were sunk deep in his head, and whose sharp cheek-bones protruded prominently. on the bridge of his thin, angular nose set a pair of "pince-nez," attached by a broad black cord, which he kept fingering nervously as he sang. his song was entitled "fleurs et pensées," and he threw himself into it with a broad and passionate eagerness that heavily strained the barrier between melodrama and burlesque. his glance sought the ceiling in a frenzied quest of imaginary nymphs, his arms swayed as he tenderly caressed imaginary flowers of sweet love and drank in their intoxicating perfume instead of the hot, tobacco-rife smoke of the room. his voice was drawn out in tremendous sighs full of tears, and his chest heaved like a blacksmith's bellows. but when he had ceased he was most generously applauded and praised. during the intervals between the songs and recitations the room was noisy with laughter, talking, and the clinking of glasses. the one garçon was industriously serving boissons and yelling orders to the bar, where the fat woman sat industriously knitting, heedless, as might have been expected of the keeper of the cave of adullam, and awakening to activity only when the stentorian yells of the garçon's orders rose above the din of the establishment. absinthe and beer formed the principal beverages, though, as a rule, absinthe was taken only just before a meal, and then it served as an appetizer,--a sharpener of hunger to these who had so little wherewithal to satisfy the hunger that unaided nature created! the mystery of the means by which these lighthearted bohemians sustained their precarious existence was not revealed to me; yet here they sat, and laughed, and talked, and recited the poetry of their own manufacture, and sang their songs, and drank, and smoked their big pipes, and rolled cigarettes incessantly, happy enough in the hour of their lives, bringing hither none of the pains and pangs and numbing evidences of their struggles. and there was no touch of the sordid in the composite picture that they made, and a certain tinge of intellectual refinement, a certain spirituality that seemed to raise them infinitely above the plane of the lowly strugglers who won their honest bread by honest labor, shone about them as a halo. their dark hours, no doubt, came with the daylight, and in these meetings at the cabaret they found an agreeable way in which to while away the dismal interval that burdened their lives when they were not asleep; for the cabaret was warm and bright, warmer and brighter than their own wretched little rooms au cinquième,--and coal and candles are expensive luxuries! here, if their productions haply could not find a larger and more remunerative audience, they could at least be heard,--by a few, it is true, but a most appreciative few, and that is something of value equal to bread. and then, who could tell but what fame might unexpectedly crown them in the end? it has happened thus. "but why worry?" asked the musician. "'laugh, and the world laughs with you. if we do not live a long life, it is at least a jolly one,' is our motto and certainly they gave it most faithful allegiance." i learned from bishop that the musical director received three francs a night for his services. should singers happen to be lacking, or should the evening be dull for other reason, he himself must sing and recite; for the tension of the soleil d'or must be kept forever taut. the old white-haired pianist received two francs a night, and each of these contributors to the gayety of the place was given a drink gratis. so there was at least some recompense besides the essential one of appreciation from the audience. glasses clinked merrily, and poets and composers flitted about the room to chat with their contemporaries. a sketch artist, deftly drawing the portrait of a baritone's jolly little mistress, was surrounded by a bantering group, that passed keen, intelligent, and good-natured criticism on the work as it rapidly grew under his hands. the whitehaired pianist sat puffing at his cigarette and looking over some music with a rather pretty young woman who had written popular songs of la villette. the opening of the doors and the straggling entrance of three men sent an instant hush throughout the room. "verlaine!" whispered the musician to me. it was indeed the great poet of the slums,--the epitome and idol of bohemian paris, the famous man whose verses had rung throughout the length and breadth of the city, the one man who, knowing the heart and soul of the stragglers who found light and warmth in such places as the soleil d'or, had the brains and grace to set the strange picture adequately before the wondering world. the musical director, as well as a number of others in the place, stepped forward, and with touching deference and tenderness greeted the remarkable man and his two companions. it was easy to pick out verlaine without relying upon the special distinction with which he was greeted. he had the oddest slanting eyes, a small, stubby nose, and wiry whiskers, and his massive forehead heavily overhung his queerly shaped eyes. he was all muffled up to the chin; wore a badly soiled hat and a shabby dark coat. under one arm he carried a small black portfolio. [illustration: 8202] several of the women ran to him and kissed him on both cheeks, which salutations he heartily returned, with interest. one of his companions was monsieur bi-bi-dans-la-purée--so he was called, though seemingly he might have been in anything as well as soup. he was an exceedingly interesting figure. his sunken, drawn, smoothshaven face gave terrible evidence of the excessive use of absinthe. a large hooked nose overshadowed a wide, loose mouth that hung down at the corners, and served to set forth in startling relief the sickly leaden color of his face. when he spoke, a few straggling teeth gleamed unpleasantly. he wore no overcoat, and his jacket hung open, disclosing a half-opened shirt that exposed his bare breast. his frayed trousers dragged the ground at his heels. but his eyes were the most terrible part of him; they shone with the wild, restless light of a madman, and their gaze was generally flitting and distrait, acknowledging no acquaintances. afterwards, when verlaine was dead, i often saw monsieur bi-bi-dansla-purée on the street, looking most desolate, a roll of white manuscript in his hand, his coat and shirt wide open, exposing his naked breast to the biting cold wind. he seemed to be living altogether in another world, and gazed about him with the same unseeing vacant stare that so startled me that night in the soleil d'or. when verlaine and his companions were seated--by displacing the artist--the recitations and songs recommenced; and it was noticeable that they were rendered with augmented spirit, that the famous poet of the slums might be duly impressed with the capabilities and hospitable intentions of his entertainers; for now all performed for verlaine, not for one another. the distinguished visitor had removed his slouch hat, revealing the wonderful oblong dome of his bald head, which shone like the soleil d'or; and many were the kisses reverently and affectionately bestowed upon that glistening eminence by the poet's numerous female admirers in the throng. a reckless-looking young woman, with a black hat drawn down over her eyes, and wearing glasses, was now reciting. her hands were gloved in black, but the finger-tips were worn through,--a fact which she made all the more evident by a peculiar gesture of the fingers. as the small hours grew larger these gay bohemians waxed gayer and livelier. formalities were gradually abandoned, and the constraint of dignity and reserve slowly melted under the mellowing influences of the place. ceremonious observances were dropped one by one; and whereas there had been the most respectful and insistent silence throughout the songs, now all joined heartily in the choruses, making the dim lights dance in the exuberance of the enjoyment. i had earnestly hoped that verlaine, splendid as was his dignity, might thaw under the gathering warmth of the hour, but beyond listening respectfully, applauding moderately, and returning the greetings that were given him, he held aloof from the influence of the occasion, and after draining his glass and bidding good-night to his many friends, with his two companions he made off to another rendezvous. monsieur le directeur came over to our table and asked bishop to favor the audience with a "_chanson américaine_." this rather staggered my modest friend, but he finally yielded to entreaties. the director rang his little bell again and announced that "monsieur beeshup" would sing a song _à l'américaine_. this was received with uproarious shouts by all, and several left their seats and escorted bishop to the platform. i wondered what on earth he would sing. the accompanist, after a little coaching from bishop, assailed the chords, and bishop began drawling out his old favorite, "down on the farm." he did it nobly, too, giving the accompanist occasion for labor in finding the more difficult harmonies. the hearers, though they did not understand a word of the ditty, and therefore lost the whole of its pathos, nevertheless listened with curious interest and respect, though with evident veiled amusement. many quick ears caught the refrain. at first there came an exceedingly soft chorus from the room, and it gradually rose until the whole crowd had thrown itself into the spirit of the melody, and swelled it to a mighty volume. bishop led the singers, beating time with his right arm, his left thumb meanwhile hooked in the arm-hole of his waistcoat. "_bravo! bravo, beeshup! bis!_" they yelled, when it was finished, and then the room rang with a salvo of hand-clappings in unison: 1-2--3-4-5--1-2-34-5--1-2-3-4-5--1--2--3!! a great ovation greeted him as he marched with glowing cheeks to his seat, and those who knew him crowded round him for a hand-shake. the musician asked him if he would sing the song in private for him, that he might write down the melody, to which bishop agreed, on condition that the musician pose for him. bishop had a singularly sharp eye for opportunities. the sketch artist sauntered over and sat down at our table to have a chat with bishop. he was a singular fellow. his manner was smoothed by a fine and delicate courtesy, bespeaking a careful rearing, whose effects his loose life and promiscuous associations could not obliterate. his age was about thirty-two, though he looked much older,--this being due in part to his hard life and in other part to the heavy whiskers that he wore. an absurd little round felt hat sat precariously on his riotous mane, and i was in constant apprehension lest it should fall off every time he shook his head. over his shoulders was a blue cape covering a once white shirt that was devoid of a collar. his fingers were all black with the crayon that he had used in sketching. he said that he had already earned twelve sous that evening, making portraits at six sous a head! but there was not so much money to be made in a place like this as in the big _café_s,--the frequenters were too poor. [illustration: 0206] i asked him where he had studied and learned his art, for it could be easily seen that he had had some training; his portraits were not half bad, and showed a knowledge of drawing. he thereupon told me his story. he had come to paris thirteen years before from nantes, brittany, to study art. his father kept a small grocery and provision-shop in nantes, and lived in meagre circumstances. the son having discovered what his father deemed a remarkable talent for drawing when a boy, the father sent him to paris, with an allowance of a hundred francs a month, and he had to deny himself severely to furnish it. when the young man arrived at paris he studied diligently at the ecole des beaux-arts for a while, and became acquainted with many of the students and models. he soon found the easy life of the _café_s, with the models for companions, more fascinating than the dull grind of the school. it was much pleasanter to enjoy the gayety of the nights and sleep all day than drone and labor at his easel. as his small allowance did not permit of extravagance, he fell deeply into debt, and gave more heed to absinthe than his meals,--it is cheaper, more alluring, and brings an exhilaration that sharpens wit and equips the soul with wings. for a whole year the father was in total ignorance of his son's conduct, but one day a friend, who had seen the young man in paris, laid the ugly story in his father's ear. this so enraged the father that he instantly stopped the remittances and disowned his son. all appeals for money, all promises to reform, were in vain, and so the young madcap was forced to look about for a means of subsistence. and thus it was that he drifted into the occupation of a sketch artist, making portraits in the _café_s all night and sleeping in daytime. this brought him a scant living. but there was his mistress, marcelle, always faithful to him. she worked during the day at sewing, and shared her small earnings with him. all went fairly well during the summer, but in winter the days were short, marcelle's earnings were reduced, and the weather was bitter cold. still, it was not so bad as it might be, he protested; but underneath his easy flippancy i imagined i caught a shadow,--a flitting sense of the hollowness and misery and hopelessness and shame of it all. but i am not certain of that. he had but gone the way of many and many another, and others now are following in his footsteps, deluding self-denying parents, and setting foot in the road which, so broad and shining at the beginning, narrows and darkens as it leads nearer and nearer to the ratholes under the bridges of the seine, and to the grim house whose lights forever shine at night under the shadow of notre-dame. had monsieur a cigarette to spare? monsieur had, and monsieur thought that the thanks for it were out of all proportion to its value; but they were totally eclipsed by the praises of monsieur's wonderful generosity in paying for a glass of absinthe and sugar for the man who made faces at six sous apiece. the quiet but none the less high tension of the place, the noise of the singing, the rattling of glasses and saucers, the stifling foul air of the room, filled me with weariness and threatened me with nausea. things had moved in a constant whirl all night, and now it was nearly four o'clock. how much longer will this last? "till five o'clock," answered the musician; then all the lights go out, and the place is closed; and our friends seek their cold, cheerless rooms, to sleep far into the afternoon. we paid for our saucers, and after parting adieux left in company with the musician and the aesthetic poet. how deliciously sharp and refreshing was the cold, biting air as we stepped out into the night! it seemed as though i had been breathing molasses. the fog was thicker than ever, and the night was colder. the two twisted gas-lamps were no longer burning as we crossed the slippery stone-paved court and ascended to the narrow street. the musician wrapped a gray muffler about his throat and thrust his hands deep into his pockets. the poet had no top-coat, but he buttoned his thin jacket tightly about him, and shivered. "shall we have some lait chaud and a croissant?" inquired the musician. yes, anything hot would be good, even milk; but where could we get it? "ah, you shall see!" we had not gone far when it gave me a start to recognize a figure that we had seen in the boul' mich' on our way to the soleil d'or. it was that of an outcast of the boulevards, now slinking through the shadows toward the river. we had been accosted by him in front of one of the brilliant _café_s, as, trembling and rubbing his hands, a picture of hopeless dejection and misery, and in a quavering voice he begged us to buy him a drink of brandy. [illustration: 0210] it probably saved him from an attack of delirium tremens that night, but here he was drifting, with a singular fatality, toward the river and the morgue. now, that his day's work of begging was done, all his jackal watchfulness had disappeared, and an inner vision seemed to look forth from his bleared eyes as their gaze strained straight and dull toward the black river. it may have been a mere fancy, but the expression in his eyes reminded me strongly of similar things that i had seen on the slabs in the morgue. we crossed the rue du haut-pavé again to the river wall, and arrived at the bridge leading back of notre-dame and past the morgue. on the farther end of the bridge, propped against the parapet, was a small stand, upon a corner of which a dim lamp was burning. in front were a number of milk-cans, and on a small counter were a row of thick white bowls and a basket of croissants. inside, upon a small stove, red with heat, were two kettles from which issued clouds of steam bearing an odor of boiling milk. a stout woman, her face so well wrapped in a shawl that only the end of her red nose was visible, greeted us,--"_bon jour, messieurs. en voulez-vous du bon lait bien chaud?_" she poured out four bowls of steaming milk, and gave us each a roll. for this luxury we paid three sous each; and a feast it was, for the shivering poet, at least, for he licked the hot bowl clean and ate the very crumbs of his croissant. as we were bound for widely separated quarters, our bohemian friends bade us an affectionate good-night, and were soon swallowed up in the gloom. we turned towards home and the boul' mich'. all the _café_s were closed and dark, but the boulevard was alive with canal-boatmen, streetsweepers, and rumbling vegetableand milk-carts. the streets were being washed clean of all evidences of the previous day's life and turmoil, and the great city was creeping forth from its lair to begin another. [illustration: 5213] the café procope in the short, busy little street, the rue de l'ancienne-comédie, which runs from the boulevard st. germain, in a line from the théâtre national de l'odéon and connecting with the rue mazarin, its continuation, the heavy dome of the institut looming at its end, is to be found probably the most famous _café_ in paris, for in its day it has been the rendezvous of the most noted french littérateurs, politicians, and savants. what is more, the procope was the first _café_ established in paris, originating the appellation "_café_" to a place where coffee is served, for it was here that coffee was introduced to france as an after-dinner comforter. that was when the famous _café_ was in its glory. some of the great celebrities who made it famous have been dead for nearly two hundred years, though its greatest fame came a century afterwards; and now the _café_, no longer glorious as it was when the old théâtre français stood opposite, reposes in a quiet street far from the noise and glitter and life of the boulevards, and lives on the splendid memories that crowd it. other _café_s by the thousand have sprung into existence, and the word has spread to coffee saloons and restaurants throughout christendom; and the ancient rive droite nurses the history and relics of the golden days of its glory, alone in a quiet street, surrounded by tightly shut shops, and the calm of a sleeping village. still, it retains many of its ancient characteristics and much of the old-time quaintness peculiar to itself and setting it wholly apart, and it is yet the rendezvous of littérateurs and artists, who, if not so famous as the great men in whose seats they sit, play a considerable rôle in the life of modern paris. the front of the _café_ is a neat little terrace off the street, screened by a fanciful net-work of vines and shrubbery that spring from green painted boxes and that conceal cosey little tables and corners placed behind them. instead of the usual showy plate-windows, one still finds the quaint old window-panes, very small carreaux, kept highly polished by the tireless garçon apprentice. tacked to the white pillars are numerous copies of _le procope_, a weekly journal published by théo, the proprietor of the _café_. its contributors are the authors, journalists, and poets who frequent the _café_, and it publishes a number of portraits besides, and some spirited drawings. it is devoted in part to the history of the _café_ and of the celebrities who have made it famous, and publishes portraits of them, from voltaire to paul verlaine. this same journal was published here over two hundred years ago, in 1689, and it was the means then by which the patrons of the establishment kept in closer touch with their contemporaries and the spirit of the time. théo is proprietor and business manager, as well as editor. [illustration: 0215] the following two poems will give an idea of the grace of the matter contained in le procope: à une espagnole au loin, quand, l'oil rêveur et d'ennuis l'âme pleine, je suivrai sur les flots le vol des alcyons chaque soir surgira dans les derniers rayons le profil triste et doux d'ida, de ma sirène. la figure et de lys et d'iris transparente, ressortira plus blanche en l'ombre des cheveux profonds comme un mystère et troublants et mes yeux boiront dans l'idéal sa caresse enivrante. et je rechercherai l'énigme du sourire railleur ou de pitié qui luisait dans ses yeux en des paillettes d'or sous ses beaux cils ombreux.... et je retomberai dans la tristesse... et dire qu'un seul mot me rendrait et la vie et l'espoir: belle, mon rendez-vous n'est-il point pour ce soir? l birr. petite chanson désolée je suis seul dans la grande ville où nul n'a fêté mon retour, cour vide, et cerveau qui vacille, sans projet, sans but, sans amour je suis seul dans la grande ville. le dos voûté, les bras ballants, je marche au hasard dans la foule a longs pas lourds et nonchalants, on me pousse, heurte, refoule, le dos voûté, les bras ballants. je suis accablé de silence, de ce silence intérieur, tel un brouillard subtil et dense, qui tombe à plis lourds sur le cour, je suis accablé de silence. ah! quand viendront les jours heureux, quand viendra la chère attendue qu'espère mon cour amoureux, qu'implore mon âme éperdue, ah! quand viendront les jours heureux! achille segard. here is a particularly charming little poem, written in the musical french of two or three centuries ago: un bayser sur vostre lèvre fraîche et rose, ma mye, ah! laissiez-moi poser cette tant bonne et doulce chose, un bayser. telle une fleur au jour éclose, le vois vostre teint se roser; si ie vous redonnois,--ie n'ose, un bayser. laissiez-moi vous prendre, inhumaine, a chascun iour de la sepmaine un bayser. trop tôt viendront vieil aage et peine! lors n'aurez plus, l'eussiez-vous reine, un bayser. maistre guillaume. the modern gas illumination of the _café_, in contrast to the fashion of brilliant lighting that prevails in the showy _café_s of the boulevards, must nevertheless be a great advance on the ancient way that it had of being lighted with crude oil lamps and candelabra. but the dim illumination is in perfect keeping with the other appointments of the place, which are dark, sombre, and funereal. the interior of the procope is as dark as a finely colored old meerschaum pipe. the woodwork, the chairs, and the tables are deeply stained by time, the contrasting white marble tops of the tables suggesting gravestones; and with all these go the deeply discolored walls and the many ancient paintings,--even the caisse, behind which sits madame théo, dozing over her knitting. this caisse is a wonderful piece of furniture in itself, of some rich dark wood, beautifully carved and decorated. madame théo is in black, her head resting against the frame of an old crayon portrait of voltaire on the wall behind her. a fat and comfortable black cat is asleep in the midst of rows of white saucers and snowy napkins. the only garçon, except the garçon apprentice, is sitting in a corner drowsing over an evening paper, but ever ready to answer the quiet calls of the customers. for in the matter of noise and frivolity the café procope is wholly unlike the boulevard _café_s. an atmosphere of refined and elegant suppression pervades the place; the roystering spirit that haunts the boulevards stops at the portals of the procope. here all is peace and tranquillity, and that is why it is the haunt of many earnest and aspiring poets and authors; for hither they may bring their portfolios in peace and security, and here they may work upon their manuscripts, knowing that their neighbors are similarly engrossed and that intrusion is not to be feared. and then, too, are they not sitting on the same chairs and writing at the same tables that have been occupied by some of the greatest men in all the brilliant history of france? is not this the place in which greatness had budded and blossomed in the centuries gone? are not these ancient walls the same that echoed the wit, badinage, and laughter of the masters? and there are the portraits of the great themselves, looking down benignly and encouragingly upon the young strugglers striving to follow in their footsteps, and into the ghostly mirrors, damaged by time and now sending back only ghosts of shadows, they look as the great had looked before them. it is here, therefore, that many of the modern geniuses of france have drawn their inspiration, shaking off the endless turmoil of the noisy and bustling world, living with the works and memories of the ancient dead, and working out their destiny under the magic spell that hovers about the place. it is for this reason that the habitués are jealous of the intrusion of the curious and worldly. in this quiet and secure retreat they feel no impinging of the wearing and crippling world that roars and surges through the busy streets and boulevards. [illustration: 0221] m. théo de bellefond is the full name of the proprietor, but he is commonly known as m. théo. he is a jolly little man, with an ambitious round stomach, a benevolent face covered with a vandyke beard, and a shining bald head. a large flowing black cravat, tied into an artistic négligé bow, hides his shirt. m. théo came into possession of the procope in 1893, a fact duly recorded on a door panel, along with the names of over a score of the celebrities who have made the procope their place of rest, refection, and social enjoyment. m. procope was a journalist in his day, but now the ambition that moves him is to restore the ancient glory of the procope; to make it again the centre of french brains and power in letters, art, and politics. to this end he exerts all his journalistic tact, a fact clearly shown by the able manner in which he conducts his journal, _le procope_. he has worked out the history of the _café_, and has at the ends of his fingers the lifestories of its famous patrons. the café procope was founded in 1689 by françois procope, where it now stands. opposite was the comédie française, which also was opened that year. the _café_ soon became the rendezvous of all who aspired to greatness in art, letters, philosophy, and politics. it was here that voltaire, in his eighty-second year, while attending the rehearsals of his play, "irène," descended from his chaise-à-porteur at the door of the café procope, and drank the coffee which the _café_ had made fashionable. it was here also that he became reconciled to piron, after an estrangement of more than twenty years. ste.-foix made trouble here one day about a cup of chocolate. a duel with the proprietor of the _café_ was the immediate result, and after it ste.-foix, badly wounded, exclaimed, "nevertheless, monsieur, your sword-thrust does not prevent my saying that a very sickly déjeuner is une tasse de chocolat!" jean-jacques rousseau, after the successful representation of "le devin de village," was carried in triumph to the procope by condorcet, who, with jean-jacques on his shoulders, made a tour of the crowded _café_, yelling, "vive la musique française!" diderot was fond of sitting in a corner and manufacturing paradoxes and materialistic dissertations to provoke the lieutenant of police, who would note everything he said and report it to the chief of police. the lieutenant, ambitious though stupid, one night told his chief that diderot had said one never saw souls; to which the chief returned, "m. diderot se trompe. l'âme est un esprit, et m. diderot est plein d'esprit." danton delighted in playing chess in a quiet corner with a strong adversary in the person of marat. many other famous revolutionists assembled here, among them fabre d'eglantine, robespierre, d'holbach, mirabeau, camille desmoulins. it was here that camille desmoulins was to be strangled by the reactionists in the revolution; it was here that the first bonnet rouge was donned. the massacre of december, 1792, was hereplanned, and the killing began at the very doors of the _café_. madame roland, lucille desmoulins, and the wife of danton met here on the ioth of august, the day of the fall of the monarchy, when bells rang and cannon thundered. it was later that bonaparte, then quite young and living in the quai conti, in the building which the american art association now occupies, left his hat at the procope as security for payment for a drink, he having left his purse at home. in short, the old _café_ of the rue des fossés-st.-ger-main (its old name) was famous as the meeting-place of celebrities. legendre, the great geometrician, came hither. one remembers the verses of masset: "je joue aux dominos quelquefois chez procope." here gambetta made speeches to the reactionist politicians and journalists. he engaged in more than one prise de bec with le père coquille, friend of veuillot. coquille always made sprightly and spirited replies when gambetta roared, thundered, and swore. since then have followed days of calm. in later times paul verlaine was a frequenter of the procope, where he would sit in his favorite place in the little rear salon at voltaire's table. this little salon, in the rear of the _café_, is held sacred, for its chair and table are the ones that voltaire used to occupy. the table is on one side of the small room. on the walls are many interesting sketches in oil by well-known french artists, and there are fine ceiling decorations; but all these are seen with difficulty, so dim is the light in the room. since voltaire's time this table has become an object of curiosity and veneration. when celebrated habitués of the _café_ died this table was used as an altar, upon which for a time reposed the bust of the decedent before crêpe-covered lanterns. during the revolution hébert jumped upon this table, which had been placed before the door of the _café_, and harangued the crowd gathered there, exciting them to such a pitch that they snatched the newspapers from the hands of the news-venders. in a moment of passionate appeal he brought down his heavy boot-heel upon the marble with such force as to split it. in the _café_ are three doors that are decorated in a very interesting fashion. on the panels of one, well preserved in spite of the numerous transformations through which the establishment has gone, m. théo conceived the happy idea of inscribing in gold letters the names of the illustrious who have visited the _café_ since its founding. many of the panels of the avails are taken with full-length portraits by thomas, representing, among others, voltaire, rousseau, robespierre, diderot, danton and marat playing chess, mirabeau, and gambetta. there are smaller sketches by corot, d'aubigny, vallon, courbet, willette, and roedel. some of them are not fine specimens of art. m. théo is a devoted collector of rare books and engravings. his library, which contains many very rare engravings of the eighteenth century and more than one book of priceless value, is open to his intimate friends only, with whom he loves to ramble through his treasures and find interesting data of his _café_. le moulin de la galette bishop had been industriously at work upon a large black-and-white drawing. the subject was a ball-room scene,--of evident low degree, judging from the abandon of the whirling figures and the queer types that were depicted. white lace skirts were sweeping high in air, revealing black-stockinged ankles and gauzy lingerie in a way unknown to the monde propre. [illustration: 8228] in contrast to the grace and abandon of the female figures were the coarseness and clumsiness of their male partners. the work was nearly finished, but bishop professed to be dissatisfied with the foreground architecture and with the drawing of a hand belonging to one of the male dancers. after boring me at length with a speech on the necessity of having a model for that hand, he sheepishly asked me if i would pose for the elusive member. it was then that curiosity prompted me to inquire where he had found the original of this remarkable scene. "_mon enfant sculpteur_," he replied, with the patronizing air of a man of the world, "this is the moulin de la galette." "and where is that?" i asked. "i will show you to-morrow night, if you agree." to-morrow would be sunday. when it had passed and the evening was come, and after we had enjoyed two courses of madame darblay's juicy gigots and irresistible beans, with the incomparable sauce afforded by the presence of the sunny actresses who were there, we walked over to the boulevard st.-jacques and waited for the montmartre 'bus to come along. these small, ancient omnibuses are different from the other vehicles of that breed in paris, in that instead of having a narrow curved stairway at the rear leading up to the impériale, there are but three or four iron foot-rests against the outside of the rear wall, with an iron rod on either side to cling to in mounting. now, the traveller who would reach the impériale must be something of either an acrobat or a sailor, because, first, as these 'buses do not stop, a running leap has to be made for the ladder, and, second, because of the pitching and rolling of the lumbering vehicle, the catching and climbing are not easy. if you carry a cane or a parcel, it must be held in the teeth until the ascent is made, for both hands have all they can do in the ladder exercise. the gleam of the red lamp coming down the street prepared us for a test of our agility. as only one could mount the ladder at a time, and as i was the first to attack the feat, bishop had to run behind for nearly a block before i could give him the right of way up the ladder. the conductor registered deux sur l'impériale as we swung to the top and took seats forward, just behind the driver. ladies and fat gentlemen are rarely, or never, found riding on the impériale of the montmartre line. we wrapped up in our big warm coats and lay back smoking three-sous cigars (always three-sous ones on sunday), and as the driver cracked his whip and the heavy machine went rolling along, we enjoyed the wonderful treat of seeing gay paris of a sunday night from the top of an omnibus. there is hardly anything more delightful, particularly from the top of a st. jacques-montmartre 'bus, which generally avoids the broad, brilliant streets and goes rolling and swaying through the narrow, crooked streets of old paris. here there is hardly room for such a vehicle to pass, and one is anxious lest one's feet sweep off the gas-lamps that fly past. an intimate view of the domestic life of paris presents itself likewise, for, being on a level with the second story windows, you have flitting visions of the parisian ménage in all its freedom and variety. at this time of the evening the windows are wide open and the dinner-tables are spread near them, for a view of the street below. on, on we rumbled, through seemingly interminable miles of crooked streets, over the gay boul' mich', and the place st.-michel; across the river, which reflected the myriads of lights along its walls and bridges; past the halles, the greatest marketplace in the world; past the grand boulevards, a confusing glitter of colors and lights; past the folies-bergère, where flaming posters announced loie fuller in the throes of a fire dance; and at last to the steep grade of montmartre. here a third horse was added to the pair, and slowly we were dragged up the slope. at the boulevard clichy we suddenly found ourselves in the midst of a terrific uproar; bells, steam-whistles, hand-organs, bands of music, drums, and calliopes made the bedlam. the streets were blocked with moving masses of laughing people, and the scene was gayly illuminated by rows of lamps overhead and on hundreds of stands, merry-go-rounds, theatres, circuses, museums, and all kinds of catchpenny attractions that lined the boulevard. for this was the fête de clichy. far down the street, almost hidden by a curve, could be seen the illuminated arms of the moulin rouge slowly revolving through the night. still on and up crawled the 'bus, now in the very heart of montmartre, through the lively, crowded, bright streets on the great hill of paris. here are hot-chestnut venders at the corners; fried-potato women, serving crisp brown chips; street hawkers, with their heavy push-carts; song-sellers, singing the songs that they sell, to make purchasers familiar with the airs; flower-girls; gaudy shops; bright restaurants and noisy _café_s,--all constituting that distinctive quarter of paris, montmartre. at last the summit of the hill was made, and the panting horses must have been glad that it was all down-hill ahead. bishop gave the signal to alight a block before the desired street was reached, for by the time we could touch the ground the 'bus had covered that distance on the down run. bishop led the way up a dim little street,--the rue muller, i noticed on the wall. it was very steep, and at last ended at the bottom of a flight of stone steps that seemed to run into the sky. their length was marked by lamps glowing one above another in long rows. it was hard work climbing to the top. the top at last! we seemed to be among the clouds. far below us lay the great shining city, spreading away into distance; and although it was night, the light of a full moon and untold thousands of lamps in the streets and buildings below enabled us easily to pick out the great thoroughfares and the more familiar structures. there was the opéra, there the panthéon, there notre-dame, there st.-sulpice, there the invalides, and, uplifted to emulate the eminence on which we stood, the tour eiffel, its revolving searchlight at the apex shining like an immense meteor or comet with its misty trail stretching out over the city. the roar of life faintly reached our ears from the vast throbbing plain, where millions of human mysteries were acting out their tragedies. the scene was vast, wonderful, entrancing. far above us still a maze of rafters, beams, and scaffolding fretted the sky,--the skeleton of that beautiful but unfinished church of the sacrécour, crowning the very summit of montmartre. there seemed to be no life here, for not a soul did we meet, and not a light shone except that of the moon. bishop guided me through a maze of steep stony passages, between the walls of dark gardens, turning now to the right, again to the left, through archways and courts; and i wondered how he could remember them all. before i could fully comprehend our position we were confronted by two black, gaunt, uncanny objects with long outstretched arms that cut across the sky like giant skeleton sentinels forbidding our farther advance. but the sounds of lively music and the glow of rows of white-globed lamps quickly banished the illusion and advertised the fact that we were in a very material and sensual world, for they announced the moulin de la galette at the foot of the passage. the spectres against the sky were only very, very old windmills, relics of the time, three centuries gone, when windmills crowded the summit of montmartre to catch all the winds that blew. now they stand, stark, dead, silent, and decaying; their stately revolutions are no more; and the skeleton frames of their fans look down on a marvellous contrast, the intensely real life of the galette. [illustration: 0234] we fell in line with many others at the ticket office, and paid the fifty centimes admission fee (ladies twenty-five centimes). we were relieved of our hats and canes by a stout old woman in the vestiaire, who claimed two sous from each. following the up-hill passage of the entrance, the walls of which are painted with flowers and garden scenes, we entered the great ball-room. what a brilliant scene of life and light!--at first a blur of sound, light, and movement, then gradually resolving into the simple elements composing it. the floor was covered with dancers, and the girls were making a generous display of graceful anatomy. a large band at the farther end of the room, on an inclined stand, was the vortex of the din. the promenade encircling the hall was crowded with hatless laughing girls and smooth-faced boys wearing caps or flat-brimmed low-crowned hats; their trousers fitted tight at the knees, and their heads were closely cropped. these were strolling in groups, or watching the dancers, or sitting at the rows of wooden tables drinking. all within the vast hall had gone to enjoy their sunday night as much as possible. to most of the girls this was the one night in the week when, not tired out from the drudgery of hard work, they could throw aside all cares and live in the way for which their cramped and meagre souls yearned. this is a rendezvous for the humble workers of the city, where they may dress as best they can, exchange their petites histoires, and abandon themselves to the luxury of the dance; for they are mostly shop-girls, and blanchisseuses, and the like, who, when work fails them, have to hover about the dark streets at night, that prosperous-looking passers-by may be tempted by the pleading of their dark saucy eyes, or be lured by them to some quiet spot where their lovers lie in wait with a lithe and competent black slung-shot. no mercy for the hapless bourgeois then! for the dear henris and jacques and louises must have their sous for the comforts of life, as well as the necessities, and such luxuries as tobacco and drink must be considered; and if the money wherewith all this may be bought is not produced by marcelle or hélène or marie, she will get a beating for her slothfulness or lack of skill, and will be driven into the street with a hurting back to try again. and so henri, jacques, or louis basks in the sun, and smokes cigarettes with never a care, except that of making his devoted little mistress perform her duties, knowing well how to retain her affection by selfishness and brutality. this night, however, all that was forgotten. it was the one free, happy night of the week, the night of abandon and the dance, of laughter, drinking, and jollity, for which one and all had longed for a whole impatient and dreary week; and henri, jacques, and louis could spend on drinks with other of their feminine acquaintances the sous that their mistresses had provided. the band played lustily; the lights shone; the room was filled with laughter,--let the dance go on! stationed in different parts of the room were the big soldiers of the garde municipale, in their picturesque uniform so familiar to all the theatre-goers of paris. they were here to preserve order, for the dancers belong to an inflammable class, and a blaze may spring up at any moment. equally valuable as a repressing force was a burly, thicknecked, powerful man who strolled hither and thither, his glance everywhere and always veiling a threat. he wore a large badge that proclaimed him the master of ceremonies. true, he was that, which was something, but he was a great deal more,--a most astonishingly prompt and capable bouncer. the male frequenters of the place were evidently in mortal terror of him, for his commanding size and threatening manner, and his superbly developed muscles, contrasted strikingly with the cringing manner and weak bodies of henri and his kind; and should he look their way with a momentary steadiness of glance and poise of figure, their conversation would instantly cease, and they would slink away. we seated ourselves at a vacant table that commanded a sweeping view of the floor and the promenade. a seedy-looking garçon worked his way through the crowd and took our order for beer; and mean, stale beer it was. but we did not care for that. bishop was all afire with enjoyment of the scene, for, he protested, the place was infinitely rich in types and character,--the identical types that the great steinlen loves to draw. and here is an interesting thing: the girls all were of that chic and petite order so peculiar to certain classes of parisian women, some hardly so high as bishop's shoulder, which is itself not very high; and though they looked so small, they were fully developed young women, though many of them were under twenty. they wore no hats, and for the most part, unlike their gorgeous sisters of the boulevard _café_s, they were dressed plainly, wearing black or colored waists and skirts. but ah!--and here the unapproachable instinct-skill of the french-woman shows itself,--on these same waists and skirts were placed here and there, but always just where they ought to be, bows and ribbons; and it was they that worked the miracle of grace and style. and the girls had a certain beauty, a beauty peculiar to their class,--not exactly beauty, but pleasing features, healthy color, and, best of all and explaining all, an archness of expression, a touch of sauciness, that did for their faces what the bows and ribbons did for their gowns. [illustration:0240] near us a large door opened into the garden of the moulin; it was filled with trees and benches and tables, and amidst the dark foliage glowed colored chinese lanterns, which sifted a soft light upon the revellers assembled beneath them in the cool evening air. on one side of the garden stretched paris far down and away, and on the other side blazed the moulin de la galette through the windows. a waltz was now being danced. strange to say, it was the one dismal feature of the evening, and that was because the french do not know how to dance it, "reversing" being unknown. and there was an odd variety of ways in which the men held their partners and the dancers each other. some grasped each other tightly about the waist with both arms, or similarly about the necks or shoulders, and looked straight into each other's face without a smile or an occasional word. it was all done in deadly earnest, as a serious work. it was in the quadrille that the fun came, when the girls varied the usual order by pointing their toes toward the chandeliers with a swish of white skirts that made the bystanders cry, "encore, marcelle!" the men, yearning for a share of the applause, cut up all sorts of antics and capers, using their arms and legs with incredible agility, making grotesque faces, and wearing hideous false noses and piratical moustaches. securing a partner for a dance was the easiest thing possible. any girl was eligible,--simply the asking, the assent, and away they went. bishop's pencil kept moving rapidly as he caught fleeting notes of faces, dresses, attitudes--everything--for his unfinished piece at the studio. a number of promenaders, attracted by his sketching, stopped to watch him. that dance was now finished, and the dancers separated wherever they stopped, and turned away to seek their separate friends; there was no waste of time in escorting the girls to seats, for that is not fashionable at montmartre. the girls came flocking about bishop, curious over his work, and completely shut out his view. "oh!" exclaimed one saucy petite blonde, "let me see my portrait! i saw you sketching me during the dance." "_et moi,--moi aussi!_" cried the others, until bishop, overwhelmed, surrendered his book for the inspection of bright, eager eyes. "has not monsieur a cigarette?" archly asked a girl with a decided nez retroussé. "_oui_," i answered, handing her a packet, from which with exquisite, unconscious daintiness she selected one. the whole bevy then made a similar request, and we were soon enveloped in a blue haze. "_vous ferez mon portrait, n'est-ce-pas?_" begged a dark-eyed beauty of bishop, in a smooth, pleasant voice. she had a striking appearance. a mass of rebellious black hair strove persistently to fall over her oval face, and when she would neglect to push it back her eyes, dark and melancholy, shone through its tangle with a singular wild lustre. her skin was dark, almost swarthy, but it was touched with a fine rosy glow of health and youth. her features were perfect; the nose was slightly romanesque, the chin firm, the lips red and sensuous. when she drew our attention with her request she was standing before us in a rigid, halfdefiant, half-commanding posture; but when she quickly added, "i will pose for you,--see?" and sat down beside me, opposite bishop, her striking native grace asserted itself, for from a statue of bronze she suddenly became all warmth and softness, every line in her perfect, lithe figure showing her eagerness, and eloquent with coaxing. it was clear that bishop was deeply impressed by the striking picture that she made; it was her beautiful wild head that fascinated him most. "no, i am first," insisted a little vixen, hard-featured and determined. "_jamais de la vie!" "c'est moi!_" protested others, with such fire that i feared there would be trouble. the turmoil had the effect of withdrawing bishop's attention momentarily from the beautiful tigress beside me. he smiled in bewilderment. he would be happy to draw them all, but---at last he pacified them by proposing to take them in turn, provided they would be patient and not bother him. to this they poutingly agreed; and bishop, paying no more attention to the girl beside me, rapidly dashed off sketch after sketch of the other girls. exclamations of surprise, delight, or indignation greeted each of the portraits as it was passed round. bishop was seeking "character," and as he was to retain the portraits, he made no efforts at flattery. all this time the dark-eyed one had sat in perfect silence and stillness beside me, watching bishop in wonder. she had forgotten her hair, and was gazing through it with more than her eyes as his pencil worked rapidly. i studied her as well as i could as she sat all heedless of my existence. her lips slightly curved at the corners into a faint suggestion of a smile, but as bishop's work kept on and the other girls monopolized him, the lips gradually hardened. the shadow of her chin fell upon her smooth throat, not darkening it too much for me to observe that significant movements within it indicated a struggle with her selfcontrol. bishop was now sketching a girl, the others having run off to dance; they would return in their order. the girl beside me said to me, in a low voice, without looking at me,--"_monsieur est anglais?_" "no," i answered. "ah! américain?" "yes." "and your friend?" nodding toward bishop. "american also." "is he----" but she suddenly checked herself with odd abruptness, and then quickly asked, with a shallow pretence of eager interest, "is america far from paris?" and so she continued to quiz me rather vacantly concerning a great country of whose whereabouts she had not the slightest idea. then she was silent, and i imagined that she was gathering herself for some supreme effort. suddenly she turned her marvellous eyes full toward me, swept the wild hair from her face, looked almost fiercely at me a moment, and, rigid from head to foot, asked, half angrily, and then held her breath for the answer,--"is he married?" the question was asked so suddenly and so strangely, and with so commanding a manner, that i had not a moment to consider the wisdom of lying. "no," i answered. she sank back into her chair with a deep breath, all softness and grace again, and her wild hair fell back over her face. she had lost all interest in the ball. while her companions were enjoying themselves in the dance, she sat motionless and silent beside me, watching bishop. an uncomfortable feeling had taken possession of me. presently i abruptly asked her why she did not dance. she started. "dance?" she replied. she looked over the hall, and an expression of scorn and disgust came into her face. "not with that espèce de voyous," she vehemently added; and then she turned to watch bishop again. i now noticed for the first time that a group of the human vampires, standing apart at a little distance, were watching us closely and talking in low tones among themselves. my attention had been drawn to them by a defiant look that the girl had shot at them. one of them was particularly repulsive. he was rather larger and stronger than the others. his garb was that of his species,--tight trousers, a négligé shirt, and a rakish cap being its distinguishing articles. he stood with his hands in his pockets and his head thrust forward. he had the low, brutal face of his kind. it was now pale with rage. i asked the girl what her name was. "hélène," she answered, simply. her other name? oh, just hélène. sometimes it was hélène crespin, for crespin was her lover's name. all this with perfect frankness. "where is he?" i asked. "_c'est lui avec la casquette_," she answered, indicating the brute whom i have just described, but i had expected that. "i hate him now!" she vehemently added. no, she had neither father nor mother; had no recollection of parents. sometimes she worked in a printing shop in the rue victor massé when extra hands were needed. after the girl who had been posing was dismissed another took her place; then another, and another, and others; and still others were waiting. the girl beside me had been watching these proceedings with increasing impatience. some of the girls were so delighted that they threw their arms round bishop's neck and kissed him. others called him endearing names. at last it was evident that the dark girl could bear it no longer. she had been growing harder and harder, more and more restless. i continued to watch her narrowly,--she had forgotten my existence. gradually the natural rich color in her cheeks deepened, her eyes blazed through the tangled hair, her lips were set. suddenly, after a girl had been more demonstrative than the others, she rose and confronted bishop. all this time he had not even looked at her, and that, while making me uneasy, had made her furious. we three were alone. true, we were observed by many, for invasions by foreigners were very rare at the moulin de la galette, and we were objects of interest on that account; and the sketching by bishop had sent our fame throughout the hall. in a low, quiet voice the girl said to bishop, as he looked up at her wonderingly,--"you promised to draw mine long ago." i had never seen my friend more embarrassed than he was at that moment. he stumbled over his excuses, and then asked her to pose to suit her fancy. he did it very gently, and the effect was magical. she sank into her chair and assumed the indolently graceful pose that she had unconsciously taken when she first seated herself. bishop gazed at her in silence a long time before he began the sketch; and then he worked with a sure and rapid hand. after it was finished he handed it to her. instantly she was transfigured. she stared at the picture in wonder and delight, her lips parted, her chest hardly moving from her nearly suppressed breathing. "do i look like that?" she asked, suspiciously. indeed, it was an exquisite little piece of work, for bishop had idealized the girl and made a beautiful portrait. "did you not see me draw it while looking at you?" he replied, somewhat disingenuously. "will you give it to me?" she asked, eagerly. "certainly." "and will you sign your name to it?" bishop cheerfully complied. then she took it, kissed it, and pressed it to her bosom; and then, leaning forward, and speaking with a richness and depth of voice that she had not betrayed before, and in the deepest earnestness, said,--"_je vous aime!_" bishop, staggered by this forthright declaration of affection, blushed violently and looked very foolish. but he rallied and assured her that her love was reciprocated, for who, he asked, could resist so beautiful a face, so warm a heart? if he had only known, if i could only have told him! the girl sank back in her chair with a quizzical, doubting smile that showed perfect white teeth and changed to bright dimples the suggestion of a smile that fluttered at her mouth-corners. she carefully folded the sketch and daintily tucked it away in her bosom. bishop had now quitted work,--hélène had seen to that. she had moved her chair close to his, and, looking him straight in the eyes, was rattling away in the untranslatable argot of montmartre. it is not the argot of the slums, nor that of the thieves, nor that of the students, but that of montmartre; and there are no ways of expressing it intelligibly in english. presently she became more serious, and with all the coaxing and pleading of which her ardent, impetuous nature was capable, she begged,-"let me be your model. _je suis bien faite_, and you can teach me to pose. you will be kind to me. i have a good figure. i will do everything, everything for you! i will take care of the studio. i will cook, i will bring you everything, everything you want. you will let me live with you. i will love no one else. you will never be sorry nor ashamed. if you will only----" that is the best translation i can give; it is certainly what she meant, though it indicates nothing of the impetuosity, the abandon, the eagerness, the warmth, the savage beauty that shone from her as she spoke. bishop rose to the occasion. he sprang to his feet. "i must dance after that!" he exclaimed, catching her up, laughing, and dragging her upon the floor. he could dance superbly. a waltz was being played, and it was being danced in the stiff and stupid way of the people. very soon bishop and hélène began to attract general attention, for never before had montmartre seen a waltz danced like that. he reversed, and glided, and threw into the queen of dances all the grace and freedom that it demands. at first hélène was puzzled and bewildered; but she was agile both of mind and body, and under bishop's sure guidance she put them to excellent use. rapidly she caught the grace and spirit of the waltz, and danced with a verve that she had never known before. swiftly and gracefully they skimmed the length of the great hall, then back, and wherever they went the dancers watched them with astonishment and delight, and gradually abandoned their own ungraceful efforts, partly in shame, partly in admiration, and partly with a desire to learn how the miracle was done. gradually the floor was wholly abandoned except for these two, and all eyes watched them. hélène was happy and radiant beyond all ways of telling. her cheeks were flushed, her eyes sparkled, her lithe figure developed all the ease, grace, and suppleness of a cat. some muttered expressions of contempt spoken near me caused me to listen without turning round. they were meant for my ears, but i gave no heed. i knew well enough from whom they came,--crespin and his friends. and i realized that we were in for it. true, there were the big guards and there was the capable bouncer, and they would glance my way now and then, seemingly to let crespin know that all was understood and that it must be hands off with him. there was no danger here, but afterwards--the waltz came to an end, and the two were vigorously applauded. this was a critical moment, but bishop handled it adroitly. he conducted hélène to a seat remote from our table, bowed low, and left her, and came over to me. i told him of my fears, but he laughed. he had got rid of hélène with perfect address, and perhaps she was nursing an angry and aching heart after her glorious triumph; perhaps bishop had whispered to her something of the danger and suggested that they have nothing more to do with each other that evening. [illustration: 9251] presently i saw her start and look round. crespin was behind her, livid with rage. she promptly rose and followed him into the garden. bishop had not seen the movement. we were near the door leading into the garden, and by turning a little i could see the couple outside, not far away. crespin was standing with a bullying air, and was evidently cursing her. she had tossed back her hair and was looking him defiantly in the face. i saw her lips move in speech. instantly the ruffian dealt her a violent blow upon the chest, and she staggered back against a tree, which prevented her falling. "come, let us stop that," i said to bishop. "hélène's lover is beating her in the garden." bishop sprang to his feet and followed me. as he glanced out the window at the couple, whom i pointed out, he saw crespin approach the dazed girl and deal her a terrible blow in the mouth, and he saw the blood that followed the blow. we arrived in the garden as a crowd was gathering. bishop pushed his way ahead and was about to spring upon the brute, when hélène saw him. with a supreme effort she leaped forward, thrust bishop aside with a command to mind his own affairs, threw herself into her lover's arms, and kissed him, smearing his face with her blood. he glared at us, triumphant. the guards arrived, and hélène and her lover disappeared among the trees in the darkness. "oh, another unfaithful cocotte!" laughed one in the crowd, explaining to the guards; and they returned to their drinking and dancing, remarking, "beat a woman, and she will love you." they had all missed the heroism and devotion of hélène's interference. it was to keep a knife out of the body of the man she loved that she smeared her lover's face with her blood. we saw her no more. we returned to the hall and strolled round the promenade, for we needed that to become calm again. and the girls mobbed bishop, for he had passed out the word that he wanted a model, and that he would pay a franc an hour. a franc an hour! and so they mobbed him. was not that more than they could hope to earn by a whole day's hard work? yes, they would all pose gladly, but only in costume, bien entendu! so bishop was busy taking down the names of marcelle, lorette, elise, marie, and the rest, with the names of the queer and unheard-of streets in which they lived, mostly in the quarters of montmartre and the batignolles. the can-can was now raging on the floor, and the tired garçons were dodging about with their glassladen trays. dancing, making love, throwing lumps of sugar, the revellers enjoyed themselves. we left. the moon cast gaunt shadows across the streets from the old windmills and the trees. we struck out briskly, intending to catch the last st.-jacques 'bus home, and with that purpose we threaded the maze of steep passages and streets on our way to the rue muller. upon reaching the top of the hill, behind the great skeleton of the sacred heart, where all was silent and still as the grave, we suddenly discovered the shadowy figures of men slipping out from a dark little street. we knew what it meant. with a common impulse we sprang forward, for it was now a run for our lives. i had recognized crespin in the lead. with headlong speed we dashed down the steep incline, swinging our canes to check an attack in the rear. we had dodged out of our proper way to the rue muller, and now it was a matter of speed, endurance, and luck to reach blindly some street where life and protection might be found. a man clutched my coat. i beat him off with my stick, but the skirt of my coat was hanging loose, nearly ripped off. a cord went whizzing past me and caught bishop's hat, but he went sturdily on bareheaded. stones flew past us, and presently one caught me a terrific, sickening blow in the back. i did not fall, but i staggered in my flight, for a strange heaviness came into my legs, and my head soon began to ache violently. crespin was desperately active. i could hear him panting heavily as he gained upon us. his long shadow, cast by the moon, showed that he was about to spring upon bishop. i swung my cane blindly, but with all my might, and it fell upon his head and laid him low; but he quickly scrambled to his feet again. the ruffians were now upon us,--they were better used to the hill than we. "separate!" gasped bishop. "it is our only chance." at the next corner we suddenly swung apart, taking opposite directions. i plunged on alone, glad to hear for a time that footfalls were following,--they meant that the pursuit had not concentrated on bishop. but after a while i realized that i was no longer pursued. i stopped and listened. there was no sound. weak and trembling, with an aching back and a splitting head, i sat down in a door-way and rested. that luxury was quickly interrupted by my reflecting that possibly bishop had been overtaken; and i knew what that would mean. i ran back up the hill as rapidly as my weakness and trembling and pain permitted. at last i found myself at the corner where we had separated. there was no sound from any direction. i could only hope for the best and search and listen blindly through this puzzle of streets and passages. presently i realized that i was near the fortifications of paris, close to st. ouen,--that is to say, at the other end of paris from the quartier latin, which was eight miles away. there was nothing to do but walk home. it was nearly four o'clock when i arrived. and there was bishop in bed, nursing a big lump on his head, made by a flying stone. he had reached a street where a gendarme was, and that meant safety; and then he had taken a cab for home, where he was looking very ridiculous poulticing his lump and making himself sick fretting about me. [illustration: 5255] a night on montmarte [illustration: 0256] near the end of a recent december bishop received a note signed "a. herbert thomp-kins," written at the hôtel de l'athénée, saying that the writer was in paris for four days with his wife before proceeding to vienna to join some friends. it closed by asking, "could you call at the hotel this evening, say at seven?" this note created great excitement at our studio early one morning, the facteur having climbed six flights of stairs (it being near to new year) to deliver it; for mr. thompkins was one of bishop's warmest friends in america. his unexpected arrival in paris at this unseasonable time of the year was indeed a surprise, but a most agreeable one. so bishop spent the whole of the afternoon in creasing his best trousers, ransacking our trunks for a clean collar to wear with my blue-fronted shirt, polishing his top-hat, and getting his velasquez whiskers trimmed and perfumed at the coiffeur's. it was not every day that friends of mr. thompkins's type made their appearance in paris. bishop, after hours spent in absorbing mental work, at last disclosed his plan to me. of course he would not permit me to keep out of the party, and besides, he needed my advice. [illustration: 0257] here was mr. thompkins in paris, and unless he were wisely guided he would leave without seeing the city,--except those parts and phases of it that tourists cannot keep from stumbling over. it would be both a duty and a pleasure to introduce him to certain things of which he might otherwise die in ignorance, to the eternal undevelopment of his soul. but here was the rub: would mr. thompkins care to be so radically different here for one night--just one night--from what he was at home? i could not see how any harm could come to mr. thompkins or any one else with sense, nor how bishop could possibly entertain him in anyway that would be disagreeable to a man of brains. but bishop was evidently keeping something back. for that matter, he never did explain it, and i have not bothered about inferences. what mr. thompkins was at home i do not know. true, he was very much confused and embarrassed a number of times during the evening, but one thing i know,--he enjoyed himself immensely. and that makes me say that no matter what he was at home, he was a gentleman and philosopher while exploring an outlandish phase of parisian bohemian life that night under our guidance. he had a prim, precise way of talking, and was delightfully innocent and unworldly. my! it would have been a sin for him to miss what he saw that night. so i told bishop very emphatically that no matter what mr. thompkins was at home, nobody who knew him was likely to see him in paris at that time of the year, and that it was bishop's duty as a friend to initiate him. bishop was very happy over my advice; but when he insisted that we should take a cab for the evening's outing, i sternly reminded him of the bruises that our funds would receive on new year's, and thus curbed his extravagance. he surrendered with a pang, for after all his preparation he felt like a duke, and for that night, while entertaining his friend, he wanted to be a duke, not a grubbing student. we met mr. thompkins at the hotel, and i found him a delightful man, with a pleasant sparkle of the eye and a certain stiffness of bearing. it was his intention to have us dine with him, but bishop gently took him in hand, and gradually gave him to understand that on this night in a lifetime he was in the hands of his friends, to do as they said, and to ask no questions. mr. thompkins looked a little puzzled, a little apprehensive, and withal not unwilling to be sacrificed. the first thing we did was to introduce mr. thompkins to a quiet restaurant famous for its coquilles st.-jacques; it is in the old palais royal. this is the dinner that bishop ordered: huîtres portugaises. sauterne. médoc. consommé. coquilles st.-jacques. macaroni à la milanaise. filet de bouf. pommes nouvelles sautées. crème petit suisse. eclairs. café. mr. thompkins's enjoyment of the meal was as generous as his praise of bishop's skill in ordering it, and he declared that the wines particularly were a rare treat. by the time that dinner had been finished he was enthusiastic about paris. he said that it was a wonderful city, and that he was entirely at our disposal for the night. "i suppose, gentlemen," he suggested, "that you are going to invite me to the opera. now, i have no objections to that, and i am sure i shall be delighted,--it is only one evening in a lifetime, perhaps. but i shall insist that you go as my guests." bishop laughed merrily, and slapped his friend on the back in a way that i never should have employed with a man of so much dignity. "the opera, old man!" cried bishop. "why, you blessed idiot, you act like a tourist! the opera! you can go there any time. to-night we shall see paris!" and he laughed again. "the opera!" he repeated. "oh, my! you can fall over the opera whenever you please. this is an opportunity for a tour of discovery." mr. thompkins laughed with equal heartiness, and declared that nothing would delight him more than to be an explorer--for one night in a lifetime. "the boul' mich' or montmartre?" bishop whispered to me. "montmartre," i replied; "heaven, death, hell, and bruant." never had the avenue de l'opéra appeared so brilliant and lively as on that cold, crisp december night, as we strolled towards the boulevards. its thousands of lights, its dashing equipages with the jingling harness of horses drawing handsome women and men to the opéra, its swiftly moving cabs and heavy 'buses rolling over the smooth wooden pavement, the shouts of drivers and the cracking of whips, the throngs of gay people enjoying the holiday attractions, the endless rows of gaudy booths lining the street, the flood of light and color everywhere, the cuirassiers of the garde municipale mounted on superb horses standing motionless in the place de l'opéra, their long boots and steel breastplates and helmets glistening,--these all had their place,--while the broad stairs of the opéra were crowded with beautifully gowned women and fashionable men pouring in to hear sibyl sanderson sing in "samson and delilah,"--all this made a wonderful picture of life and beauty, of color, motion, vivacity, and enjoyment. above the entrance to the opéra red marble columns reflected the yellow light of the gilded foyer and of the yellow blaze from the café de la paix across the way. we mounted a montmartre 'bus and were pulled up the hill to the boul' clichy, the main artery of that strange bohemian mountain with its eccentric, fantastic, and morbid attractions. before us, in the place blanche, stood the great moulin rouge, the long skeleton arms of the red mill marked with red electric lights and slowly sweeping across the heavens, while fanciful figures of students and dancing girls looked out the windows of the mill, and a great crowd of lively, chatting, laughing people were pushing their way toward the entrance of this famous dancehall of paris. mr. thompkins, entranced before the brilliant spectacle, asked somewhat hesitatingly if we might enter; but bishop, wise in the ways of montmartre, replied,--"not yet. it is only a little after nine, and the moulin does not get wide awake for some hours yet. we have no time to waste while waiting for that. we shall first visit heaven." [illustration: 0263] mr. thompkins looked surprised, but made no response. presently we reached the gilded gates of le cabaret du ciel. they were bathed in a cold blue light from above. angels, gold-lined clouds, saints, sacred palms and plants, and other paraphernalia suggestive of the approach to st. peter's domain, filled all the available space about the entrée. a bold white placard, "_bock, i franc_," was displayed in the midst of it all. dolorous church music sounded within, and the heavens were unrolled as a scroll in all their tinsel splendor as we entered to the bidding of an angel. flitting about the room were many more angels, all in white robes and with sandals on their feet, and all wearing gauzy wings swaying from their shoulder-blades and brass halos above their yellow wigs. these were the waiters, the garçons of heaven, ready to take orders for drinks. one of these, with the face of a heavy villain in a melodrama and a beard a week old, roared unmelodiously,--"the greetings of heaven to thee, brothers! eternal bliss and happiness are for thee. mayst thou never swerve from its golden paths! breathe thou its sacred purity and renovating exaltation. prepare to meet thy great creator--and don't forget the garçon!" a very long table covered with white extended the whole length of the chilly room, and seated at it, drinking, were scores of candidates for angelship,--mortals like ourselves. men and women were they, and though noisy and vivacious, they indulged in nothing like the abandon of the boul' mich' _café_s. gilded vases and candelabra, together with foamy bocks, somewhat relieved the dead whiteness of the table. the ceiling was an impressionistic rendering of blue sky, fleecy clouds, and stars, and the walls were made to represent the noble enclosure and golden gates of paradise. [illustration: 8264] "brothers, your orders! command me, thy servant!" growled a ferocious angel at our elbows, with his accent de la villette, and his brass halo a trifle askew. mr. thompkins had been very quiet, for he was wonder in the flesh, and perhaps there was some distress in his lace, but there was courage also. the suddenness of the angel's assault visibly disconcerted him,--he did not know what to order. finally he decided on a verre de chartreuse, green. bishop and i ordered bocks. "two sparkling draughts of heaven's own brew and one star-dazzler!" yelled our angel. "thy will be done," came the response from a hidden bar. obscured by great masses of clouds, through whose intervals shone golden stars, an organ continually rumbled sacred music, which had a depressing rather than a solemn effect, and even the draughts of heaven's own brew and the star-dazzler failed to dissipate the gloom. suddenly, without the slightest warning, the head of st. peter, whiskers and all, appeared in a hole in the sky, and presently all of him emerged, even to his ponderous keys clanging at his girdle. he gazed solemnly down upon the crowd at the tables and thoughtfully scratched his left wing. from behind a dark cloud he brought forth a vessel of white crockery (which was not a wash-bowl) containing (ostensibly) holy water. after several mysterious signs and passes with his bony hands he generously sprinkled the sinners below with a brush dipped in the water; and then, with a parting blessing, he slowly faded into mist. "did you ever? well, well, i declare!" exclaimed mr. thompkins, breathlessly. [illustration: 0266] the royal cortège of the kingdom of heaven was now forming at one end of the room before a shrine, whereon an immense golden pig sat sedately on his haunches, looking friendly and jovial, his loose skin and fat jowls hanging in folds. lighted candles sputtered about his golden sides. as the participants in the pageant, all attachés of the place, formed for the procession, each bowed reverently and crossed himself before the huge porker. a small man, dressed in a loose black gown and black skullcap, evidently made up for dante, whom he resembled, officiated as master of ceremonies. he mounted a golden pulpit, and delivered, in a loud, rasping voice, a tedious discourse on heaven and allied things. he dwelt on the attractions of heaven as a perpetual summer resort, an unbroken round of pleasures in variety, where sweet strains of angelic music (indicating the wheezy organ), together with unlimited stores of heaven's own sparkling fire of life, at a franc a bock, and beautiful goldenhaired cherubs, of la villette's finest, lent grace and perfection to the scheme. [illustration: 8268] the parade then began its tour about the room, dante, carrying a staff surmounted by a golden bull, serving as drum-major. angel musicians, playing upon sacred lyres and harps, followed in his wake, but the dolorous organ made the more noise. behind the lyre angels came a number of the notables whom dante immortalized,--at least, we judged that they were so intended. the angel garçons closed the cortège, their gauzy wings and brass halos bobbing in a stately fashion as they strode along. the angel garçons now sauntered up and gave us each a ticket admitting us to the angel-room and the other delights of the inner heaven. "youarre eengleesh?" he asked. "yes? ah, theece eengleesh arre verra genereauz," eyeing his fifty-centime tip with a questioning shrug. "can you not make me un franc? ah, eet ees dam cold in theece laigs," pointing to his calves, which were encased in diaphanous pink tights. he got his franc. dante announced in his rasping voice that those mortals wishing to become angels should proceed up to the angel-room. all advanced and ascended the inclined passage-way leading into the blue. at the farther end of the passage sat old st. peter, solemn and shivering, for it was draughty there among the clouds. he collected our tickets, gave the password admitting us to the inner precincts, and resented bishop's attempts to pluck a feather from his wings. we entered a large room, all a glamour of gold and silver. the walls were studded with blazing nuggets, colored canvas rocks, and electric lights. we took seats on wooden benches fronting a cleft in the rocks, and waited. soon the chamber in which we sat became perfectly dark, the cleft before us shining with a dim bluish light. the cleft then came to life with a bevy of female angels floating through the limited ethereal space, and smiling down upon us mortals. one of the lady angel's tights bagged at the knees, and another's wings were not on straight; but this did not interfere with her flight, any more than did the stationary position of the wings of all. but it was all very easily and gracefully done, swooping down, soaring, and swinging in circles like so many great eagles. they seemed to discover something of unusual interest in mr. thompkins, for they singled him out to throw kisses at him. this made him blush and fidget, but a word from bishop reassured him,--it was only once in a lifetime! after these angels had gyrated for some time, the head angel of the angel-room requested those who desired to become angels to step forward. a number responded, among them some of the naughty dancing-girls of the moulin rouge. they were conducted through a concealed door, and presently we beheld them soaring in the empyrean just as happy and serene as though they were used to being angels. it was a marvel to see wings so frail transport with so much ease a very stout young woman from the audience, and their being fully clothed did not seem to make any difference. mr. thompkins had sat in a singularly contemplative mood after the real angels had quit torturing him, and surprised us beyond measure by promptly responding to a second call for those aspiring to angelhood. he disappeared with another batch from the moulin rouge, and soon afterwards we saw him floating like an airship. he even wore his hat. to his disgust and chagrin, however, one of the concert-hall angels persisted in flying in front of him and making violent love to him. this brought forth tumultuous applause and laughter, which completed mr. thompkins's misery. at this juncture the blue cleft became dark, the angel-room burst into light, and soon mr. thompkins rejoined us. as we filed out into the passage father time stood with long whiskers and scythe, greeted us with profound bows, and promised that his scythe would spare us for many happy years did we but drop sous into his hourglass. there was no conversation among us when we emerged upon the boulevard, for mr. thompkins was in a retrospective frame of mind. bishop embraced the opportunity to lead us up the boulevard clichy to the place pigalle. as we neared the place we saw on the opposite side of the street two flickering iron lanterns that threw a ghastly green light down upon the barred dead-black shutters of the building, and caught the faces of the passers-by with sickly rays that took out all the life and transformed them into the semblance of corpses. across the top of the closed black entrance were large white letters, reading simply: "_cafe du néant_" the entrance was heavily draped with black cerements, having white trimmings,--such as hang before the houses of the dead in paris. here patrolled a solitary croque-mort, or hired pall-bearer, his black cape drawn closely about him, the green light reflected by his glazed tophat. a more dismal and forbidding place it would be difficult to imagine. mr. thompkins paled a little when he discovered that this was our destination,--this grisly caricature of eternal nothingness,--and hesitated at the threshold. without a word bishop firmly took his arm and entered. the lonely croque-mort drew apart the heavy curtain and admitted us into a black hole that proved later to be a room. the chamber was dimly lighted with wax tapers, and a large chandelier intricately devised of human skulls and arms, with funeral candles held in their fleshless fingers, gave its small quota of light. large, heavy, wooden coffins, resting on biers, were ranged about the room in an order suggesting the recent happening of a frightful catastrophe. the walls were decorated with skulls and bones, skeletons in grotesque attitudes, battle-pictures, and guillotines in action. death, carnage, assassination were the dominant note, set in black hangings and illuminated with mottoes on death. a half-dozen voices droned this in a low monotone: "enter, mortals of this sinful world, enter into the mists and shadows of eternity. select your biers, to the right, to the left; fit yourselves comfortably to them, and repose in the solemnity and tranquillity of death; and may god have mercy on your souls!" a number of persons who had preceded us had already pre-empted their coffins, and were sitting beside them awaiting developments and enjoying their consommations, using the coffins for their real purpose,--tables for holding drinking-glasses. alongside the glasses were slender tapers by which the visitors might see one another. [illustration: 0273] there seemed to be no mechanical imperfection in the illusion of a charnel-house; we imagined that even chemistry had contributed its resources, for there seemed distinctly to be the odor appropriate to such a place. we found a vacant coffin in the vault, seated ourselves at it on rushbottomed stools, and awaited further developments. [illustration: 8274] another croque-mort--a garçon he was--came up through the gloom to take our orders. he was dressed completely in the professional garb of a hearse-follower, including claw-hammer coat, full-dress front, glazed tile, and oval silver badge. he droned,--"_bon soir, macchabées! * buvez les crachats d'asthmatiques, voilà des sueurs froides d'agonisants. prenez donc des certificats de décès, seulement vingt sous. c'est pas cher et c'est artistique!_" * this word (also maccabe, argot macabit) is given in paris by sailors to cadavers found floating in the river. bishop said that he would be pleased with a lowly bock. mr. thompkins chose cherries à l'eau-de-vie, and i, une menthe. "one microbe of asiatic cholera from the last corpse, one leg of a lively cancer, and one sample of our consumption germ!" moaned the creature toward a black hole at the farther end of the room. some women among the visitors tittered, others shuddered, and mr. thompkins broke out in a cold sweat on his brow, while a curious accompaniment of anger shone in his eyes. our sleepy pallbearer soon loomed through the darkness with our deadly microbes, and waked the echoes in the hollow casket upon which he set the glasses with a thump. "drink, macchabées!" he wailed: "drink these noxious potions, which contain the vilest and deadliest poisons!" "the villain!" gasped mr. thompkins; "it is horrible, disgusting, filthy!" the tapers flickered feebly on the coffins, and the white skulls grinned at him mockingly from their sable background. bishop exhausted all his tactics in trying to induce mr. thompkins to taste his bran-died cherries, but that gentleman positively refused,--he seemed unable to banish the idea that they were laden with disease germs. after we had been seated here for some time, getting no consolation from the utter absence of spirit and levity among the other guests, and enjoying only the dismay and trepidation of new and strange arrivals, a rather good-looking young fellow, dressed in a black clerical coat, came through a dark door and began to address the assembled patrons. his voice was smooth, his manner solemn and impressive, as he delivered a well-worded discourse on death. he spoke of it as the gate through which we must all make our exit from this world,--of the gloom, the loneliness, the utter sense of helplessness and desolation. as he warmed to his subject he enlarged upon the follies that hasten the advent of death, and spoke of the relentless certainty and the incredible variety of ways in which the reaper claims his victims. then he passed on to the terrors of actual dissolution, the tortures of the body, the rending of the soul, the unimaginable agonies that sensibilities rendered acutely susceptible at this extremity are called upon to endure. it required good nerves to listen to that, for the man was perfect in his rôle. from matters of individual interest in death he passed to death in its larger aspects. he pointed to a large and striking battle scene, in which the combatants had come to hand-to-hand fighting, and were butchering one another in a mad lust for blood. suddenly the picture began to glow, the light bringing out its ghastly details with hideous distinctness. then as suddenly it faded away, and where fighting men had been there were skeletons writhing and struggling in a deadly embrace. a similar effect was produced with a painting giving a wonderfully realistic representation of an execution by the guillotine. the bleeding trunk of the victim lying upon the flap-board dissolved, the flesh slowly disappearing, leaving only the white bones. another picture, representing a brilliant dance-hall filled with happy revellers, slowly merged into a grotesque dance of skeletons; and thus it was with the other pictures about the room. all this being done, the master of ceremonies, in lugubrious tones, invited us to enter the chambre de la mort. all the visitors rose, and, bearing each a taper, passed in single file into a narrow, dark passage faintly illuminated with sickly green lights, the young man in clerical garb acting as pilot. the cross effects of green and yellow lights on the faces of the groping procession were more startling than picturesque. the way was lined with bones, skulls, and fragments of human bodies. [illustration: 0277] "o macchabées, nous sommes devant la porte de la chambre de la mort!" wailed an unearthly voice from the farther end of the passage as we advanced. then before us appeared a solitary figure standing beneath a green lamp. the figure was completely shrouded in black, only the eyes being visible, and they shone through holes in the pointed cowl. from the folds of the gown it brought forth a massive iron key attached to a chain, and, approaching a door seemingly made of iron and heavily studded with spikes and crossed with bars, inserted and turned the key; the bolts moved with a harsh, grating noise, and the door of the chamber of death swung slowly open. "o macchabées, enter into eternity, whence none ever return!" cried the new, strange voice. the walls of the room were a dead and unrelieved black. at one side two tall candles were burning, but their feeble light was insufficient even to disclose the presence of the black walls of the chamber or indicate that anything but unending blackness extended heavenward. there was not a thing to catch and reflect a single ray of the light and thus become visible in the blackness. between the two candles was an upright opening in the wall; it was of the shape of a coffin. we were seated upon rows of small black caskets resting on the floor in front of the candles. there was hardly a whisper among the visitors. the black-hooded figure passed silently out of view and vanished in the darkness. presently a pale, greenish-white illumination began to light up the coffin-shaped hole in the wall, clearly marking its outline against the black. within this space there stood a coffin upright, in which a pretty young woman, robed in a white shroud, fitted snugly. soon it was evident that she was very much alive, for she smiled and looked at us saucily. but that was not for long. from the depths came a dismal wail: "o macchabée, beautiful, breathing mortal, pulsating with the warmth and richness of life, thou art now in the grasp of death! compose thy soul for the end!" her face slowly became white and rigid; her eyes sank; her lips tightened across her teeth; her cheeks took on the hollowness of death,-she was dead. but it did not end with that. from white the face slowly grew livid... then purplish black.... the eyes visibly shrank into their greenish-yellow sockets.... slowly the hair fell away.... the nose melted away into a purple putrid spot. the whole face became a semiliquid mass of corruption. presently all this had disappeared, and a gleaming skull shone where so recently had been the handsome face of a woman; naked teeth grinned inanely and savagely where rosy lips had so recently smiled. even the shroud had gradually disappeared, and an entire skeleton stood revealed in the coffin. the wail again rang through the silent vault: "ah, ah, macchabée! thou hast reached the last stage of dissolution, so dreadful to mortals. the work that follows death is complete. but despair not, for death is not the end of all. the power is given to those who merit it, not only to return to life, but to return in any form and station preferred to the old. so return if thou deservedst and desirest." [illustration: 0280] with a slowness equal to that of the dissolution, the bones became covered with flesh and cerements, and all the ghastly steps were reproduced reversed. gradually the sparkle of the eyes began to shine through the gloom; but when the reformation was completed, behold! there was no longer the handsome and smiling young woman, but the sleek, rotund body, ruddy cheeks, and self-conscious look of a banker. it was not until this touch of comedy relieved the strain that the rigidity with which mr. thompkins had sat between us began to relax, and a smile played over his face,--a bewildered, but none the less a pleasant, smile. the prosperous banker stepped forth, sleek and tangible, and haughtily strode away before our eyes, passing through the audience into the darkness. again was the coffin-shaped hole in the wall dark and empty. he of the black gown and pointed hood now emerged through an invisible door, and asked if there was any one in the audience who desired to pass through the experience that they had just witnessed. this created a suppressed commotion; each peered into the face of his neighbor to find one with courage sufficient for the ordeal. bishop suggested to mr. thompkins in a whisper that he submit himself, but that gentleman very peremptorily declined. then, after a pause, bishop stepped forth and announced that he was prepared to die. he was asked solemnly by the doleful person if he was ready to accept all the consequences of his decision. he replied that he was. then he disappeared through the black wall, and presently appeared in the greenish-white light of the open coffin. there he composed himself as he imagined a corpse ought, crossed his hands upon his breast, suffered the white shroud to be drawn about him, and awaited results,--after he had made a rueful grimace that threw the first gleam of suppressed merriment through the oppressed audience. he passed through all the ghastly stages that the former occupant of the coffin had experienced, and returned in proper person to life and to his seat beside mr. thompkins, the audience applauding softly. a mysterious figure in black waylaid the crowd as it filed out. he held an inverted skull, into which we were expected to drop sous through the natural opening there, and it was with the feeling of relief from a heavy weight that we departed and turned our backs on the green lights at the entrance. what a wonderful contrast! here we were in the free, wide, noisy, brilliant world again. here again were the crowds, the venders, saucy grisettes with their bright smiles, shining teeth, and alluring glances. here again were the bustling _café_s, the music, the lights, the life, and above all the giant arms of the moulin rouge sweeping the sky. "now," quietly remarked bishop, "having passed through death, we will explore hell." mr. thompkins seemed too weak, or unresisting, or apathetic to protest. his face betrayed a queer mixture of emotions, part suffering, part revulsion, part a sort of desperate eagerness for more. [illustration: 0284] we passed through a large, hideous, fanged, open mouth in an enormous face from which shone eyes of blazing crimson. curiously enough, it adjoined heaven, whose cool blue lights contrasted strikingly with the fierce ruddiness of hell. red-hot bars and gratings through which flaming coals gleamed appeared in the walls within the red mouth. a placard announced that should the temperature of this inferno make one thirsty, innumerable bocks might be had at sixty-five centimes each. a little red imp guarded the throat of the monster into whose mouth we had walked; he was cutting extraordinary capers, and made a great show of stirring the fires. the red imp opened the imitation heavy metal door for our passage to the interior, crying,--"ah, ah, ah! still they come! oh, how they will roast!" then he looked keenly at mr. thompkins. it was interesting to note how that gentleman was always singled out by these shrewd students of humanity. this particular one added with great gusto, as he narrowly studied mr. thompkins, "hist! ye infernal whelps; stir well the coals and heat red the prods, for this is where we take our revenge on earthly saintliness!" "enter and be damned,--the evil one awaits you!" growled a chorus of rough voices as we hesitated before the scene confronting us. near us was suspended a caldron over a fire, and hopping within it were half a dozen devil musis dans, male and female, playing a selection from "faust" on stringed instruments, while red imps stood by, prodding with red-hot irons those who lagged in their performance. crevices in the walls of this room ran with streams of molten gold and silver, and here and there were caverns lit up by smouldering fires from which thick smoke issued, and vapors emitting the odors of a volcano. flames would suddenly burst from clefts in the rocks, and thunder rolled through the caverns. red imps were everywhere, darting about noiselessly, some carrying beverages for the thirsty lost souls, others stirring the fires or turning somersaults. everything was in a high state of motion. numerous red tables stood against the fiery walls; at these sat the visitors. mr. thompkins seated himself at one of them. instantly it became aglow with a mysterious light, which kept flaring up and disappearing in an erratic fashion; flames darted from the walls, fires crackled and roared. one of the imps came to take our order; it was for three coffees, black, with cognac; and this is how he shrieked the order: "three seething bumpers of molten sins, with a dash of brimstone intensifier!" then, when he had brought it, "this will season your intestines, and render them invulnerable, for a time at least, to the tortures of the melted iron that will be soon poured down your throats." the glasses glowed with a phosphorescent light. "three francs seventyfive, please, not counting me. make it four francs. thank you well. remember that though hell is hot, there are cold drinks if you want them." presently satan himself strode into the cavern, gorgeous in his imperial robe of red, decked with blazing jewels, and brandishing a sword from which fire flashed. his black moustaches were waxed into sharp points, and turned rakishly upward above lips upon which a sneering grin appeared. thus he leered at the new arrivals in his domain. his appearance lent new zest to the activity of the imps and musicians, and all cowered under his glance. suddenly he burst into a shrieking laugh that gave one a creepy feeling. it rattled through the cavern with a startling effect as he strode up and down. it was a triumphant, cruel, merciless laugh. all at once he paused in front of a demure young parisienne seated at a table with her escort, and, eying her keenly, broke into this speech: "ah, you! why do you tremble? how many men have you sent hither to damnation with those beautiful eyes, those rosy, tempting lips? ah, for all that, you have found a sufficient hell on earth. but you," he added, turning fiercely upon her escort, "you will have the finest, the most exquisite tortures that await the damned. for what? for being a fool. it is folly more than crime that hell punishes, for crime is a disease and folly a sin. you fool! for thus hanging upon the witching glance and oily words of a woman you have filled all hell with fuel for your roasting. you will suffer such tortures as only the fool invites, such tortures only as are adequate to punish folly. prepare for the inconceivable, the unimaginable, the things that even the king of hell dare not mention lest the whole structure of damnation totter and crumble to dust." the man winced, and queer wrinkles came into the corners of his mouth. then satan happened to discover mr. thompkins, who shrank visibly under the scorching gaze. satan made a low, mocking bow. "you do me great honor, sir," he declared, unctuously. "you may have been expecting to avoid me, but reflect upon what you would have missed! we have many notables here, and you will have charming society. they do not include pickpockets and thieves, nor any others of the weak, stunted, crippled, and halting. you will find that most of your companions are distinguished gentlemen of learning and ability, who, knowing their duty, failed to perform it. you will be in excellent company, sir," he concluded, with another low bow. then, suddenly turning and sweeping the room with a gesture, he commanded, "to the hot room, all of you!" while he swung his sword, from which flashes of lightning trailed and thunder rumbled. we were led to the end of a passage, where a red-hot iron door barred further progress. "oh, oh, within there!" roared satan. "open the portal of the hot chamber, that these fresh arrivals may be introduced to the real temperature of hell!" [illustration: 0290] after numerous signals and mysterious passes the door swung open, and we entered. it was not so very hot after all. the chamber resembled the other, except that a small stage occupied one end. a large green snake crawled out upon this, and suddenly it was transformed into a red devil with exceedingly long, thin legs, encased in tights that were ripped in places. he gave some wonderful contortion feats. a poor little white pierrot came on and assisted the red devil in black art performances. by this time we discovered that in spite of the halfmolten condition of the rock-walls, the room was disagreeably chilly. and that ended our experience in hell. bishop then led us to the closed, dark front of a house in front of which stood a suspicious-looking man, who eyed us contemptuously. bishop told him that we should like to enter. the man assented with a growl. he beat upon the door with a stick; a little wicket opened, and a villanous face peered out at us. "what do you want?" came from it in gruff tones. "to enter, of course," responded bishop. "are they, all right, do you think?" asked the face of the sentinel. "i think they are harmless," was the answer. several bolts and locks grated, and the stubborn door opened. "enter, you vile specimens of human folly!" hissed the inside guard as we passed within. "d------all three of you!" we had no sooner found ourselves inside than this same person, a short, stout man, with long hair and a powerful frame, and the face of a cutthroat, struck a table with the heavy stick that he carried, and roared to us,--"sit down!" mr. thompkins involuntarily cowered, but he gathered himself up and went with us to seats at the nearest table. while we were doing this the habitués of the place greeted us with this song, sung in chorus: "oh, là là! c'te gueule- c'te binette. oh, là là, c'te gueule, qu'il a." "what are they saying?" asked mr. thompkins; but bishop spared him by explaining that it was only the latest song. [illustration: 0294] the room had a low ceiling crossed by heavy beams. wrought-iron gas lamps gave a gloomy light upon the dark, time-browned color of the place. the beams were loaded with dust, cobwebs, and stains, the result of years of smoke and accumulation. upon the walls were dozens of drawings by steinlen, illustrating the poems of low life written by the proprietor of the _café_; for we were in the den of the famous aristide bruant, the poet of the gutter,--verlaine had a higher place as the poet of the slums. there were also drawings by chéret, willett, and others, and some clever sketches in oil; the whole effect was artistic. in one corner was an old fireplace, rich in carvings of grotesque heads and figures, grilled iron-work, and shining copper vessels. the general impression was of a mediaeval gun-room. near the fireplace, upon a low platform, was a piano; grouped about it were four typical bohemians of lower bohemia; they wore loads of hair; their faces had a dissipated look, their fingers were heavily stained by cigarettes; they wore beards and négligé black cravats. these were all minor poets, and they took their turn in singing or reciting their own compositions, afterwards making a tour of the crowded tables with a tin cup and collecting the sous upon which they lived, and roundly cursing those who refused to contribute. bishop was so delighted with the pictures on the walls that he proceeded to examine them, but the bully with the stick thundered,--"sit down!" and shook his bludgeon menacingly. bishop sat down. then the brute swaggered up to us and demanded,--"what the devil do you want to drink, anyway? speak up quick!" when he had brought the drinks he gruffly demanded, "pay up!" upon receiving the customary tip he frowned, glared at us with a threatening manner, and growled, "humph! _c'est pas beaucoup!_" and swept the money into his pocket. "goodness! this is an awful place!" exclaimed mr. thompkins under his breath. he seemed to fear being brained at any moment. retreat had been rendered impossible by the locking of the door. we were prisoners at the will of our jailer, and so were all the others. the great bruant himself sat with a party of congenial bohemians at a table near the piano and fireplace; they were drinking bocks and smoking cigarettes and long-stemmed pipes. on the wall behind them was a rack holding the pipes of the habitués of the _café_, mostly broken and well browned. each pipe was owned by a particular bohemian, and each had its special place in the rack. the other tables held a general assortment of lesser bohemians and sight-seers, all cowed and silent under the domination of the bawling ruffian with the stick. whenever he smiled (which was rare, a perpetual frown having creased a deep furrow between his eyes) they smiled also, in great relief, and hung upon every word that his occasional lapses into an approach to good nature permitted him to utter. the poets and singers howled their productions in rasping voices, and put a strain upon the strength of the piano; and the minor bohemians applauded them heartily and envied them their distinction. in the midst of this performance there came a knock upon the door. the bully walked up to the wicket, peered out, and admitted an elderly gentleman, accompanied by a lady, evidently his wife. these the habitués greeted with the following song: "tout les clients sont des cochons- la faridon, la faridon donne. et surtout les ceux qui s'en vont- la faridon, la faridon donne." the gentleman, somewhat abashed by this reception, hesitated a moment, then sought seats. the two had hardly seated themselves when the burly ruffian with the stick began to recite a villanous poem reflecting upon the chastity of married women, emphasizing it with atrocious side remarks. the gentleman sprang from his seat in a rage and advanced threateningly upon the brute, who stood leering at him and taking a firmer hold upon his stick; but the visitor's wife caught the outraged man by the arm and restrained him. a wordy war ensued (for the gentleman was a frenchman), in which the choicest argot of montmartre and la villette was exhausted by the ruffian. he closed by shouting,--"you were not invited to enter here. you asked the privilege of entering; your wish was granted. if you don't like it here, get out!" the gentleman flung down a franc upon the table, the bolts were withdrawn, and he and his wife passed out while the roysterers sang,- tout les clients sont des cochons," etc., amid the laughter of the smaller bohemians. aristide bruant now rose from his table and strode to the centre of the room. a perfect silence fell. he is rather a small man, slender, and of delicate build; he has a thin, sallow face, with piercing black eyes, prominent cheek-bones, and long raven-black hair falling over his shoulders from beneath a broad black slouch hat down over his eyes. his unbuttoned coat showed a red flannel shirt open at the throat; a broad sash was about his waist; his trousers were tucked into top-boots,--the ensemble reminding one of buffalo bill. he glared sullenly round upon the people, and then sprang lightly upon a table. from that perch he recited one of his poems, selected from his book of songs and monologues. it does not bear reproduction here. for that matter, being written in the argot of montmartre, it could hardly be understood even by french scholars unfamiliar with montmartre. happily mr. thompkins understood not a word of it, smiling perfunctorily out of politeness while bruant was uttering things that might have shocked the most hardened parisians. there were several young women present, and while bruant was reciting they ogled him with genuine adoration. the other poets hung reverently upon his every word. a mighty burst of applause greeted the finish of the recitation; but bruant slouched indifferently to his seat, ignoring the ovation. the bully with the stick immediately stopped the noise by yelling, "silence!" this he followed up with the contribution-cup for the benefit of the idol of montmartre. with the cup he brought the volume of bruant's poems from which he had given the recitation,--a cheaply printed pamphlet. no one dared refuse to buy, and no change was returned. was not this the great aristide bruant, the immortal of montmartre? [illustration: 0300] he was followed by other poets with songs and the banging of the piano. we presently rose to leave, but the bully shouted,--"sit down! how dare you insult the young poet who is now singing?" we submissively resumed our seats. after a while, in a lull, we respectfully rose again, and the bully, shouting, "get out!" unbarred the door and we were free. mr. thompkins was more deeply puzzled than he had been before that night. he could not understand that such a resort, where one is bullied and insulted, could secure patronage. "but this is paris, mr. thompkins," explained bishop, somewhat vaguely; "and this particular part of paris is montmartre." midnight was now close at hand, but montmartre was in the height of its gayety. students, bohemians, and cocottes were skipping and singing along the boulevard,--singing the songs of bruant. the _café_s were crowded, the theatres and concert halls only in the middle of their programmes. cabs were dashing about, some stopping at the moulin rouge, others at the elysée montmartre, still others picking up fares for more distant attractions. bishop halted in front of a quiet-looking house with curtained windows, and bluntly asked mr. thompkins if he would like to go to church. mr. thompkins caught his breath, and an odd, guilty look came into his face. but before he could make reply bishop was leading the way within. the interior of the place certainly looked like a church,--it was fitted to have that significance. the cold, gray stone walls rose to a vaulted gothic ceiling; gothic pillars and arches and carved wood completed the architectural effect; statues of saints appeared in niches, some surmounted by halos of lighted candles; and there were banners bearing scriptural mottoes. [illustration: 9303] the heavy oaken tables on the floor were provided with stiff, highbacked pulpit-chairs, beautiful in color and carving, and of a gothic type, the whole scene suggesting a transept of notre-dame. mr. thompkins had reverently removed his hat. it was not long afterward that he quietly replaced it on his head. no notice was taken by us of these movements. at the farther end, where the church altar belonged, was indeed a handsomely carved altar. above it sprang a graceful arch, bearing a canopy beautifully painted in blue, with yellow stars. in the centre was a painting of christ upon the cross. the altar was the bar, or caisse, of this queer _café_, and behind it sat the proprietress, quietly knitting and waiting to fill orders for drinks. the walls of the _café_ were almost entirely covered with framed drawings by rodel; all were portraits of well-known bohemians of montmartre in characteristic attitudes,--the star patrons of this rendezvous. many women figured among them, all bohemian to the bone. [illustration: 0304] this was the café du conservatoire, famous for its celebrities, the poets of bohemian paris, among whom marcel legay is eminent. it was evident that the habitués of the conservatoire were of a much higher order than those whom we had seen elsewhere. [illustration: 8306] they looked more prosperous, were more amiable, and acted more as other people. true, there was much long hair, for that is a disease hard to shake off; but when it did occur, it was well combed and oiled. and there were many flat-brimmed "plug" hats, as well as collars,--clean ones, too, an exceptional thing in bohemia, laundering being expensive. but the poverty-haunted bohemians in the soleil d'or are more picturesque. that, however, is in the latin quarter: anything exceptional may be expected at montmartre. when we had finished our coffee we approached the patronne behind the bar, and bought billets for the salle des poètes at two francs each. this was a large room crowded with enraptured listeners to legay, who was at that moment rendering his song. les cloches. "les cloches catholiques, du haut de leur beffroi, voyaient avec effroi la résurrection des grandes républiques. les cloches rêvaient, en quatre-vingt onze, les cloches de bronze rêvaient." legay had quite a distinguished appearance as he stood singing before the piano. he wore a generously cut frock-coat, and his waistcoat exposed a spacious show of white shirt-front. [illustration: 9307] his long hair was carefully brushed back, his moustaches neatly waxed; altogether he was dainty and jaunty, and the ladies in the room made no concealment of their adoration. the accompanist was a picturesque character. he was forty-five or fifty years of age; he had long white hair and a drooping moustache, and his heavy protruding eyes were suffused with tears evoked by the pathos of the song. while he gazed up into the singer's face with tear-filled eyes he was in another life, another world, where there was nothing but music and poetry unalloyed to constitute his heaven. for legay sang charmingly, with an art and a feeling that were never obtrusive; and his audience was aesthetic. when he had finished he was cheered without stint, and he clearly showed how much the attention pleased him. [illustration: 8308] his song was only one of the numbers on a very interesting programme. this was the training school of the young poets and song-writers of upper bohemia; this was where they made their début and met the test of that discriminating criticism which decided them to advance upon the world or conceal themselves for yet a while from its cruel glare; and were they not but repeating the ordeal of the ancient greeks, out of which so many noble things passed into literature? these critics were as frank with their disapproval as generous with their acceptance. among those who sang were gustave corbet, marius geffroy, eugene lemercier, xavier privas, delarbre, and henri brallet, men as yet unknown, but likely to make a mark under the training, inspiration, and severe checks of the café du conservatoire. one of the goals for which these writers strive, and one that, if they win it, means to them recognition, is to have their poems published in _gil blas_, with illustrations by the peerless steinlen, as are the works of legay, and also of bruant, le terrible. marcel legay is a familiar figure on the boulevards, where his dainty person is often seen after nightfall, hurrying to one or another of his haunts, with a small roll of music under his arm, and his fluffy hair streaming over his shoulders. on certain nights of every week he sings over in the latin quarter, at the cabaret des noctambules, rue champollion, near the chapel of the sorbonne. the other singers that night at the café du conservatoire each affected his peculiar style of habit, gesture, and pose that he deemed most fetching. the entire programme was of songs: hence the name, café du conservatoire. after we had deft, bishop bought some brevas cigars; thus fortified, we headed for the moulin rouge. it was evident that mr. thompkins had reserved his enthusiasm for the great dance-hall of montmartre,--le moulin rouge,--with its women of the half world, its giddiness, its glare, its noise, its naughtiness. [illustration: 0310] here at last we should find all absence of restraint, posing, sordidness, self-consciousness, and appeals to abnormal appetites. mr. thompkins visibly brightened as we ascended the incline of the entrance and came within the influence of the life and abandon of the place. indeed, it must have seemed like fairy-land to him. the soft glow of hundreds of lights fell upon the crowds in the ball-room and balconies, with their shifting streams of color from the moving figures of dancing women in showy gowns and saucy hats, and its many chatting, laughing, joyous groups at the tables along the passage and the balconies, enjoying merry little suppers and varied consommations that kept scores of garçons continually on the move. a placard announced american bar; american and english drinks--as bald and unashamed as that. here on high stools, american free-lunch fashion, ranged along the bar, were english and american tourists and french dandies sipping manhattan cocktails with a cherry, brandy-and-soda, tom-and-jerry, and the rest. along the walls hung vivid paintings of some of the famous dancing-girls of the moulin, their saucy faces half hidden in clouds of lacy white skirts. high up on a pretty balcony at the end of the huge ball-room were the musicians, enjoying their cigarettes and bocks between pieces. a small stage occupied the opposite end of the room, where a light vaudeville performance had been given; but that was all over now, and attention centred in the tables and the dancing. the moulin rouge resembles very much the bul-lier; but at the moulin the cocottes are much more dashing and gaudy than over in the quartier, because the inspector at the door of the moulin maintains a more exacting standard on the score of the toilettes of the women whom he admits free of charge. women, women, women! there seemed no end of them; and each was arrayed to the full limit of her means. and there were french dandies in long-white melton coats that were very tight at the waist, and that bore large brown-velvet collars; their hair, parted behind, was brushed toward their ears; they strolled about the place in numbers, twirling their moustaches and ogling the girls. and there were french army officers, martinique negroes, longhaired students and montmartre poets, artists, actors, and many three-days-in-paris english tourists wearing knickerbockers and golf-caps, and always smoking bulldog pipes. there were also two parties of american men with their wives and daughters, and they enjoyed the spectacle with the natural fulness and responsiveness of their soil. for the moulin is really now but a great show place; it has been discovered by the outside world, and, unlike the other quaint places mentioned in this paper, has suffered the change that such contact inevitably imparts. it is no longer the queer old moulin, genuinely, spontaneously bohemian. but the stranger would hardly realize that; and so to mr. thompkins it seemed the brilliant and showy side of bohemian paris. by reason of its change in character it has less interest than the real bohemian paris that the real bohemians know, enjoy, and jealously guard. many light-footed young women were amusing circles of on-lookers with spirited dancing and reckless high-kicking; and, being adepts in their peculiar art, were so flashing and illusory that an attempt to analyze their movements brought only bewilderment. no bones seemed to hamper their swiftness and elasticity. the flash of a black stocking would instantly dissolve into a fleecy cloud of lace, and the whirling air was a cyclone; and there upon the floor sat the dancer in the "split," looking up with a merry laugh, flushed cheeks, and sparkling eyes, twinkling from the shadow of a twisted toque; then over her would sweep a whirlwind of other dancers, and identities would become inextricably confused. an odd-looking man, with a sad face and marvellously long, thin legs in tights, did incredible things with those members; he was merely a long spring without bones, joints, or hinges. his cadaverous face and glittering black eyes, above which rose a top-hat that never moved from place, completed the oddity of his appearance. he is always there in the thickest of the dancing, and his salary is three francs a night. we suddenly discovered mr. thompkins in a most embarrassing situation. a bewitching chemical blonde of the clinging type had discovered and appropriated him; she melted all over him, and poured a stream of bad english into his ear. she was so very, very thirsty, she pleaded, and monsieur was so charming, so much a gentleman,--he was beautiful, too. oh, monsieur would not be so unkind as to remove the soft, plump arm from round his neck,--surely it did not hurt monsieur, for was it not warm and plump, and was not that a pretty dimple in the elbow, and another even prettier in the shoulder? if monsieur were not so charming and gracious the ladies would never, never fall in love with him like this. and oh, monsieur, the place was so warm, and dancing makes one so thirsty! mr. thompkins's face was a picture of shame and despair, and i have never seen a more comical expression than that with which he looked appealingly to us for help. suppose some one in the hall should happen to recognize him! of course there was only one thing to do. mademoiselle blanche's thirst was of that awful kind which only shipwrecked sailors, travellers lost in a desert, and _café_ dancing-girls can understand. and so four glasses of beer were ordered. it was beautiful to see the grace and celerity with which mademoiselle blanche disposed of hers, the passionate eagerness with which she pressed a long kiss upon mr. thompkins's unwilling lips, and the promptness with which she then picked up his glass, drained it while she looked at him mischievously over the rim, kissed him again, and fled. mr. thompkins sat speechless, his face blazing, his whole expression indescribably foolish. he vigorously wiped his lips with his handkerchief, and was not himself again for half an hour. innumerable bright little comedies were unconsciously played in all parts of the room, and they were even more interesting than the antics of the dancers. we presently strolled into the garden of the moulin, where a performance is given in the summer. there stood a great white sheet-iron elephant, remindful of coney island. in one of the legs was a small door, from which a winding stair led into the body of the beast. the entrance fee was fifty centimes, the ticket-office at the top of the stair. it was a small room inside the elephant, and there was a small stage in the end of it, upon which three young women were exercising their abdominal muscles in the danse du ventre. mr. thompkins, dismayed at this, would have fled had not bishop captured him and hauled him back to a conspicuous seat, where the dancing-girls, quickly finding him, proceeded to make their work as extravagant as possible, throwing him wicked glances meanwhile, and manifestly enjoying his embarrassment. of course the dancers came round presently for offerings of sous. we returned to the dance-hall, for it was now closing-up time, and in order to feel a touch of kinship with america, drank a gin fizz at the american bar, though it seemed to be a novelty to mr. thompkins. the streets were alive with the revellers who had been turned out by the closing of the _café_s, dancehalls, and theatres, and the cries of cabbies rose above the din of laughter and chatter among the crowds. but the night was not yet quite finished. said bishop,--"we shall now have coffee at the red ass." that was below the place pigalle, quite a walk down to the rue de maubeuge, through that suddenly quiet centre of artists' studios and dignified residences. at last we reached l'âne rouage,--the red ass. it has a small and unassuming front, except that the window-panes are profusely decorated with painted flowers and figures, and a red ass peers down over the narrow door. l'âne rouge has no special distinction, save its artistic interior and the fanciful sketches on its walls. it is furnished with heavy dark tables and chairs, and iron grilled into beautiful scrolls and chandeliers,--like the famous chat noir, near by. in fact, l'âne rouge resembles an old curiosity shop more than anything else, for it is filled with all imaginable kinds of antiques, blackened by age and smoke, and in perfect harmony. it, too, has its particular clientèle of bohemians, who come to puff their long pipes that hang in racks, and recount their hopes, aspirations, achievements, and failures, occasionally breaking into song. for this they bring forth their mandolins and guitars, and sing sentimental ditties of their own composition. there is a charming air of chez soi at the red ass; a spirit of good-fellowship pervades it; and then, the _café_ is small, cosey, and comfortable, as well as artistic. [illustration: 0318] it was in a lively commotion when we crossed the threshold, the place being filled with littérateurs of the quarter. a celebration was in progress,--one of their number had just succeeded in finding a publisher for two volumes of his poetry. it was a notable event, and the lucky bohemian, flushed with money, had settled his debts and was now treating his friends. although we were strangers to him, he cordially invited us to share the hospitality of the occasion, and there was great applause when bishop presented him with a brevas cigar. "_bravo, les anglais! ce sont des bons types, ceux-là!_" and then they sang in chorus, a happy, careless, jolly crowd. there was a small, thin young sketch artist making crayon portraits of the successful poet and selling them to the poet's friends for fifty centimes apiece,--with the poet's autograph, too. in response to a call for une chanson anglaise, bishop sang "down on the farm" as he had never sung it before, his shining top-hat pushed back upon his curly hair, his jovial face beaming. at its conclusion he proposed a toast to the successful poet, and it was drunk standing and with a mighty shout. we looked in at the cabaret des quat'z' arts,--a bright and showy place, but hardly more suggestive of student bohemianism than the other fine _café_s of the boulevards. and thus ended a night on montmartre. we left mr. thompkins at his hotel. i think he was more than satisfied, but he was too bewildered and tired to say much about it. montmartre presents the extravagant side of parisian bohemianism. if there is a thing to be mocked, a convention to be outraged, an idol to be destroyed, montmartre will find the way. but it has a taint of sordidness that the real bohemianism of the old latin quarter lacks,--for it is not the bohemianism of the students. and it is vulgar. for all that, in its rude, reckless, and brazen way it is singularly picturesque. it is not likely that mr. thompkins will say much about it when he goes home, but he will be able to say a great deal in a general way about the harm of ridiculing sacred things and turning reverence into a laugh. [illustration: 0321] moving in the quartier latin the quartier latin takes on unwonted life about the fifteenth of july, when the artists and students change their places of abode under the resistless pressure of a nomadic spirit. [illustration: 8322] studios are generally taken for terms ranging from three months to a year, and the terms generally expire in july. the artists who do not change their residence then go into the country, and that means moving their effects. it is a familiar fact that artists do not generally occupy a high position in the financial world. consequently they are a very practical lot, attending to their own domestic duties (including washing when times are hard), and doing their own moving when july comes; but this is not a very elaborate undertaking, the worse of them for that. one day in july bishop and i sat in our window overlooking the court, and observed the comedy of a a student moving no one thinks student in the throes of moving. the old building at the end of our court was a favorite abiding-place for artists. evidently, on this day, a young artist or art student was _en déménagement_, for his household goods were being dragged down the stairs and piled in the court preparatory to a journey in a small hand-cart standing by. he was cheerfully assisted by a number of his friends and his devoted companion, a pretty little grisette. there were eight of them in all, and their laughter and shouts indicated the royal fun they were having. the cart was one of those voitures à bras that are kept for hire at a neighboring location de voitures à bras at six sous an hour. in order to get locomotion out of it you have to hitch yourself in the harness that accompanies it, and pull the vehicle yourself; and that is no end of fun, because your friends are helping and singing all the way. into this vehicle they placed a rickety old divan and a very much dilapidated mattress; then came half a sack of coal, a tiny, rusty, round studio stove with interminable yards of battered and soot-filled pipe, a pine table, two rush-bottomed chairs, and a big box filled with clattering dishes, kettles, pots, and pans. on top of this came a thick roll of dusty, faded, threadbare hangings and rugs, and the meagre wardrobes of the artist and the grisette; then a number of hat-boxes, after which mademoiselle looked with great solicitude. last of all came bulky portfolios filled with the artist's work, a large number of canvases that were mostly studies of mademoiselle au naturel, with such accessories as easel, paint-boxes, and the like, and the linen and bedding. the fat old concierge stood grumbling near by, for the ropes were being tied over the load, and she was anxiously waiting for her _dernier adieu_, or parting tip, that it is the custom to give upon surrendering the key. but tips are sometimes hard to give, and bohemian etiquette does not regard them with general favor. after the load had been made snug, the artist approached the concierge, doffed his cap, bowed low, and then in a most impressively ceremonious manner handed her the key, avowed that it broke his heart to leave her, and commended her to god. that was all. there seems to be a special providence attending upon the vocabulary of concierges in their hour of need. the shrill, condemnatory, interminable vocalization of this concierge's wrath indicated specific abilities of exceptional power. but the artist paid no attention. he hung his coat and "plug" hat on the inverted table-leg, got between the shafts, hitched himself in the harness, and sailed out of the court, his friends swarming around and assisting him to drag the toppling cart away. and this they did with a mighty will, yelling and singing with a vigor that wholly obliterated the concierge's noise. the little grisette closed the procession, bearing in one hand a lamp and in the other a fragile bust. and so the merry party started, possibly for the other end of paris,--the greater the distance the more the fun. they all knew that when the voiture had been unloaded and all had fallen to and assisted the young couple in straightening out their new home, there would be a jolly celebration in the nearest _café_ at the moving artist's expense. so the start was made fairly and smoothly; but the enthusiasm of the crowd was so high and the little vehicle was so top-heavy, that at the end of the passage the comedy seemed about to merge into a tragedy. it was announced to all the court in the shrill voice of the concierge, who exultingly screamed,--"the stove has fallen out! and the coal! the things are falling all over the street! oh, you villain!" to the movers themselves it was merely an incident that added to the fun and zest of the enterprise. [illustration: 0326] my plans carried me to concarneau, and bishop's took him to italy, where i would join him after a while. and a royal time we had in our several ways. the autumn found us fresh and eager for our studies in paris again, and so we returned to hunt a studio and establish ourselves in new quarters. we had stored our goods with a kind american friend; and as we had neither the desire nor the financial ability to violate the traditions of the quartier, we greatly scandalized him and his charming family by appearing one day with a crowd of students and a voiture à bras before his house and taking our effects away in the traditional fashion. of course our friend would have gladly paid for the transport of our belongings in a more respectable fashion; but where would have been the fun in that? i am pleased to say that with true american adaptiveness he joined the singing and yelling crowd, and danced a jig to our playing in our new quarters after a generous brew of punch had done its share in the jollity of the event. [illustration: 0328] ah, dear old paris! wonderful, bewildering paris! alluring, enchanting paris! our student years are now just ended, and paris is already so crowded with workers who cannot bear to leave it that we must seek our fortune in other and duller parts of the world. but paris has ineradicably impressed itself upon us. we have lived its life; we have been a part of its throbbing, working, achieving individuality. what we take away will be of imperishable value, the salt and leaven of our hopes and efforts forever. the end woman and artist by max o'rell author of "john bull and co." "john bull and his island" "jonathan and his continent" etc. [illustration] london frederick warne & co. and new york [_all rights reserved_] i dedicate this volume to my wife contents page i. french and english homes 9 ii. the house in elm avenue 13 iii. the portrait 19 iv. dora 38 v. the dramatic author and the patron of arts 60 vi. the inventor 83 vii. the new house 94 viii. the house-warming 104 ix. the confession 109 x. belgravia 125 xi. general sabaroff 145 xii. the husband, the wife, and the other 164 xiii. a cruel ordeal 177 xiv. eva 209 xv. the separation 217 xvi. philip returns to the fold 235 xvii. dora's studio 246 xviii. lorimer's plot 270 woman and artist i french and english homes the english, whose knowledge of france consists in a fair acquaintance of that part of paris lying between the madeleine and the faubourg montmartre, affirm that family life is unknown on our side of the channel, putting forward as proof the fact that the french language cannot boast of possessing the word _home_, that appeals so strongly to the british heart. their conclusion is sublime: since the french have no such word, they say, it is very evident that they have not the thing. as to the word itself, i am inclined to think they may be right; we have not, or rather we have no longer, a perfect equivalent for the english expression, as our pretty word _foyer_ is only used in pretentious or poetical language. in ordinary conversation the frenchman does not refer to his _foyer_. _il rentre à la maison, chez lui._ m. perrichon, alone, returns to his _foyer_. our old french possessed an equivalent for the english word _home_. it was a substantive that is still with us, but we have it to-day in the form of a preposition--i mean the word _chez_, which is no other than the word case. the frenchman of olden times said: "_je rentre en chez moi._" but enough of philology. i own that an apartment on the fifth floor, _au dessus de l'entresol_, would not suggest to the heart what the _home_ does to every english mind. but the piquancy and humour of this malevolent criticism, founded, like all international prejudices, on the most crass ignorance and the narrowest patriotism, consists in the fact, that in all parts of london, at the present time, enormous barracks of eight and ten storeys, called flats, are being raised, where the english, tired of the tyranny of domestics, seek refuge, at the terrible risk of likening to chicago, not only that part of the city devoted to business, but all the pretty, peaceful neighbourhoods, that made london, in summer, the most charming city in the world. they offend the eye, even in st. john's wood and hampstead, etc. true, we have quite near paris, ville-d'avray, fontenay-sous-bois, enghien, meudon, bellevue, and i do not know how many more delightful places; but they are suburbs, and not _rus in urbe_, like chelsea, st. john's wood, hampstead, and many others practically in the heart of london. france, completely absorbed by paris in all that is written about her in foreign countries, is as unknown of the english people as the forbidden land of thibet. provincial france (where all enjoy the possession of homes, english fashion, _plus_ gaiety), the laborious and thrifty population of our villages (who are the fortune and salvation of france), our family life (narrow, exclusive, nay almost mean, i own it, but made up of love and devotion)--all these are a sealed letter to our neighbours over the channel, of which a goodly number still hallow the venerable joke, that the french live on frogs and snails. for that matter, there are also in france a great many people perfectly convinced that an englishman, tired of his wife, may with impunity go and sell her at smithfield market. we are quits. as we travel far less than the english, it is not surprising that we should know them still less than they know us. we cannot throw stones at them. in the utter ignorance of what exists and takes place in foreign countries, there are few nations to which france cannot give points. ii the house in elm avenue of all the rustic neighbourhoods bordering on london city, there is none prettier, fresher, and more verdant than st. john's wood. it is the refuge of workers in search of light, air, and tranquillity. painters, sculptors, writers, journalists, actors, and musicians--in fact, the majority of the highest intellectual bohemia--inhabit these semi-rural acres, lying between regent's park and hampstead heath. among the leafy haunts of st. john's wood, numberless masterpieces have been produced by writers and artists whose fame has rung through the world. it is there, in short, that chiefly congregates the artistic intelligence of london. if you doubt my testimony on this point, apply direct for further particulars to the inhabitants of this favoured district. no. 50 elm avenue, st. john's wood, did not attract the gaze of the passer-by. walled around and almost hidden by large trees, the house, which could be seen through the iron gates, was a modest, unpretentious, two-storeyed structure. on the ground floor it was traversed by a long vestibule. those who had been privileged to enter it knew that there was a long drawing-room and boudoir on one side, and on the other a spacious dining-room, and a library with a french window and steps leading down to a beautiful garden, surrounded by spreading elms and chestnut trees. on the outside, glossy ivy with gnarled stems mantled the lower part of the house, and in autumn bold virginia creepers hung wreaths of scarlet around the chamber windows. at the side of the house, with the door opening on the adjacent street, stood a building with high north window, which indicated that the house was the abode of an artist. in this spacious, well-lit studio, worked philip grantham, a.r.a. the house was furnished with great taste; everything spoke of that comfort which the english value before luxury. a thousand and one little details told of an artistic woman's hand reigning supreme in the little domain, and one left the house feeling, "these people are happy and evidently well-off; there may be artists who vegetate, but philip grantham is not one of them." the garden was admirably kept, the lawn smooth and soft as a turkey carpet to the foot; and when the sun filtered through the trees to the grass, you could imagine yourself in the depths of the country, instead of near the centre of a great city. the studio was a favourite room of the granthams. loving care had been expended upon it, and the result was a worker's paradise that invited to lofty labours and cosy conversation. dora grantham was her husband's comrade in art, and all the leisure that was hers, after seeing well to her household, was spent at philip's side. the studio was more than comfortable--it was even luxurious, with its beautiful renaissance mantelpiece of carved oak, its rich oriental rugs and curtains and hanging eastern lamps. all these gave an atmosphere of restful, dreamy ease to the place; and the fresh flowers that in all seasons filled the rare porcelain vases struck a note of gaiety among the sombreness of the old oak furniture. a thousand curios from all the ends of the earth had been accumulated in this beloved apartment, and here, too, stood dora's pleyel piano and philip's bookcase of precious volumes on art, all richly bound. a huge screen, gay with eastern embroideries, hid the door that opened into the road; and in this veritable nest, nothing reminded of a hustling and bustling world outside. in summer, through the open door that led into the garden, one got a delicious vista of green foliage and turf. in the centre of the studio stood two easels of almost equal size, and when i have told you that at these two easels, placed side by side, quite near each other, worked philip and dora, you will rightly understand that this studio had not been so fitted up to serve as a mere workshop, but that all its details had been suggested by the love of two kindred artistic spirits, who adored each other and passed most of their time there in loving rivalry and mutual encouragement. dora had such respect for the studio that she never entered it except when dressed in some colour that harmonised with the carpets and hangings and the rest of the furniture. to speak truly, this was not a difficult matter. tall, dark, superb in figure and in face, her lips perhaps a trifle haughty in repose, but instantly softened by the lightness of her frank, gay smiles, which disclosed her little even white teeth; with dark hazel eyes through which you seemed to look into her soul as through two open doors; with a smooth, fresh, and clear complexion--almost all colours became her. philip admired his wife in every separate colour of the rainbow, but he had his preferences as a painter. he loved best for her certain crimsons and deep tones of orange and of gobelin blue; and, as one must never run counter to the fads of an artist, it was generally in one of these tints that dora dressed, when she wanted philip to surpass himself at his painting. at the time when this story begins, which is but one of yesterday, philip was thirty-six and dora twenty-seven. they had been six years married, and possessed a lovely little girl of five, so full of dainty grace and childish fascination, that when philip was showing a new picture to a friend, and watching out of the corner of his eye to see if his work was being admired, as often as not the friend would say, "ah, yes! that is a fine creation, a beautiful picture; but there," indicating the lovely child, "is your _chef-d'oeuvre_--nothing can match her." and as in philip's nature the parent outweighed the painter, he would proudly smile and reply, "you are right." philip and dora had begun their married life in the most modest fashion, but fortune had smiled on them. each year the painter had become better known and valued, and his pictures more sought after. to-day he was not only well known, but almost celebrated. every succeeding year had deepened the sincere and strong love of these two lovers and friends, who led a calm, sweet existence, and trod, side by side, a flowered path, under a cloudless sky, with hope, glad labour, honour, and security as companions on the road. i think i have said enough to convince the reader, that if there existed a happy little corner of the world, it was no. 50 elm avenue, st. john's wood. iii the portrait on the 10th of may 1897, that is to say on the sixth anniversary of philip's marriage with dora, he had promised to present her with a portrait of herself. the picture was all but finished. only a painter would have noticed that it wanted a few more touches to complete it. hobbs, a faithful servant, who had been dora's nurse in her old home, and had followed her to st. john's wood when she had married, was dusting the studio and gazing with admiring eyes at the portrait of dora, which seemed to smile at her from her master's easel. "only a few flowers to put in," said the good woman, "and the picture will be finished. i have watched it for weeks. how wonderful it is! just her beautiful face and kind smile. and to think that there are people who pay hundreds of pounds to have their portrait painted! how lucky a lady is to be the wife of a painter--she can get hers for nothing!" she was interrupted in her reflections by a ring and a double knock at the studio door. hobbs ran to answer the postman, and returned immediately, bearing in her hand a box from which some magnificent pansies were escaping. she had great difficulty in extracting the flowers from the badly crushed box. "pansies," said she, "for the portrait, no doubt--models for copying. if i were the wife of a painter, that is the only kind of model i would allow my husband to paint from--nature. fancy women coming to a studio and undressing before a man!--the hussies! i am glad there are no such creatures wanted here." it is necessary to be an artist, or at any rate of an artistic nature, to understand that it is possible to regard a perfectly nude model with as much _sang-froid_ and respect as one would a statue; but the english middle class have not the artistic nature; and, in the eyes of a good ordinary woman, a female model is a lost creature, and the artist who studies and draws her an abandoned man. england produces something very humorous: this is the prudish model, who comes to an artist's studio, refuses at first, hesitates long, and finally offers to pose in tights. better still. a french painter in new york was doing the portrait of a beautiful american woman in evening dress. when the head and shoulders were finished, the pretty american declared that she was too busy to pose any longer, and suggested that the picture might be completed from a model of her own height and figure, who could wear her gown. the painter agreed, but had the greatest difficulty in finding a model who would consent to exhibit her charms, as the society lady of the united states had done freely and imperturbably. hobbs did not let her indignation get the better of her, and, consoling herself with the thought that "the creatures" were not wanted here, finished dusting the studio, and then, gathering up the pansies, took them to her mistress. it was ten o'clock. philip had not yet come to the studio. he usually began working at nine o'clock, and went on steadily until one, so as to profit fully by the best of the light that london puts at the disposition of an artist. hobbs was astonished that her master was not yet at work, especially as she knew he had promised dora to finish her portrait by the 10th of may. she herself had told her so. she began making conjectures, when a loud ringing at the studio door aroused her from her reverie. she returned in a few moments, followed by a young man about twenty-five, tall and distinguished-looking, with a pleasant face, whom she had often seen in the house. "this way, please, sir," said she, showing him into the studio; "master hasn't come down yet, but i am sure he won't be long. i will go and tell him you are here." hobbs knew that m. de lussac was a friend, and not one of those inconvenient people who bore artists by going to their studios and talking inanities to them about their work. besides, she had a list of the people whom philip received at any time. and she went immediately to inform her master of m. de lussac's arrival. georges de lussac was an attaché at the french embassy in london. the manly beauty of his face and figure, his good spirits, elegant manners and easy wit, added to the lustre of his name, made him one of the favourites of london society. no ball, dinner, or house-party was quite complete without him, the most sought-after man in the most aristocratic circles. he was a favourite with artists, whose works he well knew how to appreciate, and welcomed in literary society owing to his brilliant conversational powers. these also gained for him the admiration of society women, who were fascinated by his soft, insinuating voice. there are legions of women who admire first in a man--a well-cut coat, an intelligent and handsome face, with a slightly cynical smile which seems so little in earnest that they say to themselves, "he is not serious; with him one can have a good time without fear of being compromised; and then, he is a diplomatist, and as discreet as a tomb." by reason of this reputation for discreetness, the diplomatist is beyond competition in the race for women's favour, without even excepting the brilliant cavalry officer who appeals chiefly to women in love with glitter and who are ready to catch cupid as he flies. i have not mentioned the tenor, who only makes his chief conquests amongst romantic and flighty women. in high society in france, england, and probably everywhere, the distribution of prizes is somewhat in this order: first prize, the diplomatist; second prize, the officer of hussars; third prize, the tenor. _accesserunt_, the remainder who have not much to share between them. in the remainder may be classed husbands. de lussac drew a gold cigarette case from his pocket, took a cigarette, and seating himself on a divan began to smoke. "i know of nothing pleasanter," said he, "than a chat and smoke in the morning with a painter in his sanctum. if i had to live all my time in one apartment, i would choose first a studio, secondly, a library; in all other rooms, one eats, drinks, sleeps, or bores oneself." he gazed complacently around the studio and his eyes fell on dora's portrait. he rose, chose a good angle, and inspected the picture carefully. "beautiful likeness!" said he, "full of poetry--modelling perfect. it is simply quivering with life--and what lovely flesh colour! there is not a man in england that can paint flesh like grantham--no, not one that comes up to his ankle. yet, with the most brilliant future before him, with the foremost place among the painters of the day close at hand, and certain to be a royal academician before he is forty--here is a man to whom artistic fame does not suffice." without noticing it he had approached the door leading to the garden. he opened it. the lilacs and hawthorns were in bloom, and whiffs of delicious scents were wafted into the studio. "who would imagine," thought he, "that in this peaceful retreat, where the rustling of the trees is the only sound to be heard, a man was to be found who had invented a projectile likely to revolutionise modern warfare!" philip entered hurriedly. "ah, my dear de lussac--no news yet?" "no! the commission is to-day sitting in paris at the war office. there is every hope of a favourable decision, i believe." "not so loud," said philip, "not so loud; dora might hear you. she knows nothing about it. ah, my dear fellow, i have worked day and night to perfect that shell. the mechanism is so simple and yet so precise, that, by winding up the little spring, the shell will burst without necessarily striking any object on the ground or in the air, at any portion of its course, exactly so many seconds as is wished after it has been fired. the usefulness of the shell in the open field or against fortified positions is obvious." "that is so! in every case the experiment has proved entirely successful; and we wonder how it is the invention was not immediately bought by the english government." "do you think the commission will soon arrive at a decision?" "to-day, probably," replied de lussac, "very likely in a few hours. we are expecting every minute a telegram from paris." "if they should buy it!" said philip dreamily. "well, then, you will be a wealthy man!" "shall i?" exclaimed philip, his eyes shining with joy--"shall i be rich? my dear de lussac, i am quite satisfied with my lot. i earn more than i want. but my wife, my dora--i want to be rich for her sake. she was brought up surrounded with every luxury. six years ago, she left the house of a wealthy and generous father to share the life of a struggling artist. she never once complained, but has been happy and has made me the happiest of men. she has sat constantly by my easel, inspiring my brush by her sweet presence, and encouraging me by her constant and discriminating praise. to better appreciate my work, she has set to work herself, and has had two pictures hung at the royal academy, which have been splendidly noticed. how she has helped me! sometimes she would come and put her arms on my shoulders and say, 'go on, philip, you are on the road to fame.' what a wife! yes," said he, with earnestness and warmth, "i want wealth, but god is my witness that it is for her that i aspire to riches." "still in love, i see, _cher ami, hein_? it is possible then to be in love with one's wife after six years, six long years, of marriage." "still in love! why, i am only now beginning to love her as she deserves. oh, that wealth may enable me to make her still happier!" "amen," said de lussac, and he turned again to the picture. "i think this portrait is delightful," said he; "you can never have done a better piece of work than this!" "yes! i am fairly satisfied with it," said philip; "it is like her, is it not? my wife with a bunch of pansies in her hand." "i don't see the pansies," remarked de lussac. "no! i shall put them in presently. i shall finish the picture this afternoon." "i see," said de lussac, "that madame grantham will have the bunch of pansies in her hand, and that she will look lovingly at them." "yes, it is her favourite flower," replied philip, "and mine too. there was a bed of pansies growing just under her window in that beautiful country house where i met her for the first time and where i courted her. she tended them herself, and called them 'her family.' before entering the house, i would always pluck one and place it in my buttonhole. when it was faded, i gave it to her. it is utter nonsense, i know; but, after all, happiness is made up of little foolish trifles of that sort." "the anglo-saxons!" said de lussac--"a practical and yet sentimental race." philip went to a bureau and, opening a drawer, took out a little packet carefully tied up. "here they are," said he, "her family." and he replaced the packet with great care. "this is charming, quite romantic," cried de lussac, "perfectly idyllic! you know, you are a curious mixture, _mon cher ami_. fancy your inventive genius turning to an instrument of war that will make widows of wives who perhaps once had such a 'family.'" "oh, if i thought that!" exclaimed philip. "you would beg the commission to kindly return you your shell," suggested de lussac, with a wink. "hardly," said philip, smiling; "i am too near the goal to do that." "i think i had better be off now," said de lussac, looking at his watch. "i am preventing you from working." "not at all, my dear fellow. i have, it is true, to finish this portrait to-day; but i have plenty of time. i will go and put on my working-jacket. dora will be down in a minute ... only, dear boy, do not mention the shell, will you? not a word about it!" de lussac, left alone, could not control his curiosity. the drawer in which the pansies had been placed was only half shut. he took the packet in his hand and gave way to hearty laughter at the expense of philip and dora. "well! i'll be hanged," said he, "if ever a woman makes me save some withered old flowers tied in pink ribbon, like a box of chocolates." if he had only looked round at the garden door, while indulging in these reflections, he would have seen dora come into the studio. dora was radiant, in a pretty simple morning gown, which accentuated her severe and classical beauty. her large hazel eyes, encircled with long lashes, had an expression of exquisite sweetness; but they were also capable of making any man, who would dare look into them with any other sentiment than that of profound respect, sink into the ground. her haughty mouth, with its short upper lip, almost austrian, betrayed a proud, susceptible, and ardent nature. she had the consciousness of her beauty and intellectual worth. the smallest underhand act filled her with repugnance. on seeing de lussac with the packet of flowers in his hand and the drawer still open, she hardly knew whether to laugh or treat him with contempt. the corner of her mouth turned slightly up and, with a little mocking smile which completely disconcerted the young diplomatist, she said-"well, monsieur de lussac, and how are you?" "how are you, _chère madame_," answered he in an embarrassed manner. "very well, thank you. i thought i heard philip." "he is in there, changing his coat." and, remarking that dora had brought in a handful of pansies, he added-"more pansies?" "why more? ah! that is true, you have some also, i see." de lussac reddened to the tips of his ears. "yes! a minute ago philip was telling me the history of your 'little family,' and when he went out i could not resist the temptation of taking another peep at the little packet that he had left in my hand, and which contains the prologue of your love affairs." seeing himself caught in the act he did not hesitate to tell this little fib, so as to reinstate himself in dora's good graces. she was taken in by it. "give the packet to me; you are a very wicked man--these are not for the profane; and philip is still more wicked than you are to show them to you." she put the packet back again. she was vexed, almost humiliated. why had philip mentioned the story of the pansies to monsieur de lussac? it could interest no one, except the two lovers, who had thus repeated their vows. why had philip shown him the packet? in her eyes, it was an almost ungentlemanly act. she passed a hand across her forehead, as if to brush away the ideas that came to her mind, and smiled good-humouredly once more. "i believe you are jealous," said she gaily. "not a bit--i am disgusted. two people supposed to be sensible, billing and cooing over a package of old flowers, after being married, let me see--how long?" "six years to-day." "and after six years of marriage you are still in the region of romance? will you allow a bachelor, an intimate friend of your husband's, to congratulate you with all his heart? i declare i almost envy your happiness." "well, get married yourself!" exclaimed dora; "it is very easy." "not for the world," said he, in a bantering tone. "i am too fond of woman in the plural to ever love one in the singular. besides, i could never marry a woman unless i could respect her." "naturally." "well!" exclaimed de lussac, laughing heartily, "i don't believe i could respect a woman who would be willing to marry me." "oh! come, you are like most frenchmen," said dora, "not so bad as you would make people believe. you will succumb to the temptation all in good time. you will marry, you will love your wife, and, what is more, you will make the most docile of husbands. it is the most recalcitrant of you that generally become the model husbands in the end." "heaven forbid! i will succumb to every temptation you like to name except that one; if i ever find myself married i shall have been chloroformed before the ceremony. for fear of giving way to this temptation i will stick to all the others, in case they should forsake me--you see, i am a vagabond pure and simple." "women love vagabonds--many do at any rate. you will find a hundred for one that will have you." "a hundred perhaps--one never," said de lussac. "and when you are old, who will occupy the other side of the chimney corner? a chimney has two corners." "i know it," said de lussac; "but there is also the middle, where i shall be very happy and comfortable--that is better still. no, no, long live liberty!" "pure selfishness--and besides, conjugal life is the most comfortable." "undeceive yourself, madame; one lives as well at the club. one dines better at a restaurant, where for a small tip one may grumble and blow up the waiter to one's heart's content." "you can do as much in your own house, and blow up your wife without its costing you a farthing." the light-hearted gaiety of the young man amused dora. a woman, although she does not countenance that love of independence in her husband, admires it in other men. i feel inclined to believe that women have a mingled feeling of admiration and respect for the man who has not been caught in the matrimonial toils. dora was playing with the pansies that she had scattered on the table. "you see these flowers," she said suddenly to de lussac, "well, there is an impenetrable mystery connected with them." "you don't say so," said he, noticing the comically majestic air she had assumed. "yes! a real live mystery. on our wedding-day there arrived a bunch similar to this one. who sent it? that is the mystery. on every anniversary of our marriage, we get another. are the flowers for philip or for me? more mystery. philip says they are from some old admirer of mine; from some old sweetheart of his, i say. still they come, and are always welcome." "i am not versed in the language of flowers," said de lussac, "but i fancy i remember a little verse, beginning something after this fashion- pansies for thought- love lies bleeding. i cannot recollect the words exactly, but perhaps there is a bleeding heart somewhere. oh, this is terrible of me," exclaimed de lussac, again looking at his watch; "it is eleven o'clock, and i am still here chattering. i ought to be at the embassy; i must really go. will you be kind enough to tell your husband that i will send him a wire as soon as i know something definite?--no, no, i will come myself." "about what?" said dora. "oh! about something--which concerns me." he shook hands with dora and went out hurriedly. dora, left alone, began to arrange the flowers. the pansy was a flower which fascinated her, and suggested to her mind all kinds of fantastic faces. she seemed to see sad and solemn ones, some smiling and gay, others saucy; they represented to her a perfect gallery of weird faces. she chose some of the best, made them into a little bouquet for philip to paint in her picture. taking away one or two that did not harmonise with her dress, she placed the bunch on her husband's easel. "oh, what pretty flowers!" shouted eva, who had just come into the studio, followed by hobbs. she was dressed to go out for her daily morning walk. "mama, aren't you coming out for a walk with us?" "no, my sweet," replied dora; "i cannot this morning. you know that daddy is going to finish my picture this morning, so i must stay with him; he will want me." "you are always with daddy," said eva, pouting. "you never come for a walk with me." "how can you say such things? you know i go out very often with you--but i can't to-day. to-morrow, yes! to-morrow. come, be a good little girl." "a good little girl," said eva, sighing, "that's what you always say to me." "when i was a little girl," said dora, trying to look serious, "i, too, had to be good, you know." "oh, mama! aren't you glad you're not a little girl any longer?" said eva. "oh, what shall we do with her, hobbs, if she is so naughty?" said dora, taking the child up in her arms and covering her with kisses. and yet, she knew that the reproaches were well-merited. "is it true that mama was a little girl first?" "of course, dear, certainly." "quite a little girl, and then as tall as that--and that--and that?" "yes!--and then like this," said dora, touching the top of her head. "well, then, you had a mama, too, that's grandma, isn't it? was she pretty, like you?" "much prettier." "did she scold you?" "certainly, when i was naughty." "isn't it funny though?--where is daddy?" "he is coming in a minute, dearie. come, it is time you went for a walk, hobbs," said dora to the good woman, who was laughing at the child's questions; "do not stay out very long; it is chilly, and miss eva might catch cold." "very well, ma'am," replied hobbs. dora, ascertaining that the child was warmly enough clad, gave her bonnet strings an extra touch, then looked at her and kissed her again and again. eva and her nurse went out at the studio door. the latter, finding a letter in the box, came back with it and gave it to dora, returning again to the child. dora, remembering eva's reproaches, felt the tears come into her eyes. with many women the mother kills the wife, but dora was so much absorbed in her husband that she often reproached herself with not taking enough notice of the child. she was wife first, mother next. yet, god knew how she adored her child. iv dora it was past noon, and philip had not yet set to work. for some time past dora had noticed that philip had no longer the same lively interest in his painting, but she had been very careful not to speak to him about it. dora was the ideal artist's wife, not only because she understood her husband's art, but also because she was keenly alive to the conditions under which works of art are produced. if she had been the wife of bernard de palissy, she herself would have broken up the furniture of her home to keep alive the furnace fire. blessed with a calm, even temperament herself, she knew that the artistic nature is sensitive, susceptible, irritable even, and that a veritable diplomacy has to be exercised daily and hourly, if one would so live with an artist as to cheer him in his moments of discouragement, to stimulate him, to give him constantly the discreet and intelligent praise he needs, when it seems to him that his imagination and his powers are forsaking him, and that he is no longer doing his best work. an artist is a piece of machinery that must be wound up every day. there is scarce an artist worthy of the name who does not think he is used up each time that he terminates a new work, and there is not a painter who, when he shows a new picture for the first time, does not watch the scrutinising gaze of the critic, much as a mother watches with anxious eye the expression of the doctor who is going to pronounce himself upon the subject of her sick child. an artist is a child, who must be constantly petted and applauded. dora knew all that, and, on this subject, she had nothing to reproach herself with; on the contrary, it was to her that her husband owed his growing celebrity--she had made him what he was. she did not take any credit for this, she had never reminded him of it, never a hint on the subject had passed her lips. a woman like dora leaves a husband to recognise these things for himself, but never speaks of them. dora had not the courage to ask philip why he painted with less ardour, but she longed to say to him, "you promised me that you would finish the portrait to-day; you tell me that it is only a matter of two or three hours' work; but i am sure that it will take seven or eight hours to finish it ... why don't you set about it?" and her imagination fell to inventing all sorts of explanations, each more fantastic and improbable than the other. the last words of monsieur de lussac came back to her memory, "_pansies for thought--love lies bleeding._" what connection would there be between a pansy and a crushed love? no one had ever loved her well enough to break his heart about her, except philip, and he had married her. but he? had there been a romance in his life, before she had known him? he had never spoken of anything of the kind. "after all," she said to herself, "the best of men have some experience of that kind in their early life, which they do not talk about. ah, well! what matters it? philip has filled my life with happiness." her glance wandered again to the picture. "not yet finished," she murmured. "has he forgotten his promise? for some time past he has been quite strange; he seems preoccupied, distraught, anxious even--at times his mind seems to be far away." and a thousand ideas flitted through her mind, only to be dismissed as all equally absurd. suddenly she uttered a little cry of surprise, to find the vigorous arms of her husband clasped around her waist. "what is my little wife thinking of so deeply that she does not notice the sound of her husband's footsteps?" said philip. "of you," said dora, laughing, "and of these flowers." "they have come again, eh?" said philip, taking up his palette and brushes. "yes; who sends them?" "that is what i should like to know. as i told you before, an old admirer of yours, i daresay." "nonsense, you know better. as i said before, some old sweetheart of yours--far more likely," replied dora. then looking her husband straight in the eyes, she added-"confess." "look here," said philip, "i have come to work; if you tease me in this way, i shall never do anything." he tried his brushes and began mixing his colours. dora took the little bunch of pansies which she had arranged, and placed them near the portrait. "the colours harmonise exquisitely with the yellow of the dress. how sweet they are, these pansies! look, do look, at this dear little yellow one--what a saucy face! put it in the picture. by-the-bye, there is a letter for you." she went to the table, where hobbs had laid the letter, took it up and read the envelope aloud, "philip grantham, esq., a.r.a. associate of the royal academy! there are lots of people who live in hopes of adding letters to their name, but you, my philip, will soon drop one: instead of a.r.a., just royal academician, r.a." "who knows?" said philip. "perhaps--thanks to your encouragement and loving praise. there! open the letter for me, will you?" "it is sir benjamin pond, who announces that he is coming to see you to-day: he wants to choose one or two pictures." "i hope he will come late, then," said philip. "i want to finish your portrait before dinner. it ought to be easy enough--two or three hours of steady work, and the thing is done." dora smiled a little smile of incredulity. "seven or eight," said she, "at least." philip had stuck the bunch of pansies on the easel, his palette was ready, he was just going to begin. "come here," said he to dora, "here, quite close--that's it. i can work so much better, darling, when you are near me. look, the brush works already more easily, my hand is surer--there, that is good--splendid--i shall go ahead now." philip was in working mood, and dora was beaming. she could have hugged him, and would not have been able to resist the temptation, but for the fear of hindering his progress. after a few minutes' silence, she burst out-"philip!" "yes, dearest," replied philip, without withdrawing his eyes from his work. "don't you think ours is a very romantic life?" "very romantic? how do you mean?" "oh, i mean that we are so happy." "yes, but that is hardly what people call romance. a romantic life is an eventful life, and happy people have no events in their lives. i don't believe that cousin gerald lorimer, with all his imagination, could get a one-act play out of our lives. there is no plot to be found in them. to make a novel or a play, there must be intrigue, troubles, misunderstandings, moral storms. there are people who love storms. some people only love the sea when it is in a fury. are you fond of storms yourself?" "oh no," replied dora; "i have no sea-legs. i love the life that i lead with you--and my enthusiasm for your art deepens my love for you every day." "my darling," said philip, drawing dora still nearer to him, and caressing the graceful head that was resting against his knee, "do you know that one of these days i shall be jealous of you, you are making such progress with your painting." "what nonsense! i am learning, so that i may understand you better. to appreciate you thoroughly, my ambition soars no higher than that." philip looked at his watch, turned towards the door that led to the street, and made a little gesture of impatience, that did not escape dora. "philip," said she, "what are you thinking of?" "why, of you, dear, always you." "no, you were not thinking about me just now. you cannot deceive me," said she coaxingly. "do you know that, of late, i have observed a little change in you--oh! just a little change." "a change? what a little goose you are!" "oh, i am not so silly as all that; the fact is you seem absent-minded lately, anxious, irritable even; and, worse than all that, this morning you had forgotten it was the anniversary of our wedding. now, had you not?" philip started. "oh, but i am quite sure of what i am saying. i am certain you had forgotten." "what nonsense! it is all in your imagination, my dear child." "no, it is not," said dora, with great emphasis; "a woman's intuition is often a safer guide than her eyes." "your intuition, then, for once is wrong." "come, come," said dora tenderly, "tell me, have you any troubles, any little worry?" "no, dear, none," said philip, frowning a little. "let me get on with my work, and don't ask silly questions." "oh, very well," said dora, pouting. she rose, and went away from the easel a few steps; but noticing that philip was looking at her, as if to ask her forgiveness for having been a trifle abrupt, she turned her steps towards him, and, laying her head on his shoulder, burst into tears; then looking him in the face, with eyes that were smiling through the tears, she cried, "oh, do tell me what ails you." "what a child you are, dearest! i assure you, there is nothing the matter." "i know better." "you will have to believe me," said philip, in a not very convincing tone, but doing his best to comfort her with his look, "when i tell you, that there is absolutely nothing wrong, although"-"although? ah!" cried dora, "you see that i was right after all. well?" and she eagerly waited to hear the explanation that should put an end to all her conjectures. "well, then, yes," said philip resolutely, "there is something. sometimes i feel i should like to do so much more for you than i have been able." "what an idea! there is not a woman in the world with whom i should like to change places. how could i be happier than i am?" "what is your definition of happiness?" said philip, continuing to paint. "for a woman," replied dora, with warmth, "happiness consists in being loved by the man whom she loves and can be proud of; in being rich enough to afford all the necessary comforts of life, and poor enough to make pulling together a necessity; an existence hand in hand, side by side. and what is yours?" "well, i confess, i should like to be a little richer than that," said philip, with a little amused smile. "ah! i see," exclaimed dora sadly; "you are beginning to grow tired of this quiet life of ours. take care, philip, noise frightens happiness away. happy the house that is hidden in the trees, as the nest in the thick of the hedges." "my dear child, we have to live for the world a little." "excuse me if i do not understand you," said dora; "i am only a woman. i can live for you, and for you alone. i know that love is not sufficient even for the most devoted and affectionate of husbands. a woman can live on love and die of it. that's the difference. now, what is your definition of happiness?" "to be blessed with a dear, adorable wife; to have money enough to enable me to surround her with every luxury. yes, i long to be really rich, if only to make my father repent of his treatment of me. in his eyes a man is successful according to his proven ability to pile up money. ah, that letter of his, how it rankles in my mind still and always will!" "what letter is that?" said dora; "you never spoke to me of it before. why, what a tomb of dark secrets you are!" philip rose, went to a drawer, took out a letter, and returned with it in his hand. "here it is," he said; "listen." "my son,--when i opened to you the doors of the banking house which i have founded, and bade you join me as a clerk who would eventually be master of it, i did not doubt that you had sufficient good sense and filial docility to make you joyfully accept such an opening. it appears that you have neither of these qualities. twice i have made the offer, twice you have declined it. from this day please to consider yourself free to follow art or any other road to starvation. i relinquish all right to direct your career, but i also require you to relinquish all right to call yourself the son of "thomas grantham." philip folded the letter and replaced it in the drawer. "yes," said dora, "it was a cruel letter, for, after all, your only crime had been to wish to become an artist. and yet, a father knows that out of a hundred men who take up painting as a profession, one or two perhaps get to the top of the tree. where is the father who would advise his son to work at art, music, or literature for a livelihood? in the case of a real vocation, he may bow gracefully to the inevitable, but, as a rule, a parent does not bring up his sons with a view to making artists of them. on the contrary, he does what he can to dissuade them from choosing that course. in the case of your father, my dear philip, i think one might allow extenuating circumstances. where is the head of the family who would not dread for his sons these often illiberal professions? professions, which ninety-nine times out of a hundred bring in little besides disappointments, disillusions, a miserable pittance, and often despair? try and forget this grievance, darling. in any case you have had your revenge already. you are celebrated, and we are no longer poor." "ah, but we have been, and it has sometimes brought tears of rage to my eyes, and to-day we are a long, a very long way, from being rich." "ah, but think what an enviable lot yours is!" said dora proudly. "yours is the most honourable of callings. you have no poor wretches sweating for you. your income is the fruit of your personal handiwork. you are your own master. you help to make life beautiful. you have a fame increasing every day. you enjoy the respect of everybody, the admiration of the public, the appreciation of the best critics, the company and the friendship of all the intelligence of london. a king might well envy the life of a great artist!" dora was excited, and philip looked at her with eyes that thanked her for all she thought of him. "you are quite right," he resumed, "and i am far from complaining of my fate. i have also full confidence in the future. but you, my darling; it is of you i am thinking." "of me?" exclaimed dora. "but do i not share all your honours? what more can i wish for? why, my dear boy," she added, laughing, "before ten years have passed you will be knighted, and i run the risk of being one day lady grantham. just fancy?" and she drew herself up most comically. they both burst out laughing. philip was in a confessing mood, and he went on. "i should like," he said, "to see you the mistress of such a house as you were brought up in!" "good heavens! it is all i can do to keep this dear little one properly! besides, where is it now, that beautiful house where i was brought up? after my mother's death, my father took to speculating, and he died penniless. everything had to be sold to pay his debts. much better begin as we do than finish as he did." "i should like," continued philip, in the same strain, "to see you drive in a handsome carriage of your own." "a hansom cab," replied dora, laughing, "is much more convenient, goes faster, costs less, and gives you much less trouble." "i should like to see _rivières_ of diamonds on your lovely neck, precious stones on your fingers." dora looked serious, almost sad. "i wish no better collar for my neck than your true, manly arms--my philip! on my fingers? do you see this little ring?" "a five-pound ring!" said philip, with an air of contempt. "i am almost ashamed to see it on your finger." "a five-pound ring!" exclaimed dora,--"a priceless ring! do you remember--ah, i do!--how for many weeks you put away ten shillings a week so as to be able to buy it for me on my birthday? a five-pound ring, indeed! not for the koh-i-nûr would i exchange it," she added, as she kissed the little ring passionately. "to me the real value of a jewel is the love it represents in the giver, and no rich gems could be richer in that sense than this dear little ring." philip felt deeply moved and almost humiliated. he tenderly kissed dora, and resumed painting. dora thought she was gaining her cause, and went on pleading-"ah, philip," she said, "the rich don't know the pleasures they miss, the sweetest pleasures of poverty. their gifts cost them no sacrifice. they don't possess their wealth, it is their wealth that possesses them. they have not the satisfaction of knowing that they are loved for their own sake. i would not give one year of my life for ten years of a millionaire's life. why, they don't even have the proof that they are honest. they have no temptations. i would shudder at the idea that i might be rich one day." "well," said philip sarcastically, "i think i could bear it with fortitude. my darling, the philosophers of all ages have taught that money does not make happiness; but sensible men of all times have come to the conclusion that it considerably helps to make it. i want money for no sordid reason. money is round, it was meant to roll, and i mean to enjoy it." "no, dear," replied dora reproachfully and pathetically, "money is flat, it was meant to stop and be piled up a little. and, by the way, do you know that you have made over a thousand pounds this year, and that we have kept very nearly half of it? you see i am of some use after all. the financial position is good, since the chancellor of the exchequer has only spent half his budget. we are rich, since we don't want all we have." "yes, you are a dear, lovely little housewife," said philip rather coldly and without raising his eyes from the canvas. dora was susceptible. she felt a little wounded. "am i?" she said. "perhaps you will say i am a good little _bourgeoise_. possibly! but i will tell you this: happy as i am now, i am not sure that i was not happier still when we were quite poor, pulling, struggling together, hand in hand. i have never dreaded poverty; on the contrary, i have enjoyed it, loved it by your side. to poverty i owe the happiest days of my life. do you remember, for instance, how we enjoyed the play when, once a month, obscure, unknown to everybody, we went to the upper circle? wasn't it lovely? and how we often yawn now, once a week, in the stalls!" "yes," said philip, "and how we made the dinner shorter, so as to be able to afford the price of two seats in that upper circle?" "right, and that's why we enjoyed the play so much. we were not overfed in those days." "we were not," seconded philip. "you cannot enjoy, even appreciate anything intellectual after a dinner of six or eight courses: you are only fit for a pantomime or a music-hall. and that's why those pathetic forms of entertainment are so successful now. why, look at the people in the boxes--indifferent, half sulky, lifting their eyebrows and staring their eyes out--like that--awful!" "yes," said philip, "all the response, all the appreciation, all the warmth comes from the pit and gallery." "and do you also remember when, two years after we were married, our _general_ suddenly gave notice, and left us alone to manage housekeeping as best we could while hobbs was temporarily absent? and how i cooked all the meals, and how you never enjoyed them better? now, say it's true." "perfectly true. and i peeled the potatoes." "the less you speak of that, the better. you wasted half of them. but what fun! the house was gay, happy, ringing with our laughter all day long; so much so that, in a month, baby put on six pounds of flesh." "and how i cleaned the knives!" said philip, who was enjoying the reminiscences. "which helped your appetite for breakfast." "and the boots--now, i did not like cleaning the boots." "yes, you did, and they never shone so beautifully." "well, i flatter myself i was able to make myself useful." "those were and will always be the dear old days of my life." "and how pretty you looked," said philip, "with a white apron on, and your sleeves tucked up, showing your lovely arms." "ah!" said dora, "and do you also remember how you were once turned out of the kitchen for kissing the cook? you were sorry when i got a new servant." "upon my word, i believe i was." "ah!" exclaimed dora, "you will never picnic like that again, you will never have such lovely times. my dear philip, the very rich people must lead very dull lives. we look for happiness far ahead of us, when often we have it close at hand. the poet is right: 'paradise is cheap enough, it's only the hells we make for ourselves that are expensive.' we are as rich now as we should ever wish to be. and, let me tell you that, if ever we get really rich (that will be through your fault), i shall find my consolation in the constant recollection of all the pleasures i enjoyed when i was poor--as the ear remains for ever under the charm of some sweet old melody that once struck it. i could go on for ever on this theme. now, do you know the holiday of my life that i shall never forget?" "our trip to paris with ten pounds in our pockets," replied philip. "that's not fair; you guess too quickly. well, didn't we do it after all? we saw everything--the museums, the theatres, the gardens, and when we arrived home"-"we had to borrow one-and-six from the servant to pay the cab fare from charing cross." "lovely!" cried dora, clapping her hands with joy. "what fun we had--real, good, wholesome fun! now, look at our little girl. she will hardly look at the beautiful dolls she has. she always goes back to the old stuffed stocking, with a face painted on the ball of cotton that does duty for a head. now, why? tell me why she prefers it to all the others." "oh, probably because she can ill-use it to her heart's content." "not a bit of it; because it reminds her of the happiest, the jolliest days of her life. the pleasures of poverty again, my dear philip, the sweetest, the never-to-be-forgotten ones--alas, never to be enjoyed again, perhaps!" "i will see that they are not," said philip. "oh, philip, tell me that you are happy now, that the ambition of your life will be your work, your art, not money." "certainly, darling. but, let me tell you also, honestly, that the greatest pleasure in connection with my days of poverty" ... "well?" "is that i am poor no longer." "you incorrigible cynic." dora looked at philip for some moments. "oh, philip," she cried, "say that you are only teasing me, that you don't mean a word of it." "yes, dear, i am only teasing you," said philip indifferently. "now, little wife, you must be quiet and let me work, or this portrait will never be finished to-day." philip looked at the clock, then at his watch. it was half-past one. a ring was heard at the studio door. he shivered with excitement. "it is perhaps de lussac," he said to himself. "i hope it is not that bothering sir benjamin coming to disturb me," he said to dora. gerald lorimer, for whom there was always a cover laid at philip's table, entered the studio. "why, it's lorimer," exclaimed philip, rising, and going to shake hands with his friend. "i am as hungry as a hound; i'll go and wash my hands, and we'll have lunch at once." "well, and how goes the portrait?" said lorimer. "my dear fellow," replied philip, "i shall have to take a studio a mile or two off, so that my wife will not be able to come and chatter and hinder me from working. look at it: here have i been for the past two hours in front of this easel, and done half an hour's painting at most." philip ran upstairs to wash and change his coat, and quickly rejoined dora and lorimer in the dining-room. v the dramatic author and the patron of arts gerald lorimer, although still quite young, was already a dramatist of some note. he was gaiety and _insouciance_ personified. a genial philosopher, witty, sometimes a cynic, but always a kindly one, indulgent to the shortcomings of humanity, he looked at life as a comedy, which he witnessed from the most comfortable of orchestra stalls. the world amused him and supplied him with types for study. he enjoyed robust health, the joy of living was written all over his face, and, wherever he went, he brought an atmosphere of contagious irresistible gaiety. he was a handsome man, distinguished-looking, and fairly well off. when asked why he did not marry, he answered, "thanks, i prefer to study from afar; one observes better at a distance." he had a little house in philip's neighbourhood, that was the envy of all who were privileged to enter its doors. women thought it impudence of a man to dare to install himself thus, and so prove _urbi et orbi_ that it is not absolutely necessary to have a woman under one's roof to enjoy the most perfect comfort. and yet, when asked why lorimer did not marry, all that women had to say, was, "no inclination, i suppose." women adore parties given by bachelors. they went in crowds, when lorimer asked them to an "at home" or a garden-party. they took free advantage of the permission he gave them to wander over the house, and examined all its corners. every bachelor's house interests women and arouses their curiosity. they pried into every nook and cranny, in the hope of bringing to light a mystery, perchance some woman's portrait--heaven knows what, perhaps a hairpin on the carpet. wherever they looked, everything was ease, comfort, and liberty; and they arrived at the conclusion, that one may be a bachelor and yet live happily, but consoled themselves with the thought that nobody has found the way to live a bachelor and die happily. lorimer's house was arranged with taste, in the oriental style. the drawing-room, dining-room, library, and smoking-room formed a delightful suite of rooms. "you see," said some woman, "nothing but men-servants--a french cook, a german valet: our host must be a woman-hater." "i do not see that that follows, dear," said another one: "men are more discreet and less gossiping than women, and i warrant that this house has been the scene of many an interesting little tête-à-tête." each one had her own opinion; none of them really knew anything about it. lorimer had never given anyone occasion to gossip about him; he was english and a gentleman, therefore discreet. the french boast often of things they have never done; the english never boast of what they do. the latter are right. besides, a bachelor, in giving his house a reputation of perfect respectability, can thus invite to it not only his friends, but their wives and daughters. lorimer knew all london: the club world, the aristocratic world, the artistic world of chelsea and st. john's wood; and at his parties duchesses, actresses, cabinet ministers, painters, writers, actors, and journalists jostled one another. a friend of men, because of his good-fellowship, frankness, and loyalty; and of women, by reason of his wit, his discretion, and his charming manners, lorimer was received everywhere with open arms. he could have dined and lunched out every day, if this had been the programme of his existence. on the contrary, he worked hard, went out little, knew everybody, but was the intimate acquaintance of but few, and amongst these were numbered philip and dora, whom he liked exceedingly and who interested him intensely. they sat down in merry mood and did honour to the simple and appetising lunch. "what a pity you did not turn up a few moments earlier, my dear fellow!" said philip to lorimer. "you would have been edified, and have heard dora holding forth against wealth. the contempt my wife has for money is sublime. she is of the opinion that art, like virtue, should be its own reward." "i'm sorry to say it's often the only one art gets," said lorimer. "well, what's your news?" "haven't any," said philip. "oh yes, though," added he, "sir benjamin pond threatens to pay us a visit to-day ... deuce take him." "you're in luck; he spends a mint of money in pictures." "they say he buys them by the dozen." "hum," said lorimer, "by the square yard. he's an awful ass, but his money is as good as that of the cleverest. when i said just now, 'what's your news?' i meant from the workshop." "my wife's portrait will be finished in an hour's time; you shall see it after lunch." "and what will you call it?" "oh, simply, 'portrait of mrs. grantham,' or perhaps, 'a bunch of pansies.'" "'a bunch of pansies,' that's charming," said lorimer; "i should like to have a title like that for my new play, as simple" ... "oh, by-the-bye, how about your play, is it getting on?" "it's finished, my dear fellow. i have the manuscript with me. i have to read it to the company at the queen's theatre to-day at four o'clock." "are you pleased with it?" "my dear friend, when a man has the artistic temperament, his work never realises his ideal--but, thank goodness, when i have finished a play, i think of nothing but--the next one." "you are right--but, still, with your experience--you have been writing plays for years." "i wrote my first play when i was seventeen," said lorimer, drawing himself up in a comic manner. "when you were seventeen?" exclaimed dora. "yes! a melodrama, and what a melodrama it was!--blood-curdling, weird, terrible, human, fiendish. i portrayed crime, perfidy and lying triumphing for a while, but overtaken in the long-run by fatal chastisement." "and was the piece produced?" interrupted dora. "it was read," answered lorimer. "i received a very encouraging letter from the manager of the theatre. my play, it appeared, showed a deplorable ignorance of stagecraft, but was well written and full of fine and well-conceived situations. however, horrors followed one another so closely that it was to be feared that the audience would scarcely have time to draw breath and dry their tears. finally, the letter terminated with a piece of good advice. this was, in the future, not to kill all my _dramatis personæ_, so that, at the fall of the curtain, there might be someone left alive, to announce the name of the author, and bring him forward!" "it was most encouraging," said dora, in fits of laughter. "that is not all," added lorimer; "i received, a month later, an invitation to a dinner given by the society of dramatic authors, and found myself amongst the leading authors and actors of the day." "you must have been proud," said dora. "proud, my dear madam," said lorimer; "if you would form an idea of what i felt, try to imagine a little shepherd of boeotia asked to dine with jupiter, to meet all the gods of olympus." "now, come, tell us about your new play," said philip. "oh, well, you know, i hope it will be a success, but you never know what will please the great b.p. the dialogue is good, the characters are interesting, the situations are strong without being vulgar, the idea is new ... yes, i must say, i am sanguine." "bravo!" said philip, "the theme is original." "perfectly original," said lorimer. "i don't adapt parisian plays for the _pharisian_ stage." "it must be enchanting," cried dora, "to see one's own creations in flesh and blood ... alive!" "yes, for one month, two months, perhaps six months. the creations of painters last for centuries." "that is true," said dora, looking at philip. "shakespeare and molière are still being played with success," said philip. "yes, i grant you these two. human nature is still and always will be what it was in their time. there are no new passions, follies, to portray since their time; but against those two names which you cite ... real demi-gods ... i could give you two hundred painters and sculptors dating from antiquity down to the present day." dora was delighted with the turn the conversation had taken. it seemed to her that philip no longer enthused over his art, and she tried her utmost to rekindle the sacred fire that threatened to go out. so, encouraging lorimer to continue in the same strain, she said-"yes, you are right. it is painting that expresses all that is beautiful in the world." "especially philip's art," said lorimer, seeming to grasp dora's meaning from the warmth with which she spoke. "you paint nature, my dear friend, flowers, portraits ... you do not inflict the nude upon us, as do so many of your brothers in art, who show themselves but poor imitators of the french school, _servum pecus_." "but nature is surely always beautiful, wherever she is found," said dora. "the ideal, yes," said lorimer; "but it is the realistic method of treatment, in most pictures, that displeases me. perhaps i am a little puritanical; but what can you expect? i'm english!" "but there is no ideal nature, there is only true nature," said dora. "call it realism, if you wish: what is real is true, and what is true is beautiful." "my dear lorimer," exclaimed philip, "if you are going to argue out that subject with dora, you are lost, i warn you. you will get the worst of it." "well, you will admit this much, i suppose," said dora, "that the models chosen are generally beautiful. english models are even more than beautiful, they are mostly pure in form." "quite so, but no artist has a right to expose a woman's nude figure to the public gaze. in sculpture it may be permissible,--the cold purity of the marble saves everything,--but never in painting." "shake up the englishman," said dora, laughing, "and the puritan rises to the surface. i thought you were artistic, my dear friend. one may forgive a puritan, but a _pruritan_, excuse the word. oh!... i have met people who only saw in the _venus de milo_ a woman with no clothes on. poor venus! i wish she could grow a pair of arms and hands to box the ears of such philistines. of course, i must say, these people were not of our society." "well, call me prejudiced if you will; but i hate to see woman robbed of her modesty ... and of her clothes, for the edification of a profane public, especially a public as inartistic as our english one. your remark about the _venus de milo_ proves that i am right. in france it is another matter. the public understands. it knows that such and such a picture is beautiful, and why it is beautiful. even the workmen over there have been visitors of picture galleries from generation to generation, and i have heard some, at the louvre and the luxembourg, making criticisms of pictures that they looked at, criticisms which proved to me that they had more true appreciation of painting than the fashionable crowd that goes to the royal academy on private view day. no, i say, the nude in france, if you will; but in england, heaven preserve us from it!" "and yet," said dora, in a calmer tone of voice, "the novelists and dramatists of to-day, for the most part, do exactly the same thing." "what do you mean to say? novelists and dramatists describe the emotions, the passions of the soul. to uncover the heart and uncover the body are two vastly different things. add to that, in england on the stage, if not in the novel, that virtue triumphs invariably." "yes, but at what cost? firstly, often at the expense of insulting one's common-sense; but that is the fault of a public that insists on being sent home, perfectly convinced that the hero and heroine still henceforth live happily ever after. that is not the worst of it. before seeing the triumph of virtue, often an impossible kind of virtue, one must assist at the heartrending dissection of a woman's soul. all the deformities of her heart are laid bare. i suppose you call that realism too, i call it clinical surgery--that is to say, my dear friend, that modern fiction exhales a strong odour of carbolic acid. ah, i must say i prefer a picture in which a woman is presented in all her beauty of form and colour, to a novel or a play, in which we see woman represented as impure, corrupted" ... "i told you that you would be beaten, lorimer. own yourself vanquished." "my dear madam," said lorimer, "you preach to a convert. but i must remind you that converting the british public is not my rôle. i serve up to that worthy public, which has always been kind to me, the dish of its predilection. we cannot always put on the stage pauls and virginias, who, moreover, are getting rarer every day, as you will admit." "virginias, especially," said philip, in parenthesis. "oh, that's another thing," exclaimed dora almost indignantly; "you work, you turn out dramatic literature, for what it brings you in; own it at once--to make money! that is modern art, the art of making ten thousand a year. some are writers, some are green-grocers; you put them all in the same category. under these conditions, i do not see why philip should not accept offers to paint advertisements for manufacturers of soaps and hair restorers." "but, my dear friend," said lorimer, "some of our greatest academicians have accepted such commissions with the most satisfactory results." "oh, hold your tongue, you are incorrigible!" said dora, laughing. philip saw that it was time to put a stop to the conversation that threatened to get too heated, and proposed a smoke in the studio. dora did not go with them; she made a solemn bow to lorimer; and all three burst out laughing and separated the best of friends. philip and lorimer lit their cigars, the latter without taking his eyes off the portrait of dora, which he thought a splendid likeness and perfect in colouring and modelling. "ah, my dear friend, what a wife you have! what a companion for an artist! upon my word, if i were married to such a woman, i believe i could write masterpieces." philip hardly heeded him. he paced up and down the studio, looking at the clock, then at the door, and starting at every sound he heard in the street. "i should like to gain the world, to lay it at the feet of this woman," said he, standing before the portrait a moment. philip felt more and more agitated. lorimer looked at him fixedly. "why, old fellow, what on earth is the matter with you?" "my dear lorimer," answered philip, who could conceal his feelings no longer, "you see me to-day in an indescribable state of excitement. in a few moments, i may hear that i am a rich man." "you don't say so," said lorimer, amazed; "an old uncle about to depart this life?" "no," said philip; "my work, my very own work is perhaps on the point of making me wealthy. for months past, night and day so to speak, i have been working" ... "at a great picture," interrupted lorimer. "at an invention." "nonsense! take care. you will die in the workhouse." "not at all, old fellow," said philip; "there are two kinds of inventors, those who seek and those who discover. i have discovered." "what have you discovered, dear friend?" said lorimer, more and more surprised. "a shell that may revolutionise the art of warfare. a special commission is now sitting at the war office in paris, to discuss its merits. i am awaiting their decision. i shall get a telegram to-day, perhaps in a few moments. i offered my shell to the english government, but they declined it." "are you speaking seriously?" "do i look as if i were joking? can't you see, man, i'm in such a fever of impatience, that i can't hold a brush, my hand is trembling so? i have neither the courage nor the strength to finish this portrait, which only requires about an hour's work. but not a word to dora on the subject; she knows nothing about it yet, and never will, if the affair falls through." a violent ringing was heard at the studio bell. "there," said philip, "that is it perhaps ... the telegram at last." and he ran to open the door himself. he returned accompanied by a big man, pompous and shiny, who entered the studio with a majestic step. bald, chubby-faced, with a huge nose that divided his face in two, as the apennines divide italy, and two large round eyes set lobster-fashion, he was, with his huge white waistcoat, a fair example of a certain type of city merchant, in all his glory. this pretentious personage cast a look into every corner of the studio. "plague take the bore," said philip to lorimer. "i'll be off," said lorimer. "oh no, please stay. sir benjamin pond's visit won't last long." "ah, ah," said the big city alderman; "you received my note, in which i announced my visit?" philip made a sign in the affirmative. sir benjamin placed his hat on a table and, rubbing his hands, threw a condescending glance at philip, which seemed to say, "you ought to be proud to have a visit from me." he took stock of the furniture in detail. "very cosy here; very comfortable quarters indeed. you are evidently doing well. one is constantly hearing of artists who live on buns in garrets ... upon my word, i don't know any such inviting and attractive houses as those inhabited by artists, and i flatter myself i know them all." "painters surround themselves with a certain artistic luxury, as a means of inspiration," said philip; "and then, sir benjamin," added he, laughing, "i don't see why all the good things of this life should be for the fools. pray, take a seat." "thanks," said the patron of arts ... "i came" ... "to arrange for a portrait?" "no, no, not a portrait. now i hope i shan't offend you by saying so, but i really don't care for portraits in oil. you may say what you like, but, to have a perfect likeness, give me a good coloured photograph. that's my tackle. for fancy portraits, very good, but otherwise" ... "it sounds promising," thought lorimer, who took up his position near the window, to enjoy the fun. "the moment a process is discovered for photographing colour as well as lines and shade," continued sir benjamin, "nobody will want a painted portrait. for a portrait, you don't want imagination, you want truth, sir, real truth, an exact reproduction of the original." "some people prefer madame tussaud's exhibition to the louvre or the british museum," said lorimer. the city alderman turned round and looked at him, and philip introduced them to each other. "sir benjamin pond--mr. gerald lorimer, our well-known playwright; no doubt you know him by reputation." "delighted to make your acquaintance," said pond, shaking hands with lorimer. "i see by the papers that you are going to give us a new play. when i was a young man i wrote several plays myself, but i thought better of it, and, like a good briton, i preferred to be useful to my country and go into business. no offence, i hope," added he, bursting into loud guffaws. "how long is this ass going to stay here boring us, i wonder?" murmured philip. "but to return to the object of my visit," said sir benjamin. "a few days ago my daughter got married, and, among other presents, i gave her the choice of two pictures in my gallery. it has left two empty spaces on my wall, one eighteen by twenty-four, another thirty-six by fifty. now, what have you got that would fill them?" "framed or unframed?" said philip, who by this time was beginning to thoroughly enjoy the situation. "bless me, framed, of course," said sir benjamin. "i asked the question merely to form an idea of the size of the canvas." "do you think you have what i want? some pictures that you have finished lately? if they are a trifle smaller, it won't matter much. i like wide frames, they show their value better; and no picture ever suffered from a good-sized frame. i have all my frames made at denis's ... only the french know how to frame pictures and bind books." "a sensible remark," said lorimer to himself. "i am afraid i have nothing to suit you," said philip, in the tone of a bootmaker, who has not the right-sized shoes for his customer. the alderman took a rule out of his pocket, and measured several canvases that philip placed on dora's easel, after having removed the copy that she was doing of her own portrait. "too small ... too small again ... oh, much too small. by george, what a pity!" "perhaps you could put two of those in the larger space, sir benjamin," suggested lorimer, with a wink at philip, and without losing that british calm, which is the strong point of the englishman in critical situations. "two! oh dear no, that would look patchy. i am very proud of my gallery, sir.... come and see it some day. there is hardly a good modern painter that isn't represented there. my philanthropy consists in patronising the arts, and especially modern artists. in buying old pictures you put money in the pockets of collectors and dealers, whereas, in buying pictures from living painters, you put money in the pockets of the artists. now, don't you think i'm right?" philip and lorimer recognised that this was indeed the best manner of appreciating modern art. "and so you have nothing?" continued sir benjamin. "one eighteen by twenty-four, and one thirty-six by fifty," he repeated. "my work is either too small or too large, i fear. i could, within a month or six weeks, fill your eighteen by twenty-four." "no, no, i can't wait. those open spaces, staring me in the face, are too awful." "i am extremely sorry," said philip. "so am i," replied sir benjamin. "i wanted a picture of yours; i like variety in my gallery." "and no doubt he has it," thought lorimer. "mr. grantham," continued the city man, "you have a great career before you. everybody says so. you'll be an academician before five years are over; you are one of our future great painters." he gazed around the studio once more, and suddenly noticing the portrait of dora, he said, "holloa! what's this?" and proceeded to measure the picture. "why, this is the very thing. i'll take this ... i don't know the original, but she's a deuced pretty woman, and if it's a fancy portrait" ... "it is not quite finished yet." "yes, that's true," said sir benjamin; "i see the face and hands want a little" ... "no, the flowers," interrupted philip; "but it will be finished to-day." "good, send it to me to-morrow." "sir benjamin, this picture was painted under exceptional circumstances. i mean" ... "that's all right, my dear sir; your price is mine. that is my way of doing business. when i have taken a fancy to a picture, i never bargain with the artist." "you misunderstand me, sir benjamin," returned philip; "i simply meant to say, that this picture is not for sale. it is a portrait of my wife, and belongs to her." "oh, that's another matter. in that case, i'll say nothing more." "i hope to be more fortunate some other time." "so do i. well, good-day, good-day," said sir benjamin, as philip handed him his hat. "very pleased to have made your acquaintance. i will let you know, as soon as another" ... "vacancy occurs," suggested lorimer. "that's it, that's it. good-bye." philip would have liked to give him a kick as well as his hat. he accompanied the alderman to the door and, returning to the studio, found lorimer holding his sides with laughter. "those people are the drawbacks of my profession, old man. they are enough to disgust you with it all. great heavens, what a fool!" "i don't know about that; they buy pictures and pay cash down. one may safely say that but for the good inartistic british middle class, the fine arts would have to put up their shutters. our upper classes have only praise and money for foreign works. have we not musicians by the score, who have had to resort to italian _noms de guerre_, to get a hearing in this country? yes! i must say, i admire our middle classes. if it were not for our aldermen and county councillors, who have sufficient patriotism to get their portraits done in their own country, our english portraitists would end their careers in the workhouse. and, come, you must own that he was vastly amusing, the dear man; that the imposing big-wig of the city was simply killing." and the humour of the situation striking him afresh, lorimer rolled on the sofa with laughter, and dora, entering the studio at that moment, discovered him in a far from dignified position, his legs cutting figures in the air. "oh, you've just come too late," said he, rising quickly; "he is gone." "who is gone?" said dora. "why, the patron of the arts, alderman sir benjamin pond." and in a few words, lorimer described the humorous little scene that had just taken place. then, suddenly remembering his appointment, he looked at the clock. "by jove! it's four o'clock! that is the time i had promised to be at the theatre.... i must fly!" "are you off?" said philip; "i'll go with you. i want some fresh air; i feel stifling, staying all day in this confounded studio. don't worry, darling," said he to dora, on seeing her look at the picture that he had begun almost to take a dislike to. "i will finish the picture when i come back. as i said, there is only an hour's work to do to it." "where in the name of fortune have i put my manuscript?" exclaimed lorimer. "here it is on the table," said dora. "is there a woman with a past in it?" "a past?" said lorimer. "four pasts, and fine ones too. quite enough to make up for all possible defects in the play. my dear mrs. grantham, i shall not put in appearance here again until i have written a play with an angel in it." "never mind the angel," said dora. "have a real, true woman--that's good enough for anybody." "oh, well, never mind; with all her pasts, you know, this woman has a great future." "i hope so, for your sake. good luck." philip and lorimer got into a cab and went off waving their hands to dora. vi the inventor philip's state of feverish agitation had not escaped dora's notice. she had never seen him thus preoccupied and restless, until to-day. it was very evident that he was hiding something from her, and that it must be something most important. what could it possibly be? philip, hitherto always so open and confiding, had failed for the first time to unbosom himself to her. she was no longer the confidante of his worries and the dispeller of his clouds of depression. there must be something very extraordinary going on, something quite exceptional and hitherto unknown, since she had been kept in the dark concerning it. uncertainty is the cruellest trial for the heart of a woman to endure, when that woman is resolute and brave, and feels ready to face any danger courageously. dora knew herself to be strong and valiant enough to brave any ordinary danger, but what was the use of that while there was nothing tangible to deal with and defy? this incertitude was devouring her. "i am stifling in this wretched studio," philip had said to her, before going out with lorimer. never had she heard him speak thus of the dear retreat where they had passed so many exquisite hours together. a kind of presentiment came over dora, that their artistic existence was about to be broken up. their past life had been an unbroken chain of happy days; what did the future hold in store? for the first time, dora could see only a mist of uncertainty in front of her. up to to-day, the road had seemed clear and sunny to her happy vision, and easy to tread, but now doubt clouded her sky; she could not see ahead. the road was perhaps going to branch. would they take right or left? "this wretched studio," had dealt her a blow, straight at the breast. a man may be irritable, sulky, wanting in common politeness even; he may forget himself so far as to lose his temper and use violent language, if you will; but there are hallowed things that he respects in all times and seasons, in temper and out of temper, and to dora the studio was one of these things--a temple dedicated to all that she most cherished. "this wretched studio," signified for her much more than philip had put into the words, for, in her brain, things began to take magnified proportions. in cursing the studio, philip had cursed his art, and for this he had chosen a day like the present, the anniversary of their wedding, and just when he was to have finished the portrait, whose growth she had watched as a child watches, with bated breath, the growth of a house of cards, which one false touch will destroy. for the first time in her life dora was miserable. her pride revolted at the thought that something mysterious was passing under their roof, and that her husband had not thought fit to take her into his confidence. it did not occur to her that a man often avoids taking his wife into his confidence rather than expose her to the risk of a disappointment, by talking to her of hopes which may not be realised. besides, there are important secrets which a man has to know how to keep to himself. a secret disclosed proves to be an indiscretion in the confiding one as often as a show of faith in the confidante. but dora felt so sure of herself, so strong in her power of devotion, that it would never have entered her head that philip could not repose entire confidence in her. when little eva returned from a walk, about half-past four, accompanied by hobbs, she found her mother in tears, half lying on the sofa, her face hidden in her hands. eva had never seen her mother weep before. the effect upon the child was terrible. "mama, what is the matter?" cried eva. and she burst into violent tears. quickly dora pressed her handkerchief over her eyes to dry them, and smiled at the child. "it is nothing at all, darling; nothing, nothing." and she took her up and pressed the poor little heaving breast to her own, but the more she sought to console her, the more the child sobbed and cried. it was impossible to calm her grief, it was heartrending. "mama, mama, are we not going to be happy any more?" dora rocked her beloved eva in her arms and said, with a gay laugh-"what a little goose it is! was there ever such a goosikins?" eva had hidden her face on her mother's shoulder, and dared not look up for fear of seeing the awful mysterious something that had caused the state of distress in which she had discovered her mother. her sobs finally died down into hiccoughs, and dora began to sing to her some songs that the child loved. eva gazed at her mother, whose face had regained its look of serenity, and then, growing bolder, glanced around into every corner of the room. smiling once more, after her cautious survey of her surroundings, she ensconced herself more comfortably upon dora's knees and said-"weren't we stupid, mama? there is nothing here, is there? but where can daddy be? how lazy he is to-day!" "yes, isn't he? naughty father, he ought to be at work." "when i marry," said eva, "i shall never have a painter." "why?" asked dora, whom the child's chatter always amused. "oh, because--i don't know--a painter is too busy always--he doesn't play with little girls. when i have a little girl, i shall play with her all day long." dora felt the reproach stab straight to her heart. she was on the verge of tears once more, and felt a choking lump in her throat, but she mastered the emotion. "then what kind of man shall you marry?" said she, with an effort at her gayest tones. "none at all--i shall stay and live with you always; or else i shall be a nurse, like aunt gabrielle." "to nurse sick people and take care of the poor who are suffering?" "yes," replied eva, "and to wear a dress just like auntie's." "oh, that is your reason, eh? a very good one!" gabrielle looked her best perhaps in the nurse's costume which had so taken eva's fancy. of the purely english type, with rosy complexion, delicate features, sweet soft eyes and fair hair, and with that mixture of modesty and assurance in her bearing which is so characteristic of the best of her countrywomen, she lent a fresh charm to the always pleasing semi-nun-like attire worn by hospital nurses. something of that joy of living, which angels seem to stamp upon the faces of women who devote themselves to the well-being and happiness of others and to the assuaging of pain and suffering, had fascinated her little niece. eva felt the charm, without being able to analyse it. she knew that aunt gabrielle would look beautiful in any dress, but thought that she was lovely in her nurse's garb. the child had forgotten all her tears and went on with her prattle. it was nearly five o'clock when philip came in, evidently in a poor humour, and muttering words that did not reach dora's ear. "eva," said he, "you must go and get dressed now, there's a good child; we are going to dine a little earlier to-night, so that you may sit up to dinner with us. you know, it is a holiday to-day; it is the anniversary of the day daddy and mama were married on--i'll warrant there will be a special pudding for the occasion." eva ran off, singing in her delight, and went to find hobbs. a moment later, her little silvery voice was heard at the top of the stairs, announcing to her nurse that she was to stay up to dinner with mama and daddy. presently the sound of the delightful babble ceased with the closing of the nursery door. "you have scarcely had time to go down to the theatre," said dora. "no," replied philip. "lorimer began upon his endless theories again--what a bore he is when he talks like that! i could not stand him to-day; and, besides, i thought i had better get back and go on with the portrait until dinner." he looked at the clock and took off his coat. "it is going to be done to-day, after all then, that wretched portrait," said dora, laughing and laying a stress on the word "wretched." "why do you say that?" "because i see you are tired of it." "to tell you the truth, i am dying to get it done." he put on his velvet jacket, sat at the easel, took his palette and his brushes. "now then, to work!" said he. "it is only five o'clock," said dora; "you have a good deal of time yet before dinner." he mixed his colours and was soon apparently engrossed in the pansies. he worked three-quarters of an hour without stopping. dora had taken a book, and sat reading a few paces from the easel. on the stroke of six, a violent ring at the bell, impatiently repeated, was heard at the door. philip, who had heard a cab draw up outside the studio, trembled with excitement at the sound of the bell and let fall his palette and brush. "it is he," he cried; "it is de lussac! no one else would ring violently like that. he has good news, he must have--yes," he shouted, wild with joy, "it is his step, i hear him." and he ran to meet the young attaché, whose voice he recognised. dora had thrown her book down on the sofa, and had risen from her chair. de lussac came briskly into the studio, with a telegram in his hand, which he waved about his head. "good news! victory!" he cried. "hip, hip, hurrah! as you say in england--adopted unanimously, my dear fellow. the government offers you a million francs for the shell--here is the wire!" philip was half beside himself with joy. he seized the telegram from the hands of the attaché, read it, re-read it, and handed it back. dora, mute, immobile, was standing a couple of paces off. "oh, dora dear, my dream is realised at last! for months i have worked in secret. i was so afraid of failing that i have never dared mention a word to you about this thing, but i have succeeded. i am rewarded for all my labour and agony of anxiety about my invention. this shell is bought by the french government. i am rich--rich!" he cried. "do you hear, darling? oh, my dora!" and he folded her lovingly in his arms. eva had come, running in at the sound of her father's shouts, which had reached her ears. "daddy, daddy, what is the matter?" philip seized the child and lifted her in the air. "why, the matter is that your papa is a rich man. are you glad?" "oh yes, of course i am very glad," said the child, seeing her father's beaming face. "then we are going to be happier than ever?" "why, to be sure we are," said philip, executing another swing of the child into the air. dora seemed to be stunned. she did not realise the situation, which, for that matter, could only be fully explained by philip later on. all that the poor woman clearly understood for the moment was, that in the present state of excitement in which philip appeared to be, he would certainly not finish the portrait that day. philip begged de lussac to stay and dine, and also sent a telegram to lorimer, to tell him the great news and ask him to try and join them. he needed friends to help him bear his joy. to bear hers, dora would have chosen to be alone with philip. in moments of greatest joy a woman prefers solitude with the man she loves, and dora was vexed that philip should invite de lussac and lorimer to pass this evening with him. the two sexes will probably never understand each other. it may possibly be that each one judges the other by its own. vii the new house to dora the vow that she had taken on her wedding-day was a sacred thing. as he knelt at her side in church, philip had murmured low in her ear: "before god and man i love you." this had sufficed her, and, following on it, even the words of the church service pronounced by the priest had seemed almost superfluous. the phrase uttered in that solemn moment had sealed her fate and ordained her line of conduct. her life belonged to this man. besides, had she not in firm clear tones given her promise to love, honour, and obey him? to her this was no empty formula--it was an oath; and she had sworn that, come what would, how fatal soever to her personal happiness, she would be loyal to her vow. she prepared to play her new rôle with the ardour which she had always shown in seconding her husband, even in the most trifling affairs of life, quietly effacing herself, satisfied and happy if philip seemed to appreciate the efforts that she made to please him. philip left his house in elm avenue without even trying to sublet it. he took a house in belgravia and installed himself there among the aristocracy and plutocracy of london. mayfair is, perhaps, still more aristocratic and select; but it is sombre, its streets are narrow, and philip had been too long accustomed to plenty of light to care to bury himself alive in the midst of its dark, depressing-looking streets. mayfair is to belgravia what the rue st. dominique is to the avenue des champs elysées in paris. the rent of his house was a thousand a year. when he added what he would have to pay in parish taxes, queen's taxes, and all those little blessings which endear great britain to every true-born englishman, philip had to come to the conclusion that his new house would cost him about fifteen hundred pounds a year. he spent some five thousand pounds upon his installation. the furniture was chosen by dora, who was consulted upon every point. most of the things from the st. john's wood house were distributed throughout the new one, but dora took it upon her to arrange, on the ground floor, behind the dining-room, the library, exactly as it had been arranged in elm avenue; not a book, nor a picture, not a photograph, nor a knick-knack was forgotten. dora had the bump of remembrance. this library would be her favourite room, she said to herself, and she would pass an hour or two every day here among the souvenirs of the happy days lived in the artists' quarter. near the drawing-room, philip arranged a room which might have passed for a studio in the eyes of people who see likenesses everywhere. to speak truly, there was no longer a studio. as for painting, there was no more question of that; philip had other ideas in his head. he would go into society and would entertain. he could do it now that he had a suitable house. he would make useful acquaintances, and the celebrity that his invention of the famous shell had brought him would lead to his being sought after. he had no doubts, no misgivings. the future was safe enough. occasionally, however, he fell into reflection. he had spent something like five thousand pounds over his installation; there remained therefore in hand not more than thirty-two or three thousand pounds. at five per cent. interest, that would bring him an income of some fifteen hundred pounds, just about the amount of his rent and taxes. now, he had started his new existence on a scale which entailed an expenditure of at least ten thousand a year. he would therefore need to earn the rest, about eight thousand pounds, or else his capital would last him only four years. there it was--a judgment without appeal, arrived at by the inflexible rule of three. it is not money that ensures a man's being rich, it is the excess of his receipts over his expenditure. such is the declaration made by that great philosopher who was called monsieur de la palice. such is also, however, the principle which even very intelligent people fail to understand. philip reflected. "pooh!" said he to himself, "there is no need to bother myself yet; fortune has smiled on me once, she will again." dora consented to everything without a murmur. with the exception of a general sadness, which she could not entirely dissimulate, she gave no outward sign of dissent, and approved before philip many things which she tacitly condemned. she did not encourage her husband in his new ideas, but she did not feel the strength of will to discourage him. she would not earn reproaches. she had taken a resolution to let events follow their course and to remain firm at her post of observation, so as to be ready to save philip before the coming of the downfall which to her seemed inevitable. she almost found a happiness in this new part. "i will prevent his going under," she said to herself. gaiety had vanished, there was no more laughter, the chief subject of talk was speculations. in the mornings philip read the financial papers. "by jove!" he would exclaim, "here is a south african mine which was worth one pound a share. these shares are now worth twelve pounds." philip was probably seeking to solve this problem: how can i make eight thousand pounds a year with a capital of hardly forty thousand pounds? and the devil answered him: by placing your money where you can get twenty-five per cent. interest for it. philip was anxious; dora was depressed; life was monotonous, and they were both bored to death. dora would fain have said to the french government, much as good old la fontaine's cobbler said to the financier, "give me back my songs and take again your lucre." the artists, writers, and all the friends who had frequented the old house dropped away one after another, till lorimer was almost the only one they continued to see anything of. he had always felt a sincere friendship for philip and dora, and now they were playing a little comedy before him which interested him keenly. he watched closely and awaited the dénouement. he came in his old intimate way, without waiting to be asked. his frequent visits delighted dora, for he was the only friend to whom she opened her heart or from whom she could hope for sound advice. "be patient," he would say; "philip will grow tired of this kind of life; one of these days he will set to work and will return to his studio never to leave it." to speak truly, dora scarcely had time to brood on the past. the management of her house, which was kept with scrupulous order, six servants to superintend, her child to be watched over, visits to pay and receive--all these things filled up her time. but, full of occupation as her days might be, the life that they composed appeared to her empty and aimless, compared to the one she had led hitherto. once a week she received, and her rooms were crowded. by her sweetness and tact, the simplicity of her manner and rare beauty of her face and figure, it had been easy to her to make the conquest of the fashionable world as, years before, she had made the conquest of the artistic one. the men were loud and untiring in their praises of her. the women, who, with the best will in the world to do so, could find no flaw in her, declared that she was "very nice." some of them went so far as to pronounce her charming, and one or two to say that she was fit to be a duchess. "what do you think of my new acquaintances?" asked dora of lorimer, after he had helped her to entertain a number of them one thursday afternoon. "lady a. is pretty," he replied; "lady b. is not bad in her own style." "no, no; i ask you for a general opinion." "in the lump? well, i would give the whole batch for a new umbrella." "you are like me," said dora. "i would give all the trees of hyde park and kensington gardens for the few chestnuts and limes in my garden in elm avenue. and how stupidly they kill time, all these people! in spite of their rank and their fortune, they are bored to death. i can see it in their wrinkled foreheads and quenched, weary-looking eyes. the theatre makes them yawn, they prefer the vulgar inanities of the music-halls; they do not read; art is nothing to them; their parties are mass meetings where one is hours on one's feet without being able to move or talk comfortably, and to get a sandwich or a glass of champagne costs the poor victims of this strange hospitality frantic struggles. when they speak of their pleasures it is with a sigh as if they were so many irksome tasks, and, the season over, they go to homburg or elsewhere to drink the waters and get set up and patched up in readiness for the shooting and house-parties of the autumn." "you exaggerate slightly," said lorimer; "there are in that set plenty of very clever people with literary and artistic tastes, but i grant you that the majority lead a pitiful existence." dora had taken a violent dislike to society, so when lorimer came she often revenged herself for the smiles she was obliged to dispense to her new acquaintances by running them down to her heart's content. philip had lately been several times to paris without taking dora, as he had always done formerly. he had not confided to her the object of these journeys, but had contented himself with telling her that he was going on business. he was always back again on the second or third day. without entering into details, he had mentioned some visits to the russian embassy. he had even confided to her that, in consequence of a rather lengthy correspondence between the russian ambassador in paris and general ivan sabaroff, war minister in st. petersburg, it was not impossible that the czar might make overtures to him for the purchase of the shell he had invented. the french government, he said, would not be opposed to his accepting such overtures from an ally of france. there would be nothing very extraordinary in such a proceeding, of course. the young czar of all the russias and the worthy president of the republic had given each other the kiss of brotherhood in public; monsieur felix faure had returned the visit which the young sovereign had paid him; and there had been signed at st. petersburg that gigantic joke, that titanic hoax which is called the franco-russian alliance, an alliance between the phrygian cap and the cossack cap, between the sons of the great revolution and the scourgers of women, an alliance by the terms of which the blind gallic cook undertook to pull the chestnuts out of the fire for the wily bear of the caucasians, and gave to the rest of europe a grotesque and amusing spectacle. the french _badaud_ rarely misses an opportunity of making france the laughing-stock of the whole world. it is much to be regretted that the french do not read the two or three columns that are devoted to them every day by the newspapers of london, new york, and berlin. their follies supply these great dailies with more material for comment than they can hope to get out of all that goes on in their respective countries, and that, i say it to their credit and to be just, without bitterness, without prejudice, for france counts among her sincerest friends and admirers, in england and america, all that is most intelligent and enlightened in these two countries of light and leading. it is a cosmopolitan traveller, french-born and still french at heart, who ventures to speak thus in parenthesis. alexis de tocqueville might have written in the year of grace 1899 the following lines, which were penned by him in 1849: "france, the most brilliant and most dangerous nation of europe, is destined ever to be, in turn, an object of admiration, of hatred, of terror and of pity, but of indifference, never." viii the house-warming philip decided to give a house-warming party in the month of november, and to ask to a large _soirée musicale_ all the society notabilities, in fact all london and his wife. cards of invitation were sent to ambassadors, cabinet ministers, aristocracy, and city princes. he invited a few literary friends, but not many artists, being afraid of passing for a man who was trying to dazzle his less fortunate brothers in art by his wealth. perhaps he also rather feared meeting them--the studio world has not a very developed bump of admiration for painters who make a rapid fortune and settle in belgravia. those who believed that he still painted had nicknamed him _le grantham des salons_, a not very brilliant pun upon his name which sounded rather like the two french words _grand homme_. between four and five hundred people accepted invitations. the artists for the most part refused, "having a previous engagement which prevented them from accepting mrs. philip grantham's kind invitation." poor dora seemed to see the artistic world slipping away from her, since art itself had deserted the house. lorimer had accepted. thank heaven, she would at least have one real friend at her reception. she set about doing her best to ensure the success of her party. she had a long list of the people who were coming, all well-known names. she gave _carte blanche_ to the best impresario of london, who was entrusted with the arrangement of the musical programme. she ordered her supper from benoist, and flowers and palms in profusion for the decoration of the house, and went to the best dressmaker in london for a gown which, when it came home, philip pronounced simply beyond competition. dora was a born _grande dame_. true, she preferred the simple intellectual life that she had led hitherto, but she was fitted to shine in the gay world. if she had been the wife of the president of the french republic, all the faubourg st. germain would willingly have rendered her homage at the elysée, and would probably have said, on returning home, "a _républicaine_ can be as beautiful, witty, and distinguished-looking as the most high-born _marquise_, were she as noble as charlemagne or louis xiv." dora felt sure of herself, certain of doing honour to philip, and, notwithstanding the profound sadness that reigned in her heart, she was still woman enough to rejoice in advance over the success which she anticipated. she accordingly made all her preparations to that end, and took pains to put her beauty and intelligence at her husband's service. philip, for that matter, did things in lordly style; he had given dora an unlimited credit, _carte blanche_, that is to say a blank cheque. philip wished to have a great social success. without saying anything to his wife, he had sent invitations to all the principal papers, thinking that if the editors did not come they would not fail to send reporters who would write accounts of the party, the publication of which would make them known, he and dora, in the society in which he had taken a firm resolution to shine. the concert alone caused dora some anxiety. she almost regretted having had _music_ printed on her cards. her artistic temperament had often caused her to pity from the bottom of her heart those pianists and singers, whom nobody listens to at parties, and whose first notes invariably give the signal for general conversation. she thought this unmannerly, even offensive, not only to the hosts, but to the artistes. the shopkeeper demands only the price of the goods that he sells you, and it is a matter of indifference to him whether you have your hat in your hand or on your head in his shop. the artiste is more difficult to please. he asks for the appreciation of those who pay him, and more than one celebrated star has consented to sing in drawing-rooms for hundreds of pounds, but only on the formal condition that silence would be enforced. it must be said that at these gatherings many people, who are too busy to pay one another frequent calls, are pleased to have the opportunity of meeting, the men to talk of politics and business, the women of dress, theatres, gossip, or scandals. they can so well dispense with music that many englishwomen have the words _no music_ printed on their invitation cards. i know one who, in order to persuade me to accept her invitation, put a postscript thus: "i shall have a hungarian orchestra, but you won't hear it." dora was reassured, however, as the impresario, who was to arrange the music, knew his public. he had guaranteed her "complete satisfaction." she thought no more about it, and awaited the day with all the serenity of a society stager who had done nothing else all her life. ix the confession like the great condé, on the eve of the battle of rocroy, dora slept peacefully and profoundly on the eve of the day that was to see her play the rôle of hostess for the first time in her new house in belgravia. she was careful not to tire herself during the day, in order to feel fresh and alert at half-past nine, the hour at which the guests would begin to arrive. for a mistress of a house, for a novice especially, a reception of this kind is a severe trial. she stands four mortal hours at the entrance of the drawing-room, all the while on the _qui-vive_. she would like to possess a hundred pairs of eyes instead of one, to assure herself that everything is going as smoothly as she could wish, for the least little _contretemps_ will spoil the party. out of four hundred people who accept an invitation, two hundred come to criticise--some the music, others the supper, others the wines, others the dresses. if there is the slightest hitch in the proceedings, there are whispered comments on it. if the music is bad, people drown it with their voices; if the supper is of doubtful quality, they go early; if the servants do not number the hats carefully, the men, on leaving, choose the best that come to their notice; if the hostess is embarrassed, they smile. if the women meet people whom they have ceased to know, they look bored. the most thankless task in the world is giving a large "at home." i know many women who, after giving such parties, have to go to bed for a couple of days. dora dined lightly at seven o'clock, and, after giving her last instructions, went to dress. at nine o'clock she was ready. her white dress of exquisite material, trimmed with old lace and silver embroidery, suited her to perfection, and set off every line of her supple figure. she seemed to be moulded in it. she wore a _rivière_ of diamonds and emeralds, and three magnificent diamond stars were fastened on her bodice. philip had given her these diamonds, to console her for the portrait that he had not had the courage to finish. she would have infinitely preferred the portrait, but she accepted the jewels willingly, and, thanking her husband prettily, she said to herself, "when the shell bursts, its pieces will be useful. i shall at any rate have a couple of thousand pounds with which to face the situation." she wore no ornament in her hair, which seemed to be proud of being entrusted alone with the task of showing off her beautiful pure madonna-like face. never had a lovelier head, framed in luxuriant tresses, been placed more proudly on classical shoulders. her beauty was dazzling. she went into the drawing-room to give a last glance at the decorations. everything looked perfect. notwithstanding the air of calm and simple dignity that she wore, like all who have the knowledge of their own worth and who know their triumph is assured, those who had examined dora's expression attentively would have discovered a new anxiety depicted on her countenance, perhaps nothing very important, but nevertheless an annoyance at the least. general ivan sabaroff, russian war minister, was in london. philip had invited him to dora's party, and he had accepted. philip told his wife this at dinner. dora sat down in the drawing-room with a cloud on her brow. "sabaroff!" she said to herself, "general sabaroff! what if it be the colonel sabaroff that i met eight years ago at monte carlo? he was already much talked about. to-day he is the russian minister of war--it is quite possible, even probable; but then? see the man again! oh no, never! and yet, i shall be obliged to receive him--i shall warn philip that he had a detestable reputation with women, and if that does not suffice, well--i will tell philip everything. and why shouldn't i? the confession will not be very painful, and i have often been on the point of making it. i have made up my mind--i will not, and i cannot meet this man. i will be polite to him to-night, but very distant; of course, i know what is expected of me as hostess. after that i hope there will be an end of it." this resolution seemed to clear away the clouds from her face. she smiled eagerly at her husband when he came gaily into the drawing-room. "everything is ready and admirably arranged," said philip. "the drawing-room is decorated with such taste! ah, my dearest, it is easy to see you have had a hand in the arrangements. i recognise your touch in a thousand little details. your party will be a huge success--the rooms will look splendid, the music will be excellent, the supper first-rate, and we shall have a regular crowd of celebrities and pretty women--it will be a triumph! and you, darling--how beautiful you look to-night! that gown suits you to perfection. i wish i was going to have you all to myself." "how absurd! nothing would have been easier, if you had only expressed the wish," said she, a little piqued. there are many men who are on the point of falling in love with their wives when they see them near to making the conquest of a crowd of outsiders. "and those diamonds," continued he, "how splendid they look on you! you were built to wear a diadem, that's your style. at last you are playing your proper rôle, and i am proud to see you doing the honours of a house that is worthy of you. when i come to think of it, fortune has been very kind to me." on seeing dora quite unmoved, he added-"really, one would think, to look at you, that all this does not stir you to the least enthusiasm: it's curious! sometimes i can't quite make you out. i am nearly beside myself with delight. now, listen a moment," said he, taking her hand. "i am negotiating with russia. if they take my invention, as i have every hope that they will, my ambition will be satisfied, my wildest dreams realised. i shall be rich. you know we are not really rich. it costs a perfect fortune to keep this house going. ah, but only let general sabaroff approve of my shell, and, dearest,--we are all right." he rubbed his hands with joy. "philip," said dora, "i want to speak to you about this general sabaroff." "yes, yes," said philip, without heeding her; "i want you to charm him. you must make a conquest of him. bring all your diplomacy to bear. he has an immense influence at the russian court, and is, i hear, the favourite minister of the czar. being minister of war, he is the master, the autocrat of his department. and, darling, i count on you to help me. i repeat to you, everything depends on him." "money again, philip, always money," replied dora. "are you not rich enough yet? if we have not the income to keep a house like this, why do we live in it? why should we live beyond our means? i don't think it is right, philip. what has become of those happy days when we loved each other so much, and when you thought only of your art? ah, give me back my dear studio." "i am not rich enough yet," said philip, "but i am perhaps on the road that leads to fortune." "you were rich before, and on the road to fame. i loved an artist and i adored his art." "oh, deuce take art and artists," cried philip, getting angry. "philip, how can you? if you only knew how it pains me to hear you speak like that." "well, my dear dora," said philip, "there are times at which i can scarcely keep my patience with you--you don't interest yourself in me as you used to do." "is it really you who dare speak to me in that way?" exclaimed dora indignantly. "is it you who accuse me of not being the same, you who consecrated your life to art and to my happiness, and who to-day think of nothing but making money, like the first city man in the street? there are times when i long to go and earn my own living with my brush. the only thing that holds me back is eva--you too, perhaps, for i am certain that one of these days you will cry 'help!' and i shall have to rescue you from drowning." "you are ungrateful, dora. it is for you that i work." "for me? but can't you see i loathe the life i lead? for me? when the thirst for wealth gets hold of a man, he has always the same excuse--it is not for himself. it is even the eternal parrot-cry of the miser; if he holds fast to his money, it is for the children; and under this pretext he renders his wife, his children, and everyone around him as miserable as he is himself." "night and day," said philip, "i have worked, and god is my witness that in working all my thoughts were for you. now that i am almost at the goal, you turn against me--you refuse to give a smile to the man who can realise all my hopes." "ah, why do you choose that one?" said dora, frowning. "what a funny remark!" said philip. "just as if he was my choice." then, looking at dora, who seemed agitated, he added-"what do you mean?" "i have been told that general sabaroff is a libertine, a roué of the worst type, and you know what a detestation i have of such men." "let him be what he likes; what on earth does it matter to me?" exclaimed philip. "really, dora, you can help me with a few smiles; ask him to come and see you on one of your thursdays, without compromising yourself, and without your virtue running any danger. it ought to be easy enough for a woman to protect her virtue against a man--in a drawing-room," added philip, with a slightly mocking air which intensely displeased dora. "yes, much easier than protecting one's reputation against women. i hope you will not insist. i shall receive the general politely, that goes without saying, but i shall certainly not ask him to come and see me on the days i receive or the days on which i do not receive." philip and dora looked at each other for a few seconds. they seemed both very determined. "and suppose i insist," said philip, who was the first to break the silence, "and, what is more, suppose i expect you to do what i wish?" "in that case," said dora, "since there is no other way of obtaining your indulgence, stay a moment and listen to me." philip looked at the clock. "there is plenty of time," continued dora, "we have nearly half an hour before anyone will come. my dear philip, i have every reason to believe that this general sabaroff is no stranger to me. perhaps i should have told you this before, but when i have been on the point of doing so, i always said to myself, 'what is the use?' and i really did not see the need of it. this is the incident in two words. when i was nineteen, just out of the schoolroom, my aunt took me to winter in the riviera. among the many people we met there was a colonel sabaroff, a man of about thirty-five. from the first he paid me marked attention, and at the end of two months he made me an offer of marriage. he was handsome, clever, say fascinating if you like, had the reputation of being a brilliant officer, and was much sought after in society. i, a mere child, could not but feel flattered at his choice of me. what my answer might have been--i had asked for a week to consider it--i can scarcely tell, although my heart, i can say in all sincerity, was not touched. a _bal masqué_ was to be held that week and my aunt had subscribed to it, but she disliked public balls, and it had been decided that we were not to go, especially as she thought it hardly proper for two women alone to be present at such a ball. you know, my aunt was then still young and pretty. however, my uncle, arriving from england on the day of the ball, persuaded her to let him take me, for he guessed at my eagerness to go, and he assured her that if he came with me, the strictest british propriety would be satisfied. when we reached the ball, it was already late. after making a tour of the rooms, we sat down in a dimly lit conservatory, and i was just going to tell him of the offer of marriage i had received, when i started at hearing colonel sabaroff's voice in low but fierce altercation with that of a woman. both were masked, and the language they spoke in was french, which was unintelligible to my uncle. signing to him to keep silence, i listened intently. my own future was decided in those few minutes. but what need i tell you more except that i, a girl ignorant of all the world's falseness and ugly coarseness, sat dumfounded, petrified, as the history of a vulgar liaison was unfolded to my young ears, and the man who had asked for my hand and heart flung off a wretched woman who, to her own undoing, had given herself to him a year before." "what did you do?" asked philip. "i sat spellbound as long as their conversation lasted; but when they rose and passed in front of us, i removed my mask, looked the man straight in the face, and, in as steady a voice as i could command, asked my uncle to take me home." "did you see any more of him after that?" "no--the next day, at my request, we left monte carlo. during several months i received letters from him, all of which i tore up without reading, and soon, thank god, i ceased to know whether he existed or not." "perhaps it is he who sends the pansies," said philip. "don't talk nonsense," replied dora. "but general sabaroff may not be the man at all." "i feel sure he must be," said dora. "the description i have been giving of him corresponds perfectly. philip, if it should be so, you won't throw me into the society of this man, will you? you won't ask me to make him welcome here?" a servant came into the room to say that the decorations in the dining-room were finished, and to ask whether dora would go and give a look to them before the florist left the house. "very well," said she to the servant, "i will go." and, smiling at philip, she said to him-"it is understood, then,--you will not insist any more, philip." "curious tricks fate plays us all!" exclaimed philip when dora had gone. "one would think the devil had a hand in it." it was half-past nine; nobody was likely to come before ten o'clock. he went downstairs to the library and asked for a glass of fine champagne and seltzer water. he was pained to see dora lose her gaiety. to give him his due, his one hope was to soon see his ambitious dreams realised, to consecrate anew his whole existence to his wife. he hated himself for being unable to do so at once. but he had gone too far to retrace his steps. he seemed to be carried along by an irresistible current. in his heart of hearts he felt poignantly how much he was in the wrong, but he could not bring himself to break off yet and give up his darling hopes. his behaviour had assumed a disgraceful aspect to his eyes, although he dared not own it to himself. often and often he longed to go and throw himself at dora's feet. he had not the moral courage necessary to take a decision on which the whole happiness of his wife depended. every feeling of delicacy and generosity in his composition revolted within him, for he adored her. he fought hard, but each time he returned to the attack he was vanquished. philip was unhappy, in spite of the gaiety he forced himself to assume; within him was a mortal sadness. he swallowed his drink, sat down, and began to think over what dora had said to him. "suppose," thought he, "that general sabaroff should turn out to be dora's old admirer. well, what then? he must have forgotten her long ago--she never had any love for him--not even a school-girl's love. where is the danger? she has a painful recollection of him; but she is no longer a child, she is a woman of the world. why should she not conquer her antipathy for him and make use of a little diplomacy to render me a service? i must absolutely get general sabaroff's approval. everything depends on that. but, what if he should not have forgotten her, if he still loves her? he would not feel disposed to place a fortune in my hands. stay, though, perhaps he would, on the contrary, to please dora. another reason why she should be amiable to him" ... his evil genius urged him on. "it's decided," said he; "whatever it may cost, i must have the man's approbation of my shell--and i must have that money to be rich--really rich. yes, my dear father, i shall be wealthy, and i will prove to you that it is possible to make a fortune without being your slave." his spirits brightened considerably, and, rubbing his hands cheerfully, he strode up and down the room exultantly, perfectly convinced that he had formed a resolution which would turn out to his advantage. "suppose i should succeed! well, of course i shall succeed. i must, something tells me i shall, i will. yes, this man sabre-off or sabre-on must be made much of. as to dora,--with some wives it might be a risky experiment, but with her,--why, i should as soon think of doubting my own existence as of doubting her! 'oh, my darling!'" said he aloud, taking up a photograph of dora and kissing it, "'forgive me for having had such a thought, and still more for having expressed it.' yes, she must receive this man smilingly whether he turns out to be a sir galahad or not. i have gone too far to draw back now. it's annoying all the same--pity there is so much sentimental nonsense in even the best of women, and dora is one out of ten thousand." the final chords of a pianoforte solo reached his ears, followed by loud applause. "by jove," said he, "i was nearly forgetting all about the party." he hurriedly left the library and went upstairs to the drawing-room. x belgravia dora was receiving her guests at the top of the staircase, at the entrance of the large drawing-room. philip found about thirty people already arrived, and he proceeded to shake hands and distribute words of welcome. at half-past ten it had become difficult to circulate in the rooms; the staircase and hall were crowded, but a stream of carriages still flowed up. at eleven o'clock the fête was at its height, veritably dazzling. the lights, the flowers, made it a fairy scene. it was a phantasmagoria of heads, bare shoulders, black coats, diamonds, shimmering satins, and priceless lace; and, permeating the whole, a perfume as of hot-house flowers. all the types of society were to be recognised in the throng--the diplomatists, with their eternal smile and irreproachably cut clothes; the aristocracy, with its frigid bored look, occasionally smiling, as if by mechanism; the city by its biblical noses; the stock exchange by those cold, metallic, careworn men, aged before their time by the wrinkles that money preoccupations plough on their foreheads; literature by men bright and interested in everything around them, cheerily provoking ripples of laughter among the women, and recounting their best anecdotes among the men. the fine arts were represented by a few noble-looking heads rising out of shakespeare collars. on all sides were exquisite toilettes, setting off forms of dazzling fairness and admirable poise--a complete representative crowd of that calm, proud, haughty british nation, full of dignity, robust health, and self-confidence; a nation that holds in its hands the destinies of half the earth. lorimer and de lussac met in a corner of the drawing-room. "what a reception!" said de lussac. "all london is rubbing shoulders here, in order to have a look at the man who has invented the famous shell." "and his wife," added lorimer. "and his wife," repeated de lussac. "i never saw her looking so lovely. raphael might have drawn the oval of her face, murillo her eyes, titian her hair, rubens her shoulders." "and a modern english painter the sadness of her brow," said lorimer. "doesn't she look bored, poor woman?" "that puts the finishing touch, and helps to make her superb--ideal. a calm, cold, sad face is the one _mieux portée_ in england. it is almost _de rigueur_. nothing is such bad form as to appear to enjoy life. she is quite _à la mode_." "_a la mort_," said lorimer. "my dear fellow, i'll tell you what it is, such parties as this give me shivers down the back. your countrywoman, madame vigée-lebrun, was right when she said, 'the english amuse themselves as the french bore themselves.'" "then why do you come here, old fellow?" "oh, i! why, i come as a doctor. i am deeply interested in a special case. i am studying and following carefully the progress of a malady. i am here diagnosing." "and your patient is" ... "our worthy host," said lorimer. "how do you find him to-day?" "the disease is taking its course; he will get over it; but the cure will take time." lorimer fixed his eyeglass in his eye, and surveyed the crowd. "ah," he ejaculated, letting his glass drop again, "how i preferred the good little bohemian sunday suppers, the pretty little house in st. john's wood! the servants were dismissed, and everybody helped everybody else. there was a house where gaiety reigned supreme, _en autocrate_! and what music we used to have! what glorious talks, what delicious discussions on every topic under the sun! artists, writers, journalists, out-vied one another in brilliancy. politics were put aside, and the bourse and all that makes modern life insufferable. we were never more than twelve of us, so that the conversation could always be general, and, for that matter, the house did not contain a room large enough to hold comfortably more than a dozen people. how all the guests harmonised together! those were parties. here they are funereal functions. in a small room conversation is easy, people can talk easily. in a large room one is swamped, and feels like a solution of oneself." "i see," said de lussac, "that in spite of all your successes, you have remained a philosopher." "more than ever. but look round you. look at all these faces. these people touch a spring to make themselves smile. oh, if that is your fashion of enjoying yourself, thanks, i prefer something else. every time i come among this set, i am taken with furious longings every quarter of an hour to rush into the street and shout, to assure myself that i am alive. poor old grantham! it was his dream to see his wife shine in society. poor devil! and such a good fellow, not to speak of his great future as a painter. however, there is our hostess coming towards us. look at her! how happy she looks, this queen with her new crown--a capital model for 'mary stuart going to the scaffold.'" de lussac, recognising some people he knew, moved off to join their group. lorimer went towards dora, who smiled with relief at seeing him in the crowd. everyone seemed to have arrived now, and there was no need for her to remain at her post; but, in case of possible fresh comers, she stayed near the entrance of the room. she looked pale, her face was drawn with fatigue, and her eyes looked unnaturally large. "oh, what good it does one to see an old friend's familiar face in a crowd like this," she said to lorimer, drawing him back towards the doorway of the large drawing-room. "my dear gerald, i don't believe i know by sight the half of my guests." the idea struck her as so funny that she began to laugh heartily. "do you know half?" exclaimed lorimer; "that is very good really. as for the crowd, don't complain of that. an english hostess is a failure if people do not stifle in her drawing-room; and if half a dozen women faint, then the party is a social success that covers its giver with glory. the society papers talk of her.--you seem tired." "yes," said dora, "tired--at the end of my strength and my courage." "let me take you to the buffet." they went down together. lorimer got her a biscuit, an ice, and a glass of champagne, and this light refreshment reanimated her. on their way back to the drawing-room lorimer took up the thread of the conversation again. "come now, my dear dora," said he, "your lot is very enviable after all, you know. you are young, beautiful, rich, adored--one of the queens of society. what more do you ask?" "i ask nothing more," replied dora; "i ask a great deal less. a queen in society! i had rather be queen at home, as i used to be. we were left in peace in those times. now all the idlers pry into our life. and why? oh, it is too silly! because philip refused to sell sir benjamin pond a picture which he was painting for me. yes, that is what is occupying them to-night. they all go to have a look at the portrait, one after another, and then they laugh. can you conceive such a thing? there exists, or rather there existed, a painter who loved his wife, and did not mind showing it! is it not droll? so vulgar, you know! it appears that it creates high fun at the clubs. ah, you may talk about women's tongues, but to retail rubbish and circulate scandal, you must get a dozen men together in a club smoking-room. they are beyond competition, my dear gerald. i would give all my guests for a couple of intimate friends, for a couple of devoted relatives. ah, you may say what you like, blood is thicker than afternoon tea." "you were too happy," said lorimer, who had been amused at dora's tirade; "now you must share your happiness a little." "yes, and my husband with everybody. where is my share? how i should like to leave this room and go and sit in a quiet corner for a good talk, such as we used to have in the good old times in the other house." "why move? stay where you are, and instead of thinking yourself on show, try and imagine that all this crowd is here for your amusement. i know all your guests personally or by sight. i am your 'who's who' for to-night. make use of me. i will show and explain the magic lantern." "so you shall," said dora, amused by the suggestion. "now, then, who is that horrible creature painted and dyed, with eyes half out of her head and an eternal sickly smile on her face?" "lady agatha ashby, an old grump of the fashionable world. no one knows her age. some say it is seventy-two, others put it at a hundred and seventy-two. she is enamelled, and the mouth, as you see it, is fixed in that way with a smile that lasts three hours. they say she used to be pretty and rather witty. makes it her duty to know everybody worth knowing. will probably leave memoirs behind her--a diary at anyrate." "and those?" said dora, indicating two couples passing near her. "the earl of gampton. behind him the countess, a young american woman, who brought him three million dollars, with which he has been able to get his coat-of-arms out of pawn. our british aristocracy gets regilded in chicago and new york." "how can a woman love or respect a man who allows himself to be purchased for a title of nobility?" "and," said lorimer, "how can a man love or respect a woman who buys him, and degrades him in his own eyes?" "you are right," responded dora. "i cannot see any possible element of happiness in such marriages. she is ugly," she added, after taking a second look at the countess. "beauty fades," said lorimer, in excuse for lord gampton. "yes, but ugliness remains," replied dora. "and the dollars, too, happily--it is a compensation--a fine indemnity." "not always; fortunes have been known to fade too." "ah," ejaculated lorimer, as there passed by him a middle-aged man, fairly good-looking, but wearing a forbidding, sulky expression, "there is sir george hardy. he has not inflicted his wife on you." "no, thank heaven!--if what people say is true." "true enough. people don't ask lady hardy, but sir george is a philosopher; he does not resent being asked out alone; and he has the good sense never to try and introduce one to his wife. there are two kinds of women--those you marry, and those you don't introduce to your friends. sir george has them both in one." "what a dead-weight such a woman must be! to be proud of one's wife, to be proud of one's husband--that is one of the great keys to happiness in married life. oh, gerald, do look at that imposing-looking matron; who is she?" "the dowager-countess of chausey, pretty well known for her serious flirtations in 1850." "how can a woman of her age go about so outrageously uncovered? so long as english women do not show their feet, they think they are all right. her dress is perfectly indecent." "not the dress, but its contents," said lorimer. "the countess might, it is true, draw a veil across the past and leave something to the imagination of the beholder. but the fun of the thing is, that the dowager is one of the vice-presidents of the society recently founded for the suppression of the nude in our museums and picture galleries. o the british matron!" "what a proud carriage she has for a woman of her age," said dora. "one would think she was carrying the holy grail--two holy grails in a parsifal procession." "upon my word, i do believe," said dora, "that women nowadays trust to providence to keep their dresses on their backs! but what lovely frocks! i do not understand how there can still be people who say that the english woman does not know how to dress." "not now. a few years back one might have said with truth that the german woman was covered, the english woman was clothed!" "not always," said dora, laughing. "the american was arrayed, but the french woman alone was dressed. in the present day, the english woman of good society dresses as tastefully as her french sisters, and this fact would be known in france, if english women had not that bad habit of putting all their oldest garments into requisition when they travel." "french women have not much to teach us now." "one or two things still. a little parisian dressmaker, who would come over and set up in england to teach english women to hold their dresses up in the street, ought to make a fortune in no time. it is the most graceful, artistic, and typical movement of the french woman." "on the other hand, my dear gerald," said dora, "french women mince or trot or proceed, english women walk. we are their superiors in many things." "we might make comparisons without end, and finally be sorely puzzled where to award the prize." here the servant announced "mrs. van der leyd smith." "smythe--not smith," said the new arrival, indignantly turning to the domestic. "that is the mother of lady gampton," whispered lorimer to dora. dora rose and went to shake hands with her. "i am a little late," she said; "i have been to the queen's theatre to see _majella_. it is a play that will draw crowded houses till the end of next season. you have seen it, of course." "yes," said dora, "i was at the first night--allow me to introduce its author--mr. gerald lorimer." "what a pleasure to meet you!" said she, as lorimer came forward and bowed. "i congratulate you sincerely; your play is a _chef-d'oeuvre_. the house was packed to-night, and the enthusiasm boundless." "i am happy the public appreciate the play," said lorimer, bowing his acknowledgments of her compliments. "_majella_ will place our old friend in the front rank of the dramatic authors of the day." "and fill his coffers to the brim," said the american lady, with a knowing glance, which meant, "that is the main thing." lorimer and dora exchanged comprehensive looks. the lady's wink had explained in one flash the motto of new york. not _who are you?_ nor _what are you?_ nor yet _what have you done?_ but _how much do you make?_ loud and evidently sincere applause was heard coming from the smaller drawing-room where the concert was being given. presently there appeared, making towards the staircase, a tall fair young man who replied by smiles and repeated bows to the bravos which were accorded to him by this _blasé_ audience of people, little accustomed to lavish applause on anyone. it was schowalski, a well-known pianist who came to london every year to give a concert, and play in drawing-rooms during the season. at a certain distance, schowalski's head recalled that of his celebrated compatriot and confrère paderewski; however, he had not the delicate, finely chiselled profile which gives the latter his striking and unforgetable physiognomy. taller, more vigorous, more solidly and massively built, with long light hair, straight and thick, and his enormous moustache falling in a semicircle around the mouth, he might have sat for brennus or vercingetorix. dora held out her hand as he was about to go downstairs. "thanks a thousand times," said she; "you have played like an angel." and she introduced him to the american lady still at her side. "i had the honour of making madame's acquaintance in new york," said schowalski, bowing. "really," replied mrs. w. g. van der leyd smythe, "when was that?" "why, two years ago in new york, in your drawing-room, where i had the honour of playing." "that's true--i think i remember--in january 1896; yes, yes--delighted to meet you again, mr. ... i never can remember names--what is his name again?" asked she of dora. schowalski heard no more. he bowed, shook hands with a few friends and disappeared. "schowalski is one of the greatest pianists of the day," said dora. "i know, i know," said the lady with the string of names, "but what impertinence to enter into conversation with your guests, as if he had been invited. upon my word, the effrontery of these musicians!" she followed him with her eyes as she stared through a pair of long-handled glasses, that are a weapon of offence in the fingers of some women. "well, to be sure," she cried, "if he isn't shaking hands with lady gampton now! my dear mrs. grantham, in new york we do not entertain musicians, we engage them to entertain us--we pay them and we are quits." "my dear mrs. van der leyd smith"-"smythe," said the lady, correcting dora. "excuse me, i never can remember names. in england, artists like schowalski are received by the aristocracy and even at court. perhaps that makes them so bold as to think they may be fit to associate with the aristocracy of new york." "take that," she said to herself. the magnificent new yorker fanned herself, smiled a little awry, and went to join the group which held her daughter, the countess of gampton. lorimer had not lost a word of the conversation. he would fain have cried "bravo." "for a _débutante_," said he, "you are going strong--that was promising." "my dear gerald, i feel that i am getting spiteful--i shall bite soon." just at this moment, quite near the door, she perceived a lady taking notes. she had already noticed her before--this person who drew up every now and then near certain groups, carefully studied the dresses, and looked up and down the people whom she did not seem to know. "do tell me," dora said to lorimer, "who is that woman who puzzles me so? what is she doing? she seems to be taking notes; just now she was making little sketches--she is an artist, no doubt." "how innocent you are!" cried lorimer, laughing loudly. "yes, she is an artist, if you will--who works for some fashion paper--or a lady reporter taking notes for a society paper." "but i do not know her," said dora; "i am perfectly sure i never asked her here." "you, no; but perhaps someone else. for that matter reporters find their way pretty nearly everywhere without invitation. it is their calling. this one is taking notes, to publish in her paper an account of your party." "but it is an insult," cried dora; "i wish they would leave me alone. i don't want accounts in papers--my house is private." "wait a moment--why, yes," exclaimed lorimer, who had just put up his eyeglass to look at the lady in question; "yes, of course, i know her, she writes for _the social wave_, a paper for people in the swim. shall i introduce her to you?" "oh, no thank you, please don't," replied dora. "some time ago," continued lorimer, "i used to meet her often at parties. she is a rather clever little woman, and has the knack of turning out readable paragraphs. she is tolerated everywhere for the sake of what she writes--you know, there are plenty of people who like publicity." lorimer had noticed that the lady reporter had let fall two leaves from her notebook. he watched his opportunity, picked them up, and brought them to dora. "look, we are going to have some fun. i have samples. listen, 'lady mardon looked thrillingly lovely in electric blue ... her superb shoulders'" ... "enough, enough," said dora. "the idea of it." "wait a minute; here is something else. 'lady margaret solby wore a dream of sea-green and salmon, and was the admiration of everyone. mrs. van der leyd smythe received congratulations on all sides on the subject of her daughter's marriage with the young earl of gampton.'" "and people read that!" said dora. "certainly, and, more wonderful still, people buy it. oh, listen to this, here is something that concerns you personally. 'mrs. philip grantham wore a dress of white satin, trimmed with lace and silver embroidery, and, blazing with diamonds and emeralds, received her guests with a simplicity and a grace which will speedily make her one of the most popular hostesses in london.' now, that is what i call amiable; she treats you with generosity." and seeing that dora seemed very much annoyed, he added, "that is the kind of literature that delights our modest countrywomen." "there are no more journalists," said dora, with disgust, "there are only _concierges_." she took the pages and tore them in shreds. then, with a little feeling of shame at having been amusing herself at the expense of her guests, she rose, made a little sign to lorimer, and was soon swallowed up in the crush, saying a few pleasant words here and there to her acquaintances as she went. lorimer went down to the buffet, where he found schowalski, who was going in heavily for sandwiches, cakes and ices and champagne. the appetite of musicians is proverbial! "ah, monsieur lorimer," said he, "i am so glad to see you, you will be the very man to render me a little service. i have just finished," he added in confidence, "a grand concerto in four parts for the piano. in that concerto i have expressed all the great sorrows of life: first, an adagio--sad, full of tears; then a grand allegro, full of despair. you understand, don't you? well, what i am trying to find is a title, a telling title. as a playwright you know the importance of a good title. can you suggest something?" "my dear sir," said lorimer, "great sorrows are silent." "what do you mean?" asked the pianist, for whom british humour was a closed letter. "are you joking with me? how can one be silent and make music?" the most thankless task in the world is explaining a joke to a person who has not seen it. lorimer did not try, and after suggesting _les peines du coeur_, _angoisses de l'âme_, _le mal de dents_, _les désespoirs de l'amour_, and a few other eye-tickling titles, he left the puzzled composer and made his way upstairs. it was close upon midnight, the hour at which supper was to be served. xi general sabaroff philip was here, there, and everywhere, playing the host to the admiration of all. everyone voted him charming. the most exacting society critics admired the ease with which he did the honours of his house, and declared that philip grantham was a gentleman. the english man of the world has no higher dignity to confer. no one thought of going away, although the crowd began to be stifling, but an english crowd is ready to endure anything in order to contemplate at close quarters the celebrity of the moment. the lion that they were expecting to roar for them this evening was general sabaroff, the _pièce de résistance_ of the evening. philip began to fear that the general had been detained by some unforeseen business, and would not put in an appearance after all. he had not sent out invitations "to meet general sabaroff," but he had told a great many of his guests beforehand that he expected him; one person had told another; and it came to much the same thing. he caught sight of de lussac, who threw him an appealing little glance which plainly said, "come to my rescue." he found the young diplomat in the toils of mrs. van der leyd smythe. he joined them and led off de lussac, after having passed the lady on to an old banker who happened to be standing near, alone and negotiable. "my dear fellow," said de lussac, "i owe you a debt of gratitude for having extracted me from the clutches of that american mamma. i have had to listen to the history of the noble house of gampton. upon my word, a lot of those worthy americans are prouder of their aristocratic alliances than of the brave pioneers who founded the united states. they would sell all the shirt sleeves that felled the forests of america for the coat-of-arms of some ancestor ennobled, a few centuries ago, for something which to-day would perhaps be rewarded with a few years' penal servitude." "snobbishness," said philip, "is a disease that one meets with in all anglo-saxons, but with terrible complications in certain americans.... i almost expected the minister for war. his lordship promised me he would come." "if i were you," replied de lussac, "i would not count upon him. i know he is very busy to-day. special order to send to woolwich arsenal; a message of congratulation to telegraph to the sirdar on his victory at atbara; orders to send to various regiments to hold themselves in readiness to set out for india--it appears there is rather disquieting news in the north-west; a consultation with the commander-in-chief; a cabinet council. besides which, i fancy, he has promised to speak to-night at a meeting of the peace association at the queen's hall: the ubiquity of some of you englishmen is simply prodigious." "a fine programme," said philip, "a well-filled day indeed--i should have been pleased to receive his congratulations. oh, he must be vexed to have been, so to speak, the cause of the refusal i have met with in my own country. why did they refuse my shell? i should have been prouder of my invention if i had been able to ensure the advantages of it to my motherland." "my dear fellow, the english do not invent; they buy the inventions of outsiders when they are successful. they looked upon the inventor of the suez canal as a dangerous lunatic; to turn him from his project they went so far as to rake up an old theory of herodotus, that the red sea and the mediterranean were on different levels. at the present day, they hold four millions-worth of stock in the concern, and would only like to have the lot. the fact is, if ever england should meet with a great reverse, if ever she comes to grief, she will have only her vanity and self-confidence to thank." "our security is so great." "i know that," said de lussac, laughing--"your volunteers can insure their lives without paying any extra premium. by-the-bye, general sabaroff is in london. he says he has come over to consult a certain oculist. you may be sure, dear boy, that the eye he is concerned about is the one he means to keep on you." "i know he is in town--i expect him to-night." "i heard that just now in the other room--you lose no time." de lussac drew philip towards the landing, which was clear of people for the moment. "with the general, i don't see that you need make a secret of your shell. russia is our ally; it is to our advantage that she should possess the best possible weapons; and i don't believe the french government would have any objection to russia's profiting by your invention." "really?" said philip anxiously--"nor do i. i had already thought of it in that light myself, i confess." "well, you are a gallant man, i must say, to leave me in the lurch like that," cried mrs. van der leyd smythe, who now came up. "you went off just as i was going to introduce you to three prominent american women who are dying to make your acquaintance." "well then, by all means, let us go and save their lives," said de lussac. "one of them," said his companion, as she led him towards the small drawing-room, "is a well-known literary woman, another is a celebrated public speaker, and the other" ... "oh, please," exclaimed de lussac, "can't you introduce me to some pretty woman who has never done anything at all?" a servant, who had just come upstairs, announced in a loud voice, "his excellency general sabaroff." the name passed from mouth to mouth, and there was a general lull in the conversation; the crowd surged towards the door, and with frantic cranings of the neck endeavoured to get a glimpse of the new arrival. dora had recognised him at once. he had not changed. sabaroff, on his side, as soon as he caught sight of dora at the top of the staircase, had exclaimed inwardly, "it is she after all; i was told right--it is my lovely english girl of monte carlo." not a look nor a movement of sabaroff or of dora had escaped philip: "it is the same man," he said to himself--"they recognise each other." he moved towards the general. "your excellency is very good to have come," he said. and, leading him to where dora was standing, he went through with an introduction. sabaroff bowed, kissed dora's hand respectfully, and addressed a few commonplace words to her to excuse himself for coming so late. general ivan sabaroff, minister of war to his majesty the czar and autocrat of all the russias, was forty-five years of age, but, thanks to the military bearing which always rejuvenates a man's appearance by a few years, he looked scarcely forty. the ladies declared at once that he was a superb man, and indeed the general had a striking-looking appearance. in the streets of any town, people would have turned round to look at him, the women saying, "what a fine man!" the men, "that is somebody!" six feet three in his stockings, broad of shoulder, admirably proportioned, with an iron will written on his face, a herculean strength and remarkable suppleness of body, the head dignified and proudly set on a large neck, the face stern with keen scrutinising eyes, straight prominent nose, a sensual mouth, with full red lips and a thick black moustache twisted into two sharp points, the general looked like a man who might be as redoubtable in a boudoir as on a battlefield. as a matter of fact he had won many hearts in the former and many victories in the latter. not being married, he had risked his reputation in the service of women, and his life in the service of his sovereign, with more impunity and less hesitation than might otherwise have been the case. "i am delighted to make your acquaintance, delighted," he said to dora. and in a lower tone he added, "to renew your acquaintance." dora, fearing that the general might give a disagreeable turn to the conversation, hastened to make the first remark that passed through her mind. nothing betrayed the uneasiness she felt at seeing this man again. "has your excellency been long in london?" she asked of sabaroff, in her calmest tones. "a few days only. i have come to consult an oculist who has been specially recommended to me; and, besides, i have wanted for some time past to visit england and see some of my old friends here." sabaroff was a man of the world. he knew that it would be bad form to monopolise his hostess, so he exchanged a few words more with her on trivial topics, and then, accompanied by philip, entered the drawing-room. he recognised an acquaintance here and there, to whom he bowed. philip introduced a few people to him, and he was soon the centre of an interested group. "i hope," said lord bentham, "that your excellency's impressions of the english are favourable. we do our best to make ourselves agreeable to distinguished strangers who visit us." "and we love to know what they think of us," added lady margaret solby, who had drawn near the general and now placed herself in front of him, that he might have an opportunity of noting at his ease all the good points of a handsome englishwoman. "i have never," said sabaroff to lord bentham, "met such kind and hospitable people as your compatriots; abroad they are sometimes haughty and, i may add" ... "extremely disagreeable," said his lordship, finishing the sentence. "no, i do not say that. in any case, that could only be on the surface, for at home they are a revelation, really the most charming hosts in the world. to study a man, you must study him when he is at home. on foreign soil he is playing a part that he only knows imperfectly. he is hampered, and is scarcely a free agent. he is often misunderstood. he is not in his proper setting, much less in his element. i am convinced that when the creator made man, he must have said to him, 'thou shalt stay at home.'" "a commandment which we english have sadly neglected, then," remarked philip. "and our english women, general?" questioned lady margaret, simpering and attracting his attention by expert fan wavings to a figure which she knew was above criticism, a figure such as english women can claim almost a monopoly in. "oh, they are beautiful, they are glorious!" said sabaroff, with the air of a connoisseur; "they are dreams, angels of beauty. what flowing lines, what graceful proportions, what lovely complexions, what fine delicately carved features! they are vignettes! when an englishwoman is beautiful, madame, she is beyond competition." "and when she is ugly?" said lady margaret. "oh, heaven help her!" said lorimer, who had just been introduced to sabaroff, and who, surrounded as he was by pretty women, did not fear to risk a joke at the expense of the absent, who are always out of it. "i am very proud, general, to hear your excellency express yourself so warmly on the subject of english women's beauty," exclaimed lady margaret. "and all those attributes of the beautiful woman," murmured sabaroff in her ear, "i find united near me." and with a rapid and comprehensive glance he made an inventory of her charms. sabaroff had as keen a scent for game as the huntsman's dog, and he could recognise a coquette a mile off. he knew just how much he could say to certain women without running the risk of offending them. lady margaret flirted her fan as every woman should do in such a circumstance, made a profound curtsey to the general, and from behind her fan shot at him, out of the corners of her eyes, the invitation of the flirt, which seems to promise so much, but which means so little. i think it was georges sand who wittily said, "the flirt is a woman who signs a bill with the firm intention of not honouring her signature." in the centre of a neighbouring group, sir benjamin pond was holding forth on commerce, politics, the theatre, and fine arts--all subjects were within the domain of this pompous personage with the white waistcoat. "yes, the ministry ought to be impeached for having allowed such an acquisition to go out of the country. we are the richest and most enterprising people in the world, but the most stupid, the most obstinate, and the slowest to adopt new ideas"--he looked round him at the rooms. "what a house he has, this lucky dog! six months ago he was living in a little shanty in st. john's wood. what luxury! shells pay better than painting. why, there is mr. lorimer; my congratulations; your play is a masterpiece, you have taken london by storm! oh, but for taking the world by storm, give me the invention of our friend grantham. that's a _bon mot_, and not a bad one either." "what a donkey!" thought lorimer. "his shell fell on us like a bomb, eh? ah, ha, ha!" and as he laughed his loud guffaw, his white waistcoat kept time. lorimer slipped away and returned to dora's side. pond rejoined him almost immediately. "mrs. grantham, lady pond has the greatest desire to see the famous picture." "what famous picture?" asked dora. "why, the one that all london is talking of--the one i so much wanted to buy six months ago." "you remember," said lorimer, "thirty-six by fifty" ... "oh, of course. you can see it in the adjoining room, at the end of the small drawing-room." "thanks!" and he set off in the direction indicated. "always that picture," said dora to lorimer; "my head is dazed; why do we not go to supper and put an end to this? holloa! what is that frantic applause for?... listen, they are going on with it, they are encoring something. what can it be all about?" lorimer pressed through the crowd a little, and then came back to dora. "you may count upon something spicy," said he; "it is mimi latouche, once the darling of paris, now all the rage in london. did you ask her here to-night?" "i asked her--that is to say, the impresario who has charge of my programme sent her." "don't apologise; mimi is all the go; it is who shall have her; and i suppose you ought to consider yourself lucky to be able to serve her up to your guests. you used to live in an artistic circle, that you could charm with a beethoven quartette. now you move in a set where classical music would clear your drawing-room as rapidly as a raid of police would a gambling den." mimi latouche had just finished her second song. there was a fresh sound of applause, and cries of "bravo" were heard as she left the small drawing-room accompanied by de lussac, and followed by half a dozen young men. she passed in front of dora, and brought up near the door by de lussac. "_hein!_ georges, don't you think i knock 'em with my songs?" "they are enchanted with you, you electrify them. your songs are awfully jolly, as they say here--light, crisp, and so daring; but these people have not understood, and if they had, it would not matter; they will applaud, when it is done in a foreign language, a thing that they would not tolerate a moment in their own." "your english people, my boy, are hypocrites. when i am in the bill at _les ambassadeurs_, the place is always full of english--my songs are _canaille_, aren't they? really _canaille_. the english like that kind of thing. they give me ovations at the pavilion every night, and i get bouquets by the bushel. why, old chappie, since i took up the _canaille_ line i have been making my four hundred pounds a week. i have an offer of ten thousand pounds, to appear in new york for six weeks. would you believe it? i say, georges, look what i found in my box at the pav. to-night"; and she showed de lussac a lovely bouquet of white orchids. "superb!" exclaimed the young man. "yes, old boy, but look what there is inside it." so saying, she drew out a handsome bracelet of rubies and diamonds. "exquisite!" said de lussac; "is it the price of laxity hidden in the emblem of chastity? it is a diplomatist who sent you that. flowers have often served as cupid's letter-box." "hush! it is from sabaroff. the bracelet is worth four hundred pounds, at least." "sabaroff? why, he is here." "i know that very well," said mimi; "look at him over there talking to the lady in pearl grey." "i see him; he is gazing her out of countenance," said de lussac. "out of countenance? out of corset, you mean. sabaroff has a way of staring at a woman; it makes her quite nervous to be near him if she has on evening dress." "my dear mimi, i did not know you were so easily shocked." "oh! when i say a woman i don't mean myself--that sort of thing doesn't affect me, you may imagine. i am quite at his disposition--and yours too, yours especially--you are perfectly mashing to-night. after all these englishmen, dear boy, it is a treat to look at a frenchman; to be looked at by one--dessert after dinner." dora had heard it all. her indignation was at boiling point. "i am going to turn that creature out," she said to lorimer. "oh, don't, i beg of you, dora," replied lorimer. "it might make a scandal--that woman would not hesitate to insult you." but dora was determined to get rid of mimi, and, addressing her, said, "i will not trouble you to sing any more, mademoiselle; i will send you your cheque to-morrow." so saying, she turned her back on mimi. "much obliged," said the latter. and, turning to de lussac, she added, "well, i never! she wants to dismiss me. did you ever hear such cheek? much obliged, but i'm starving hungry. i'm off to the buffet--your arm, georges." she went down with de lussac. lorimer began to be seriously concerned about dora. she was pale as death, and seemed every now and then on the point of fainting. she had been going through tortures, but the thing which had dealt her a terrible blow was a scrap of conversation, which she had just heard as she passed through the drawing-room. "it happens every day, and in the best society," said a man whom she did not recognise. "one constantly sees a man making use of his wife's attractions to further his own ends. it is called diplomacy." "in such cases the wife is often an innocent agent." "that is true, but the husband is none the less reprehensible for that," added a third voice. of whom had they been speaking? there was a singing in her ears. great heaven! was it of her? she closed her eyes and thought she was going to lose consciousness. lorimer took it upon him to go to philip and tell him that dora was tired and unwell, and that it would perhaps be unwise to expose her to any more fatigue that evening. "thanks, dear old fellow," said philip, "it will be all over in an hour or less; we are going to supper in a moment." lorimer had found philip engaged in describing his shell to sabaroff. philip went at once to dora; her pallor frightened him. taking her hands in his own, he said-"well, darling, how do you feel? you look tired; keep up your courage, we are going to supper now. in an hour's time you will be free to rest--you must not get up to-morrow; the next day you will feel nothing more of it. everything has gone beautifully, everybody is delighted with the evening they have passed. the general is interested in my shell--i am convinced that russia will offer me a fortune for it; but why do you look at me in that way?" "i am tired to death; i don't feel well; i cannot go on any longer." "have courage, dear; it is nearly over. the hour has come when you can do great things for me; a wife can be of such help to her husband--with a little diplomacy." dora shuddered--it was the phrase which she had just heard. the room seemed to swim round as she heard philip repeat the words. "what do you want me to do?" "why, nothing very difficult for you,--help me with a few smiles; invite the general to come and see us sometimes. why do you look at me in that strange fashion?" "you want me to ask that man to come and see me as a friend, after what i have told you?" "why not?" said philip. "come, be a good girl; when i have sold my invention, i will never think of anything but you and my painting. i shall install myself in the most sumptuous studio that ever inspired an artist. forgive me my thirst for a little more wealth. i shall soon have quenched it for ever. you will help me, won't you?" "once more, what is it you would have me to do?" "we are going to supper--you will take general sabaroff's arm." "no, no, not that," said dora, with an imploring look at philip. "yes, yes, you cannot refuse. you are the hostess and he the principal guest. i expect you to go down with him." sabaroff had drawn near to them; dora could refuse no longer. she bent her head and said to philip-"very well." "will your excellency offer your arm to my wife?" dora mastered her emotion, her weakness, and her indignation. many eyes were upon her; not a moment's hesitation was possible. she lifted her head proudly, took the proffered arm, and went down to supper. xii the husband, the wife, and the other after going through the unaccustomed and fatiguing function, which we have tried to describe in the two preceding chapters, dora took a day or two's rest in the house. during this time of repose, which her husband had specially enjoined her to indulge in, she resolved to limit her social relations, and consecrate most of her time to her child, who was beginning to cause her some anxiety. eva was not strong, and it became more and more evident from her frequent complaints that a delicacy of the throat was constitutional in the child. she, who up to this time passed her days playing in the open air, had now to be content with a sedate walk in the park, which she could only take hatted, gloved, and accompanied by a servant. good-bye to the romps and scampers on the lawn and the merry hours of delicious freedom she used to enjoy so much with her little friends. children are only happy and gay where there is no atmosphere of restraint. dora continued to take an interest in household matters, kept her house with scrupulous care and with economy, so as to avoid or, at any rate, retard the financial wreck which she believed to be ahead. she put into requisition all her house-wifely arts, learnt in the happy school of their early married life, and all the ingenious tastefulness of the artistic woman she was, in order that philip should not discover that she had conceived a complete distaste for the existence which she was forced to lead, nor accuse her of trying to keep aloof from the life of fashionable society. the unhappy woman was wearied and worn by her secret struggles, and almost crazy at the thought that her husband's heart had ceased to beat for her. the more she thought of that which was going on, the wider the chasm which separated her from philip appeared to grow. she had reached a point at which the question arose in her mind, whether philip, in his craving for the success of his new plans, did not seek to push her into the arms of general sabaroff. that revolting thought filled her with such horror that she dared not entertain it long. "no," she said to herself, "a man does not change so suddenly as that; he does not take six years to reveal himself, and then, at a day's notice, become transformed from an affectionate husband, an honourable, upright, and devoted man, into a nameless scoundrel." when she argued with herself, she arrived at the conclusion that she must be mad to have allowed such an idea to enter her brain, and yet, drive it away as she would, the horrible thought assailed her more and more persistently. dora was above all things a woman of sound intelligence. after mature reflection she traced for herself a line of conduct that seemed to her the only wise one. first, she took a firm resolution never to address any more reproaches to philip. things had gone too far for recriminations to have any effect upon him. she was clear-sighted enough to know that a husband's vagrant affection is not won back by reprimands and reproaches, but only by sweetness, persuasion, and diplomacy. her greatest fear was that her temper might sour, and against this possibility she set herself to watch most rigorously. she did her best to be attractive, and cultivated a gaiety that should help her to break down the cold barrier that seemed to have fixed itself between her and this man who had so detached himself from her. she took more care than ever of her appearance, and called all her taste into play to help her set off her beauty to best advantage. one evening, when she was dressing for dinner, she remembered that philip had said to her, before the arrival of their guests at their memorable evening party, "how beautiful you are! how i should love to have you all to myself this evening!" women seldom forget a remark of that sort. she put on the same dress that had charmed philip so much, and went downstairs looking her loveliest. after dinner they passed the evening in dora's boudoir, where she allowed her husband to smoke his cigarette, and smoked one herself when the temptation took her. philip took no notice of his wife's attire; no remark, no compliment passed his lips. tired of the tête-à-tête, he took up a book and yawned over it for a while, and about eleven o'clock went out for a breath of air. "it is hopeless; i am done for," said dora, when philip had left her, and she burst into tears. what had come over this man who thus caused such suffering to a wife--young, beautiful, dowered with all the gifts that nature can lavish upon a woman, and for whom he would certainly have been ready to lay down his life, if necessary? lorimer was right; it was a special case, and he, as a psychologist, watched its development with interest. the specialist declares that a man absorbed in speculations is, naturally, fatally indifferent to all the other affairs of life. philip had been attacked with what we will call mental absorption, a sort of bewitchment from which nothing could exorcise him, so to speak, but some great shock, powerful and unforeseen. all the ideas which dora had taken into her head were false. philip adored his wife. he was blinded by a thick veil, which he had not the courage to tear from his eyes. he was so sure of attaining his aim in a few days that he said to himself, "i shall soon be able to repair all my faults. a little while and everything will go smoothly again. i shall be free, master of myself once more, and there will be half a century in front of me, in which to compensate dora for the anxiety i am causing her now." he was honest, and had only feelings of profound love and respect for his wife; but to a looker-on, to dora above all, the fact was difficult to believe in, it must be confessed. in order to keep up close relations with sabaroff, philip had asked him to sit for his portrait. the general had accepted, and came three or four times a week to pose in the room which served philip as a studio. dora resigned herself to this humiliation. "he has not yet finished my portrait," she said to herself, "but that man's, he will finish fast enough." not once, however, did she make a remark to philip on the matter. every thursday sabaroff came to call on dora, who received him politely, but coldly. on several occasions he found himself alone with her, and philip never thought of joining them. he ended by believing himself encouraged by philip in the assiduity of his visits to dora. this woman so impressed him that he never once ventured on a glib gallantry, scarcely even an ordinary compliment. he felt himself on new ground and not thoroughly at home in the presence of this being, who seemed never to have been soiled by even an impure glance. before her he became almost timid, he the daring don juan of courts, who made light of women whose conquest he had so often found easy, and for whom he felt the sentiment of the oriental, a sentiment made up of condescension and fierce and short-lived passion, followed by contempt. not more than one woman had ever been able to boast of having been his mistress longer than a week. and yet he had loved once in his life, loved with a noble passion a young girl with a face full of lofty beauty, eyes in whose look were depths of loyalty and truth, and on whose brow purity sat enthroned. and that woman, whom he had thus loved, whose image had never become completely effaced from his memory--that woman was dora! whom he here found again lovelier still than in bygone years, and married to a man who was evidently absorbed in his invention and his calculations. sabaroff watched philip and dora attentively. he could not discover in their conduct towards each other any of the thousand and one little familiarities which always exist between two people living happily side by side under one roof. he also thought that philip opened his house to him with an insistence almost suspicious, and yet dora not only gave him no encouragement, but seemed to behave with a studied reserve when in his society. he concluded that she either felt complete indifference for him, or that she hid her sentiments under a very clever mask. the more he tried to understand, the more he lost himself in conjecture. in his estimation, philip was either a fool who neglected his wife, or an intriguing fellow who sought to make use of her to attain his own ends. one thing at all events was clear in his mind, and that was that there existed between philip and dora no sentiment of affection, much less of love. he resolved to await a favourable occasion, and not to decide upon a plan of action until he was surer of his ground. philip had finished his portrait, and everyone who saw it declared that no modern portrait-painter, since the death of frank holl, had done such a fine piece of work. dora, mortified and stung by jealousy, could not help admiring her husband's masterpiece, and said to him: "since you wish for wealth, here is the means of attaining it; with a talent such as yours you could soon command a thousand pounds for a portrait, and paint ten or twelve a year." his portrait finished, sabaroff had less excuse for constant calls at the house. he had to content himself with his weekly visits on dora's day. however, one day when he knew philip to be absent and dora at home, he presented himself at the house; but dora sent word that she was not well and regretted to be unable to receive him. on the evening of the same day, he received an invitation to dine with philip and dora, and accepted it by return of post. the dinner was for the 15th of december. sabaroff's report upon philip's shell had long since been sent to st. petersburg, and as he had marked it "urgent and specially recommended," he expected a reply at any moment. the day after philip had sent to ask the general to dinner, he received from him the following note:- "dear mr. grantham,--i have just received a letter from st. petersburg from which i learn that the commission, charged by his imperial majesty, my august master, to examine my report and that of the council of artillery upon the experiments made with your shell, will sit on the 15th of december, and will send me a wire the same evening to acquaint me with their decision. thus i may possibly, as you see, have a piece of good news to give you at dessert. "pray, dear sir, present my most respectful compliments to mrs. grantham, and accept for yourself the assurance of my devoted regards. "ivan sabaroff." philip, overcome with joy, ran to show dora sabaroff's letter. "at last," he cried, "we are near the goal. ten days more and i shall know whether they take my shell or not. and then, from that day, heaven be thanked, no more invention on the brain, no more anxiety, no more worry; i shall be rich, and i shall get at my work again, the work that you love. only, you know, i shall take things easily. i shall not work now to pay the tradespeople; i shall paint seriously, i tell you." seeing a ray of joy pass over dora's face, he added, "you see, i do not intend to throw all overboard. look here, we have been married six years, and you don't know me yet. that's the fact of the matter." his gaiety and enthusiasm of other days seemed to have come back again, and dora's heart leapt within her at the sight. she went so far as to encourage him in his present hopes, but more especially applauded the resolution that he appeared to have taken to return to his old work. philip took her in his arms and kissed her more tenderly than he had done for six months past. "after all," said dora to herself, "my suspicions were perhaps absurd; there was no foundation for them. i have had a bad dream, a horrible nightmare--i must fling it off. it is all over--patience, patience. just a few days longer." next time sabaroff called, dora received him with less coldness and reserve. she was cheerful, amiable, and appeared almost glad to see him. this new attitude delighted him. there was no mistaking the looks he gave her, his whole body betrayed the feelings of this man for dora. "after all," she thought, "in a few days he will be back in st. petersburg, and i shall have finished for ever with his excellency the war minister of his majesty the czar of all the russias." on the 13th, philip received a telegram calling him to paris at once. he was begged to spend a few hours at the arsenal of artillery with the ministre de la guerre. he could not refuse. he wired immediately that he would comply without delay. dora naturally proposed to send at once to general sabaroff, asking him to dine with them another evening instead of on the 15th. "no, no," said philip; "i shall leave paris the day after to-morrow by the nine o'clock train in the morning. it is the mail, and i shall arrive in london at half-past four; even allowing for a couple of hours of possible delay, i should still reach home in good time. besides," he said, glancing at a newspaper, "the barometer is rising, the sea is good, there is no danger of bad weather and delays." it was in vain for dora to persist, philip would not consent to any change in the arrangement. "my dear child, one cannot put off a minister at a moment's notice, when one has asked him to dinner. i would rather refuse to go to paris, and you know it would be impossible to do that. i really must respond to this request, which is as natural as it is cordial. i owe some consideration to those good frenchmen for buying my shell of me, and, no doubt, it is to ask my advice on some matter that they want me at the arsenal in a hurry. and then, you know, i have another reason for specially wanting to meet general sabaroff here on the 15th--it is on the 15th that i am to hear russia's decision." dora saw that it was useless to argue the point any further. philip's preparations for departure were rapidly made; in a few minutes he was ready to set out for paris. he sprang into a cab and reached charing cross ten minutes before the eleven o'clock mail train was ready to start. at seven in the evening he was in paris. xiii a cruel ordeal on the 15th of december, at eight o'clock in the evening, philip had not arrived home. general sabaroff came at the hour appointed. great was his surprise to find only dora and her sister in the drawing-room. he had been invited to dine quite informally, but he expected to see at least two or three other guests. far from regretting their non-appearance, he congratulated himself on his good luck, and thanked his hostess for showing him this mark of friendly intimacy. it occurred to him that, perhaps, dora's sister would not stay long after dinner. when dora, humiliated and mortified, explained to him that philip had not returned from paris, she was very naturally profuse in her apologies. sabaroff concluded that a tête-à-tête had been arranged. "at any rate," he thought to himself, "i shall soon be clear on that point." dinner was announced, and gabrielle went down to the dining-room, followed by dora, to whom sabaroff had offered his arm. the dinner proceeded, excellent and well served in itself, but a wearisome function to all three partakers of it. dora was too much a prey to the most painful reflections to play the hostess with her usual grace. gabrielle, at no time a conversationalist of any brilliancy, detached as she was from social pleasures by duty and inclination, sat almost mute. sabaroff himself suffered from the constraint which the presence of this hospital nurse imposed upon him. he could never dissociate her from her semi-religious habiliments, which inspired him with an enforced respect. dora, feeling stranded and forlorn, wrapped herself in a reserve of manner that was unmistakable, and gabrielle, as the dinner proceeded, grew more and more a prey to vague alarms while she watched the burning glances that sabaroff threw at dora. the dinner was of the simplest and lasted at the utmost an hour, but to the poor girl it seemed unending. at last they were all three on their feet again, and she and dora were moving to the drawing-room, where she would be able to speak freely to her sister, perhaps, and ease her mind. "we will leave you to your cigar, general," said dora, taking the lead into the doorway. the general bowed, and, when they had gone, he seated himself again, lit a cigar, and fell into a reverie. as soon as dora reached the drawing-room, she threw herself into her sister's arms. "i am so glad that you came this evening," she said. "eva is not at all well. the dear child seems to get less and less strong as she grows older. i often feel quite concerned about her. she has been feverish all day to-day, and you know that when she has the slightest ailment, she always wants auntie to nurse her. the very sight of your cap and apron is as potent as a soothing draught, i do believe. i have just sent a servant to the hospital to know if i can keep you till to-morrow morning--and i was glad to have you make a third at dinner this evening, philip being absent. it was an inspiration that brought you to the house ... but you look quite depressed; your face, usually so cheerful, so gay, is sad. you seemed strange all through dinner. now, what is the matter?" gabrielle looked at dora strangely. for a long time she hesitated before answering, then, seeing that dora seemed to insist, she looked her sister straight in the face, and said-"dora, dear, why is general sabaroff dining here to-night when philip is away from home? there, since you insist, it is out." dora felt offended, but did not betray her feeling. "ah, you see," she said, smiling, "i knew there was something troubling you. well, you must know that, a few days ago, philip invited general sabaroff to dine with us to-night quite _en famille_ and he accepted. the day before yesterday, philip received a letter calling him to paris immediately, on business connected with the shell--his invention, you know. he set out by the morning train that very day, telling me to expect him back about five o'clock to-day, and i cannot account for his not having returned yet. i had a letter from him this morning in which he said that the matter was settled yesterday, and that he would take the nine o'clock train from paris this morning. i had suggested putting off general sabaroff, but he would not hear of my doing that, as he was sure of arriving home three hours before dinner. now, don't look at me any longer with that tragedy air or you'll upset my gravity, dear. one would think you suspected me of arranging a tête-à-tête dinner with the man. haven't i already told you how glad i was that you came in time to sit down with us? but how absurd all this is! one would really imagine i was here on my defence. enough of this nonsense! and now, before general sabaroff has finished his smoke, i will run up and see how my darling is and tell her that you are here." "dora, one moment; i must speak to you, i feel i must. do not be offended with me, nor think me prying and foolish, will you, if i seem to meddle in what you may say does not concern me; but, dear, i cannot keep it to myself any longer. it makes me so miserable to see what is going on in this house--tell me, what does it all mean? you do not answer me, you dare not tell me the truth." "my dear sister," said dora, "i have nothing to hide from you." and she added, with sudden resolution, looking gabrielle straight in the face, "love has deserted the house--that is the truth, a truth which will soon kill me, i hope." "but whose fault is it?" rejoined gabrielle. "this general sabaroff, why is he so often here? i cannot help noticing the frequency of his visits, and i cannot help seeing philip's sad look and your altered manner towards him. again, what does it all mean? he is suffering, i am sure of it; your coldness towards him is distressing him deeply. all your amiability seems to be reserved for this russian, whom i heard you call profligate, the last person in the world that i should have thought you would hoard your smiles for. how can you turn a cold face to such a husband as yours for such a man as this?" "really you are very observant, and your conclusions are most charitable, my dear sister--of charity," said dora, who was beginning to stifle with misery and indignation. "yes," continued gabrielle, not listening to her sister, "a husband who has given you a place in his heart which one only gives to god. ah, do not attempt to contradict me. your love for philip is dying, if not already dead. take care, dora; philip still loves you. he knows nothing of what is going on. it is not too late. forbid your door to this man before harm comes of it. i beseech you, put a stop to general sabaroff's too evident attentions to you." this was more than dora could stand. this woman, whose pride would not allow her to confide her sorrow to another soul, was roused to her very depths, and, seizing her sister's arms, she said to her-"my loving husband, who gives me a place in his heart which should be reserved for god alone, is ready to sell my smiles for five hundred thousand roubles--do you hear what i tell you? after having been false to art, that mistress of whom i should have been proud to be jealous, he does not seek to be false to me--that would be nothing compared to the crime he is about to commit. a husband! ah, faugh! there, i have unloaded my heart, i feel better." "dora, what are you saying? you are mad." "i tell you that he knows everything and that you know nothing. it is philip who forces me to receive this man in our intimate circle. it is he who throws open to general sabaroff my dining-room, my drawing-room, and who, one of these days, will lend him the key of my bedroom. it was he who invited him to dine here to-night, certainly not i." "but," said gabrielle, "why is philip not here?" "ah!" exclaimed dora, "well you may ask--that is just what i should like to know." dora looked at gabrielle, who stood dumfounded. "never mind, don't listen to me, i scarcely know what i am talking about," she added, passing her hand over her forehead; "i am losing my head. no, no, my suppositions are impossible. he must have met with an accident. there can be no other explanation." dora succeeded in mastering her emotion, and fixing gabrielle with a strange, half-haggard gaze, she said-"you must not believe a word of what i have said; you don't, do you? and now, i must go to eva. the dear child will be so delighted to know you are here." she threw herself into her sister's arms and kissed her tenderly several times. gabrielle stood petrified. she had long guessed that there was no more happiness in her sister's home, but she had not had the least idea that things had gone so far as to lead dora to despise philip. gabrielle had always felt a mixture of love and admiring respect for her sister; in her estimation, dora was the ideal woman; so much superior to all the other women she had known, that she could not believe that the pedestal upon which she had placed her could possibly crumble to atoms. dora returned after a few minutes. she seemed uneasy, still more upset than she had been when she left the drawing-room. "eva is asking for you," she said to gabrielle; "she complains of sore throat now, and appears to be feverish, but i hope it is nothing worse than a cold coming. go and sit with the dear child. if she should grow worse during the evening, send for the doctor at once. i trust her to your hands." kissing gabrielle once more, she tried to smile, and added-"don't distress yourself about me. i shall be able to join you presently. general sabaroff has, i hope, enough tact to make him feel the awkwardness of the situation. he will retire at once. there, go now, dear." dora, as soon as gabrielle had left the drawing-room, was seized with an intangible terror. doubt and uncertainty had undermined her spirits. she no longer felt her usual dauntless courage. she was afraid of being alone, afraid of the unknown, afraid of the man who, at any moment, might enter the room; but, above all, was her thought for the child. "my poor little treasure! going to be ill perhaps!" a horrible thought flashed across her mind and wrung a cry from her lips. "oh, no, no, my god, not _that_! no, not if there is justice in heaven!" calming herself with an effort, she went on, "ah, if it was not for the child, i would leave this house to-day, i would go no matter where, take a few brushes, and earn my bread with them. it would be hard if i could not turn my work to some account and lead a life independent of everyone. oh to live anywhere, to live anyhow, dear heaven, rather than go on with this existence which revolts me and is crushing me! oh, how lonely it is! how silent the house is! the very air chokes me--where is philip now? what has happened that he is not here? what is he doing? oh, my head burns so! i will send up for gabrielle--no, she must stay with eva. what to do? send a telegram to lorimer, and ask him to come quickly?--no, i should have to give explanations. beg the general to excuse me; tell him i am not well and am obliged to retire." she was interrupted in her reflections by the entrance of a servant who brought a telegram. feverishly she broke open the envelope and read: "missed nine o'clock train, started at noon, and will be with you at eight o'clock." she looked at the timepiece. it was ten o'clock, and philip had not yet arrived. the telegram was from dover. what could have happened since? "then, philip may perhaps not be here at all to-night," she said to herself; "i shall be forced to pass the rest of the evening with general sabaroff. is it an accident ... or a diabolical plot? no, no, the thought is too horrible. i must, i will chase it out of my mind. and yet--oh, there is only one thing to be done. yes, yes, no more hesitation; i will finish with the general, and to-night. no more shall philip accuse me of not helping him. i will get sabaroff's signature, if power of mine can do it. i will be extra amiable to him--repulsive task! philip shall have his beloved money, for which he has broken my heart, and then--then i have done with him for ever." when she lifted her eyes, sabaroff stood before her. immersed in her own thoughts, she had not seen him come in. at once rising, she collected her ideas rapidly and scarcely showed sign of embarrassment. "i must apologise again to you for my husband, general," she said; "i have just had a wire from him saying he missed the nine o'clock train in paris, but that he had left at noon and would be here at eight. i am very alarmed. it is ten o'clock. i fear there must have been an accident, for i can explain his absence in no other way. it is really most unfortunate, and i don't know how to apologise enough. i feel quite confused." the smile which crossed sabaroff's face at these words was particularly offensive to dora. the general was not long coming to the point. when he had entered the drawing-room and found dora alone, he had instantly taken his resolution. here was his opportunity. "as far as i am concerned," he said, "there is nothing unfortunate in the situation--i should rather call it fortunate for me. so, please, do not apologise. i can never get enough of your society. every day on which i do not see you is dull, weary, wasted. to be allowed to see you is my sweetest privilege, to see you alone my dearest joy." "really, general, spare me, please," said dora, striving to smile naturally. "ah, do not stop me, do not turn away your face. remember the time when i first met you in the lovely south, and you gave me the happiness of feeling that my society was not displeasing to you. these were golden days! your fresh young beauty, your clear young eyes and voice made the world new again for me, a travel-worn soldier, already beginning to find the world a tinsel-trimmed hearth with little warmth, and a great deal of ashes. weary of the nomadic life of a russian soldier, i fell to dreaming of another kind of existence, a sweet, peaceful life at your side. i would have consecrated the rest of my days to the dear task of making you happy. ambition and glory, i would have said good-bye to all that, for my noblest ambition would have been to reign supreme in your heart. you judged me unworthy, and i have never ceased to mourn the fading of my beloved dream--nay, i mourn it to-day more than ever. if only i had found you happy," he added insinuatingly. "you are unwise, general, to talk to me of that winter," rejoined dora. "can i ever forget that, thanks to you, one single day, one single hour of it turned me from a light-hearted, innocent, ignorant girl into a woman?--innocent still, but no longer ignorant of the sad and degrading side of existence. ah, in those few moments, i had passed out for ever from the sweet calm garden of girlhood into the dusty crowded highway of the world, and there i saw one of the saddest sides of life--the humiliation and despair of a woman dismissed, cast off by the man who should have passed the rest of his days in shielding her." "it was not my fault that you overheard my wretched secret; but a foolish liaison, which seemed to a strictly nurtured girl so vile a thing, can it, must it make me for ever odious to a sweet and gracious woman who knows the world? how many men have succeeded in keeping on virtue's path altogether? the members of the young men's christian association are not recruited from among the ranks of our society." "does wrong become right by multiplication?" said dora, who was not sorry to see the turn that the conversation had taken, a turn which would give her the opportunity of making a little sermon that should cool down the ardour of the general. "i shall never be able to understand why the men who belong to what is called society should not be expected to conduct themselves as honourably as those of the modest middle classes. it is from above that example should come, and, believe me, it will have to come from above, or society will disappear for want of having fulfilled its mission." "well, well, you may be right," said sabaroff; "but listen to my story. for months, for years, i could not bear to think of all that i had lost in losing you. was it any wonder that i went half mad and ran into all kind of excesses? the light of your pure eyes was turned away from me. i tossed about like a rudderless ship, and only my ambition saved me from wreckage of body and soul." "does it not seem to you a little cowardly," said dora, glad to recover the thread of her little sermon, "for a man to lay the blame for such a life at a woman's door, because he would not exercise the self-control that thousands of women have to exercise almost all their lives? do you think it is only men who feel? ah, believe me, there are few women who have not had, at some period of their lives, to suffer and be silent, to hold a bursting heart, and go about the daily task, with its cruel, half-mechanical routine, which leaves the mind free to dwell on all the misery that stirring scenes might help it to forget. those who give way to their despair, society mocks at; those who abandon themselves to their passions, society puts outside the pale." dora began to feel that she was putting too much heat into her reply. with an attempt at a tone of indifference, she went on-"but tell me more about that saving grace of ambition, general. it has made you a great and powerful man." "great, no; powerful, yes," replied sabaroff, and he laid an insinuating stress on the word _yes_, which did not escape dora's notice. "but, of all the satisfaction which my present position of confidence with my imperial master has brought me, nothing is so sweet as the power of doing what i am going to do for you." "i am so proud you approve of the shell--then you will have it taken up by the russian government? "yes," said sabaroff, "i have the paper here ready to sign, and am only waiting for a telegram from st. petersburg, which i have ordered to be brought to me here if it should happen to arrive before ten o'clock" ... "my husband will be so glad!" "ah, 'my husband will be glad,'" repeated sabaroff, in a half-mocking tone; "mrs. grantham, will _you_ be glad?--dora," said he, warming as he proceeded, "do you not realise that what i am going to do is for your sake, and not for the man who has won the only woman i ever loved?" on hearing herself called by her christian name, dora was indignant. "general, once more i beg of you, i'm afraid you forget yourself." at this moment a servant entered the room. "a telegram for his excellency," said he. then he handed the telegram to the general, and retired after receiving dora's order to bring tea. sabaroff read the despatch to dora: "approved by council of war. final decision left to you. if you yourself approve, offer five hundred thousand roubles." dora was standing at the fireplace, with one foot on the fender. sabaroff, with the telegram in his hand, gave her a look which seemed to say: "when i said _powerful_, you see i was right." the servant brought the tea, which he placed on a table near dora, and retired. dora poured out two cups. "no milk, i think--a little rum and some lemon, _à la russe_?" "thank you," said sabaroff. he cut himself a slice of lemon, helped himself to rum, and began to sip his tea. there was an unbroken silence for a couple of minutes. "you are not offended with me?" he resumed. "ah, forgive me if i have called you by your beautiful first name, your sweet name of dora, it is the only one i ever give you in my thoughts. here is a pansy," he said, opening his pocket-book, "a flower that you dropped at monte carlo. there is no mrs. grantham for me; there is dora, the name i cannot forget." "this man really loved me, then," said dora to herself, "and loves me still perhaps." the thought displeased her, but it was not insulting. she thought of the pansies which had come regularly, year after year, on the anniversary of her marriage. then, if he loved her still, she had everything to fear in this solitary tête-à-tête. she resolved to be more than ever on her guard. "but it is precisely my other name, general, that i would have you remember always," she said, with a calm smile. "if i thought of that one, i should not be here now; i should never come to this house," said sabaroff. "i should not be now preparing to sign this paper, which is to enrich still further the man to whom you gave yourself, the man who already possesses the only thing i ever really craved. shall i sign? why should i?" said he, drawing from his pocket an envelope containing a blank contract. "what will be my thanks? what is to be my reward?" "oh, general," said dora, nervous but still smiling, "you are too good a patriot to need any incentive but the love of your country." "no, mrs. grantham, that is not enough. i love my country, but i do not love your husband. for you alone i sign. to you i turn for my reward. ah, let me hear from those lovely lips that you have only kind, pitying thoughts for the man who still worships you and loves you as you are worthy to be loved." sabaroff's eyes were lit with a strange fire, and threw burning glances upon dora. she began to tremble. this man frightened her. "of course, general, i am grateful, i" ... she felt incapable of finishing the phrase. "must i go through with this?" she thought. "oh that i could get rid of this man!" sabaroff did not take his eyes off her face. he was striving to read her inmost thoughts. "i have no resentment," she continued; "i have long ago forgotten what passed between us, and if you will do the same, here is my hand." sabaroff unfolded the paper which he had taken from the envelope, placed it on the table and signed it. dora was still holding out her hand to him. sabaroff seized it and drew her close to him. "dora," he exclaimed, "my dora!" "you forget, once more you forget," she said, freeing herself. "if my husband were here" ... "if your husband were here!" cried sabaroff, with a sneer. "once for all, is it possible that you do not see the rôle that your husband is playing? are you indeed so blind? tell me, does a man encourage a former lover of his wife about his house constantly, a lover who was on the point of becoming her _fiancé_, and who perhaps loves her still? does he miss the train when he knows that his wife will be alone with that man for a whole evening? no, my dear mrs. grantham, a man misses everything you like to name, but he does not miss such a train as that. ah, let us have no more of these pretences. you know perfectly well what he is, that husband of yours who missed his train. you know that you have no love left for him, that you only feel the most profound contempt for that man who, to put a fortune in his purse, does not hesitate to play the _mari complaisant_." "no, it's impossible, it is not true," cried dora, suffocating with indignation; "spare me your suppositions." "you shall not make me believe that you do not despise him. i have watched you both carefully from the first day that i have visited your house. do not deceive me, do not attempt to deceive yourself. you do not love your husband. i have seen how your noble heart has shrunk from contact with so sordid a nature, as his has proved to be in the past few months. he may have loved you once in his cool, jellyfish fashion; perhaps you have loved him yourself, but since his new craze for wealth has ousted you from his consideration, except when you are useful to him as a bait, you have hated him--ah, worse than that, you have despised him. you know that he is not worthy of you, who have the soul as well as the body of an angel. no, you are not blind; you are not a child, to sit down tamely under his treatment of you. be a woman, take a woman's revenge. only give me a tithe of the love he has held so lightly and i will be your slave, your adoring slave to my dying day. dora, i love you," he cried as he advanced towards her. "i can listen to no more of this. you have tried my patience too far already. i thank you, in my husband's name, general, for having signed this paper; but i don't feel well,--have pity on me. you have before you a woman full of gratitude for what you have done; it would not be generous to take advantage of it to press your company upon me in my present state. leave me now, please." "leave you! leave you! ah, ah! and this is my reward? now that you have obtained all you want, you dismiss me. dora, take care. you are too intelligent, too much of a woman, not to see that my love for you has come back to me redoubled, that it blinds me, makes me mad, and that your resistance only adds fuel to the fire." "go, i beseech you, at once," exclaimed dora, now thoroughly alarmed; "go, i command you. nothing will force me to listen to you any longer--i tell you i am suffering tortures; you say that you love me, then, spare me and go." "so, then," said he reproachfully, "you let me see you, let me come here almost day after day until i cannot live away from you, and then, when you have done your despicable husband's work, you dismiss me with a _many thanks, good-bye_. no, dora," he added, raising his voice, "i will not be dismissed so. look at me well," he said, seizing her arm; "do i look like a man who can be so lightly played with?" "let me go; you hurt me," cried dora, distracted with indignation; "how dare you treat me so?" "how dare i?" said sabaroff. "you wonder how i dare? ah, wonder rather that i kept silent so long with your beautiful face before me, your voice and eyes bewitching me, your lips so near, all your loveliness making mad riot in my pulses! what do you think i am made of? does one take a starving wretch to see a banquet spread, and, when he has just begun to eat, then cast him out, because he dares to say he is hungry still? does one offer rich wine to a weary traveller, and, when he has taken but one sip from the cup, dash it from his lips and bid him begone? in your presence, dora, i am craving for your love." "philip, where are you?" cried the poor woman wildly, and feeling more dead than alive. she made towards the door, but sabaroff intercepted her passage. "dora," said he, "why keep up this farce any longer? be honest. unmask yourself, for i am convinced you are wearing a mask. why do you call your husband? you know that he is not here, and you must know only too well why he is not here. your husband has kept away to-night, that you may be alone with me. you cannot but despise him, a creature who, when he had won it, knew not how to value the prize i crave in vain. and now that i have found you suffering tortures at his callousness, you will not let me tell you how i love you--passionately, madly! ah, since it is he who throws you into my arms, come and make your home there; you shall never repent the step--i swear it!" "ah, enough, enough, spare me any more indignities," cried dora, with head proudly uplifted. "general sabaroff! leave, leave this house instantly." so saying, she made a movement towards the bell. "dora!" cried sabaroff, seizing her in his strong arms. she struggled, and finished by freeing herself from his grasp. "go this moment, i tell you. you have treated me as you would not dare treat a servant-girl in a low lodging-house, you have treated me as if you took me for a mimi latouche--you are a coward!" dora was nearly at the end of her strength. she was wild, at bay, without power to cry for help. a coquette would have known how to defend herself. knowing to what she exposes herself, the coquette always prepares a line of retreat before engaging in the battle; but a woman as pure as dora is almost defenceless in the presence of a man who has burned his ships and who intends to stop at nothing: she has no weapons for such a contest. dora was paralysed with fright and indignation. she made a last and supreme effort to reach the bell; but sabaroff stopped her, and seizing her more firmly than he had done before, he cried-"my reward! i claim my reward for so much patience!" she was in his arms, panting, almost unconscious. he strained her to his heart, and kissed her passionately on the eyes, on the lips again and again. exhausted by the struggle, dora yet made a supreme effort, and succeeded in once more freeing herself from sabaroff's hold; but he caught her by the arm, which he kissed devouringly. dora sank fainting on the sofa. at this moment the door opened, and gabrielle, with agony depicted on her face, rushed into the room. she had come to fetch her sister, to take her to eva's bedside, for the child had grown rapidly worse. seeing sabaroff on his knees gazing at dora, she drew back, stifling a cry, and, wringing her hands in despair, she disappeared. sabaroff heard the cry, but did not move. after a moment, turning round and seeing no one, he rang the bell, hurriedly impressed a further kiss on the forehead of the unconscious woman, and left without waiting for the arrival of a servant. when the servant entered, dora had regained consciousness. "did you ring, ma'am?" "no," she said; "what is it?" she looked around her, passing her hand over her eyes and forehead. she realised that she was alone. her eyes were haggard. she looked wild, half mad. "where is he?" she said; "gone?" then she fixed her eyes on the servant, who seemed to have a message to deliver. "well, what is it?" she repeated. "miss gabrielle," replied the man, "told me to say that she had sent for the doctor, and that he is now with miss eva. will you, please, go up at once, ma'am?" dora gazed fixedly at the man. she had not heard, or, rather, she had not taken in a single word of the servant's message. she signed to him to go, and he left. taking her head in both hands, she tried to remember what had been happening. "my body burns," she murmured; "i feel as if i had been bitten by a reptile." her eyes fell on her arm, where sabaroff's kiss had left a mark that was still red. a cry of disgust and horror escaped her. she gazed again at her arm, leapt to her feet, and paced the room almost foaming with rage. to wipe out that mark was her one thought. with her handkerchief she rubbed the burning spot, and, with a movement of fury, sucked it and spat as if she had been sucking poison from the bite of a snake. she was unrecognisable, transformed into a tigress ready to spring upon any who might come near. suddenly an idea lit up her face, as she passed the fireplace in her furious pacings. she seized the poker and thrust it in among the live coals. "yes, yes, i will, i'll do it," she muttered. suddenly she heard a cab stop outside, and the street door open and close noisily. philip, for it was he, bounded upstairs and rushed into the drawing-room. it was half-past eleven. dora had the poker in her hand. she put it back into the fire. "ah, my dear dora," said philip, quite out of breath, "i can't tell you how sorry i am to have been delayed all these hours. i missed the nine o'clock train, as i explained in my wire; but i must tell you all about that by and by. it's a long story. i left paris at noon, as you know, but the train broke down between canterbury and chatham, and got in three hours late. but for that, i should have been here at eight. the general is gone, of course?" he added. dora stood motionless, speechless. she merely nodded her head affirmatively. "how shall i ever be able to excuse myself to him? i wish now that i had followed your suggestion and put off this dinner, so as not to run such a risk. when you travel, you start, but you don't know what may happen before you reach home again." he caught sight of the paper, which sabaroff had signed, lying on the table. he seized it eagerly and began to read. "what is this?" he exclaimed, overcome with joy. "why, it is the purchase of my shell by the russian government! the general ought to have stayed. you should have kept him ... i should have been so happy to thank him myself ... but, i understand; the proprieties, i suppose; he did not like to stay on during my absence.... five hundred thousand roubles! here it is, all set down and signed.... ah, my dora, my darling!" dora did not move. she was pale as death. she looked at him with eyes that appeared to see nothing. philip made as if he would seize her in his arms. she recoiled affrighted. "don't touch me! don't come near me!" she cried in a voice that gurgled. "dora, what has happened? heavens, you frighten me. what is the matter? why, you are trembling, you can scarcely stand. speak, speak, what is it?" "where have you been and where have you come from?" "but i have just told you what happened to me. i missed the nine o'clock train and there was an accident ... but what is the use of trying to explain anything to you in your present state? you evidently do not understand. i ask you again. what has been happening here to put you in such a state?" "ah, ah, he asks me what has happened!" she hissed, snatching the paper from philip's hands. "this has happened. your ambition is satisfied now. here is the signature that gives you half a million of roubles, the gold for which you did not hesitate to make me submit to the society of a betrayer of women, a protector of mimi latouche, a man against whom my whole womanhood revolted. stung by your heartless indifference to my pleadings, stung by your taunts that i no longer helped you, i have goaded myself to endure his presence constantly. and now, i think my task is ended; i have paid the price; so take the paper--it is yours. it is signed. the gold will be handed to you." "dora, for god's sake, tell me, what does it mean? you never spoke to me like this before," gasped philip, in a voice choking with anger and excitement. "hush!" continued dora, "your ambition is realised. your fortune is more than doubled; but when you are counting it up, think of me, your wife, in the arms of that man, every fibre of my powerless body revolting at the kisses of his polluted lips. yes, the lips of that libertine have soiled mine; on my face, on my arms, he pressed his burning kisses. look, look at this arm. see for yourself the mark that will not go. i am stained, contaminated. oh! am i mad? no, i have drunk the bitter draught, i have gone through the mire of degradation; and now, is the nightmare ended? are you satisfied, or shall i call him back to offer him the rest?" "i will kill him!" cried philip. "ah, rather kill me; that would be more generous," exclaimed dora. "take your money, and now let me go--unless," she added, with a sneer, "you have some other war minister that you wish to take your invention; think, i am here to pay the price they may exact for their approval." "dora, this is madness--you are out of your mind." "i soon should be if i stayed here." dora broke off suddenly. the coming of the servant flashed across her mind. he had brought a message. what was it? "yes, yes, of course, i remember. gabrielle sent for me a few moments ago--she had called the doctor to eva--eva! ah, let me go to my child," she cried, waving philip aside as he was going to speak again. but before she reached the door, gabrielle had opened it. "are you coming?" said the poor girl, with tears in her voice. "eva?" "yes, she is worse; it is diphtheria." dora realised now the full import of the former message. with one horror-struck look at the distressed white face before her, she rushed from the room uttering a broken cry-"eva!" gabrielle followed after her, and philip was left crushed, stunned, incapable yet of understanding clearly the terrible scene which he had just witnessed, or the new terror with which he was brought face to face. xiv eva philip dropped into an armchair. his forehead was bathed in perspiration. he was seized with a convulsive trembling, caused by the rage that he felt at not being able to avenge there and then the outrageous conduct of general sabaroff towards his wife. if he had known at that moment where to find the russian, he would have gone straightway and had it out with him. he went through a torment of impotent fury and disappointment at thinking that his arrival had been but a few moments too late. "fool that i was!" he cried, "what have i done? then dora thinks"--he dared not utter his thought--"and, if so, i am guilty in her mind of the vilest, the most despicable act that a man can commit--it is a frightful idea! and yet my indifference, my insistence that dora should receive that man, when she implored me not to oblige her to submit to his company--sabaroff loves her still then? or does he, too, believe that he was encouraged by me? oh, but the thought is horrible! the idea of it is maddening. fool that i have been!" for the first time he saw the enormity of his conduct. he called himself coward and criminal. in that dreadful hour he awoke from his dream and became himself again. the veil fell from his eyes, the transformation was complete. to do him justice there was no more inventor, no more blindly ambitious seeker after wealth, but the philip of former days with no thought but for dora. he would have given, that night, his last farthing for a smile from her! philip rose suddenly from his seat. he must take a resolution on the spot. he was face to face with a vital crisis on which all his future life depended. his first impulse was to go to dora and throw himself at her feet to implore her pardon. "no," he said to himself, "as long as that contract exists, there is nothing to be done." he held it in his hands, that paper which had cost dora so much. it burned to the touch. he looked at it twice, and he read it through. his mind was at once made up--tear up the thing, and fling it in the face of sabaroff! during this time there was much movement, much sound of coming and going on the staircase and in the hall. suddenly philip recognised the voice of dr. templeton saying, "it is the only way to save her, at least the only hope." upon this a servant came rapidly downstairs, and philip stopped him in the hall to ask-"where are you going?" "to st. george's hospital," was the reply. "for miss eva? is she worse?" "yes, sir; it appears that they are going to perform tracheotomy," said the man, who had heard the word and repeated it correctly. philip flew upstairs. when he reached the door of eva's room, saw the child half choking and unconscious, and saw dora kneeling by the bedside, he dared not enter, but stood in the doorway--heart-broken, pale, and immobile as death. that which crowned his misery and despair was the fact that dora had not thought of sending down for him in such a moment as this. with difficulty he repressed the sob that rose from his heart. he realised then all the depth of the abyss that separated him now from his wife and child, an abyss of his own digging. no, he, adoring eva as he did, dared not penetrate into the room where she lay. almost immediately a surgeon and two students arrived from the hospital. philip let them pass, and then took up his post of observation again; but when he saw them open the case that contained the shining steel instruments and little sponges, the needles and all the apparatus for their operation; when he saw the surgeon sign to dora to rise and, by a touch firm and gentle, direct her to leave the bedroom, philip could bear up no longer, all his courage forsook him. he fled to the library, and there let his choking tears have way. wretched and forsaken, he broke down utterly. "o god!" he cried, "it is too much; i have not deserved such punishment." gabrielle was a great help to the doctors, and prompt and reliable in her movements--a nurse of the first order. she watched with a calm, clear vision the work of the bistoury on the little throat, and knew exactly when to hand the implements necessary, as the work proceeded, and earned the compliment of the surgeon thereupon; but it was not merely her nurse's intelligence that was at work, it was her love for the child she ached to save. the preparation being completed, the surgeon with a hand at once deft and rapid, introduced the tube into the trachea. eva opened her eyes almost immediately. a flush of living colour returned to her face, and she breathed freely again. the tube was then bandaged into place, and a long silk hankerchief tied firmly round the throat. soon the child's face lost its aspect of deathly struggle, and put on a smiling look of profound relief and happy peace. her countenance lit up with a seraphic light; it was as though the child's soul had just been wafted back to its dwelling-place from a visit to paradise. when all was done, dora was fetched and shown the success of the operation. "then she is saved!" she cried, clasping her hands and lifting to heaven a glance of thanksgiving. "not yet," said the doctor; "there remains the morbid action to cure; but there is hope, every hope. only you must watch the child with extreme attention; she must not be left for a moment. she must not be allowed to move for some time. if the tube got displaced, or if the heart, which is very feeble, should receive the least shock, everything would be over in a moment. but," added he, "i confide your child to this lady's care," indicating gabrielle; "i have seldom met with a nurse so gifted. rely in all security upon her; i have given her my instructions, and she knows to the full the importance of them." the surgeon bowed to dora, and departed. dora returned to the bedside on tiptoe, and, placing her finger on her lips, made signs to eva that she was to keep perfectly quiet; then, throwing her a kiss and a smile of a guardian angel, she sat down beside the child. her face betrayed no sign of weakness, expressed neither grief nor despair; it was scarcely sad. she had the look of a man who throws himself into the sea, to try and save some beloved friend in deadly peril of drowning. philip did not go to bed. he begged gabrielle to come two or three times during the night to tell him how the child fared, and he remained in the library. dora watched all night by eva's bed. she was valiant, and inspired others with her own brave spirit. she had thrown aside the thought of all that had happened in the drawing-room a few hours before; far, indeed, from her thoughts was the man who had insulted her, and who no longer existed in her thoughts--the distracted mother had swamped the indignant woman. it was with death that she had to fight now, and she fought with a _sang-froid_ and a courage that were the astonishment and admiration of all who surrounded her. the morning and the afternoon passed without new disquieting symptoms arising, and at night the doctor left his patient going on satisfactorily. the following morning, about seven o'clock, dora, worn out with excitement, had fallen into a dose. gabrielle went to tell philip that eva also was sleeping, and that such sleep was a very good sign. their hopes rose considerably. philip could not resist the longing he had to go and look upon his wife and child, both sleeping calmly at last, unconscious of pain and anxiety. he crept stealthily upstairs, opened very softly the door of the dear child's room, and with loving eyes looked towards the bed. unhappily, eva had just woke up. she saw in the doorway her father whom she loved, and had not seen for several days; she raised herself eagerly and tried to call, "daddy." the little form fell back heavily upon the pillow. when gabrielle came into the room again, dora was still sleeping. eva slept too, but it was the sleep from which none waken. xv the separation when dora awoke, gabrielle was standing at the bedside, motionless, beautiful in her impassive grace, and looking like one of the angels that painters represent at the bedside of children whose souls they have come to bear to the abode of the seraphim. dora looked at gabrielle, then at the child. with heartrending cry she threw herself on eva's body. the struggle was over, and she had lost the battle. her strength forsook her, all her being seemed to be crushed. she slipped inanimate on the floor. they bore her to her own room, where, for more than a week, she lay benumbed by her grief, unconscious of everything, hovering between life and death. none but gabrielle and hobbs were allowed access to her chamber. philip was excluded by the doctor's command. in her delirium the name of her husband was often on her lips. "philip," she would cry, "murderer! you have killed my child." he had been indeed her murderer! involuntarily it is true, but nevertheless he had killed her. if he had resisted his desire to look upon his child, she would probably have recovered, surrounded as she was by the most assiduous care. her death had been accidental. in moving, and in trying to lift her poor little fragile body into a sitting posture, she had caused the derangement of the tube, and the heart had been suddenly stopped. choking and syncope instantly did their dreadful work, and all was over. neither dora nor gabrielle ever knew, however, that philip had been the involuntary cause of eva's death. he himself never suspected the terrible truth. "in spite of my injunctions," said the doctor, "the child has been allowed to move herself. she must have sat up in bed." the last words that eva had said to her mother came back constantly to dora's memory. "how sad it is here! oh, mama, how i wish we were in our other house; you know, the one where we lived when we were happy." poor little darling! "when we were happy." a phrase like that in the mouth of a child of five, intended by nature for joy and brightness, had made dora's heart bleed. the last words of the child were the irrevocable sentence of the father. tears might have relieved dora's desolate heart, and her faithful watchers hoped day by day for the crisis which never came. but she lay in numb paralysing grief, and never a tear fell. her life was not in danger, but her reason was. the delirium continued day and night. often she did not know her two devoted nurses, gabrielle and hobbs. her utterances were mostly incoherent sentences in which three names occurred constantly--philip, eva, sabaroff. "is that man gone?" and she would seek upon her arm for traces of the loathed kisses he had placed there. "where is philip? gone too, no doubt." then she would resume: "eva? yes, i am alone, all alone; everybody is gone." the scene quite unnerved the two dear women who were enforced spectators of it. they would take her hands and kiss them--gabrielle with affectionate warmth, and hobbs with the most touching respect. the days dragged on, but the doctor did not despair. dora's constitution was so strong, her will so powerful, her courage so lofty always, that there might be a crisis at any moment, and a favourable change might well ensue. he counted upon help in the carrying out of anything he might plan for the patient's good. he was well aware of all that had been passing latterly in the house. he was the friend and confidant of both husband and wife. nothing had been hidden from him, not even the scene between sabaroff and dora. he advised philip to leave the house. "you must do it," said he; "only time can cure your wife. have patience. go away for a few days. she is dazed; an explanation would but irritate her more--she is not in a state to listen. i quite expect to see her recover her mental faculties as suddenly as she lost them. the strength of her character is prodigious, and that strength will probably show itself in some sudden decision. do not cross her in anything," added he to gabrielle, who had come to receive his directions. "whatever decision she may take when the crisis is over, be very careful to fall in with it. i do not despair of anything, neither for her nor for you, my dear fellow," said he, shaking hands with philip, in whose eyes tears were glistening. philip consented to obey. he left his house, went to paris for two days, and on his return to london remained a week at the alexandra hotel, a few yards from his house, which he visited twice or thrice a day for news of dora. we shall see later how he employed his time during these few days of banishment. * * * * * eva had been dead ten days. one morning, when dora awoke from an excellent night of ten hours' sleep, gabrielle and hobbs were astonished to see their patient calm, and not only in full possession of her faculties, but apparently strong and courageous. the evening before she had wept for the first time, but the crisis had ended there. dora asked for breakfast. when gabrielle reminded her that she had some medicine to take first, dora reiterated her demand in an imperative fashion. "i tell you i am hungry," said she, and she not only asked for her breakfast, but she chose her own food. her orders were obeyed. she ate a small boiled sole, an egg, and two slices of toast, and drank a cup of tea. gabrielle and hobbs were fairly amazed. they looked at dora, they looked at each other, they could not believe their eyes. it was a resurrection. "i am going to get up," said dora, when the tray had been removed. "you cannot think of such a thing," said gabrielle. "i tell you, i am going to get up," repeated dora; "i am better, much better." her eyes shot lightning glances. her two nurses were dumfounded, and knew not what to do. the doctor had not yet arrived on his morning round. "do have patience, ma'am. wait at least until the doctor comes," said hobbs, thoroughly alarmed. and she insisted upon it that her mistress must not get up until dr. templeton came. "i shall not wait for anything," said dora. "i tell you that i am going to get up." she left her bed, swayed for a moment on her feet; but presently, standing bravely up without support of any kind, she said, with a laugh-"you see quite well that i am better. i am cured. i shall dress and go out." "but you are crazy," said gabrielle. "you are joking, ma'am," added hobbs. it is true that the doctor had told them to do nothing which might cross her, but the two good women said to themselves: "yet, if she wanted to throw herself out of the window, we should certainly not let her do it. and to go out in her present state is probably about as dangerous." they did not know what to do. the doctor did not come. still less did they know what to think. was dora completely mad, or was this some marvellous and mysterious metamorphosis? no, she was not mad. dora possessed something which has saved thousands of much-tried human beings from spiritual and moral shipwreck, and has reattached them to life again. she possessed that internal god whom the greeks called _enthusiasm_, that divine transport which, lifting the soul above itself, excites to great resolutions and lofty actions. eva was no more. philip was gone, and little she cared to know where. she was free, mistress of her actions. she had no longer husband or child. well! there was still left to her a third motive for living, art. the mother and the wife had ceased to exist, but the artist was still alive. gabrielle tried once more to dissuade dora from going out, but without success; no argument could influence her. she consented, however, that gabrielle should accompany her. she dressed herself without help. the mourning raiment which had been ordered she had not yet been able to have fitted, but she found in her wardrobe a black dress which served. a hat which hobbs in a few minutes trimmed with crape completed her toilette. she did not appear to be in the least excited. she was calm, deliberate, sure of each of her words, sure of each of her movements. gabrielle, who was under the influence of this powerful will, obeyed her sister's most trivial wishes, and appeared to be completely reassured about her. she begged her, however, for her own satisfaction, to let her feel her pulse and take her temperature. the pulse was normal, and the temperature did not indicate the least trace of fever. the case appeared to her to be a most exceptional one, almost phenomenal in fact, but she was reassured and much comforted. she no longer felt any anxiety, especially as the morning promised to be fine, and the open air could certainly do dora nothing but good. "well! where are we going?" said gabrielle, whose curiosity was keenly aroused. "to st. john's wood," replied dora. "to st. john's wood?" "yes, i am going to take a studio there. i have something left to me still. i can paint, and paint i will!" gabrielle was amazed. she gazed with affectionate eyes at dora, and kissed her. it was happiness to see her reviving interest in life. "send for a cab, darling," said dora. when the vehicle was at the door, dora, with gabrielle at her side, descended the steps with a firm foot, seated herself in the cab, and gave the driver an address in finchley road. she was set down in front of the office of an estate agent, and told the driver to wait. there she was given several addresses of apartments to let. two or three rooms, one of them large and possessing a good north light, was what she wanted. after a round of inspection, she fixed her choice upon a set of rooms a few yards from elm avenue. the place suited her requirements in every respect, and the price was reasonable, thirty pounds a year. she was not asked for references, for her name was well known in these regions. the people who let her the rooms thought that philip had need of a studio there for some special work, and that his wife had been sent to choose a suitable one for him. "when do you wish to take possession, madam?" asked the agent, who had accompanied her. "at once," replied dora, "that is, to-morrow or the next day." and the whole matter was arranged then and there. when dora got into her cab again, she began to talk almost gaily. she looked happy once more. it was a glimpse of the old dora that gabrielle had known all her life, but missed for a while, and now rejoiced to see again. at the end of a couple of hours they were at home again. poor hobbs had been a prey to terrible fears, all the while conjuring up in her mind visions of her beloved mistress being brought back on a litter in a dying condition. she had spent the time watching at the window in mortal anxiety. dora stepped briskly out of the cab, paid the driver, and threw her arms round the poor woman, who looked more dead than alive. "ah, at last," gasped hobbs. "oh, ma'am how could you! how could you!" so saying, she burst into tears, and then began to smile again on seeing dora standing so alert and on the point of making fun of her. "but what do you mean, my dear hobbs?" said dora. "i feel quite recovered. the fresh air has done me a lot of good and has given me a ferocious appetite." "well, well! i declare!" exclaimed hobbs, comforted a little by these words and the sight of her patient. but she went on wondering whether she was dreaming or whether dora had gone clean mad. "hobbs," said dora, "we must make haste about our preparations. we leave the house to-morrow, and, god be praised, never to return," she added. "to-morrow, ma'am!" rejoined hobbs, with a look that seemed to express the impossibility of further astonishment. "yes, to-morrow, we get to a new home and take leave of this one." "she has already taken leave of something else," thought the distressed servant. "we go to st. john's wood! but why do you stare so, hobbs? you are not going to remain here and let me go without you, surely?" "how could i think of doing such a thing!" said poor hobbs, really hurt by the suggestion. and she fell to laughing and crying softly to herself without knowing why, thoroughly bewildered at the turn things had taken. dora passed the remainder of the day in choosing the things she intended to take away with her; first, the furniture of her own bedroom and that of hobbs, then some studio belongings, the two easels, and her portrait which philip had not finished, the old clock that stood in the hall, and a few other things that belonged to her personally; some table silver, and many an odd piece of furniture that had been dear to her in the old house, but which had been since relegated to the attics, as being not worthy to figure in the new one. the next day she bought a japanese screen and a few things which, while costing little, would yet help her in the execution of the project which she had set her mind upon. these purchases made, there remained twenty pounds in her purse. she summoned the servants to the dining-room and told them that their master would return home shortly and would pay their wages. on the morning of the second day after her sudden decision, a van was brought to the door for her few effects, and at five o'clock she had turned her back upon the house that she had grown to loathe. two days later she was thoroughly installed in her new one. here she had succeeded in fitting up a studio, which was an imitation, a cheap and pathetic reproduction, exact in almost every detail, of the one in which she had passed the happiest hours of her old life in elm avenue. each item of furniture occupied precisely the same spot as in the st. john's wood studio, and the whole effect was tasteful, for the work had been a labour of love to dora. the two easels were placed side by side in the centre of the room, and on philip's stood the unfinished portrait. on one side of the door she had placed an old oak chest that she had picked up at a dealer's for a small sum, and which resembled closely one that philip owned and prized; on the other side of the door stood the old clock, which she did not, however, set going. what did the time of day matter to her now? clocks go too slowly when one is tired of life. away in a corner she hung philip's old working jacket, which she had come across in the depths of a chest in one of the attics. it would no longer be only in her dreams that she would see the st. john's wood studio, for it had sprung into existence again under her hands; and in these surroundings she would be able to continue the life that had been interrupted by the events already chronicled. she was going to try to bring to life again one part of her past. she turned to work to help her to forget the other. she had come here with new hope in her heart, to call her talent to her rescue, and to serve art faithfully and ask of it her bread. at the least, she felt that here she could, when her time came, die without a malediction on her lips. dora gave orders to hobbs to refuse her door generally. lorimer and dr. templeton were the only exceptions. she laid the greatest stress on these directions, and hobbs solemnly promised to obey to the letter. without delay she traced herself a programme which she resolved to follow out faithfully. she would work at her easel three hours every morning, would take outdoor exercise every afternoon to keep herself refreshed and strong, and the evenings should be devoted to reading and needlework. she had brought with her several excellent photographs of eva, and fully intended to make a portrait of the child whom death had robbed her of. her brush would help her to see again that sweet flesh of her flesh. "but not yet, not just yet," she said. as she had to earn a livelihood, and painting was to be her means of subsistence, she resolved to look about at once for a model. she chose a little italian boy who played a concertina under her windows almost every day. the picturesque urchin was ready enough to pose for the _signora_, and beamed with delight at the shilling dora put into his grubby little palm at the conclusion of each sitting. dora took her first walk in the neighbourhood, and hobbs went with her. they set out without any destination in view, but had not been walking more than five minutes when they found themselves in elm avenue. no trace of any emotion crossed dora's face, and, instead of turning back as hobbs was for doing, dora would insist on going as far as no. 50. the house was to let. no one had lived in it since philip left. dora drew up on the other side of the road in front of the house. hobbs tried to draw her away, for she feared that the sight of her old home might be too painful for her mistress. "no," said dora, "i am going to show you how thoroughly cured and strong i am ... i am going in." hobbs remembered dr. templeton's injunctions never to cross her whims, and so did not persist further. dora rang the bell. a woman, evidently a caretaker, opened the door. "do you wish to see the house, ma'am?" "yes, if you please," replied dora. she was invited to "step in," and the woman prepared to show her over the premises. "the studio is a very fine one, and communicates with the garden. your husband is an artist, i suppose, ma'am?" "yes," said dora. "then you would like to see the studio first, perhaps?" as soon as they reached it, dora asked the woman to leave her there alone a little while, under pretence that she had measurements to take and many details to think out. for the first time since the sudden change had come over her, which had so astonished her sister, dora was seized with a fit of sadness. her lips trembled, her teeth chattered. hobbs did not take her eyes off her mistress, but she did not venture to speak. dora opened the door that led to the garden, and a sharp cry escaped her. a little girl of eva's age was romping about on the lawn. she stood rooted to the ground, and a flood of tears gushed from her eyes. "let us go away," said hobbs. "you ought never to have come in at all. you think yourself much stronger than you are." "yes, let us go," said dora. they straightway went home. dora remained pensive all the evening. she scarcely opened her lips again that day. the book she tried to read fell again and again from her hands. when she noticed hobbs look at her, she said, "i tell you it is nothing. i was wrong to go into the house, and i shall not do it again. but how was i to know that, when i opened the garden door, i should see on the lawn" ... she broke off, looked once more at hobbs, and could no longer contain herself. tears choked her respiration; she was stifling. sobbing like a child, she hid her grief in the good woman's bosom. "it shall never happen again, hobbs; don't scold me, it is all over." next day she was calm again but weak; and hobbs, without telling her, sent a telegram to gabrielle to beg her to come to her dear mistress, that day if possible. gabrielle lost no time in responding to the call; but she could not discover in dora any symptoms that were at all disquieting. dora from that day avoided elm avenue in her walks. she had set bravely to work at her painting; and as the weeks went on she seemed to pick up the dropped thread of life, and gradually to attach herself to it again. her health did not suffer in the new existence, and her courage remained firm. at the end of a month she had done the picture of the little italian boy, and sold it for twenty-five guineas. "look, hobbs," she cried, on returning home; "look what i have earned--twenty-five guineas! well-earned money that!" and, in her delight, she kissed the bank notes. then finding herself quite naturally on her favourite topic, she poured into the ears of the devoted hobbs an eloquent harangue upon the wrong use of money and the demoralisation of the rich. the discourse was edifying, and duly impressed the only listener; but philip, to whom it was really addressed, was far off, and did not get the benefit of it. xvi philip returns to the fold the day after general sabaroff had dined at philip's house, he left london for paris, and from that city he went to st. petersburg. he made no further effort to see dora. "perhaps i have been deceiving myself after all," he said; "i shall forget her." the very evening of his arrival in paris, he occupied a box at the théâtre des variétés with mimi latouche. philip, when the doctor had advised him to leave home for a little while, started immediately for paris. next morning he presented himself at the hotel meurice, and sent up his card to sabaroff, for he had learnt that the general was staying there. philip was soon shown up to the first floor, where the russian had a sumptuous suite of rooms, and was ushered into the salon. in a state of feverish agitation, easy to understand, he awaited the general. he had but two or three minutes to wait. "sir," said philip, as soon as the two men were face to face, "i reached home from paris a few moments after the departure of your excellency from my house. i will not take up much of your time now. i have only a few words to say. i am an englishman, and in my country we do not fight duels with men who insult our wives; we set the law on them, or we give them a sound thrashing." "kindly explain yourself," said sabaroff, in a tone at once mocking and arrogant, and glancing about for a means of defence. "i will explain in two or three words," said philip. he drew out of his pocket the envelope which contained the torn-up contract that sabaroff had signed in dora's presence. "here is the paper you signed in my house," said he; "i return it." so saying, he flung the torn pieces of paper in the russian's face, and the bits of paper fluttered in all directions. "you will answer to me for this affront, sir," said sabaroff. "with the greatest pleasure," rejoined philip. "i am not in england now; i am in france; and you know what i mean by that. i am at your service. here is my address." the same evening a duel with pistols was arranged by two of the general's aides-de-camp and two artist friends of philip. sabaroff hated philip, and he promised himself to be revenged for dora's disdain. "i will kill him," he said to himself. the encounter took place next morning at eight o'clock in the bois de vincennes. philip lodged a ball in the right shoulder of his adversary. sabaroff would have killed philip with pleasure. at eleven-fifty philip took the train for london, and at half-past seven he was back in his rooms at the alexandra hotel. the duel had been kept secret; there was no mention of it in the newspapers. a week after philip's return to london, he was told of dora's sudden recovery and flight to st. john's wood. dr. templeton kept him informed of everything that was going on. it was arranged that philip and hobbs should meet once a day, and these daily consultations were held without the knowledge of dora, until further orders. philip took dr. templeton's advice on every point. he did not write to dora. "no," he said to himself, "all the faults are on my side; and it is for me to repair them, not by speeches and promises but by deeds. i am not ready yet with a plan of action; but i shall find one soon, and i will clear myself in dora's eyes. i have lost my child, but i will regain my wife. i will save her for her sake and my own. if i fail, life is no longer of any use to me. art could never console me; dora is more fortunate than i; she will find in painting a forgetfulness of the past. for me, i must win back dora, or everything else is worthless, and i am done for. to work, then, cautiously! everything will depend on the way in which i set about it." he began reviewing his position. the state of his finances was satisfactory. he still had thirty-two thousand pounds, of which twenty-eight thousand were invested in first-class securities. "by jove, i have only to clear out of that infernal house in order to be rich; nearly fifteen hundred pounds a year and my brush! why, of course i am rich." and he hurled at himself a succession of all the abusive epithets in his vocabulary. all his late follies arose and passed in procession before his mind's eye, and he asked himself whether it could really have been he who had committed them. at last his plan of action was clearly traced, and he prepared to execute it in detail, and that without delay. the first thing to do was to interview his landlord, or rather the agent of the noble duke who owned the district of london in which philip's house stood. he wanted permission to cancel his lease. he was prepared for a decided refusal, or, at the least, for difficulties without end. he was ready to compensate his grace by paying him a good round sum. the matter was concluded much more easily and rapidly than he had expected or hoped. a rich american, whose daughter lived in the house next to philip's, and who had long been wishing to settle close to her, was delighted to seize the opportunity, and finally took the house as it was, and renewed the lease with the landlord. it was a stroke of luck for philip, and he said to himself, "fortune is decidedly turning a better face to me." he knew that 50 elm avenue was still unlet, and he went next day to see his former landlord. the house was not only to be let, it was for sale. the price asked was three thousand pounds. philip had nearly four thousand in bank. he accepted without hesitation, and the bargain was sealed on the spot. his lawyer attended to the details of the purchase. philip had the place painted and papered from top to bottom, he disposed of some superfluous furniture, and in about a month from the time of his decision he was reinstalled in his old home. the furnishing was exactly the same as before, perhaps a trifle richer. he had been very careful to introduce no change into the studio. the only addition visible was the portrait of the little italian boy that dora had painted, and that he had secured by the help of the dealer, who, following philip's instructions, offered her twenty-five guineas for it. he engaged fresh servants; not one of the former staff was retained. if ever he should be granted the happiness of seeing dora return to the nest, he wanted to have there no witnesses of the belgravian scenes to recall her painful memories. he set to work ardently and full of hope. every day hobbs came, unknown to dora, to bring him news of her mistress. hobbs had told dora that no. 50 was let, then that it was inhabited, but by dr. templeton's orders she did not divulge the name of the occupant. dora was sad to hear the news, but she merely said, "i am surprised that it has been empty so long; it is such a pretty house, so convenient, so quiet, so" ... she could go no further, her emotion was too strong. presently, with an effort to regain command over herself, she added, "may that house be an abode of happiness to those who inhabit it!" hobbs was sorry to have spoken, and yet she was burning to say to dora, "why, it is your husband who lives there, and who holds out his arms to you; go and throw yourself into them." but she had promised to keep the secret, and she did not break her word. dora did not gain strength so fast as her friends had hoped she would. excitement, will-power, and courage had stood her in good stead at the start, but she had started too rapidly, and she had not the physical strength to carry her far at the same pace. she had unfortunately counted a little without herself. in this new existence, monotonous and almost without aim, there was not enough to satisfy her lofty character, her bright and energetic nature, which cried out for movement and an intellectual life. she still boasted of enjoying the pleasures of poverty and of preferring them to the others, but she was, in these days, chiefly brought in contact with the dulness and the bareness of poverty. discouragement invaded her heart, she began to feel that she was vegetating and not living. her courage was forsaking her. later might come despair and a desire to have done with the world. weak health, grief, and solitude were undermining her. her temper, always so equable formerly, so gay, was beginning to sour. the strangest contradictions manifested themselves in her behaviour, and that is a disquieting sign in a woman with a mind so well balanced as dora's. she had refused her door to everyone, and yet she complained that people had forsaken her. she said she wanted to forget the past, and yet she eagerly clung to everything that could remind her of it. she had promised hobbs never to go near 50 elm avenue, and for a long time she kept her word. but one day she wanted to satisfy her curiosity, to see what sort of an appearance the house had, now that it was reoccupied. she came home in a state that distressed her faithful companion. "it seems, hobbs, as if everything were conspiring to overwhelm me. i have been to see the house." "what! after your promise!" "yes, i know it is horrid of me, but i could not help it! do you believe me when i tell you that i felt as if i recognised some of our own dining-room furniture through the window? and the curtains are exactly the same!" "oh, ma'am, it is just your fancy," said poor hobbs, who feared to hear more. "at all events, you are cured of going there any more, i hope." and there the matter ended. lorimer had several times written to dora, but, not having received any answer to his letters, he had not yet ventured to try and see her. he rather dreaded the first meeting. "he too has forgotten me and given me up, you see, hobbs," said dora. "really, ma'am, you are not reasonable," replied hobbs; "mr. lorimer has written several times to you. have you answered his letters?" "no, it is true i have not, but what is there that i can say to him? no, hobbs, i have no friends left--only you, my good brave companion; but it is very wrong of me to make you share my sad existence. it is selfish of me. hobbs, you shall not stay much longer. you must leave me ... not just yet, but soon" ... the good woman, melted to tears, asked what she had done to deserve to be sent away. she vowed she was quite happy, and her tears fell in great hot drops on dora's hands, that she kissed with avidity. "if mr. lorimer does not come to see you, why don't you write and ask him to come? he would not wait to be asked twice, i know! he at least has always been a real friend, and i am sure is devoted to you." "that is true," said dora. "and then he is so merry; it does you good to look at him. he carries gaiety wherever he goes. and he is so kind! write to him, and i will guarantee that he will rush out here as soon as he gets your letter." "yes, hobbs, you are right, and i will do it to-day." she immediately took pen and paper and wrote to lorimer. "hobbs, you don't happen to know who the people are that are living in our old house, i suppose?" "no, ma'am," said hobbs, rather scared at the question. "try to find it out." "oh, why, ma'am?" "it would interest me to know, that is all." "some say it is a hermit, a bearish kind of gentleman who sees no one and never goes out." "ah," said dora. "is he a painter?" "i think so, ma'am, but i am not sure." "he has had the house done up like new." "i have heard that he is going to be married--that he has had the house finely decorated for his future wife." "ah, and who told you all these details?" "the tradespeople," replied hobbs quickly. dora went on writing, and hobbs, fearing she had said too much, determined to turn a deaf ear to any questions dora might put to her in future on the subject of 50 elm avenue and its new master. xvii dora's studio we have every reason to suppose that if lorimer had not called on dora in her new quarters, it was because he had not dared to do so. he saw philip often, and so had news of her nearly every day. he had feared to be importunate, all the more so that philip had told him how dora had closed her doors to everyone, and had shut herself up in complete seclusion. it was in the early part of the month of april 1898 that lorimer received from dora a letter in which she said to him, "if you will come, dear friend, i shall be so pleased to see you. i am in very poor lodgings, but i am sure that will not make you pass me by on the other side. do come soon, i am longing to see a friendly face." lorimer lost no time in responding to her call. hobbs opened the door to him and beamed to see his cheerful face. "oh, sir! i am glad to see you, sir," said she. "well, my dear hobbs, and how are things going by this time?" asked lorimer, in his cheeriest tones. "you will do mistress such a lot of good, sir! she has not been at all herself lately. she is very weak to-day and has passed a very bad night--she is quite changed since the day she saw our old house was occupied again, and yet she could not have thought that it would remain unlet for ever." "she does not know who it is that is living there, of course?" "no, no, sir; but i should dearly love to tell her. i believe it would put her into a better humour." "take care that you do not, hobbs; she must not hear on any account. you will know why later on. you may be sure that mr. grantham and i are not idle. we have an idea in our heads, and you shall help us by and by to put it into execution; so, for the present, not one word, you hear?" "you can rely upon me, sir." "yes, i am sure of that. and now, can i have a little talk with mrs. grantham?" "yes, sir, in a minute or two. she will be so glad to see you, you will do her much good! the doctor is with her for the moment." "what does he say about her?" "nothing--i can't get anything out of him. he shakes his head. it's disheartening. and mistress will not listen to reason; she tears up all the prescriptions, especially lately, for the last week or so--it is very sad. i shall go and tell her you are here." lorimer, left alone in the studio, looked around him and took in all its details. "why, it's freezing here!" he said to himself. "heavens! it's no wonder, there is positively no fire. is she so poor as.... oh no, it can't be so bad as that. what pathos in this room--an exact reproduction of that lovely one in the other house, where we used to have such merry times! ah, there is the old clock in its place--not going, i see. there is dora's portrait on philip's easel, still lacking the finishing touches. there is philip's jacket, hanging just where it always hung--the two easels and stools--everything in place, nothing wanting but philip himself. what treasures of tenderness are revealed in this poor counterfeit presentment of the other studio! how happy her life must have been there, that she should want to make an exact imitation of the room, and so revive the past! there are people who break with their happy bygone times, others who cling to them determinedly. a few pounds have transformed this miserable studio into a living souvenir that will kill her. and yet, why do i say _will kill her_, when it is just this living souvenir that keeps her alive--that will keep her alive, perhaps? here were two beings who loved each other dearly, and between whom a simple suspicion, a terrible misunderstanding, seems to have erected an insurmountable barrier. philip wanted to be rich, poor beggar! he has not been long learning that there is but a step from plutus to pluto. most of the old proverbs want re-editing. i know one that ought to run: 'when wealth comes in at the door, love and happiness fly out at the window.' but poor old philip is cured, radically cured, once and for ever. he talks nonsense still sometimes, but it is the other whom i am most anxious about, and who vows that everything is over. philip goes in for philosophy, and that is a healthy sign. he has decided that his wife is better off than he is, because she has found consolation in her painting. he would give his whole house for dora's garret. and the fellow tells us these things in a tone of conviction, as if he were uttering the wisdom of a solomon or a socrates. the panegyric of poverty is all bosh; it is an affectation! when i see a book entitled _how to live comfortably on two hundred a year_, i take it for granted that the author is a millionaire." dr. templeton came out of dora's bedroom and surprised lorimer in the midst of his reflections. he was looking troubled and in a bad temper. "that woman will exhaust my patience, i know she will. she is the most obstinate, the most ... the most ... there, i can't find a word for her." "don't try, doctor; you have explained yourself admirably." "yes, i am getting out of patience at last. i can do nothing with her. she takes no notice of my advice or my prescriptions. if she is bent upon dying--why, she must die, i suppose; she does not want a doctor for that." "that does not always go without saying," said lorimer jokingly. "if we cannot get her out of this place, she has not another month to live. she must have change of air, and change of scene and company, or she is done for. she has not a chance ... and that damned picture!" he vociferated, shaking his fist at the easel, "that confounded portrait! the sight of it is killing her by inches. nothing will induce her to part with it ... she was bent on bringing it here.... i tell you i have a very good mind to fling it out of the window. poor woman!" he added, calming down, "it distresses me to see her. the wound is too deep, we can do nothing to cauterise it." "listen to me, my dear doctor," said lorimer, "between ourselves dora is carrying this thing much too far. i know the story from beginning to end. it is absurdly ridiculous! philip has, so to speak, nothing to ask forgiveness about, unless it be for having neglected his wife for an invention that absorbed all his thoughts." "my dear fellow, when a woman of mrs. grantham's sort loves her husband, she exaggerates everything. the slightest inattention becomes to her a subject for deep grief, a look of indifference causes her horrible suffering. little things take on gigantic proportions. a man should surround with the most constant care and affection a woman who loves him as our friend here loved her husband." "but, after all, a busy man can't pass all his time at the feet of his wife. there is the morning paper, you know, and his correspondence, and a thousand other everyday occupations. give him a chance! happy the wife who only has an art or an invention to be jealous of! isn't it enough for a woman to know that she is loved, by the substantial proofs of affection that are given her?" "no," replied the doctor; "for us men it suffices to know that we are loved, but with women the case is quite different. they love to have it told them--some of them so much that they could hear it from morning to night and night to morning, without ever growing weary of the tale!" "mistress is coming in a moment," said hobbs to lorimer. "look here, hobbs," said the doctor, "how does mrs. grantham manage to get a living here? how does she keep you and herself? it is perhaps an indiscreet question, but it is important that we should know just how matters stand." "don't you trouble about that, doctor," replied hobbs. "we pay our way and save money. why! my mistress sold a picture yesterday." "really!--and for how much?" "well, sir, you are getting a little inquisitive. for twenty-five pounds, if you must know." "twenty-five pounds!" said the doctor, winking at lorimer. "well, and how much is your rent?" "thirty pounds a year. don't be alarmed about us, we don't spend all the money we make." "we make! oh, i see, you work too?" "i should think i did, sir; i clean the rooms, i do the cooking" ... "and what about your wages?" "my wages--the affection and kindness of my dear mistress, and i shall never ask or expect any increase. we are all right, doctor; don't make your mind uneasy about us. if only i could see her grow strong, everything else would be all right." "devoted woman!" said the doctor to lorimer; "it does one good to feel that there are hearts like that beating in the world! it isn't such a bad place after all." then turning to hobbs, and pretending to be very angry, he said, "by jove, i'll go and find the landlord, and get him to raise the rent, and turn you both out, if you don't pay it. as for this portrait, i'll throw it in the fire or pitch it out of the window, do you hear?" he shook hands with lorimer and went out. "what did he say?" exclaimed the frightened hobbs, when dr. templeton was out of hearing. "he says he will pitch that picture out of the window to begin with, and i will help him do it too." "no, no, he must not do that," cried hobbs excitedly. "that picture is the only thing she has got left now. see, she is copying it. i have caught her kneeling before it and kissing it. sometimes she will sit here in front of it and smile so happily--then she will look at the other stool beside her, and her eyes fill with tears. she believes herself in elm avenue. do you know what she did once? oh, it's too ridiculous, i ought not to tell you." "go on, hobbs," said lorimer, mastering his emotion, "tell me all about it, you know how much i am interested in everything that concerns mrs. grantham." "well, she made me sit on master's stool one day," said hobbs, in a low confidential voice. "oh, no, i can't tell you, you will laugh at it--and i could not have you laugh at anything she did," added she, with tears in her eyes. "oh, please, hobbs." "well, then," continued hobbs, "after making me sit down on the stool she threw the old velvet coat on my shoulders--there it is, hanging over there--to make the illusion more complete. she put a palette in my left hand and a brush in my right--then she burst out laughing, and the next minute had thrown herself into my arms sobbing like a child. throw the picture out of the window," added hobbs, shaking her fist at the closed door; "throw it in the fire, indeed! let him come and try it! i will obey all the orders he likes to give me, but don't let him dare to come near that picture. why, sir, it would kill her. oh, you won't let him do it, you won't, will you? promise me he shall not touch it." "no, hobbs," said lorimer, profoundly touched. "i promise you that nothing shall happen to it; make your mind easy about that." and he took the good woman's hands and pressed them with warmth. "thank you, sir, thank you," said hobbs, wiping her eyes--"oh, i hear mistress moving, i will go to her now." "dear devoted creature!" said lorimer to himself when hobbs had gone out. "the doctor is right, the world is not so bad--i wonder what all this means: the episode of the easel--what can that signify except that dora loves philip still, and cannot forget him? alas, perhaps it is only the philip of the old days that she tries to keep in her memory. anyhow, it is a good symptom--my little idea is growing." hearing steps in the adjoining room, he drew from his pocket a small packet which philip had confided to his care. it was the "little family," of which the reader made the acquaintance at the beginning of this story. philip had said to him, "carry this letter to dora and plead for me. if she refuses to listen to you and refuses to read my letter, give her this little packet, it will intercede for me." dora came into the studio pale and evidently ill, but walking with a tolerably firm step. she made a kindly gesture to hobbs and closed the door of the bedroom. "ah, my dear friend," she said to lorimer, "how good of you to come! i have not been very well lately, but i am better, much better ... well! what now? why do you look at me like that?" "why do i look at you?" "yes." lorimer had never seen dora looking more beautiful than to-day. her very pallor added a new charm. her black gown was moulded to the lovely lines of her figure, and her hair was becomingly dressed. lorimer had taken both her hands in his and was looking at her with eyes that expressed a mingling of sympathy, respect, and admiration. "why do i look at you?" he repeated, "well, then, because i should like to give you a good kiss." "why then, why don't you?" lorimer kissed her on both cheeks, while still holding her hands. "i should just like," he said, "to take you up in my arms, carry you off and place you in philip's." dora quickly disengaged herself from lorimer's light hold and repressed an angry gesture. she offered him a chair, and, taking one herself, said, "my dear gerald, never pronounce that name in my hearing, and we shall be good friends still, as we always have been. speak to me of yourself. have you a new piece on hand? i hear that _majella_ is still drawing crowded houses." lorimer saw that he had gone a little too fast at the start. he resolved to be more cautious. a better opening might occur presently, perhaps. "no," he said, "it is of you we will talk! you are not looking well. work, solitude, all that sort of thing is not good for you in your present state. come, dora, i am an old friend of your childhood, let us talk freely, you and i. you must leave london for the country, you want fresh air. it is the opinion of dr. templeton, and it is mine too." "i am very happy here, i have all that i want; don't be afraid ... i have plenty of occupation.... i work.... i try to forget." "ah, yes; you try to forget by surrounding yourself with everything that can help you to remember. it is a strange manner of setting about it. i have come here to fetch you, to beg you to come to my sister's in the country. i will take you there. come and breathe the pure air in the fields, come and see the apple trees in blossom--it will put new joy into your heart." "oh, it would be quite impossible now ... later on, perhaps.... i do not say no." the conversation did not take the turn that lorimer wished. "listen," said he, in the tone of a man who has taken a sudden resolution, "i want to speak to you upon a rather delicate subject, but you must not stop me. you have just forbidden me to mention the name of your husband before you. very well, i will not mention his name, but i am going to make you acquainted with certain facts which you ought no longer to be ignorant of. i do not come here to plead in his favour, and yet, as even the blackest criminal is not executed without a chance of defending himself, i really do not see what there would be outrageous, even in that. will you listen a few moments?" "very well! go on," said dora indifferently. "i saw him yesterday--for that matter, i have seen him almost every day since he came back to london." "where has he been?" asked dora, with but a mild display of interest. "to paris." "he often goes over--i mean he often used to go." "the last time he went there, an incident happened which it seems to me ought to interest you. he went to seek out general sabaroff. he found him, tore up before his eyes the paper that he had signed in your house, and threw the pieces in his face." "heavens!" said dora, startled, "and what happened then?" "the next morning they fought with pistols--in the bois de vincennes--your husband lodged a bullet in the general's right shoulder." dora did not attempt to hide the feeling of joy and pride that involuntarily rose within her. "philip was always a good shot--he himself was not hurt?" "no--you will allow me now to pronounce your husband's name, since you have used it yourself." dora frowned and bit her lips. "at all events, the contract is torn up!" she cried. "god be praised! i paid dearly enough for that vile piece of paper--i have a right to rejoice that it no longer exists. philip did well, he did well. and after that?" "why, that is all--ah, no, i was forgetting. philip begged me to hand you this letter--and this packet." dora went pale; she put the packet aside, and was going to tear up the letter when lorimer interrupted-"what are you going to do?" said he. "tear up this letter? you will do nothing of the kind: that letter is from philip, from your husband." "my dear gerald, my husband no longer exists for me." "dora," rejoined lorimer, "you are cruel. your husband loves you, and is overwhelmed with sorrow." "my husband never loved me. i thought he loved his art and his wife, he only loved his invention and his money." "philip has never ceased to love you. he may have lost his head for a little while, when fortune visited him almost without knocking at the door. the other day the faults were on his side, now they are more on yours. you are unjust, cruel to him, cruel to yourself. your obstinacy, my dear dora, bids fair to put an end to the pair of you. yes, that is the point things have come to; now, do you hear what i say? his despair and repentance ought to touch you; what he did in paris the other day ought to satisfy you. he lives only in the hope of your forgiveness, in the hope of your return." "philip did not hesitate to thrust me into the arms of a libertine. if i had yielded to that man's hateful desires, philip would probably never have destroyed the contract." "hold your tongue, dora!" cried lorimer; "you are uttering blasphemies. you have allowed a silly idea, an absurd suspicion to gain an entrance into your head, and, like a grain of sand in the eye, it has carried on its irritating work till it has blotted out your vision, and you can see nothing except this molecule that seems to have turned into a mountain. take care, dora, or your mountain will crush you as well as blind you. do you know that by obstinately refusing to listen to reason, a woman cuts herself off from friendly sympathy? people cease to take an interest in her woes. if you wish to alienate the sympathy of your most devoted friends, you are going the right way to work." "i do not need anyone's sympathy," replied dora proudly; "and i do not ask for it." "once more, dora, listen to me. philip may have neglected you, in order to throw himself body and soul into that invention which absorbed him night and day. but, remember, such a piece of work as that is a very exacting, inexorable mistress. you felt his indifference keenly, and it wounded you--the rest exists in your imagination alone. now the mistress is discarded, cast out completely. let the artist return again to his easel at your side." "never, oh, never!" cried dora. "ah, my dear gerald, if you only knew how i loved that man!" "and how you still love him," ventured lorimer. dora rose suddenly, the thrust had not miscarried. "i am sorry if it hurts you, but it is the truth," added lorimer, with a significant smile. "what do you mean?" demanded dora, who thought lorimer's remark somewhat out of place, and a little over-familiar. "come now, sit down here in front of me, your friend. you know i am a bit of a student of human nature, it is my stock-in-trade. my dear dora, do not attempt to throw dust in your own eyes--you love philip still; everything in this room testifies aloud to the feeling that you cannot stifle. oh, do not start, do not deny it. if i am not right, what is the meaning of all this that i see around us?" "in these surroundings i can evoke the philip of the past, and that helps me to forget the philip of the present." "he is one and the same. he was changed for a few months; but to-day he is what he used to be, and what he will be always--the artist who loves you and longs for you. dora, what have you to say in reply?" "my head burns so, dear friend, spare me now. we will talk again ... but by and by." a knock was heard at the door. "oh, would you mind seeing who that is?--i am not expecting anyone," said dora. dora threw an anxious look towards the door. lorimer went and opened it. the visitor was no other than our old friend, sir benjamin pond, city alderman and patron of arts in his spare moments. he evidently expected to find himself in a hall or anteroom, instead of straightway standing in a studio in the presence of dora and lorimer. he was seized with a little fit of timidity, which he had difficulty in mastering, and which made him awkward in the extreme. he removed his hat and stood turning it in his hands. regaining his equilibrium, after a moment, he advanced respectfully towards dora, without venturing, however, to hold out his hand. "my dear mrs. grantham--mr. lorimer, how do you do?" dora and lorimer bowed distantly without speaking, and seemed to wait for him to explain the object of his visit. the worthy man wished himself under the floor. "i came," he said, stammering, "i came--that is to say, it's just this--i only heard yesterday of your removal here, quite by accident, and i also heard that you had with you the picture that i so much wanted to purchase last year. ah, there it is, i see. you observe i have not lost all hope of possessing it, that picture which" ... dora and lorimer looked at sir benjamin without uttering a word, and the poor man grew more and more embarrassed. "well," he went on, "i have come to beg you to sell it to me. that is why i came early--to be sure to find you in. i do not, my dear madam, wish to profit by the regrettable circumstances in which you find yourself placed, to offer you a low price, or to bargain for the picture, believe me. no, no, i have too much respect for you, too much admiration for the painter. i wish to behave honourably over the matter, and deal generously, as a gentleman should." he would have given hundreds of pounds to be leagues away from this studio that he had pushed his way into. "i will willingly give you," added he, "five hundred pounds for the picture. what do you say to the offer?" dora and lorimer did not open their lips. their eyes never quitted those of the alderman. lorimer moved back a little to a more retired post of observation: the scene began to interest him keenly. to dora five hundred pounds was a small fortune. would she sell the canvas? by withdrawing a little, he placed her more at her ease, left her free to decide according to the dictates of her heart, while, as i said before, he himself obtained a better view of the little comedy that was being enacted before him. "yes," said sir benjamin again, "five hundred pounds down. i am ready to draw you a cheque this minute." "this picture is not for sale, sir benjamin," said dora frigidly, "neither for five hundred nor for five thousand, nor for any other sum that it may please you to offer." lorimer would have loved to cry _bravo_! "she does love him, then, still--we shall save her," he said to himself. "you see, my dear sir benjamin," said he, "the offer is useless. i suppose you still have the spare thirty-six by fifty to fill up, eh?" "ah, ah," laughed the alderman; "yes, that is to say, no; it is a new vacancy on my walls. everyone has his fads here on earth, has he not? the queen gives shawls to her friends when they marry, i give pictures to mine. it gives me occasion to purchase new pictures. well, madam," he added, turning to dora, "i admire you--i will beg you to excuse me. i thought that, perhaps, you might have been very glad to ... i wanted very much," he went on, retiring, nervous and awkward, towards the door, "to have that picture, but i wished also to do you a good turn--to render you a friendly service which could not hurt your susceptibilities.... after all, artists try to sell their pictures, don't they?... and i should have thought that such an offer at such a time" ... the unfortunate man floundered more and more. "well, excuse me," said he; "i will wish you good-morning." his back was now against the door. the next second he was in the street again. the poor fellow mopped the perspiration from his brow. "the woman is mad--she is a prig!" he said to himself, as he hailed a passing hansom and set out for the city, where he was more in his element. dora was choking with anger. lorimer rubbed his hands with joy. "not even a front door of my own to protect me against the importunities of such a fool as that! oh, the sympathy of such a man! the drop that overbrims the vase! the kick of the jackass! and you can stand there and laugh." "ah, my dear dora, what good you have done me!" exclaimed lorimer, who could not contain his delight. "you were quite right--not for five hundred, nor for five thousand, nor for a million. that picture is a treasure no gold could pay for--never let it go--philip will finish it. oh, how happy you have made me! you love him still! you know you do," he cried. "you know nothing about it," said dora, and, taking the little packet that lorimer had brought her from her husband, she went towards her bedroom. "i am tiring you," said lorimer. "i ought not to have stayed so long, but it seemed to me i had so many things to say to you--and i have not got through half of them. look here, i have a little business in the neighbourhood, my time is my own; may i come at four o'clock to ask you for a cup of tea?" "why, of course," said dora. "how nice of you! oh, it is good to see a friend who is always the same." lorimer took her outstretched hand and respectfully lifted her fingers to his lips. then he went out. he could have danced for very joy. the scene he had just witnessed confirmed him in his belief that there was yet hope for philip. he had a plan evolved out of his dramatic author's brain, a little _coup de théâtre_, which he thought had every chance of turning out a success. he had already talked of it to philip and dr. templeton, and both of them had pronounced it an excellent idea. hobbs also was in the secret. lorimer judged the time ripe for the execution of this plan. on leaving dora he jumped into a cab, and went to warn the other conspirators to hold themselves in readiness. the doctor was to make his appearance at dora's about five o'clock, to see how she was doing. philip was to wait in the street in readiness for a signal, which should bid him to the scene of action in due time. when everything was decided, and the details well arranged, lorimer took philip to his club, where they passed an hour or two in talk before returning to st. john's wood to proceed to action. xviii lorimer's plot when dora was alone, she took philip's letter and put it by without opening; then she softly began to untie the small packet. she could not repress her emotion at the sight of these little flowers, that brought back the memory of the happiest days of her life. it was like a breath of elm avenue, stealing into her attic. "our little family," she said. "poor little flowers, you were happy when philip plucked you, happy even as i in those days was happy! and to-day you are faded, limp, and lifeless, even as my poor heart. oh, cursed be life, i cannot weep even at sight of you.... you at least have no memory to torture you. what would i not give to obliterate my own!" when hobbs came in to set the table, she found dora lying drowsily back in her armchair, holding in her hands the flowers whose history the good woman knew well. she did not like to disturb her mistress, and retired discreetly into the bedroom to wait patiently until dora should wake. but dora did not stir, and the beefsteak would certainly be spoilt. hobbs returned, and softly and deftly set about her preparations. dora opened her eyes, and was annoyed to see hobbs smiling at sight of the flowers she still held in her hands. it seemed as if the servant had surprised a dear secret, and was reading in her mistress's heart something that she herself could scarcely decipher yet. "the pansies come back!... then it must be master who has sent them," said hobbs. "yes," replied dora, "yes, it is he; they no longer mean anything to him, so he sent them to me. he gets rid of them." "and shall i tell you what i think? i think that these flowers mean a great deal to him still, and, if he has sent them here, it is that they may say to you, 'in the name of the happy past that these flowers will remind you of, come back to me. i love you and i wait for you.' that's what i think." dora did not encourage hobbs to continue. she rose and went to the table; but she had no appetite, and scarcely touched the succulent food that hobbs had prepared for her. "i expect mr. lorimer at four o'clock," said dora; "he is coming to have tea with me. meanwhile, i am going to read. i want to be alone here, for a while, hobbs." when the lunch had been taken away, dora remained in the studio and installed herself in an armchair with a book in her hand, but she did not read. the thoughts chased one another through her brain. doubt and incertitude pursued her and disturbed her inmost soul, but although she could not exactly explain to herself what was passing within her, she felt that this doubt and incertitude were no longer of philip's innocence, but of his culpability. the fact is, she was waiting eagerly for lorimer's return, not only because his breezy company acted as a tonic to her nerves, and seemed to bring forth fresh strength, but because she was dying to learn more details about philip's doings. she did not say it to herself in so many words but something within her cried out: "you are unjust, your obstinacy blinds you; lend an ear to all that can throw light on this matter; do not refuse any longer to learn the facts." lorimer was punctual to the minute. as the clock struck four, he walked into the studio. he found dora in the same dress which she had worn in the morning, but he noticed that her hair was differently arranged, and that her very simple mourning robes yet possessed an air of elegance. in her whole appearance there was something which revealed a woman who had retained a consciousness of her beauty. lorimer seemed in gayer mood than ever. dora noticed it at once, and the good spirits of her old friend insensibly roused a response in her. hobbs brought in the tea, and dora poured out two cups. lorimer took a piece of cake, drank his cup of tea, and asked for a second. he helped himself to another slice of cake, and drank his second cup of tea with evident relish. "another cup?" said dora. "with pleasure; your tea is delicious, and tea to me is a life-saving liquid, a sovereign remedy for numberless ills. no washerwoman sips her bohea with greater gusto. it is tea that revives me after fatigue, tea that stimulates me when i am at work, tea that cheers me in desponding moments. long live tea!" "you must not overdo your devotion," said dora. "oh, my dear friend," rejoined lorimer, "you must not overdo anything, if it comes to that--you allow a cigarette?" "i allow two; have you a light?" "yes, thank you." lorimer lit a cigarette, inhaled the fragrant smoke, and sent it soaring in blue spirals to the ceiling. "we were speaking of abusing things just now ... well, as a matter of fact, it is our most salient national trait. i pass most of my time in preaching upon this text. the word _moderation_ scarcely exists for us. the apostles of temperance, for instance, exhort to total abstinence, instead of moderation. the word _temperance_ cannot by any stretch of its meaning imply total abstinence, the essence of its significance is moderation. when one speaks of a country as enjoying a temperate climate, that does not mean that the country has no climate at all, it means that it has a moderate climate, and is not very hot or very cold." dora began to wonder whether lorimer was going to philosophise long, or whether the conversation would soon turn upon philip again. "it is in the anglo-saxon blood," continued lorimer. "we fling ourselves heart and soul into our enterprises, even to the danger of our well-being and our happiness; we do not know how to steer the middle course. for instance, now, take philip's case. it is just that. there you have a striking example of my theory. a frenchman who had invented his shell, would probably have gone on painting pictures. the frenchman who has made a fortune, eases off steam, and takes things easily. the anglo-saxon who has made a fortune, wants to straightway make another. philip is english, he can't help it.... i call that the complete absorption of the individual; and, after all, this very defect in our national character has been a source of glory, for it has helped us to do great deeds and conquer half the earth." "granted," said dora; "but it is not your theory upon what you are pleased to call the complete absorption of a man, which will explain how that man can forget all his obligations to his wife." lorimer smiled as he realised that dora continued to think of philip. "oh, but it does, at least up to a certain point. first of all, what do you mean by all his obligations towards his wife? if to neglect her is to fail in all his duty towards her, my theory explains the phenomenon perfectly." "come, come, my dear friend, do you maintain, for instance, that a husband who loves his wife, or even only respects her, forces her to receive the visits of a man whom he knows to have been in love with her before her marriage, and who has earned for himself a well-merited reputation as a libertine? is that kind of thing a natural consequence of the complete absorption?" "we are getting on now," thought lorimer. "does he invite that man to his house to dine, and then miss a train, so that they may be thrown together _en tête-à-tête_ for a whole evening? is that your absorption, too? ah, don't talk to me, my dear gerald; there are circumstances which awake the most absorbed man on earth." lorimer remained dumb, and looked at dora in the strangest manner, as if seeking to know whether he had heard aright. he threw his cigarette on the tray and drew nearer to her. he hardly knew whether to pity her or to reproach her bitterly. "what!" said he, "you do not know what happened to philip at the moment that he was about to leave the paris hotel to return to london in time to dine with sabaroff? he never explained all that to you? why, he told me that he had written you a long explanation of it all." "it is quite true that he has written to me several times since that dreadful day, but i have torn up unread every letter he has sent me since i left that hated house." "well," said lorimer, with an air of mixed pity and amazement, "upon my word, you can do clever things, when you set about it! if you had read his letters, you would have learnt the whole truth." "tell me yourself, tell me everything," said dora breathlessly. "listen, then, while i show you how unfounded was your crowning suspicion of him. philip's business in paris being finished, he had breakfasted early, and was descending the staircase on his way to his cab, when, as he reached the first floor landing, a door opened, and a gentleman came out. judge of his feelings at finding himself face to face with his father! one glance served to show philip that a great change had come over him. from a hale, haughty, self-reliant man of sixty, he had turned into a pitiable invalid, and looked prematurely old and feeble. a broken cry, 'my son!' arrested philip's steps. struck with pity at the sight of the change in his father, he allowed himself to be led through the still-open door, and there ensued a moving scene in which the elder man humbled himself before the younger and implored his forgiveness. the minutes fled by meanwhile, and when philip, unnerved and shaken, reached the station, it was only to find that the train had left two minutes before. the rest you know." "oh, my poor brain is on fire," murmured dora. "dora, you have misjudged philip. he made you rich, thinking to add to your happiness--that is the only harm he ever did you. ah, say that you forgive him, and will go back to him--he is waiting for you." "no, no, never in that house." "no," said lorimer softly; "not in that house, but the old studio in elm avenue." "where? what did you say?" exclaimed dora. "philip has left the house you hate so, because of its cruel souvenirs. he has gone back to st. john's wood, where you spent the first six years of your married life, and, in order never to be turned out of that house, he has bought it." "but the house is inhabited," said dora. "i know it." "why, then--it must be philip" ... "who occupies it," said lorimer; "he is only waiting for your presence, dear dora, before beginning to work again. he will devote the rest of his life to painting in the old studio. it is his irrevocable resolution." a ray of ineffable joy spread over dora's face; but the shock had been too violent and too sudden. she was not strong enough to bear such emotion as the news had caused her. repeating over lorimer's phrase, "it is he who occupies the house! oh, my dear old studio!" she fell fainting into his arms, and he called hobbs to come quickly to her mistress's aid. after a few moments her eyes opened, she smiled at lorimer, and he took her hands and kissed them. it was five o'clock. dr. templeton arrived, and had dora led to her bedroom, with a recommendation to rest quietly on the bed a while. "it is only a little weakness," said he; "her pulse is almost normal. this sort of thing is often caused by sudden emotion. it will soon be over, but i will stay near her for the present." "my plan is working well," said lorimer; "i will give the signal to philip. be careful that she does not enter this room until everything is ready." the doctor nodded assent, as he opened dora's door and disappeared inside. philip came upstairs, trembling like a culprit. when he looked around and took in the details of the poor studio, which was such a faithful copy of another dear to both, he could not restrain his emotion. all that dora had kept back from his knowledge, this pathetic room revealed to him. he had difficulty in keeping back his tears. "dora is there," whispered lorimer, pointing to the room. "ah, she is there!" he stepped softly over on tiptoe. through the door of this room, the heart of philip sent a message to dora: "if a man's devotion can revive a woman's long-lost smile, and redeem the wrong that he has thoughtlessly inflicted, you shall live joyously once more, cherished and adored. the remainder of my life shall be consecrated to your happiness." dr. templeton came into the studio, and announced that dora was sleeping. "to tell you the truth," said he to lorimer, "your plan frightened me somewhat at first. i was afraid that the shock might be a little too much for our fragile patient. she is far from strong, she has been overtaxing her strength, and the emotions of this day, followed up by such a scene as you have planned, would, i feared, be a heavy strain to subject her to. however, i have just carefully sounded her heart, and, thank heaven, i feel relieved. it is beating regularly enough now, and i think we can, in all security, try the little manoeuvre you suggest. it is a trifle melodramatic perhaps, but an excellent idea for all that." "well, then, to work at once," said lorimer. "let us proceed to make this room a still more faithful copy of the st. john's wood studio than dora has done, by adding to it the artist himself." philip, docile as a child in the hands of these two friends, lent himself to the scheme, and did exactly as he was bid. he began by taking off his coat and donning his working jacket, then, palette and brush in hand, he seated himself on the stool in front of the easel that bore the portrait of dora. "perfect," said lorimer, who surveyed every detail, as if he had been superintending a rehearsal of one of his plays. "if i am successful to-day, this scene will be my _chef-d'oeuvre_." dr. templeton went to dora's room and found her sleeping soundly. "she sleeps still," he said, as he rejoined the others; "do not let us disturb her. when she wakens, hobbs is going to let me know, and i will go in and fetch her." they remained talking together in hushed tones for about twenty minutes. hobbs opened the door, and made a sign to signify that the patient was awake. immediately dr. templeton rose and went to the bedroom, while lorimer lowered the blinds and darkened the studio, so that nothing could be clearly distinguished. philip again took up his position at the easel. "as soon as ever the room gets lighter, work away at the picture, so as to give the impression that you are finishing it, and take no notice of anything else around you.... hush, i think i hear her coming!" sounds were heard coming from dora's room. the door was opened slowly. "now then, attention!" whispered lorimer, "and quite steady, please, as the photographers say." the doctor led in dora, followed by hobbs. "how dark it is!" said dora; "have i slept a long while? mr. lorimer is gone, i suppose?" lorimer was watching from behind a screen the working out of his stratagem. "dear mrs. grantham," said dr. templeton, "i am going to make a particular request of you. i want to try an experiment. just to please me, would you mind taking this palette and these brushes, and seating yourself in front of that easel?" the reader remembers that dora had placed, side by side, in her poor room, the two easels that had so stood in philip's studio. "it is not exactly a favour i ask, it is a prescription that i have great faith in for you, and that may have great results--i beg of you!" "why, of course, with pleasure," said dora, allowing herself to be drawn towards the second easel. "now, mix your colours and prepare to do some painting." "but what shall i mix?" demanded dora; "i am only too willing to obey." "oh, never mind what--i am making a little experiment with you--that is all; i will tell you later on more about it--come, you can't refuse me. "but, my dear doctor, the room is too dark; i cannot see; is it evening already?" "you are right. i will give you some more light." little by little, the doctor raised the blind. philip did not stir. faithful to his instructions, as soon as the light was let in, he began assiduously using his brush. dora, languid and ignoring all that was taking place around her, was mechanically mixing her colours, while waiting for dr. templeton to tell her that he had finished his experiment, and that she might rise from her seat. the room was now quite light. "well, doctor," said she, "is it over?" she turned round, and saw philip at work on the portrait, and absorbed in his occupation, as he had been in the dear old days gone by. palette and pencils fell from her hands. she gazed silent and breathless. she took her head in both hands, as if to assure herself that she was awake and not dreaming. philip turned with an imploring look in his eyes. then, laying down his brush and palette, he rose slowly and stood with open arms. dora uttered one cry, "philip!" and, sobbing with joy, she buried her face in her husband's breast. "dora, my dora!" repeated philip, caressing the beautiful head that lay once more in his embrace. they remained for several minutes, oblivious of everything around, united in a new-found exquisite bliss. hobbs ran to hide her own tears and emotions in the bedroom of her beloved mistress. "well, my dear doctor," said lorimer, "we have had an afternoon's work, but it has been successful, eh?" "yes," replied dr. templeton, "she is saved." "and now i am going to wind up the old clock and set it going once more," said lorimer. this done, the two men softly stole out of the studio. and the old clock, with its good, round, cheery face, seemed to smile at philip and dora, while its tick-tack said, as plainly as could be, "here are the good days come again, and i will count their hours for you." the end printed by morrison and gibb limited edinburgh _frederick warne & co.'s publications_ in connection with the de willoughby claim. by frances hodgson burnett. in crown 8vo, cloth gilt, price 6s. "... we have no hesitation in saying that mrs. burnett's new work is one of the most moving novels of the year ... and it contains scenes of a most tender and pervading sweetness.... as is always the case in mrs. hodgson burnett's best work, it is the lovableness of her characters which gives such charm to her pages.... to pass from scenes of keen pathos to others of such tender charm, from the piteous figure of margery to that of the radiant sheba, is an employment which, however affecting to our emotions, is very fascinating.... it is an exceedingly attractive novel."--_daily telegraph._ "mrs. burnett has never written better than in this story. she has never delineated character more delicately, more sympathetically, her pathos has never been truer, her humor more engaging. the book gives one the impression of having been written with great and worthy care. no writer, not the very ablest, who made a point of turning out, say, three novels a year, could possibly have done anything so good as 'the de willoughby claim.' the book is well worthy to be read, and will be read by the wise."--_daily chronicle._ * * * * * vroni: the weaver's heart's dearest. by the late blanche willis howard. in crown 8vo, cloth gilt, price 6s. "'vroni' is one of those pathetic and charming stories which the reader does not readily forget. 'guenn' we had learnt to regard as miss howard's masterpiece, but in point of artistic finish, and perhaps in power, 'vroni' takes a higher position. it is the only novel, we believe, which has for its heroine a 'cook,' for such is vroni lindl, daughter of dionysius, the weaver, born and reared in the bleak hill-country between the danube and the neckar, known as the rough alp. dionysius was a simple man, peasant born 'with gentle ways and a soft mode of speech'; and vroni, his little mädel, was devoted to her father--indeed, worshipped him. it is this wonderful affection between father and child which forms the vein of gold that runs through the story. one word best expresses our feeling regarding the story--it is delightful."--_birmingham post._ * * * * * john gilbert, yeoman: a romance of the commonwealth. by richard soans. frontispiece and vignette illustration by lancelot speed. in crown 8vo, cloth gilt, gilt top, price 6s. "the stirring times of the commonwealth afford a fine setting for the romance, 'john gilbert, yeoman,' by r. g. soans. it is an ambitious work, but the author has produced a story which will bear comparison with the best historical fiction of modern writers. it is far above an immense mass of novels sent out recently; it is what may be described as a strong story, containing nothing flimsy or trivial, and in certain features it even recalls the romances of scott. nothing seems out of joint--foreign to the picture. what is presented is a seventeenth century england with seventeenth century figures. there is no undue straining after effect or of the probabilities.... events, exciting and dramatic, follow fast upon each other, and the interest is closely rivetted till the end. it is a story which deserves to find many readers."--_scotsman._ "quite a fragrant fresh feeling, redolent of the breezy rolling surrey downs, in which the story is laid, comes to one in reading the adventures, love, troubles and vicissitudes of the young hero farmer.... not the least recommendation of this romance of the commonwealth is its freedom from anything repulsive or objectionable."--_weekly sun._ * * * * * the fortress of yadasara: a narrative prepared from the manuscript of clinton verrall, esq. by christian lys. with original illustrations by lancelot speed. in crown 8vo, cloth gilt, gilt top, price 6s. to the lover of genuine romance this novel will bring pure enjoyment. clinton verrall, the hero, who narrates his adventures, claims to have discovered, on the southern slopes of one of the caucasian ranges, a marvellous and hitherto unknown land which, by a sudden and gigantic landslip, was cut off from the rest of europe and "stopped short" at the middle ages. of his singular adventures therein, his hairbreadth escapes, and final exit therefrom, we can only say they are well worth the reading, and the book is not likely to be laid aside unfinished. institute for the study of beat and bohemian literature (http://home.swbell.net/worchel/index.html) note: this book by henry murger, originally published in 1851, was the source of two operas titled "la bohème"--one by giacomo puccini (1896) and the other by ruggero leoncavallo (1897). project gutenberg also has the original french version of the book (scènes de la vie de bohème); see http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/18446. bohemians of the latin quarter by henry murger 1888 vizetelly & co. london table of contents preface chapter i, how the bohemian club was formed chapter ii, a good angel chapter iii, lenten loves chapter iv, ali rodolphe; or, the turk perforce chapter v, the carlovingian coin chapter vi, mademoiselle musette chapter vii, the billows of pactolus chapter viii, the cost of a five franc piece chapter ix, the white violets chapter x, the cape of storms chapter xi, a bohemian cafe chapter xii, a bohemian "at home" chapter xiii, the house warming chapter xiv, mademoiselle mimi chapter xv, donec gratus chapter xvi, the passage of the red sea chapter xvii, the toilette of the graces chapter xviii, francine's muff chapter xix, musette's fancies chapter xx, mimi in fine feather chapter xxi, romeo and juliet chapter xxii, epilogue to the loves of rodolphe and mademoiselle mimi chapter xxiii, youth is fleeting preface the bohemians of whom it is a question in this book have no connection with the bohemians whom melodramatists have rendered synonymous with robbers and assassins. neither are they recruited from among the dancing-bear leaders, sword swallowers, gilt watch-guard vendors, street lottery keepers and a thousand other vague and mysterious professionals whose main business is to have no business at all, and who are always ready to turn their hands to anything except good. the class of bohemians referred to in this book are not a race of today, they have existed in all climes and ages, and can claim an illustrious descent. in ancient greece, to go no farther back in this genealogy, there existed a celebrated bohemian, who lived from hand to mouth round the fertile country of ionia, eating the bread of charity, and halting in the evening to tune beside some hospitable hearth the harmonious lyre that had sung the loves of helen and the fall of troy. descending the steps of time modern bohemia finds ancestors at every artistic and literary epoch. in the middle ages it perpetuates the homeric tradition with its minstrels and ballad makers, the children of the gay science, all the melodious vagabonds of touraine, all the errant songsters who, with the beggar's wallet and the trouvere's harp slung at their backs, traversed, singing as they went, the plains of the beautiful land where the eglantine of clemence isaure flourished. at the transitional period between the days of chivalry and the dawn of the renaissance, bohemia continued to stroll along all the highways of the kingdom, and already to some extent about the streets of paris. there is master pierre gringoire, friend of the vagrants and foe to fasting. lean and famished as a man whose very existence is one long lent, he lounges about the town, his nose in the air like a pointer's, sniffing the odor from kitchen and cook shop. his eyes glittering with covetous gluttony cause the hams hung outside the pork butcher's to shrink by merely looking at them, whilst he jingles in imagination--alas! and not in his pockets--the ten crowns promised him by the echevins in payment of the pious and devout fare he has composed for the theater in the hall of the palais de justice. beside the doleful and melancholy figure of the lover of esmeralda, the chronicles of bohemia can evoke a companion of less ascetic humor and more cheerful face--master françois villon, par excellence, is this latter, and one whose poetry, full of imagination, is no doubt on account of those presentiments which the ancients attributed to their fates, continually marked by a singular foreboding of the gallows, on which the said villon one day nearly swung in a hempen collar for having looked too closely at the color of the king's crowns. this same villon, who more than once outran the watch started in his pursuit, this noisy guest at the dens of the rue pierre lescot, this spunger at the court of the duke of egypt, this salvator rosa of poesy, has strung together elegies the heartbreaking sentiment and truthful accents of which move the most pitiless and make them forget the ruffian, the vagabond and the debauchee, before this muse drowned in her own tears. besides, amongst all those whose but little known work has only been familiar to men for whom french literature does not begin the day when "malherbe came," françois villon has had the honor of being the most pillaged, even by the big-wigs of modern parnassus. they threw themselves upon the poor man's field and coined glory from his humble treasure. there are ballads scribbled under a penthouse at the street corner on a cold day by the bohemian rhapsodist, stanzas improvised in the hovel in which the "belle qui fut haultmire" loosened her gilt girdle to all comers, which now-a-days metamorphosed into dainty gallantries scented with musk and amber, figure in the armorial bearing enriched album of some aristocratic chloris. but behold the grand century of the renaissance opens, michaelangelo ascends the scaffolds of the sistine chapel and watches with anxious air young raphael mounting the steps of the vatican with the cartoon of the loggie under his arm. benvenuto cellini is meditating his perseus, ghiberti is carving the baptistery doors at the same time that donatello is rearing his marbles on the bridges of the arno; and whilst the city of the medici is staking masterpieces against that of leo x and julius ii, titian and paul veronese are rendering the home of doges illustrious. saint mark's competes with saint peter's. this fever of genius that had broken out suddenly in the italian peninsula with epidemic violence spreads its glorious contagion throughout europe. art, the rival of god, strides on, the equal of kings. charles v stoops to pick up titian's brush, and francis i dances attendance at the printing office where etienne dolet is perhaps correcting the proofs of "pantagruel." amidst this resurrection of intelligence, bohemia continued as in the past to seek, according to balzac's expression, a bone and a kennel. clement marot, the familiar of the ante-chamber of the louvre, became, even before she was a monarch's mistress, the favorite of that fair diana, whose smile lit up three reigns. from the boudoir of diane de poitiers, the faithless muse of the poet passed to that of marguerite de valois, a dangerous favor that marot paid for by imprisonment. almost at the same epoch another bohemian, whose childhood on the shores of sorrento had been caressed by the kisses of an epic muse, tasso, entered the court of the duke of ferrara as marot had that of francis i. but less fortunate than the lover of diane and marguerite, the author of "jerusalem delivered" paid with his reason and the loss of his genius the audacity of his love for a daughter of the house of este. the religious contests and political storms that marked the arrival of medicis in france did not check the soaring flight of art. at the moment when a ball struck on the scaffold of the fontaine des innocents jean goujon who had found the pagan chisel of phidias, ronsard discovered the lyre of pindar and founded, aided by his pleiad, the great french lyric school. to this school succeeded the reaction of malherbe and his fellows, who sought to drive from the french tongue all the exotic graces that their predecessors had tried to nationalize on parnassus. it was a bohemian, mathurin regnier, who was one of the last defenders of the bulwarks of poetry, assailed by the phalanx of rhetoricians and grammarians who declared rabelais barbarous and montaigne obscure. it was this same cynic, mathurin regnier, who, adding fresh knots to the satiric whip of horace, exclaimed, in indignation at the manners of his day, "honor is an old saint past praying to." the roll call of bohemia during the seventeenth century contains a portion of the names belonging to the literature of the reigns of louis xiii and louis xiv, it reckons members amongst the wits of the hôtel rambouillet, where it takes its share in the production of the "guirlande de julie," it has its entries into the palais cardinal, where it collaborates, in the tragedy of "marianne," with the poet-minister who was the robespierre of the monarchy. it bestrews the couch of marion delorme with madrigals, and woos ninon de l'enclos beneath the trees of the place royal; it breakfasts in the morning at the tavern of the goinfres or the epee royale, and sups in the evening at the table of the duc de joyeuse; it fights duels under a street lamp for the sonnet of urania against the sonnet of job. bohemia makes love, war, and even diplomacy, and in its old days, weary of adventures, it turns the old and new testament into poetry, figures on the list of benefices, and well nourished with fat prebendaryships, seats itself on an episcopal throne, or a chair of the academy, founded by one of its children. it was in the transition period between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries that appeared those two lofty geniuses, whom each of the nations amongst which they lived opposed to one another in their struggles of literary rivalry. moliere and shakespeare, those illustrious bohemians, whose fate was too nearly akin. the most celebrated names of the literature of the eighteenth century are also to be found in the archives of bohemia, which, amongst the glorious ones of this epoch, can cite jean jacques rousseau and d'alembert, the foundling of the porch of notre dame, and amongst the obscure, malfilâtre and gilbert, two overrated reputations, for the inspiration of the one was but a faint reflection of the weak lyricism of jean baptiste rousseau, and the inspiration of the other but the blending of proud impotence with a hatred which had not even the excuse of initiative and sincerity, since it was only the paid instrument of party rancour. we close with this epoch this brief summary of bohemia in different ages, a prolegomena besprinkled with illustrious names that we have purposely placed at the beginning of this work, to put the reader on his guard against any misapplication he might fall into on encountering the title of bohemians; long bestowed upon classes from which those whose manners and language we have striven to depict hold it an honor to differ. today, as of old, every man who enters on an artistic career, without any other means of livelihood than his art itself, will be forced to walk in the paths of bohemia. the greater number of our contemporaries who display the noblest blazonry of art have been bohemians, and amidst their calm and prosperous glory they often recall, perhaps with regret, the time when, climbing the verdant slope of youth, they had no other fortune in the sunshine of their twenty years than courage, which is the virtue of the young, and hope, which is the wealth of the poor. for the uneasy reader, for the timorous citizen, for all those for whom an "i" can never be too plainly dotted in definition, we repeat as an axiom: "bohemia is a stage in artistic life; it is the preface to the academy, the hôtel dieu, or the morgue." we will add that bohemia only exists and is only possible in paris. we will begin with unknown bohemians, the largest class. it is made up of the great family of poor artists, fatally condemned to the law of incognito, because they cannot or do not know how to obtain a scrap of publicity, to attest their existence in art, and by showing what they are already prove what they may some day become. they are the race of obstinate dreamers for whom art has remained a faith and not a profession; enthusiastic folk of strong convictions, whom the sight of a masterpiece is enough to throw into a fever, and whose loyal heart beats high in presence of all that is beautiful, without asking the name of the master and the school. this bohemian is recruited from amongst those young fellows of whom it is said that they give great hopes, and from amongst those who realize the hopes given, but who, from carelessness, timidity, or ignorance of practical life, imagine that everything is done that can be when the work is completed, and wait for public admiration and fortune to break in on them by escalade and burglary. they live, so to say, on the outskirts of life, in isolation and inertia. petrified in art, they accept to the very letter the symbolism of the academical dithyrambic, which places an aureola about the heads of poets, and, persuaded that they are gleaming in their obscurity, wait for others to come and seek them out. we used to know a small school composed of men of this type, so strange, that one finds it hard to believe in their existence; they styled themselves the disciples of art for art's sake. according to these simpletons, art for art's sake consisted of deifying one another, in abstaining from helping chance, who did not even know their address, and in waiting for pedestals to come of their own accord and place themselves under them. it is, as one sees, the ridiculousness of stoicism. well, then we again affirm, there exist in the heart of unknown bohemia, similar beings whose poverty excites a sympathetic pity which common sense obliges you to go back on, for if you quietly remark to them that we live in the nineteenth century, that the five-franc piece is the empress of humanity, and that boots do not drop already blacked from heaven, they turn their backs on you and call you a tradesman. for the rest, they are logical in their mad heroism, they utter neither cries nor complainings, and passively undergo the obscure and rigorous fate they make for themselves. they die for the most part, decimated by that disease to which science does not dare give its real name, want. if they would, however, many could escape from this fatal _denouement_ which suddenly terminates their life at an age when ordinary life is only beginning. it would suffice for that for them to make a few concessions to the stern laws of necessity; for them to know how to duplicate their being, to have within themselves two natures, the poet ever dreaming on the lofty summits where the choir of inspired voices are warbling, and the man, worker-out of his life, able to knead his daily bread, but this duality which almost always exists among strongly tempered natures, of whom it is one of the distinctive characteristics, is not met with amongst the greater number of these young fellows, whom pride, a bastard pride, has rendered invulnerable to all the advice of reason. thus they die young, leaving sometimes behind them a work which the world admires later on and which it would no doubt have applauded sooner if it had not remained invisible. in artistic struggles it is almost the same as in war, the whole of the glory acquired falls to the leaders; the army shares as its reward the few lines in a dispatch. as to the soldiers struck down in battle, they are buried where they fall, and one epitaph serves for twenty thousand dead. so, too, the crowd, which always has its eyes fixed on the rising sun, never lowers its glance towards that underground world where the obscure workers are struggling; their existence finishes unknown and without sometimes even having had the consolation of smiling at an accomplished task, they depart from this life, enwrapped in a shroud of indifference. there exists in ignored bohemia another fraction; it is composed of young fellows who have been deceived, or have deceived themselves. they mistake a fancy for a vocation, and impelled by a homicidal fatality, they die, some the victims of a perpetual fit of pride, others worshippers of a chimera. the paths of art, so choked and so dangerous, are, despite encumberment and obstacles, day by day more crowded, and consequently bohemians were never more numerous. if one sought out all the causes that have led to this influx, one might perhaps come across the following. many young fellows have taken the declamations made on the subject of unfortunate poets and artists quite seriously. the names of gilbert, malfilâtre, chatterton, and moreau have been too often, too imprudently, and, above all, too uselessly uttered. the tomb of these unfortunates has been converted into a pulpit, from whence has been preached the martyrdom of art and poetry, "farewell mankind, ye stony-hearted host, flint-bosomed earth and sun with frozen ray, from out amidst you, solitary ghost i glide unseen away." this despairing song of victor escousse, stifled by the pride which had been implanted in him by a factitious triumph, was for a time the "marseillaise" of the volunteers of art who were bent on inscribing their names on the martyrology of mediocrity. for these funereal apotheoses, these encomiastic requiems, having all the attraction of the abyss for weak minds and ambitious vanities, many of these yielding to this attraction have thought that fatality was the half of genius; many have dreamt of the hospital bed on which gilbert died, hoping that they would become poets, as he did a quarter of an hour before dying, and believing that it was an obligatory stage in order to arrive at glory. too much blame cannot be attached to these immortal falsehoods, these deadly paradoxes, which turn aside from the path in which they might have succeeded so many people who come to a wretched ending in a career in which they incommode those to whom a true vocation only gives the right of entering on it. it is these dangerous preachings, this useless posthumous exaltations, that have created the ridiculous race of the unappreciated, the whining poets whose muse has always red eyes and ill-combed locks, and all the mediocrities of impotence who, doomed to non-publication, call the muse a harsh stepmother, and art an executioner. all truly powerful minds have their word to say, and, indeed, utter it sooner or later. genius or talent are not unforeseen accidents in humanity; they have a cause of existence, and for that reason cannot always remain in obscurity, for, if the crowd does not come to seek them, they know how to reach it. genius is the sun, everyone sees it. talent is the diamond that may for a long time remain hidden in obscurity, but which is always perceived by some one. it is, therefore, wrong to be moved to pity over the lamentations and stock phrases of that class of intruders and inutilities entered upon an artistic career in which idleness, debauchery, and parasitism form the foundations of manners. axiom, "unknown bohemianism is not a path, it is a blind alley." indeed, this life is something that does not lead to anything. it is a stultified wretchedness, amidst which intelligence dies out like a lamp in a place without air, in which the heart grows petrified in a fierce misanthropy, and in which the best natures become the worst. if one has the misfortune to remain too long and to advance too far in this blind alley one can no longer get out, or one emerges by dangerous breaches and only to fall into an adjacent bohemia, the manners of which belong to another jurisdiction than that of literary physiology. we will also cite a singular variety of bohemians who might be called amateurs. they are not the least curious. they find in bohemian life an existence full of seductions, not to dine every day, to sleep in the open air on wet nights, and to dress in nankeen in the month of december seems to them the paradise of human felicity, and to enter it some abandon the family home, and others the study which leads to an assured result. they suddenly turn their backs upon an honorable future to seek the adventure of a hazardous career. but as the most robust cannot stand a mode of living that would render hercules consumptive, they soon give up the game, and, hastening back to the paternal roast joint, marry their little cousins, set up as a notary in a town of thirty thousand inhabitants, and by their fireside of an evening have the satisfaction of relating their artistic misery with the magniloquence of a traveller narrating a tiger hunt. others persist and put their self-esteem in it, but when once they have exhausted those resources of credit which a young fellow with well-to-do relatives can always find, they are more wretched than the real bohemians, who, never having had any other resources, have at least those of intelligence. we knew one of these amateur bohemians who, after having remained three years in bohemia and quarrelled with his family, died one morning, and was taken to the common grave in a pauper's hearse. he had ten thousand francs a year. it is needless to say that these bohemians have nothing whatever in common with art, and that they are the most obscure amongst the least known of ignored bohemia. we now come to the real bohemia, to that which forms, in part, the subject of this book. those who compose it are really amongst those called by art, and have the chance of being also amongst its elect. this bohemia, like the others, bristles with perils, two abysses flank it on either side--poverty and doubt. but between these two gulfs there is at least a road leading to a goal which the bohemians can see with their eyes, pending the time when they shall touch it with their hand. it is official bohemia so-called because those who form part of it have publicly proved their existence, have signalised their presence in the world elsewhere than on a census list, have, to employ one of their own expressions, "their name in the bill," who are known in the literary and artistic market, and whose products, bearing their stamp, are current there, at moderate rates it is true. to arrive at their goal, which is a settled one, all roads serve, and the bohemians know how to profit by even the accidents of the route. rain or dust, cloud or sunshine, nothing checks these bold adventurers, whose sins are backed by virtue. their mind is kept ever on the alert by their ambition, which sounds a charge in front and urges them to the assault of the future; incessantly at war with necessity, their invention always marching with lighted match blows up the obstacle almost before it incommodes them. their daily existence is a work of genius, a daily problem which they always succeed in solving by the aid of audacious mathematics. they would have forced harpagon to lend them money, and have found truffles on the raft of the "medusa." at need, too, they know how to practice abstinence with all the virtue of an anchorite, but if a slice of fortune falls into their hands you will see them at once mounted on the most ruinous fancies, loving the youngest and prettiest, drinking the oldest and best, and never finding sufficient windows to throw their money out of. then, when their last crown is dead and buried, they begin to dine again at that table spread by chance, at which their place is always laid, and, preceded by a pack of tricks, go poaching on all the callings that have any connection with art, hunting from morn till night that wild beast called a five-franc piece. the bohemians know everything and go everywhere, according as they have patent leather pumps or burst boots. they are to be met one day leaning against the mantel-shelf in a fashionable drawing room, and the next seated in the arbor of some suburban dancing place. they cannot take ten steps on the boulevard without meeting a friend, and thirty, no matter where, without encountering a creditor. bohemians speak amongst themselves a special language borrowed from the conversation of the studios, the jargon of behind the scenes, and the discussions of the editor's room. all the eclecticisms of style are met with in this unheard of idiom, in which apocalyptic phrases jostle cock and bull stories, in which the rusticity of a popular saying is wedded to extravagant periods from the same mold in which cyrano de bergerac cast his tirades; in which the paradox, that spoilt child of modern literature, treats reason as the pantaloon is treated in a pantomime; in which irony has the intensity of the strongest acids and the skill of those marksmen who can hit the bull's-eye blindfold; a slang intelligent, though unintelligible to those who have not its key, and the audacity of which surpasses that of the freest tongues. this bohemian vocabulary is the hell of rhetoric and the paradise of neologism. such is in brief that bohemian life, badly known to the puritans of society, decried by the puritans of art, insulted by all the timorous and jealous mediocrities who cannot find enough of outcries, lies, and calumnies to drown the voices and the names of those who arrive through the vestibule to renown by harnessing audacity to their talent. a life of patience, of courage, in which one cannot fight unless clad in a strong armour of indifference impervious to the attacks of fools and the envious, in which one must not, if one would not stumble on the road, quit for a single moment that pride in oneself which serves as a leaning staff; a charming and a terrible life, which has conquerors and its martyrs, and on which one should not enter save in resigning oneself in advance to submit to the pitiless law _væ victis_. h. m. chapter i how the bohemian club was formed one morning--it was the eighth of april--alexander schaunard, who cultivated the two liberal arts of painting and music, was rudely awakened by the peal of a neighbouring cock, which served him for an alarm. "by jove!" exclaimed schaunard, "my feathered clock goes too fast: it cannot possibly be today yet!" so saying, he leaped precipitately out of a piece of furniture of his own ingenious contrivance, which, sustaining the part of bed by night, (sustaining it badly enough too,) did duty by day for all the rest of the furniture which was absent by reason of the severe cold for which the past winter had been noted. to protect himself against the biting north-wind, schaunard slipped on in haste a pink satin petticoat with spangled stars, which served him for dressing-gown. this gay garment had been left at the artist's lodging, one masked-ball night, by a _folie_, who was fool enough to let herself be entrapped by the deceitful promises of schaunard when, disguised as a marquis, he rattled in his pocket a seducingly sonorous dozen of crowns--theatrical money punched out of a lead plate and borrowed of a property-man. having thus made his home toilette, the artist proceeded to open his blind and window. a solar ray, like an arrow of light, flashed suddenly into the room, and compelled him to open his eyes that were still veiled by the mists of sleep. at the same moment the clock of a neighbouring church struck five. "it is the morn herself!" muttered schaunard; "astonishing, but"--and he consulted an almanac nailed to the wall--"not the less a mistake. the results of science affirm that at this season of the year the sun ought not to rise till half-past five: it is only five o'clock, and there he is! a culpable excess of zeal! the luminary is wrong; i shall have to make a complaint to the longitude-office. however, i must begin to be a little anxious. today is the day after yesterday, certainly; and since yesterday was the seventh, unless old saturn goes backward, it must be the eighth of april today. and if i may believe this paper," continued schaunard, going to read an official notice-to-quit posted on the wall, "today, therefore, at twelve precisely, i ought to have evacuated the premises, and paid into the hands of my landlord, monsieur bernard, the sum of seventy-five francs for three quarters' rent due, which he demands of me in very bad handwriting. i had hoped--as i always do--that providence would take the responsibility of discharging this debt, but it seems it hasn't had time. well, i have six hours before me yet. by making good use of them, perhaps--to work! to work!" he was preparing to put on an overcoat, originally of a long-haired, woolly fabric, but now completely bald from age, when suddenly, as if bitten by a tarantula, he began to execute around the room a polka of his own composition, which at the public balls had often caused him to be honoured with the particular attention of the police. "by jove!" he exclaimed, "it is surprising how the morning air gives one ideas! it strikes me that i am on the scent of my air; let's see." and, half-dressed as he was, schaunard seated himself at his piano. after having waked the sleeping instrument by a terrific hurly-burly of notes, he began, talking to himself all the while, to hunt over the keys for the tune he had long been seeking. "do, sol, mi, do la, si, do re. bah! it's as false as judas, that re!" and he struck violently on the doubtful note. "we must represent adroitly the grief of a young person picking to pieces a white daisy over a blue lake. there's an idea that's not in its infancy! however, since it is fashion, and you couldn't find a music publisher who would dare to publish a ballad without a blue lake in it, we must go with the fashion. do, sol, mi, do, la, si, do, re! that's not so bad; it gives a fair idea of a daisy, especially to people well up in botany. la, si, do, re. confound that re! now to make the blue lake intelligible. we should have something moist, azure, moonlight--for the moon comes in too; here it is; don't let's forget the swan. fa, mi, la, sol," continued schaunard, rattling over the keys. "lastly, an adieu of the young girl, who determines to throw herself into the blue lake, to rejoin her beloved who is buried under the snow. the catastrophe is not very perspicuous, but decidedly interesting. we must have something tender, melancholy. it's coming, it's coming! here are a dozen bars crying like magdalens, enough to split one's heart--brr, brr!" and schaunard shivered in his spangled petticoat, "if it could only split one's wood! there's a beam in my alcove which bothers me a good deal when i have company at dinner. i should like to make a fire with it--la, la, re, mi--for i feel my inspiration coming to me through the medium of a cold in the head. so much the worse, but it can't be helped. let us continue to drown our young girl;" and while his fingers assailed the trembling keys, schaunard, with sparkling eyes and straining ears, gave chase to the melody which, like an impalpable sylph, hovered amid the sonorous mist which the vibrations of the instrument seemed to let loose in the room. "now let us see," he continued, "how my music will fit into my poet's words;" and he hummed, in voice the reverse of agreeable, this fragment of verse of the patent comic-opera sort: "the fair and youthful maiden, as she flung her mantle by, threw a glance with sorrow laden up to the starry sky and in the azure waters of the silver-waved lake." "how is that?" he exclaimed, in transports of just indignation; "the azure waters of a silver lake! i didn't see that. this poet is an idiot. i'll bet he never saw a lake, or silver either. a stupid ballad too, in every way; the length of the lines cramps the music. for the future i shall compose my verses myself; and without waiting, since i feel in the humour, i shall manufacture some couplets to adapt my melody to." so saying, and taking his head between his hands, he assumed the grave attitude of a man who is having relations with the muses. after a few minutes of this sacred intercourse, he had produced one of those strings of nonsense-verses which the libretti-makers call, not without reason, monsters, and which they improvise very readily as a ground-work for the composer's inspiration. only schaunard's were no nonsense-verses, but very good sense, expressing with sufficient clearness the inquietude awakened in his mind by the rude arrival of that date, the eighth of april. thus they ran: "eight and eight make sixteen just, put down six and carry one: my poor soul would be at rest could i only find some one, some honest poor relation, who'd eight hundred francs advance, to pay each obligation, whenever i've a chance." chorus "and ere the clock on the last and fatal morning should sound mid-day, to old bernard, like a man who needs no warning, to old bernard, like a man who needs no warning, to old bernard, like a man who needs no warning, my rent i'd pay!" "the duece!" exclaimed schaunard, reading over his composition, "one and some one--those rhymes are poor enough, but i have no time to make them richer. now let us try how the notes will unite with the syllables." and in his peculiarly frightful nasal tone he recommenced the execution of his ballad. satisfied with the result he had just obtained, schaunard congratulated himself with an exultant grimace, which mounted over his nose like a circumflex accent whenever he had occasion to be pleased with himself. but this triumphant happiness was destined to have no long duration. eleven o'clock resounded from the neighbouring steeple. every stroke diffused itself through the room in mocking sounds which seemed to say to the unlucky schaunard, "are you ready?" the artist bounded on his chair. "the time flies like a bird!" he exclaimed. "i have but three-quarters of an hour left to find my seventy-five francs and my new lodging. i shall never get them; that would be too much like magic. let me see: i give myself five minutes to find out how to obtain them;" and burying his head between his knees, he descended into the depths of reflection. the five minutes elapsed, and schaunard raised his head without having found anything which resembled seventy-five francs. "decidedly, i have but one way of getting out of this, which is simply to go away. it is fine weather and my friend monsieur chance may be walking in the sun. he must give me hospitality till i have found the means of squaring off with monsieur bernard." having stuffed into the cellar-like pockets of his overcoat all the articles they would hold, schaunard tied up some linen in a handkerchief, and took an affectionate farewell of his home. while crossing the court, he was suddenly stopped by the porter, who seemed to be on the watch for him. "hallo! monsieur schaunard," cried he, blocking up the artist's way, "don't you remember that this is the eighth of april?" "eight and eight make sixteen just, put down six and carry one," hummed schaunard. "i don't remember anything else." "you are a little behindhand then with your moving," said the porter; "it is half-past eleven, and the new tenant to whom your room has been let may come any minute. you must make haste." "let me pass, then," replied schaunard; "i am going after a cart." "no doubt, but before moving there is a little formality to be gone through. i have orders not to let you take away a hair unless you pay the three quarters due. are you ready?" "why, of course," said schaunard, making a step forward. "well come into my lodge then, and i will give you your receipt." "i shall take it when i come back." "but why not at once?" persisted the porter. "i am going to a money changer's. i have no change." "ah, you are going to get change!" replied the other, not at all at his ease. "then i will take care of that little parcel under your arm, which might be in your way." "monsieur porter," exclaimed the artist, with a dignified air, "you mistrust me, perhaps! do you think i am carrying away my furniture in a handkerchief?" "excuse me," answered the porter, dropping his tone a little, "but such are my orders. monsieur bernard has expressly charged me not to let you take away a hair before you have paid." "but look, will you?" said schaunard, opening his bundle, "these are not hairs, they are shirts, and i am taking them to my washerwoman, who lives next door to the money changer's twenty steps off." "that alters the case," said the porter, after he had examined the contents of the bundle. "would it be impolite, monsieur schaunard, to inquire your new address?" "rue de rivoli!" replied the artist, and having once got outside the gate, he made off as fast as possible. "rue de rivoli!" muttered the porter, scratching his nose, "it's very odd they should have let him lodgings in the rue de rivoli, and never come here to ask about him. very odd, that. at any rate, he can't carry off his furniture without paying. if only the new tenant don't come moving in just as monsieur schaunard is moving out! that would make a nice mess! well, sure enough," he exclaimed, suddenly putting his head out of his little window, "here he comes, the new tenant!" in fact, a young man in a white hat, followed by a porter who did not seem over-burdened by the weight of his load, had just entered the court. "is my room ready?" he demanded of the house-porter, who had stepped out to meet him. "not yet, sir, but it will be in a moment. the person who occupies it has gone after a cart for his things. meanwhile, sir, you may put your furniture in the court." "i am afraid it's going to rain," replied the young man, chewing a bouquet of violets which he held in his mouth, "my furniture might be spoiled. my friend," continued he, turning to the man who was behind him, with something on a trunk which the porter could not exactly make out, "put that down and go back to my old lodging to fetch the remaining valuables." the man ranged along the wall several frames six or seven feet high, folded together, and apparently being capable of being extended. "look here," said the new-comer to his follower, half opening one of the screens and showing him a rent in the canvas, "what an accident! you have cracked my grand venetian glass. take more care on your second trip, especially with my library." "what does he mean by his venetian glass?" muttered the porter, walking up and down with an uneasy air before the frames ranged against the wall. "i don't see any glass. some joke, no doubt. i only see a screen. we shall see, at any rate, what he will bring next trip." "is your tenant not going to make room for me soon?" inquired the young man, "it is half-past twelve, and i want to move in." "he won't be much longer," answered the porter, "but there is no harm done yet, since your furniture has not come," added he, with a stress on the concluding words. as the young man was about to reply, a dragoon entered the court. "is this monsieur bernard's?" he asked, drawing a letter from a huge leather portfolio which swung at his side. "he lives here," replied the porter. "here is a letter for him," said the dragoon; "give me a receipt," and he handed to the porter a bulletin of despatches which the latter entered his lodge to sign. "excuse me for leaving you alone," said he to the young man who was stalking impatiently about the court, "but this is a letter from the minister to my landlord, and i am going to take it up to him." monsieur bernard was just beginning to shave when the porter knocked at his door. "what do you want, durand?" "sir," replied the other, lifting his cap, "a soldier has just brought this for you. it comes from the ministry." and he handed to monsieur bernard the letter, the envelope of which bore the stamp of the war department. "heavens!" exclaimed monsieur bernard, in such agitation that he all but cut himself. "from the minister of war! i am sure it is my nomination as knight of the legion of honour, which i have long solicited. at last they have done justice to my good conduct. here, durand," said he, fumbling in his waistcoat-pocket, "here are five francs to drink to my health. stay! i haven't my purse about me. wait, and i will give you the money in a moment." the porter was so overcome by this stunning fit of generosity, which was not at all in accordance with his landlord's ordinary habits, that he absolutely put on his cap again. but monsieur bernard, who at any other time would have severely reprimanded this infraction of the laws of social hierarchy, appeared not to notice it. he put on his spectacles, broke the seal of the envelope with the respectful anxiety of a vizier receiving a sultan's firman, and began to read the dispatch. at the first line a frightful grimace ploughed his fat, monk-like cheeks with crimson furrows, and his little eyes flashed sparks that seemed ready to set fire to his bushy wig. in fact, all his features were so turned upside-down that you would have said his countenance had just suffered a shock of face-quake. for these were the contents of the letter bearing the ministerial stamp, brought by a dragoon--orderly, and for which durand had given the government a receipt: "friend landlord: politeness-who, according to ancient mythology, is the grandmother of good manners--compels me to inform you that i am under the cruel necessity of not conforming to the prevalent custom of paying rent--prevalent especially when the rent is due. up to this morning i had cherished the hope of being able to celebrate this fair day by the payments of my three quarters. vain chimera, bitter illusion! while i was slumbering on the pillow of confidence, ill-luck--what the greeks call _ananke_--was scattering my hopes. the returns on which i counted--times are so bad!-have failed, and of the considerable sums which i was to receive i have only realised three francs, which were lent me, and i will not insult you by the offer of them. better days will come for our dear country and for me. doubt it not, sir! when they come, i shall fly to inform you of their arrival, and to withdraw from your lodgings the precious objects which i leave there, putting them under your protection and that of the law, which hinders you from selling them before the expiration of a year, in case you should be disposed to try to do so with the object of obtaining the sum for which you stand credited in the ledger of my honesty. i commend to your special care my piano, and also the large frame containing sixty locks of hair whose different colours run through the whole gamut of capillary shades; the scissors of love have stolen them from the forehead of the graces." "therefore, dear sir, and landlord, you may dispose of the roof under which i have dwelt. i grant you full authority, and have hereto set my hand and seal." "alexander schaunard" on finishing this letter, (which the artist had written at the desk of a friend who was a clerk in the war office,) monsieur bernard indignantly crushed it in his hand, and as his glance fell on old durand, who was waiting for the promised gratification, he roughly demanded what he was doing. "waiting, sir." "for what?" "for the present, on account of the good news," stammered the porter. "get out, you scoundrel! do you presume to speak to me with your cap on?" "but, sir--" "don't you answer me! get out! no, stay there! we shall go up to the room of that scamp of an artist who has run off without paying." "what! monsieur schaunard?" ejaculated the porter. "yes," cried the landlord with increasing fury, "and if he has carried away the smallest article, i send you off, straight off!" "but it can't be," murmured the poor porter, "monsieur schaunard has not run away. he has gone to get change to pay you, and order a cart for his furniture." "a cart for his furniture!" exclaimed the other, "run! i'm sure he has it here. he laid a trap to get you away from your lodge, fool that you are!" "fool that i am! heaven help me!" cried the porter, all in a tremble before the thundering wrath of his superior, who hurried him down the stairs. when they arrived in the court the porter was hailed by the young man in the white hat. "come now! am i not soon going to be in possession of my lodging? is this the eighth of april? did i hire a room here and pay you a deposit to bind the bargain? yes or no?" "excuse me, sir," interposed the landlord, "i am at your service. durand, i will talk to the gentleman myself. run up there, that scamp schaunard has come back to pack up. if you find him, shut him in, and then come down again and run for the police." old durand vanished up the staircase. "excuse me, sir," continued the landlord, with a bow to the young man now left alone with him, "to whom have i the honour of speaking?" "your new tenant. i have hired a room in the sixth story of this house, and am beginning to be tired of waiting for my lodging to become vacant." "i am very sorry indeed," replied monsieur bernard, "there has been a little difficulty with one of my tenants, the one whom you are to replace." "sir," cried old durand from a window at the very top of the house, "monsieur schaunard is not here, but his room--stupid!--i mean he has carried nothing away, not a hair, sir!" "very well, come down," replied the landlord. "have a little patience, i beg of you," he continued to the young man. "my porter will bring down to the cellar the furniture in the room of my defaulting tenant, and you may take possession in half an hour. beside, your furniture has not come yet." "but it has," answered the young man quietly. monsieur bernard looked around, and saw only the large screens which had already mystified his porter. "how is this?" he muttered. "i don't see anything." "behold!" replied the youth, unfolding the leaves of the frame, and displaying to the view of the astonished landlord a magnificent interior of a palace, with jasper columns, bas-reliefs, and paintings of old masters. "but your furniture?" demanded monsieur bernard. "here it is," replied the young man, pointing to the splendid furniture _painted_ in the palace, which he had bought at a sale of second-hand theatrical decorations. "i hope you have some more serious furniture than this," said the landlord. "you know i must have security for my rent." "the deuce! is a palace not sufficient security for the rent of a garret?" "no sir, i want real chairs and tables in solid mahogany." "alas! neither gold nor mahogany makes us happy, as for the ancient poet well says. and i can't bear mahogany; it's too common a wood. everybody has it." "but surely sir, you must have some sort of furniture." "no, it takes up too much room. you are stuck full of chairs, and have no place to sit down." "but at any rate, you have a bed. what do you sleep on?" "on a good conscience, sir." "excuse me, one more question," said the landlord, "what is your profession?" at this very moment the young man's porter, returning on his second trip, entered the court. among the articles with which his truck was loaded, an easel occupied a conspicuous position. "sir! sir!!" shrieked old durance, pointing out the easel to his landlord, "it's a painter!" "i was sure he was an artist!" exclaimed the landlord in his turn, the hair of his wig standing up in affright, "a painter!! and you never inquired after this person," he continued to his porter, "you didn't know what he did!" "he gave me five francs _arrest_," answered the poor fellow, "how could i suspect--" "when you have finished," put in the stranger-"sir," replied monsieur bernard, mounting his spectacles with great decision, "since you have no furniture, you can't come in. the law authorizes me to refuse a tenant who brings no security." "and my word, then?" "your word is not furniture, you must go somewhere else. durance will give you back your earnest money." "oh dear!" exclaimed the porter, in consternation, "i've put it in the savings' bank." "but consider sir," objected the young man. "i can't find another lodging in a moment! at least grant me hospitality for a day." "go to a hotel!" replied monsieur bernard. "by the way," added he, struck with a sudden idea, "if you like, i can let you a furnished room, the one you were to occupy, which has the furniture of my defaulting tenant in it. only you know that when rooms are let this way, you pay in advance." "well," said the artist, finding he could do no better, "i should like to know what you are going to ask me for your hole." "it is a very comfortable lodging, and the rent will be twenty-five francs a month, considering the circumstances, paid in advance." "you have said that already, the expression does not deserve being repeated," said the young man, feeling in his pocket. "have you change for five hundred francs?" "i beg your pardon," quoth the astonished landlord. "five hundred, half a thousand; did you never see one before?" continued the artist, shaking the bank-note in the faces of the landlord and porter, who fairly lost their balance at the sight. "you shall have it in a moment, sir," said the now respectful owner of the house, "there will only be twenty francs to take out, for durand will return your deposit." "he may keep it," replied the artist, "on condition of coming every morning to tell me the day of the week and month, the quarter of the moon, the weather it is going to be, and the form of government we are under." old durand described an angle of ninety degrees forward. "yes, my good fellow, you shall serve me for almanac. meanwhile, help my porter to bring the things in." "i shall send you your receipt immediately," said the landlord, and that very night the painter marcel was installed in the lodging of the fugitive schaunard. during this time the aforesaid schaunard was beating his roll-call, as he styled it, through the city. schaunard had carried the art of borrowing to the perfection of a science. foreseeing the possible necessity of having to _spoil the foreigners_, he had learned how to ask for five francs in every language of the world. he had thoroughly studied all the stratagems which specie employs to escape those who are hunting for it, and knew, better than a pilot knows the hours of the tide, at what periods it was high or low water; that is to say, on what days his friends and acquaintances were accustomed to be in funds. accordingly, there were houses where his appearance of a morning made people say, not "here is monsieur schaunard," but "this is the first or the fifteenth." to facilitate, and at the same time equalize this species of tax which he was going to levy, when compelled by necessity, from those who were able to pay it to him, schaunard had drawn up by districts and streets an alphabetical table containing the names of all his acquaintances. opposite each name was inscribed the maximum of the sum which the party's finances authorized the artist to borrow of him, the time when he was flush, and his dinner hour, as well as his usual bill of fare. beside this table, he kept a book, in perfect order, on which he entered the sums lent him, down to the smallest fraction; for he would never burden himself beyond a certain amount which was within the fortune of a country relative, whose heir-apparent he was. as soon as he owed one person twenty francs, he closed the account and paid him off, even if obliged to borrow for the purpose of those to whom he owed less. in this way he always kept up a certain credit which he called his floating debt, and as people knew that he was accustomed to repay as soon as his means permitted him, those who could accommodate him were very ready to do so. but on the present occasion, from eleven in the morning, when he had started to try and collect the seventy-five francs requisite, up to six in the afternoon, he had only raised three francs, contributed by three letters (m., v., and r.) of his famous list. all the rest of the alphabet, having, like himself, their quarter to pay, had adjourned his claim indefinitely. the clock of his stomach sounded the dinner-hour. he was then at the maine barrier, where letter u lived. schaunard mounted to letter u's room, where he had a knife and fork, when there were such articles on the premises. "where are you going, sir?" asked the porter, stopping him before he had completed his ascent. "to monsieur u," replied the artist. "he's out." "and madame?" "out too. they told me to say to a friend who was coming to see them this evening, that they were gone out to dine. in fact, if you are the gentleman they expected, this is the address they left." it was a scrap of paper on which his friend u. had written. "we are gone to dine with schaunard, no.__, rue de__. come for us there." "well," said he, going away, "accident does make queer farces sometimes." then remembering that there was a little tavern near by, where he had more than once procured a meal at a not unreasonable rate, he directed his steps to this establishment, situated in the adjoining road, and known among the lowest class of artistdom as "mother cadet's." it is a drinking-house which is also an eating-house, and its ordinary customers are carters of the orleans railway, singing-ladies of mont parnasse, and juvenile "leads" from the bobino theatre. during the warm season the students of the numerous painters' studios which border on the luxembourg, the unappreciated and unedited men of the letters, the writers of leaders in mysterious newspapers, throng to dine at "mother cadet's," which is famous for its rabbit stew, its veritable sour-crout, and a miled white wine which smacks of flint. schaunard sat down in the grove; for so at "mother cadet's" they called the scattered foliage of two or three rickety trees whose sickly boughs had been trained into a sort of arbor. "hang the expense!" said schaunard to himself, "i have to have a good blow-out, a regular belthazzar's feast in private life," and without more ado, he ordered a bowl of soup, half a plate of sour-crout, and two half stews, having observed that you get more for two halves than one whole one. this extensive order attracted the attention of a young person in white with a head-dress of orange flowers and ballshoes; a veil of _sham imitation_ lace streamed down her shoulders, which she had no special reason to be proud of. she was a _prima donna_ of the mont parnasse theatre, the greenroom of which opens into mother cadet's kitchen; she had come to take a meal between two acts of _lucia_, and was at that moment finishing with a small cup of coffee her dinner, composed exclusively of an artichoke seasoned with oil and vinegar. "two stews! duece take it!" said she, in an aside to the girl who acted as waiter at the establishment. "that young man feeds himself well. how much do i owe, adele?" "artichoke four, coffee four, bread one, that makes nine sous." "there they are," said the singer and off she went humming: "this affection heaven has given." "why she is giving us the la!" exclaimed a mysterious personage half hidden behind a rampart of old books, who was seated at the same table with schaunard. "giving it!" replied the other, "keeping it, i should say. just imagine!" he added, pointing to the vinegar on the plate from which lucia had been eating her artichoke, "pickling that falsetto of hers!" "it is a strong acid, to be sure," added the personage who had first spoken. "they make some at orleans which has deservedly a great reputation." schaunard carefully examined this individual, who was thus fishing for a conversation with him. the fixed stare of his large blue eyes, which always seemed looking for something, gave his features the character of happy tranquility which is common among theological students. his face had a uniform tint of old ivory, except his cheeks, which had a coat, as it were of brickdust. his mouth seemed to have been sketched by a student in the rudiments of drawing, whose elbow had been jogged while he was tracing it. his lips, which pouted almost like a negro's, disclosed teeth not unlike a stag-hound's and his double-chin reposed itself upon a white cravat, one of whose points threatened the stars, while the other was ready to pierce the ground. a torrent of light hair escaped from under the enormous brim of his well-worn felt-hat. he wore a hazel-coloured overcoat with a large cape, worn thread-bare and rough as a grater; from its yawning pockets peeped bundles of manuscripts and pamphlets. the enjoyment of his sour-crout, which he devoured with numerous and audible marks of approbation, rendered him heedless of the scrutiny to which he was subjected, but did not prevent him from continuing to read an old book open before him, in which he made marginal notes from time to time with a pencil that he carried behind his ear. "hullo!" cried schaunard suddenly, making his glass ring with his knife, "my stew!" "sir," said the girl, running up plate in hand, "there is none left, here is the last, and this gentleman has ordered it." therewith she deposited the dish before the man with the books. "the deuce!" cried schaunard. there was such an air of melancholy disappointment in his ejaculation, that the possessor of the books was moved to the soul by it. he broke down the pile of old works which formed a barrier between him and schaunard, and putting the dish in the centre of the table, said, in his sweetest tones: "might i be so bold as to beg you, sir, to share this with me?" "sir," replied the artist, "i could not think of depriving you of it." "then will you deprive me of the pleasure of being agreeable to you?" "if you insist, sir," and schaunard held out his plate. "permit me not to give you the head," said the stranger. "really sir, i cannot allow you," schaunard began, but on taking back his plate he perceived that the other had given him the very piece which he implied he would keep for himself. "what is he playing off his politeness on me for?" he muttered to himself. "if the head is the most noble part of man," said the stranger, "it is the least agreeable part of the rabbit. there are many persons who cannot bear it. i happen to like it very much, however." "if so," said schaunard, "i regret exceedingly that you robbed yourself for me." "how? excuse me," quoth he of the books, "i kept the head, as i had the honor of observing to you." "allow me," rejoined schaunard, thrusting his plate under his nose, "what part do you call that?" "good heavens!" cried the stranger, "what do i see? another head? it is a bicephalous rabbit!" "buy what?" said schaunard. "cephalous--comes from the greek. in fact, baffon (who used to wear ruffles) cites some cases of this monstrosity. on the whole, i am not sorry to have eaten a phenomenon." thanks to this incident, the conversation was definitely established. schaunard, not willing to be behindhand in courtesy, called for an extra quart of wine. the hero of the books called for a third. schaunard treated to salad, the other to dessert. at eight o'clock there were six empty bottles on the table. as they talked, their natural frankness, assisted by their libations, had urged them to interchange biographies, and they knew each other as well as if they had always lived together. he of the books, after hearing the confidential disclosures of schaunard, had informed him that his name was gustave colline; he was a philosopher by profession, and got his living by giving lessons in rhetoric, mathematics and several other _ics_. what little money he picked up by his profession was spent in buying books. his hazel-coloured coat was known to all the stall keepers on the quay from the pont de la concorde to the pont saint michel. what he did with these books, so numerous that no man's lifetime would have been long enough to read them, nobody knew, least of all, himself. but this hobby of his amounted to monomania: when he came home at night without bringing a musty quarto with him, he would repeat the saying of titus, "i have lost a day." his enticing manners, his language, which was a mosaic of every possible style, and the fearful puns which embellished his conversation, completely won schaunard, who demanded on the spot permission of colline to add his name to those on the famous list already mentioned. they left mother cadet's at nine o'clock at night, both fairly primed, and with the gait of men who have been engaged in close conversation with sundry bottles. colline offered to stand coffee, and schaunard accepted on condition that he should be allowed to pay for the accompanying nips of liquor. they turned into a cafe in the rue saint germain l'auxerrois, and bearing on its sign the name of momus, god of play and pleasure. at the moment they entered a lively argument broke out between two of the frequenters of the place. one of them was a young fellow whose face was hidden by a dense thicket of beard of several distinct shades. by way of a balance to this wealth of hair on his chin, a precocious baldness had despoiled his forehead, which was as bare as a billiard ball. he vainly strove to conceal the nakedness of the land by brushing forward a tuft of hairs so scanty that they could almost be counted. he wore a black coat worn at the elbows, and revealing whenever he raised his arms too high a ventilator under the armpits. his trousers might have once been black, but his boots, which had never been new, seemed to have already gone round the world two or three times on the feet of the wandering jew. schaunard noticed that his new friend colline and the young fellow with the big beard nodded to one another. "you know the gentleman?" said he to the philosopher. "not exactly," replied the latter, "but i meet him sometimes at the national library. i believe that he is a literary man." "he wears the garb of one, at any rate," said schaunard. the individual with whom this young fellow was arguing was a man of forty, foredoomed, by a big head wedged between his shoulders without any break in the shape of a neck, to the thunderstroke of apoplexy. idiocy was written in capital letters on his low forehead, surmounted by a little black skull-cap. his name was monsieur mouton, and he was a clerk at the town hall of the 4th arrondissement, where he acted as registrar of deaths. "monsieur rodolphe," exclaimed he, in the squeaky tones of a eunuch, shaking the young fellow by a button of his coat which he had laid hold of. "do you want to know my opinion? well, all your newspapers are of no use whatsoever. come now, let us put a supposititious case. i am the father of a family, am i not? good. i go to the cafe for a game at dominoes? follow my argument now." "go on," said rodolphe. "well," continued daddy mouton, punctuating each of his sentences by a blow with his fist which made the jugs and glasses on the table rattle again. "well, i come across the papers. what do i see? one which says black when the other says white, and so on and so on. what is all that to me? i am the father of a family who goes to the cafe--" "for a game at dominoes," said rodolphe. "every evening," continued monsieur mouton. "well, to put a case--you understand?" "exactly," observed rodolphe. "i read an article which is not according to my views. that puts me in a rage, and i fret my heart out, because you see, monsieur rodolphe, newspapers are all lies. yes, lies," he screeched in his shrillest falsetto, "and the journalists are robbers." "but, monsieur mouton--" "yes, brigands," continued the clerk. "they are the cause of all our misfortunes; they brought about the revolution and its paper money, witness murat." "excuse me," said rodolphe, "you mean marat." "no, no," resumed monsieur mouton, "murat, for i saw his funeral when i was quite a child--" "but i assure you--" "they even brought you a piece at the circus about him, so there." "exactly," said rodolphe, "that was murat." "well what else have i been saying for an hour past?" exclaimed the obstinate mouton. "murat, who used to work in a cellar, eh? well, to put a case. were not the bourbons right to guillotine him, since he had played the traitor?" "guillotine who? play the traitor to whom?" cried rodolphe, button-holing monsieur mouton in turn. "why marat." "no, no, monsieur mouton. murat, let us understand one another, hang it all!" "precisely, marat, a scoundrel. he betrayed the emperor in 1815. that is why i say all the papers are alike," continued monsieur mouton, returning to the original theme of what he called an explanation. "do you know what i should like, monsieur rodolphe? well, to put a case. i should like a good paper. ah! not too large and not stuffed with phrases." "you are exacting," interrupted rodolphe, "a newspaper without phrases." "yes, certainly. follow my idea?" "i am trying to." "a paper which should simply give the state of the king's health and of the crops. for after all, what is the use of all your papers that no one can understand? to put a case. i am at the town hall, am i not? i keep my books; very good. well, it is just as if someone came to me and said, 'monsieur mouton, you enter the deaths--well, do this, do that.' what do you mean by this and that? well, it is the same thing with newspapers," he wound up with. "evidently," said a neighbor who had understood. and monsieur mouton having received the congratulations of some of the other frequenters of the cafe who shared his opinion, resumed his game at dominoes. "i have taught him his place," said he, indicating rodolphe, who had returned to the same table at which schaunard and colline were seated. "what a blockhead!" said rodolphe to the two young fellows. "he has a fine head, with his eyelids like the hood of a cabriolet, and his eyes like glass marbles," said schaunard, pulling out a wonderfully coloured pipe. "by jupiter, sir," said rodolphe, "that is a very pretty pipe of yours." "oh! i have a much finer one i wear in society," replied schaunard, carelessly, "pass me some tobacco, colline." "hullo!" said the philosopher, "i have none left." "allow me to offer you some," observed rodolphe, pulling a packet of tobacco out of his pocket and placing it on the table. to this civility colline thought it his duty to respond by an offer of glasses round. rodolphe accepted. the conversation turned on literature. rodolphe, questioned as to the profession already revealed by his garb, confessed his relation with the muses, and stood a second round of drinks. as the waiter was going off with the bottle schaunard requested him to be good enough to forget it. he had heard the silvery tinkle of a couple of five-franc pieces in one of colline's pockets. rodolphe had soon reached the same level of expansiveness as the two friends, and poured out his confidences in turn. they would no doubt have passed the night at the cafe if they had not been requested to leave. they had not gone ten steps, which had taken them a quarter of an hour to accomplish, before they were surprised by a violent downpour. colline and rodolphe lived at opposite ends of paris, one on the ile saint louis, and the other at montmartre. schaunard, who had wholly forgotten that he was without a residence, offered them hospitality. "come to my place," said he, "i live close by, we will pass the night in discussing literature and art." "you shall play and rodolphe will recite some of his verses to us," said colline. "right you are," said schaunard, "life is short, and we must enjoy ourselves whilst we can." arriving at the house, which schaunard had some difficulty in recognizing, he sat down for a moment on a corner-post waiting for rodolphe and colline, who had gone into a wine-shop that was still open to obtain the primary element of a supper. when they came back, schaunard rapped several times at the door, for he vaguely recollected that the porter had a habit of keeping him waiting. the door at length opened, and old durand, half aroused from his first sleep, and no longer recalling that schaunard had ceased to be his tenant, did not disturb himself when the latter called out his name to him. when they had all three gained the top of the stairs, the ascent of which had been as lengthy as it was difficult, schaunard, who was the foremost, uttered a cry of astonishment at finding the key in the keyhole of his door. "what is the matter?" asked rodolphe. "i cannot make it out," muttered the other. "i find the key in the door, though i took it away with me this morning. ah! we shall see. i put it in my pocket. why, confound it, here it is still!" he exclaimed, displaying a key. "this is witchcraft." "phantasmagoria," said colline. "fancy," added rodolphe. "but," resumed schaunard, whose voice betrayed a commencement of alarm, "do you hear that?" "what?" "what?" "my piano, which is playing of its own accord _do la mi re do, la si sol re._ scoundrel of a re, it is still false." "but it cannot be in your room," said rodolphe, and he added in a whisper to colline, against whom he was leaning heavily, "he is tight." "so i think. in the first place, it is not a piano at all, it is a flute." "but you are screwed too, my dear fellow," observed the poet to the philosopher, who had sat down on the landing, "it is a violin." "a vio--, pooh! i say, schaunard," hiccupped colline, pulling his friend by the legs, "here is a joke, this gentleman makes out that it is a vio--" "hang it all," exclaimed schaunard in the height of terror, "it is magic." "phantasma-goria," howled colline, letting fall one of the bottles he held by his hand. "fancy," yelled rodolphe in turn. in the midst of this uproar the room door suddenly opened, and an individual holding a triple-branched candlestick in which pink candles were burning, appeared on the threshold. "what do you want, gentlemen?" asked he, bowing courteously to the three friends. "good heavens, what am i about? i have made a mistake, this is not my room," said schaunard. "sir," added colline and rodolphe, simultaneously, addressing the person who had opened the door, "be good enough to excuse our friend, he is as drunk as three fiddlers." suddenly a gleam of lucidity flashed through schaunard's intoxication, he read on his door these words written in chalk: "i have called three times for my new year's gift--phemie." "but it is all right, it is all right, i am indeed at home," he exclaimed, "here is the visiting card phemie left me on new year's day; it is really my door." "good heavens, sir," said rodolphe, "i am truly bewildered." "believe me, sir," added colline, "that for my part, i am an active partner in my friend's confusion." the young fellow who had opened the door could not help laughing. "if you come into my room for a moment," he replied, "no doubt your friend, as soon as he has looked around, will see his mistake." "willingly." and the poet and philosopher each taking schaunard by an arm, led him into the room, or rather the palace of marcel, whom no doubt our readers have recognized. schaunard cast his eyes vaguely around him, murmuring, "it is astonishing how my dwelling is embellished!" "well, are you satisfied now?" asked colline. but schaunard having noticed the piano had gone to it, and was playing scales. "here, you fellows, listen to this," said he, striking the notes, "this is something like, the animal has recognized his master,_ si la sol, fa mi re._ ah! wretched re, you are always the same. i told you it was my instrument." "he insists on it," said colline to rodolphe. "he insists on it," repeated rodolphe to marcel. "and that," added schaunard, pointing to the star-adorned petticoat that was lying on a chair, "it is not an adornment of mine, perhaps? ah!" and he looked marcel straight in the face. "and this," continued he, unfastening from the wall the notice to quit already spoken of. and he began to read, "therefore monsieur schaunard is hereby required to give up possession of the said premises, and to leave them in tenantable repair, before noon on the eighth day of april. as witness the present formal notice to quit, the cost of which is five francs." "ha! ha! so i am not the monsieur schaunard to whom formal notice to quit is given at a cost of five francs? and these, again," he continued, recognizing his slippers on marcel's feet, "are not those my papouches, the gift of a beloved hand? it is your turn, sir," said he to marcel, "to explain your presence amongst my household goods." "gentlemen," replied marcel, addressing himself more especially to colline and rodolphe, "this gentleman," and he pointed to schaunard, "is at home, i admit." "ah!" exclaimed schaunard, "that's lucky." "but," continued marcel, "i am at home too." "but, sir," broke in rodolphe, "if our friend recognizes--" "yes," said colline, "if our friend--" "and if on your side you recall that--," added rodolphe, "how is it that--" "yes," replied his echo colline, "how is it that--" "have the kindness to sit down, gentlemen," replied marcel, "and i will explain the mystery to you." "if we were to liquify the explanation?" risked colline. "over a mouthful of something," added rodolphe. the four young fellows sat down to table and attacked a piece of cold veal which the wine-shop keeper had let them have. marcel then explained what had taken place in the morning between himself and the landlord when he had come to move in. "then," observed rodolphe, "this gentleman is quite right, and we are in his place?" "you are at home," said marcel politely. but it was a tremendous task to make schaunard understand what had taken place. a comical incident served to further complicate the situation. schaunard, when looking for something in a sideboard, found the change of the five hundred franc note that marcel had handed to monsieur bernard that morning. "ah! i was quite sure," he exclaimed, "that fortune would not desert me. i remember now that i went out this morning to run after her. on account of its being quarter-day she must have looked in during my absence. we crossed one another on the way, that it is. how right i was to leave the key in my drawer!" "delightful madness!" murmured rodolphe, looking at schaunard, who was building up the money in equal piles. "a dream, a falsehood, such is life," added the philosopher. marcel laughed. an hour later they had all four fallen asleep. the next day they woke up at noon, and at first seemed very much surprised to find themselves together. schaunard, colline, and rodolphe did not appear to recognize one another, and addressed one another as "sir." marcel had to remind them that they had come together the evening before. at that moment old durand entered the room. "sir," said he to marcel, "it is the month of april, eighteen hundred and forty, there is mud in the streets, and his majesty louis-philippe is still king of france and navarre. what!" exclaimed the porter on seeing his former tenant, "monsieur schaunard, how did you come here?" "by the telegraph," replied schaunard. "ah!" replied the porter, "you are still a joker--" "durand," said marcel, "i do not like subordinates mingling in conversation with me, go to the nearest restaurant and have a breakfast for four sent up. here is the bill of fare," he added, handing him a slip of paper on which he had written it. "go." "gentlemen," continued marcel, addressing the three young fellows, "you invited me to supper last night, allow me to offer you a breakfast this morning, not in my room, but in ours," he added, holding out his hand to schaunard. "oh! no," said schaunard sentimentally, "let us never leave one another." "that's right, we are very comfortable here," added colline. "to leave you for a moment," continued rodolphe. "tomorrow the 'scarf of iris,' a fashion paper of which i am editor, appears, and i must go and correct my proofs; i will be back in an hour." "the deuce!" said colline, "that reminds me that i have a lesson to give to an indian prince who has come to paris to learn arabic." "go tomorrow," said marcel. "oh, no!" said the philosopher, "the prince is to pay me today. and then i must acknowledge to you that this auspicious day would be spoilt for me if i did not take a stroll amongst the bookstalls." "but will you come back?" said schaunard. "with the swiftness of an arrow launched by a steady hand," replied the philosopher, who loved eccentric imagery. and he went out with rodolphe. "in point of fact," said schaunard when left alone with marcel, "instead of lolling on the sybarite's pillow, suppose i was to go out to seek some gold to appease the cupidity of monsieur bernard?" "then," said marcel uneasily, "you still mean to move?" "hang it," replied schaunard, "i must, since i have received a formal notice to quit, at a cost of five francs." "but," said marcel, "if you move, shall you take your furniture with you?" "i have that idea. i will not leave a hair, as monsieur bernard says." "the deuce! that will be very awkward for me," said marcel, "since i have hired your room furnished." "there now, that's so," replied schaunard. "ah! bah," he added in a melancholy tone, "there is nothing to prove that i shall find my thousand francs today, tomorrow, or even later on." "stop a bit," exclaimed marcel, "i have an idea." "unfold it." "this is the state of things. legally, this lodging is mine, since i have paid a month in advance." "the lodging, yes, but as to the furniture, if i pay, i can legally take it away, and if it were possible i would even take it away illegally." "so that," continued marcel, "you have furniture and no lodging, and i have lodging and no furniture." "that is the position," observed schaunard. "this lodging suits me," said marcel. "and for my part is has never suited me better," said schaunard. "well then, we can settle this business," resumed marcel, "stay with me, i will apply house-room, and you shall supply the furniture." "and the rent?" said schaunard. "since i have some money just now i will pay it, it will be your turn next time. think about it." "i never think about anything, above all accepting a suggestion which suits me. carried unanimously, in point of fact, painting and music are sisters." "sisters-in-law," observed marcel. at that moment colline and rodolphe, who had met one another, came in. marcel and schaunard informed them of their partnership. "gentlemen," said rodolphe, tapping his waistcoat pocket, "i am ready to stand dinner all round." "that is just what i was going to have the honour of proposing," said colline, taking out a gold coin which he stuck in his eye like a glass. "my prince gave me this to buy an arabic grammar, which i have just paid six sous ready cash for." "i," said rodolphe, "have got the cashier of the 'scarf of iris' to advance me thirty francs under the pretext that i wanted it to get vaccinated." "it is general pay-day then?" said schaunard, "there is only myself unable to stand anything. it is humiliating." "meanwhile," said rodolphe, "i maintain my offer of a dinner." "so do i," said colline. "very well," said rodolphe, "we will toss up which shall settle the bill." "no," said schaunard, "i have something far better than that to offer you as a way of getting over the difficulty." "let us have it." "rodolphe shall pay for dinner, and colline shall stand supper." "that is what i call solomonic jurisprudence," exclaimed the philosopher. "it is worse than camacho's wedding," added marcel. the dinner took place at a provencal restaurant in the rue dauphine, celebrated for its literary waiters and its "ayoli." as it was necessary to leave room for the supper, they ate and drank in moderation. the acquaintance, begun the evening before between colline and schaunard and later on with marcel, became more intimate; each of the young fellows hoisted the flag of his artistic opinions, and all four recognized that they had like courage and similar hopes. talking and arguing they perceived that their sympathies were akin, that they had all the same knack in that chaff which amuses without hurting, and that the virtues of youth had not left a vacant spot in their heart, easily stirred by the sight of the narration of anything noble. all four starting from the same mark to reach the same goal, they thought that there was something more than chance in their meeting, and that it might after all be providence who thus joined their hands and whispered in their ears the evangelic motto, which should be the sole charter of humanity, "love one another." at the end of the repast, which closed in somewhat grave mood, rodolphe rose to propose a toast to the future, and colline replied in a short speech that was not taken from any book, had no pretension to style, and was merely couched in the good old dialect of simplicity, making that which is so badly delivered so well understood. "what a donkey this philosopher is!" murmured schaunard, whose face was buried in his glass, "here is he obliging me to put water in my wine." after dinner they went to take coffee at the cafe momus, where they had already spent the preceding evening. it was from that day that the establishment in question became uninhabitable by its other frequenters. after coffee and nips of liqueurs the bohemian clan, definitely founded, returned to marcel's lodging, which took the name of schaunard's elysium. whilst colline went to order the supper he had promised, the others bought squibs, crackers and other pyrotechnic materials, and before sitting down to table they let off from the windows a magnificent display of fireworks which turned the whole house topsy-turvey, and during which the four friends shouted at the top of their voices- "let us celebrate this happy day." the next morning they again found themselves all four together but without seeming astonished this time. before each going about his business they went together and breakfasted frugally at the cafe momus, where they made an appointment for the evening and where for a long time they were seen to return daily. such are the chief personages who will reappear in the episodes of which this volume is made up, a volume which is not a romance and has no other pretension than that set forth on its title-page, for the "bohemians of the latin quarter" is only a series of social studies, the heroes of which belong to a class badly judged till now, whose greatest crime is lack of order, and who can even plead in excuse that this very lack of order is a necessity of the life they lead. chapter ii a good angel schaunard and marcel, who had been grinding away valiantly a whole morning, suddenly struck work. "thunder and lightning! i'm hungry!" cried schaunard. and he added carelessly, "do we breakfast today?" marcel appeared much astonished at this very inopportune question. "how long has it been the fashion to breakfast two days running?" he asked. "and yesterday was thursday." he finished his reply by tracing with his mahl-stick the ecclesiastic ordinance: "on friday eat no meat, nor aught resembling it." schaunard, finding no answer, returned to his picture, which represented a plain inhabited by a red tree and a blue tree shaking branches; an evident allusion to the sweets of friendship, which had a very philosophical effect. at this moment the porter knocked; he had brought a letter for marcel. "three sous," said he. "you are sure?" replied the artist. "very well, you can owe it to us." he shut the door in the man's face, and opened the letter. at the first line, he began to vault around the room like a rope-dancer and thundered out, at the top of his voice, this romantic ditty, which indicated with him the highest pitch of ecstasy: "there were four juveniles in our street; they fell so sick they could not eat; they carried them to the hospital!- tal! tal! tal! tal!" "oh yes!" said schaunard, taking him up: "they put all four into one big bed, two at the feet and two at the head." "think i don't know it?" marcel continued: "there came a sister of charity- ty! ty! tee! tee!" "if you don't stop," said schaunard, who suspected signs of mental alienation, "i'll play the allegro of my symphony on 'the influence of blue in the arts.'" so saying, he approached the piano. this menace had the effect of a drop of cold water in a boiling fluid. marcel grew calm as if by magic. "look there!" said he, passing the letter to his friend. it was an invitation to dine with a deputy, an enlightened patron of the arts in general and marcel in particular, since the latter had taken the portrait of his country-house. "for today," sighed schaunard. "unluckily the ticket is not good for two. but stay! now i think of it, your deputy is of the government party; you cannot, you must not accept. your principles will not permit you to partake of the bread which has been watered by the tears of the people." "bah!" replied marcel, "my deputy is a moderate radical; he voted against the government the other day. besides, he is going to get me an order, and he has promised to introduce me in society. moreover, this may be friday as much as it likes; i am famished as ugolino, and i mean to dine today. there now!" "there are other difficulties," continued schaunard, who could not help being a little jealous of the good fortune that had fallen to his friend's lot. "you can't dine out in a red flannel shirt and slippers." "i shall borrow clothes of rodolphe or colline." "infatuated youth! do you forget that this is the twentieth, and at this time of the month their wardrobe is up to the very top of the spout?" "between now and five o'clock this evening i shall find a dress-coat." "i took three weeks to get one when i went to my cousin's wedding and that was in january." "well, then, i shall go as i am," said marcel, with a theatrical stride. "it shall certainly never be said that a miserable question of etiquette hindered me from making my first step in society." "without boots," suggested his friend. marcel rushed out in a state of agitation impossible to describe. at the end of two hours he returned, loaded with a false collar. "hardly worth while to run so far for that," said schaunard. "there was paper enough to make a dozen." "but," cried marcel, tearing his hair, "we must have some things--confound it!" and he commenced a thorough investigation of every corner of the two rooms. after an hour's search, he realized a costume thus composed: a pair of plaid trousers, a gray hat, a red cravat, a blue waistcoat, two boots, one black glove, and one glove that had been white. "that will make two black gloves on a pinch," said schaunard. "you are going to look like the solar spectrum in that dress. to be sure, a colourist such as you are--" marcel was trying the boots. alas! they are both for the same foot! the artist, in despair, perceived an old boot in a corner which had served as the receptacle of their empty bladders. he seized upon it. "from garrick to syllable," said his jesting comrade, "one square-toed and the other round." "i am going to varnish them and it won't show." "a good idea! now you only want the dress-coat." "oh!" cried marcel, biting his fists: "to have one would i give ten years of life, and this right hand, i tell thee." they heard another knock at the door. marcel opened it. "monsieur schaunard?" inquired a stranger, halting on the threshold. "at your service," replied the painter, inviting him in. the stranger had one of those honest faces which typify the provincial. "sir," said he. "my cousin has often spoke to me of your talent for portrait painting, and being on the point of making a voyage to the colonies, whither i am deputed by the sugar refiners of the city of nantes, i wish to leave my family something to remember me by. that is why i am come to see you." "holy providence!" ejaculated schaunard. "marcel, a seat for monsieur--" "blancheron," said the new-comer, "blancheron of nantes, delegate of the sugar interest, ex-mayor, captain of the national guard, and author of a pamphlet on the sugar question." "i am highly honoured at having been chosen by you," said the artist, with a low reverence to the delegate of the refiners. "how do you wish to have your portrait taken?" "in miniature," replied blancheron, "like that," and he pointed to a portrait in oil, for the delegate was one of that class with whom everything smaller than the side of a house is miniature. schaunard had the measure of his man immediately, especially when the other added that he wished to be painted with the best colours. "i never use any other," said the artist. "how large do you wish it to be?" "about so big," answered the other, pointing to a kit-cat. "how much will it be?" "sixty francs with the hands, fifty without." "the deuce it will! my cousin talked of thirty francs." "it depends on the season. colours are much dearer at some times of the year than at others." "bless me! it's just like sugar!" "precisely." "fifty francs then be it." "you are wrong there; for ten francs more you will have your hands, and i will put in them your pamphlet on the sugar question, which will have a very good effect." "by jove, you are right!" "thunder and lightning!" said schaunard to himself, "if he goes on so, i shall burst, and hurt him with one of the pieces." "did you see?" whispered marcel. "what?" "he has a black coat." "i take. let me manage." "well," quoth the delegate, "when do we begin? there is no time to lose, for i sail soon." "i have to take a little trip myself the day after tomorrow; so, if you please, we will begin at once. one good sitting will help us along some way." "but it will soon be night, and you can't paint by candle light." "my room is arranged so that we can work at all hours in it. if you will take off your coat, and put yourself in position, we will commence." "take off my coat! what for?" "you told me that you intend this portrait for your family." "certainly." "well, then, you ought to be represented in your at-home dress--in your dressing gown. it is the custom to be so." "but i haven't any dressing gown here." "but i have. the case is provided for," quoth schaunard, presenting to his sitter a very ragged garment, so ornamented with paint-marks that the honest provincial hesitated about setting into it. "a very odd dress," said he. "and very valuable. a turkish vizier gave it to horace vernet, and he gave it to me when he had done with it. i am a pupil of his." "are you a pupil of vernet's?" "i am proud to be," said the artist. "wretch that i am!" he muttered to himself, "i deny my gods and masters!" "you have reason to be proud, my young friend," replied the delegate donning the dressing-gown with the illustrious origin. "hang up monsieur blancheron's coat in the wardrobe," said schaunard to his friend, with a significant wink. "ain't he too good?" whispered marcel as he pounced on his prey, and nodded towards blancheron. "if you could only keep a piece of him." "i'll try; but do you dress yourself, and cut. come back by ten; i will keep him till then. above all, bring me something in your pocket." "i'll bring you a pineapple," said marcel as he evaporated. he dressed himself hastily; the dress-coat fit him like a glove. then he went out by the second door of the studio. schaunard set himself to work. when it was fairly night, monsieur blancheron heard the clock strike six, and remembered that he had not dined. he informed schaunard of the fact. "i am in the same position," said the other, "but to oblige you, i will go without today, though i had an invitation in the faubourg st. germain. but we can't break off now, it might spoil the resemblance." and he painted away harder than ever. "by the way," said he, suddenly, "we can dine without breaking off. there is a capital restaurant downstairs, which will send us up anything we like." and schaunard awaited the effect of his trial of plurals. "i accept your idea," said blancheron, "an in return, i hope you will do me the honor of keeping me company at table." schaunard bowed. "really," said he to himself, "this is a fine fellow--a very god-send. will you order the dinner?" he asked his amphitryon. "you will oblige me by taking that trouble," replied the other, politely. "so much the worse for you, my boy," said the painter as he pitched down the stairs, four steps at a time. marching up to the counter, he wrote out a bill of fare that made the vatel of the establishment turn pale. "claret! who's to pay for it?" "probably not i," said schaunard, "but an uncle of mine that you will find up there, a very good judge. so, do your best, and let us have dinner in half an hour, served on your porcelain." at eight o'clock, monsieur blancheron felt the necessity of pouring into a friend's ear his idea on the sugar question, and accordingly recited his pamphlet to schaunard, who accompanied him on the piano. at ten, they danced the galop together. at eleven, they swore never to separate, and to make wills in each other's favor. at twelve, marcel returned, and found them locked in a mutual embrace, and dissolved in tears. the floor was half an inch deep in fluid--either from that cause or the liquor that had been spilt. he stumbled against the table, and remarked the splendid relics of the sumptuous feast. he tried the bottles, they were utterly empty. he attempted to rouse schaunard, but the later menaced him with speedy death, if he tore him from his friend blancheron, of whom he was making a pillow. "ungrateful wretch!" said marcel, taking out of his pocket a handful of nuts, "when i had brought him some dinner!" chapter iii lenten loves one evening in lent rodolphe returned home early with the idea of working. but scarcely had he sat down at his table and dipped his pen in the ink than he was disturbed by a singular noise. putting his ear to the treacherous partition that separated him from the next room, he listened, and plainly distinguished a dialogue broken by the sound of kisses and other amourous interruptions. "the deuce," thought rodolphe, glancing at his clock, "it is still early, and my neighbor is a juliet who usually keeps her romeo till long after the lark has sung. i cannot work tonight." and taking his hat he went out. handing in his key at the porter's lodge he found the porter's wife half clasped in the arms of a gallant. the poor woman was so flustered that it was five minutes before she could open the latch. "in point of fact," though rodolphe, "there are times when porters grow human again." passing through the door he found in its recess a sapper and a cook exchanging the luck-penny of love. "hang it," said rodolphe, alluding to the warrior and his robust companion, "here are heretics who scarcely think that we are in lent." and he set out for the abode of one of his friends who lived in the neighborhood. "if marcel is at home," he said to himself, "we will pass the evening in abusing colline. one must do something." as he rapped vigorously, the door was partly opened, and a young man, simply clad in a shirt and an eye-glass, presented himself. "i cannot receive you," said he to rodolphe. "why not?" asked the latter. "there," said marcel, pointing to a feminine head that had just peeped out from behind a curtain, "there is my answer." "it is not a pretty one," said rodolphe, who had just had the door closed in his face. "ah!" said he to himself when he got into the street, "what shall i do? suppose i call on colline, we could pass the time in abusing marcel." passing along the rue de l'ouest, usually dark and unfrequented, rodolphe made out a shade walking up and down in melancholy fashion, and muttering in rhyme. "ho, ho!" said rodolphe, "who is this animated sonnet loitering here? what, colline!" "what rodolphe! where are you going?" "to your place." "you won't find me there." "what are you doing here?" "waiting." "what are you waiting for?" "ah!" said colline in a tone of raillery, "what can one be waiting for when one is twenty, when there are stars in the sky and songs in the air?" "speak in prose." "i am waiting for a girl." "good night," said rodolphe, who went on his way continuing his monologue. "what," said he, "is it st. cupid's day and cannot i take a step without running up against people in love? it is scandalously immoral. what are the police about?" as the gardens of the luxembourg were still open, rodolphe passed into them to shorten his road. amidst the deserted paths he often saw flitting before him, as though disturbed by his footsteps, couples mysteriously interlaced, and seeking, as a poet has remarked, the two-fold luxury of silence and shade. "this," said rodolphe, "is an evening borrowed from a romance." and yet overcome, despite himself, by a langourous charm, he sat down on a seat and gazed sentimentally at the moon. in a short time he was wholly under the spell of a feverish hallucination. it seemed to him that the gods and heroes in marble who peopled the garden were quitting their pedestals to make love to the goddesses and heroines, their neighbors, and he distinctly heard the great hercules recite a madrigal to the vedella, whose tunic appeared to him to have grown singularly short. from the seat he occupied he saw the swan of the fountain making its way towards a nymph of the vicinity. "good," thought rodolphe, who accepted all this mythology, "there is jupiter going to keep an appointment with leda; provided always that the park keeper does not surprise them." then he leaned his forehead on his hand and plunged further into the flowery thickets of sentiment. but at this sweet moment of his dream rodolphe was suddenly awakened by a park keeper, who came up and tapped him on the shoulder. "it is closing time, sir," said he. "that is lucky," thought rodolphe. "if i had stayed here another five minutes i should have had more sentiment in my breast than is to be found on the banks of the rhine or in alphonse karr's romances." and he hastened from the gardens humming a sentimental ballad that was for him the _marseillaise_ of love. half an hour later, goodness knows how, he was at the prado, seated before a glass of punch and talking with a tall fellow celebrated on account of his nose, which had the singular privilege of being aquiline when seen sideways, and a snub when viewed in front. it was a nose that was not devoid of sharpness, and had a sufficiency of gallant adventures to be in such a case to give good advice and be useful to its friend. "so," said alexander schaunard, the man with the nose, "you are in love." "yes, my dear fellow, it seized on me, just now, suddenly, like a bad toothache in the heart." "pass me the tobacco," said alexander. "fancy," continued rodolphe, "for the last two hours i have met nothing but lovers, men and women in couples. i had the notion of going into the luxembourg gardens, where i saw all manner of phantasmagorias, that stirred my heart extraordinarily. ellegies are bursting from me, i bleat and i coo; i am undergoing a metamorphosis, and am half lamb half turtle dove. look at me a bit, i must have wool and feathers." "what have you been drinking?" said alexander impatiently, "you are chaffing me." "i assure you that i am quite cool," replied rodolphe. "that is to say, no. but i will announce to you that i must embrace something. you see, alexander, it is not good for man to live alone, in short, you must help me to find a companion. we will stroll through the ballroom, and the first girl i point out to you, you must go and tell her that i love her." "why don't you go and tell her yourself?" replied alexander in his magnificent nasal bass. "eh? my dear fellow," said rodolphe. "i can assure you that i have quite forgot how one sets about saying that sort of thing. in all my love stories it has been my friends who have written the preface, and sometimes even the _denouement_; i never know how to begin." "it is enough to know how to end," said alexander, "but i understand you. i knew a girl who loved the oboe, perhaps you would suit her." "ah!" said rodolphe. "i should like her to have white gloves and blue eyes." "the deuce, blue eyes, i won't say no--but gloves--you know that we can't have everything at once. however, let us go into the aristocratic regions." "there," said rodolphe, as they entered the saloon favored by the fashionables of the place, "there is one who seems nice and quiet," and he pointed out a young girl fairly well dressed who was seated in a corner. "very good," replied alexander, "keep a little in the background, i am going to launch the fire-ship of passion for you. when it is necessary to put in an appearance i will call you." for ten minutes alexander conversed with the girl, who from time to time broke out in a joyous burst of laughter, and ended by casting towards rodolphe a smiling glance which said plainly enough, "come, your advocate has won the cause." "come," said alexander, "the victory is ours, the little one is no doubt far from cruel, but put on an air of simplicity to begin with." "you have no need to recommend me to do that." "then give me some tobacco," said alexander, "and go and sit down beside her." "good heavens," said the young girl when rodolphe had taken his place by her side, "how funny you friend is, his voice is like a trumpet." "that is because he is a musician." two hours later rodolphe and his companion halted in front of a house in the rue st. denis. "it is here that i live," said the girl. "well, my dear louise, when and where shall i see you again?" "at your place at eight o'clock tomorrow evening." "for sure?" "here is my pledge," replied louise, holding up her rosy cheek to rodolphe's, who eagerly tasted this ripe fruit of youth and health. rodolphe went home perfectly intoxicated. "ah!" said he, striding up and down his room, "it can't go off like that, i must write some verses." the next morning his porter found in his room some thirty sheets of paper, at the top of which stretched in solitary majesty of line- "ah; love, oh! love, fair prince of youth." that morning, contrary to his habits, rodolphe had risen very early, and although he had slept very little, he got up at once. "ah!" he exclaimed, "today is the great day. but then twelve hours to wait. how shall i fill up these twelve eternities?" and as his glance fell on his desk he seemed to see his pen wriggle as though intending to say to him "work." "ah! yes, work indeed! a fig for prose. i won't stop here, it reeks of ink." he went off and settled himself in a cafe where he was sure not to meet any friends. "they would see that i am in love," he thought, "and shape my ideal for me in advance." after a very brief repast he was off to the railway station, and got into a train. half an hour later he was in the woods of ville d'avray. rodolphe strolled about all day, let loose amongst rejuvenated nature, and only returned to paris at nightfall. after having put the temple which was to receive his idol in nature, rodolphe arrayed himself for the occasion, greatly regretting not being able to dress in white. from seven to eight o'clock he was a prey to the sharp fever of expectation. a slow torture, that recalled to him the old days and the old loves which had sweetened them. then, according to habit, he already began to dream of an exalted passion, a love affair in ten volumes, a genuine lyric with moonlight, setting suns, meetings beneath the willows, jealousies, sighs and all the rest. he was like this every time chance brought a woman to his door, and not one had left him without bearing away any aureola about her head and a necklace of tears about her neck. "they would prefer new boots or a bonnet," his friend remarked to him. but rodolphe persisted, and up to this time the numerous blunders he had made had not sufficed to cure him. he was always awaiting a woman who would consent to pose as an idol, an angel in a velvet gown, to whom he could at his leisure address sonnets written on willow leaves. at length rodolphe heard the "holy hour" strike, and as the last stroke sounded he fancied he saw the cupid and psyche surmounting his clock entwine their alabaster arms about one another. at the same moment two timid taps were given at the door. rodolphe went and opened it. it was louise. "you see i have kept my word," said she. rodolphe drew the curtain and lit a fresh candle. during this operation the girl had removed her bonnet and shawl, which she went and placed on the bed. the dazzling whiteness of the sheets caused her to smile, and almost to blush. louise was rather pleasing than pretty; her fresh colored face presented an attractive blending of simplicity and archness. it was something like an outline of greuze touched up by gavarni. all her youthful attractions were cleverly set off by a toilette which, although very simple, attested in her that innate science of coquetry which all women possess from their first swaddling clothes to their bridal robe. louise appeared besides to have made an especial study of the theory of attitudes, and assumed before rodolphe, who examined her with the artistic eye, a number of seductive poses. her neatly shod feet were of satisfactory smallness, even for a romantic lover smitten by andalusian or chinese miniatures. as to her hands, their softness attested idleness. in fact, for six months past she had no longer any reason to fear needle pricks. in short, louise was one of those fickle birds of passage who from fancy, and often from necessity, make for a day, or rather a night, their nest in the garrets of the students' quarter, and remain there willingly for a few days, if one knows how to retain them by a whim or by some ribbons. after having chatted for an hour with louise, rodolphe showed her, as an example, the group of cupid and psyche. "isn't it paul and virginia?" "yes," replied rodolphe, who did not want to vex her at the outset by contradicting her. "they are very well done," said louise. "alas!" thought rodolphe, gazing at her, "the poor child is not up to much as regards literature. i am sure that her only orthography is that of the heart. i must buy her a dictionary." however, as louise complained of her boots incommoding her, he obligingly helped her to unlace them. all at once the light went out. "hallo!" exclaimed rodolphe, "who has blown the candle out?" a joyful burst of laughter replied to him. a few days later rodolphe met one of his friends in the street. "what are you up to?" said the latter. "one no longer sees anything of you." "i am studying the poetry of intimacy," replied rodolphe. the poor fellow spoke the truth. he sought from louise more than the poor girl could give him. an oaten pipe, she had not the strains of a lyre. she spoke to, so to say, the jargon of love, and rodolphe insisted upon speaking the classic language. thus they scarcely understood each other. a week later, at the same ball at which she had found rodolphe, louise met a fair young fellow, who danced with her several times, and at the close of the entertainment took her home with him. he was a second year's student. he spoke the prose of pleasure very fluently, and had good eyes and a well-lined pocket. louise asked him for ink and paper, and wrote to rodolphe a letter couched as follows:- "do not rekkon on me at all. i sende you a kiss for the last time. good bye. louise." as rodolphe was reading this letter on reaching home in the evening, his light suddenly went out. "hallo!" said he, reflectively, "it is the candle i first lit on the evening that louise came--it was bound to finish with our union. if i had known i would have chosen a longer one," he added, in a tone of half annoyance, half of regret, and he placed his mistress' note in a drawer, which he sometimes styled the catacomb of his loves. one day, being at marcel's, rodolphe picked up from the ground to light his pipe with, a scrap of paper on which he recognized his handwriting and the orthography of louise. "i have," said he to his friend, "an autograph of the same person, only there are two mistakes the less than in yours. does not that prove that she loved me better than you?" "that proves that you are a simpleton," replied marcel. "white arms and shoulders have no need of grammar." chapter iv ali rodolphe; or, the turk perforce ostracized by an inhospitable proprietor, rodolphe had for some time been leading a life compared with which the existence of a cloud is rather stationary. he practiced assiduously the arts of going to bed without supper, and supping without going to bed. he often dined with duke humphrey, and generally slept at the sign of a clear sky. still, amid all these crosses and troubles, two things never forsook him; his good humor and the manuscript of "the avenger," a drama which had gone the rounds of all the theaters in paris. one day rodolphe, who had been jugged for some slight choreographic extravagances, stumbled upon an uncle of his, one monetti, a stove maker and smokey chimney doctor, and sargeant of the national guard, whom he had not seen for an age. touched by his nephew's misfortunes, uncle monetti promised to ameliorate his position. we shall see how, if the reader is not afraid of mounting six stories. take note of the banister, then, and follow. up we go! whew! one hundred and twenty-five steps! here we are at last. one more step, and we are in the room; one more yet, and we should be out of it again. it's little, but high up, with the advantages of good air and a fine prospect. the furniture is composed of two french stoves, several german ditto, some ovens on the economic plan, (especially if you never make fire in them,) a dozen stove pipes, some red clay, some sheet iron, and a whole host of heating apparatus. we may mention, to complete the inventory, a hammock suspended from two nails inserted in the wall, a three-legged garden chair, a candlestick adorned with its _bobeche_, and some other similar objects of elegant art. as to the second room--that is to say, the balcony--two dwarf cypresses, in pots, make a park of it for fine weather. at the moment of our entry, the occupant of the premises, a young man, dressed like a turk of the comic opera, is finishing a repast, in which he shamelessly violates the law of the prophet. witness a bone that was once a ham, and a bottle that has been full of wine. his meal over, the young turk stretches himself on the floor in true eastern style, and begins carelessly to smoke a _narghile_. while abandoning himself to this asiatic luxury, he passes his hand from time to time over the back of a magnificent newfoundland dog, who would doubtless respond to its caresses where he not also in terra cotta, to match the rest of the furniture. suddenly a noise was heard in the entry, and the door opened, admitting a person who, without saying a word, marched straight to one of the stoves, which served the purpose of a secretary, opened the stove-door, and drew out a bundle of papers. "hallo!" cried the new-comer, after examining the manuscript attentively, "the chapter on ventilators not finished yet!" "allow me to observe, uncle," replied the turk, "the chapter on ventilators is one of the most interesting in your book, and requires to be studied with care. i am studying it." "but you miserable fellow, you are always saying that same thing. and the chapter on stoves--where are you in that?" "the stoves are going on well, but, by the way, uncle, if you could give me a little wood, it wouldn't hurt me. it is a little siberia here. i am so cold, that i make a thermometer go down below zero by just looking at it." "what! you've used up one faggot already?" "allow me to remark again, uncle, there are different kinds of faggots, and yours was the very smallest kind." "i'll send you an economic log--that keeps the heat." "exactly, and doesn't give any." "well," said the uncle as he went off, "you shall have a little faggot, and i must have my chapter on stoves for tomorrow." "when i have fire, that will inspire me," answered the turk as he heard himself locked in. were we making a tragedy, this would be the time to bring in a confidant. noureddin or osman he should be called, and he should advance towards our hero with an air at the same time discreet and patronizing, to console him for his reverses, by means of these three verses: 'what saddening grief, my lord, assails you now? why sits this pallor on your noble brow? does allah lend your plans no helping hand? or cruel ali, with severe command, remove to other shores the beauteous dame, who charmed your eyes and set your heart on flame!' but we are not making a tragedy, so we must do without our confidant, though he would be very convenient. our hero is not what he appears to be. the turban does not make the turk. this young man is our friend rodolphe, entertained by his uncle, for whom he is drawing up a manual of "the perfect chimney constructor." in fact, monsieur monetti, an enthusiast for his art, had consecrated his days to this science of chimneys. one day he formed the idea of drawing up, for the benefit of posterity, a theoretic code of the principles of that art, in the practice of which he so excelled, and he had chosen his nephew, as we have seen, to frame the substance of his ideas in an intelligible form. rodolphe was found in board, lodging, and other contingencies, and at the completion of the manual was to receive a recompense of three hundred francs. in the beginning, to encourage his nephew, monetti had generously made him an advance of fifty francs. but rodolphe, who had not seen so much silver together for nearly a year, half crazy, in company with his money, stayed out three days, and on the fourth came home alone! thereupon the uncle, who was in haste to have his "manual" finished inasmuch as he hoped to get a patent for it, dreading some new diversion on his nephew's part, determined to make him work by preventing him from going out. to this end he carried off his garments, and left him instead the disguise under which we have seen him. nevertheless, the famous "manual" continued to make very slow progress, for rodolphe had no genius whatever for this kind of literature. the uncle avenged himself for this lazy indifference on the great subject of chimneys by making his nephew undergo a host of annoyances. sometimes he cut short his commons, and frequently stopped the supply of tobacco. one sunday, after having sweated blood and ink upon the great chapter of ventilators, rodolphe broke the pen, which was burning his fingers, and went out to walk--in his "park." as if on purpose to plague him, and excite his envy the more, he could not cast a single look about him without perceiving the figure of a smoker on every window. on the gilt balcony of a new house opposite, an exquisite in his dressing gown was biting off the end of an aristocratic "pantellas" cigar. a story above, an artist was sending before him an odorous cloud of turkish tobacco from his amber-mouthed pipe. at the window of a _brasserie_, a fat german was crowning a foaming tankard, and emitting, with the regularity of a machine, the dense puffs that escaped from his meershaum. on the other side, a group of workmen were singing as they passed on their way to the barriers, their "throat-scorchers" between their teeth. finally, all the other pedestrians visible in the street were smoking. "woe is me!" sighed rodolphe, "except myself and my uncle's chimneys, all creation is smoking at this hour!" and he rested his forehead on the bar of the balcony, and thought how dreary life was. suddenly, a burst of long and musical laughter parted under his feet. rodolphe bent forward a little, to discover the source of this volley of gaiety, and perceived that he had been perceived by the tenant of the story beneath him, mademoiselle sidonia, of the luxembourg theater. the young lady advanced to the front of her balcony, rolling between her fingers, with the dexterity of a spaniard, a paper-full of light-colored tobacco, which she took from a bag of embroidered velvet. "what a sweet cigar girl it is!" murmured rodolphe, in an ecstacy of contemplation. "who is this ali baba?" thought mademoiselle sidonia on her part. and she meditated on a pretext for engaging in conversation with rodolphe, who was himself trying to do the very same. "bless me!" cried the lady, as if talking to herself, "what a bore! i've no matches!" "allow me to offer you some, mademoiselle," said rodolphe, letting fall on the balcony two or three lucifers rolled up in paper. "a thousand thanks," replied sidonia, lighting her cigarette. "pray, mademoiselle," continued rodolphe, "in exchange for the trifling service which my good angel has permitted me to render you, may i ask you to do me a favor?" "asking already," thought the actress, as she regarded rodolphe with more attention. "they say these turks are fickle, but very agreeable. speak sir," she continued, raising her head towards the young man, "what do you wish?" "the charity of a little tobacco, mademoiselle, only one pipe. i have not smoked for two whole days." "most willingly, but how? will you take the trouble to come downstairs?" "alas! i can't! i am shut up here, but am still free to employ a very simple means." he fastened his pipe to a string, and let it glide down to her balcony, where sidonia filled it profusely herself. rodolphe then proceeded, with much ease and deliberation, to remount his pipe, which arrived without accident. "ah, mademoiselle!" he exclaimed, "how much better this pipe would have seemed, if i could have lighted it at your eyes!" it was at least the hundredth edition of this amiable pleasantry, but sidonia found it superb for all that, and thought herself bound to reply, "you flatter me." "i assure you, mademoiselle, in right-down earnest, i think you handsomer than all the three graces together." "decidedly, ali baba is very polite," thought sidonia. "are you really a turk?" she asked rodolphe. "not by profession," he replied, "but by necessity. i am a dramatic author." "i am an artist," she replied, then added, "my dear sir and neighbor, will you do me the honor to dine and spend the evening with me?" "alas!" answered rodolphe, "though your invitation is like opening heaven to me, it is impossible to accept it. as i had the honor to tell you, i am shut up here by my uncle, monsieur monetti, stove-maker and chimney doctor, whose secretary i am now." "you shall dine with me for all that," replied sidonia. "listen, i shall re-enter my room, and tap on the ceiling. look where i strike and you will find the traces of a trap which used to be there, and has since been fastened up. find the means of removing the piece of wood which closes the hole, and then, although we are each in our own room, we shall be as good as together." rodolphe went to work at once. in five minutes a communication was established between the two rooms. "it is a very little hole," said he, "but there will always be room enough to pass you my heart." "now," said sidonia, "we will go to dinner. set your table, and i will pass you the dishes." rodolphe let down his turban by a string, and brought it back laden with eatables, then the poet and the actress proceeded to dine--on their respective floors. rodolphe devoured the pie with his teeth, and sidonia with his eyes. "thanks to you, mademoiselle," he said, when their repast was finished, "my stomach is satisfied. can you not also satisfy the void of my heart, which has been so long empty?" "poor fellow!" said sidonia, and climbing on a piece of furniture, she lifted up her hand to rodolphe's lips, who gloved it with kisses. "what a pity," he exclaimed, "you can't do as st. denis, who had the privilege of carrying his head in his hands!" to the dinner succeeded a sentimental literary conversation. rodolphe spoke of "the avenger," and sidonia asked him to read it. leaning over the hole, he began declaiming his drama to the actress, who, to hear better, had put her arm chair on the top of a chest of drawers. she pronounced "the avenger" a masterpiece, and having some influence at the theater, promised rodolphe to get his piece received. but at the most interesting moment a step was heard in the entry, about as light as that of the commander's ghost in "don juan." it was uncle monetti. rodolphe had only just time to shut the trap. "here," said monetti to his nephew, "this letter has been running after you for a month." "uncle! uncle!" cried rodolphe, "i am rich at last! this letter informs me that i have gained a prize of three hundred francs, given by an academy of floral games. quick! my coat and my things! let me go to gather my laurels. they await me at the capitol!" "and my chapter on ventilators?" said monetti, coldly. "i like that! give me my things, i tell you; i can't go out so!" "you shall go out when my 'manual' is finished," quoth the uncle, shutting up his nephew under lock and key. rodolphe, when left alone, did not hesitate on the course to take. he transformed his quilt into a knotted rope, which he fastened firmly to his own balcony, and in spite of the risk, descended by this extempore ladder upon mademoiselle sidonia's. "who is there?" she cried, on hearing rodolphe knock at her window. "hush!" he replied, "open!" "what do you want? who are you?" "can you ask? i am the author of 'the avenger,' come to look for my heart, which i dropped through the trap into your room." "rash youth!" said the actress, "you might have killed yourself!" "listen, sidonia," continued rodolphe, showing her the letter he just received. "you see, wealth and glory smile on me, let love do the same!" * * * * * the following morning, by means of a masculine disguise, which sidonia procured for him, rodolphe was enabled to escape from his uncle's lodging. he ran to the secretary of the academy of floral games, to receive a crown of gold sweetbrier, worth three hundred francs, which lived "--as live roses the fairest- the space of a day." a month after, monsieur monetti was invited by his nephew to assist at the first representation of "the avenger." thanks to the talent of mademoiselle sidonia, the piece had a run of seventeen nights, and brought in forty francs to its author. some time later--it was in the warm season--rodolphe lodged in the avenue st. cloud, third tree as you go out of the bois de boulogne, on the fifth branch. chapter v the carlovingian coin towards the end of december the messengers of bidault's agency were entrusted with the distribution of about a hundred copies of a letter of invitation, of which we certify that the following to be a true and genuine copy:- ---- _m.m. rodolphe and marcel request the honor of your company on saturday next, christmas eve. fun!_ _p.s. life is short!_ _program of the entertainment_ _part i_ _7 o'clock--opening of the saloons. brisk and witty conversation._ _8.--appearance of the talented authors of "the mountain in labor," comedy refused at the odeon theater._ _8:30.--m. alexander schaunard, the eminent virtuoso, will play his imitative symphony, "the influence of blue in art," on the piano._ _9.--first reading of the essay on the "abolition of the penalty of tragedy."_ _9:30.--philosophical and metaphysical argument between m. colline, hyperphysical philosopher, and m. schaunard. to avoid any collision between the two antagonists, they will both be securely fastened._ _10.--m. tristan, master of literature, will narrate his early loves, accompanied on the piano by m. alexander schaunard._ _10:30.--second reading of the essay on the "abolition of the penalty of tragedy."_ _11.--narration of a cassowary hunt by a foreign prince._ _part ii_ _midnight.--m. marcel, historical painter, will execute with his eyes bandaged an impromptu sketch in chalk of the meeting of voltaire and napolean in the elyssian fields. m. rodolphe will also improvise a parallel between the author of zaire, and the victor of austerlitz._ _12:30.--m. gustave colline, in a decent undress, will give an imitation of the athletic games of the 4th olympiad._ _1.--third reading of the essay on the "abolition of the penalty of tragedy," and subscription on behalf of tragic authors who will one day find themselves out of employment._ _2.--commencement of games and organization of quadrilles to last until morning._ _6.--sunrise and final chorus._ _during the whole of entertainment ventilators will be in action._ _n.b. anyone attempting to read or recite poetry will be summarily ejected and handed over to the police. the guests are equally requested not to help themselves to the candle ends._ two days later, copies of this invitation were circulating among the lower depths of art and literature, and created a profound sensation. there were, however, amongst the invited guests, some who cast doubt upon the splendor of the promises made by the two friends. "i am very skeptical about it," said one of them. "i have sometimes gone to rodolphe's thursdays in the rue de la tour d'auvergne, when one could only sit on anything morally, and where all one had to drink was a little filtered water in eclectic pottery." "this time," said another, "it is really serious. marcel has shown me the program of the fete, and the effect will be magical." "will there be any ladies?" "yes. phemie teinturiere has asked to be queen of the fete and schaunard is to bring some ladies of position." this is in brief the origin of this fete which caused such stupefaction in the bohemian world across the water. for about a year past, marcel and rodolphe had announced this sumptuous gala which was always to take place "next saturday," but painful circumstances had obliged their promise to extend over fifty-two weeks, so that they had come to pass of not being able to take a step without encountering some ironical remark from one of their friends, amongst whom there were some indiscreet enough to put forward energetic demand for its fulfillment. the matter beginning to assume the character of a plague, the two friends resolved to put an end to it by liquidating the undertaking into which they had entered. it was thus that they sent out the invitation given above. "now," said rodolphe, "there is no drawing back. we have burnt our ships, and we have before us just a week to find the hundred francs that are indispensable to do the thing properly." "since we must have them, we shall," replied marcel. and with the insolent confidence which they had in luck, the two friends went to sleep, convinced that their hundred francs were already on the way, the way of impossibility. however, as on the day before that appointed for the party, nothing as of yet had turned up, rodolphe thought perhaps, be safer to give luck a helping hand, unless he were to be discredited forever, when the time came to light up. to facilitate matters the two friends progressively modified the sumptuosity of the program they had imposed upon themselves. and proceeding from modification to modification, after having seriously reduced the item "cakes," and carefully revised and pruned down the item "liquors," the total cost was reduced to fifteen francs. the problem was simplified, but not yet solved. "come, come," said rodolphe, "we must now have recourse to strong measures, we cannot cry off this time." "no, that is impossible," replied marcel. "how long is it since i have heard the story of the battle of studzianka?" "about two months." "two months, good, that is a decent interval; my uncle will have no ground for grumbling. i will go tomorrow and hear his account of that engagement, that will be five francs for certain." "i," said marcel, "will go and sell a deserted manor house to old medicis. that will make another five francs. if i have time enough to put in three towers and a mill, it will perhaps run to ten francs, and our budget will be complete." and the two friends fell asleep dreaming that the princess belgiojoso begged them to change their reception day, in order not to rob her of her customary guests. awake at dawn, marcel took a canvas and rapidly set to work to build up a deserted manor house, an article which he was in the habit of supplying to a broker of the place de carrousel. on his side, rodolphe went to pay a visit to his uncle monetti, who shone in the story of the retreat from moscow, and to whom rodolphe accorded five or six times in course of the year, when matters were really serious, the satisfaction of narrating his campaigns, in return for a small loan which the veteran stove maker did not refuse too obstinately when due enthusiasm was displayed in listening to his narrations. about two o'clock, marcel with hanging head and a canvas under his arm, met on the place de carrousel rodolphe, who was returning from his uncle's, and whose bearing also presaged ill news. "well," asked marcel, "did you succeed?" "no, my uncle has gone to versailles. and you?" "that beast of a medicis does not want any more ruined manor houses. he wants me to do him a bombardment of tangiers." "our reputations are ruined forever if we do not give this party," murmured rodolphe. "what will my friend, the influential critic, think if i make him put on a white tie and yellow kids for nothing." and both went back to the studio, a prey to great uneasiness. at that moment the clock of a neighbor struck four. "we have only three hours before us," said rodolphe despondingly. "but," said marcel, going up to his friend, "are you quite sure, certain sure, that we have no money left anywhere hereabout? eh?" "neither here, nor elsewhere. where do you suppose it could come from?" "if we looked under the furniture, in the stuffing of the arm chairs? they say that the emigrant noblemen used to hide their treasures in the days of robespierre. who can tell? perhaps our arm chair belonged to an emigrant nobleman, and besides, it is so hard that the idea has often occurred to me that it must be stuffed with metal. will you dissect it?" "this is mere comedy," replied rodolphe, in a tone in which severity was mingled with indulgence. suddenly marcel, who had gone on rummaging in every corner of the studio, uttered a loud cry of triumph. "we are saved!" he exclaimed. "i was sure that there was money here. behold!" and he showed rodolphe a coin as large as a crown piece, and half eaten away by rust and verdigris. it was a carlovingian coin of some artistic value. the legend, happily intact, showed the date of charlemagne's reign. "that, that's worth thirty sous," said rodolphe, with a contemptuous glance at his friend's find. "thirty sous well employed will go a great way," replied marcel. "with twelve hundred men bonaparte made ten thousand austrians lay down their arms. skill can replace numbers. i will go and swap the carlovingian crown at daddy medicis'. is there not anything else saleable here? suppose i take the plaster cast of the tibia of jaconowski, the russian drum major." "take the tibia. but it is a nuisance, there will not be a single ornament left here." during marcel's absence, rodolphe, his mind made up that that party should be given in any case, went in search of his friend colline, the hyperphysical philosopher, who lived hard by. "i have come," said he, "to ask you to do me a favor. as host i must positively have a black swallow-tail, and i have not got one; lend me yours." "but," said colline hesitating, "as a guest i shall want my black swallow-tail too." "i will allow you to come in a frock coat." "that won't do. you know very well i have never had a frock coat." "well, then, it can be settled in another way. if needs be, you need not come to my party, and can lend me your swallow-tail." "that would be unpleasant. i am on the program, and must not be lacking." "there are plenty of other things that will be lacking," said rodolphe. "lend me your black swallow-tail, and if you will come, come as you like; in your shirt sleeves, you will pass for a faithful servant." "oh no!" said colline, blushing. "i will wear my great coat. but all the same, it is very unpleasant." and as he saw rodolphe had already seized on the famous black swallow-tail, he called out to him, "stop a bit. there are some odds and ends in the pockets." colline's swallow-tail deserves a word or two. in the first place it was of a decided blue, and it was from habit that colline spoke of it as "my black swallow-tail." and as he was the only one of the band owning a dress coat, his friends were likewise in the habit of saying, when speaking of the philosopher's official garment, "colline's black swallow-tail." in addition to this, this famous garment had a special cut, the oddest imaginable. the tails, very long, and attached to a very short waist, had two pockets, positive gulfs, in which colline was accustomed to store some thirty of the volumes which he eternally carried about with him. this caused his friends to remark that during the time that the public libraries were closed, savants and literary men could go and refer to the skirts of colline's swallow-tail--a library always open. that day, extraordinary to relate, colline's swallow-tail only contained a quarto volume of bayle, a treatise on the hyperphysical faculties in three volumes, a volume of condillac, two of swedenborg and pope's "essay on man." when he had cleared his bookcase-garment, he allowed rodolphe to clothe himself in it. "hallo!" said the latter, "the left pocket still feels very heavy; you have left something in it." "ah!" exclaimed colline, "that is so. i forgot to empty the foreign languages pocket." and he took out from this two arabic grammars, a malay dictionary, and a stock breeder's manual in chinese, his favorite reading. when rodolphe returned home he found marcel playing pitch-and-toss with three five franc pieces. at first rodolphe refused his friend's proferred hand--he thought some crime had been committed. "let us make haste, let us make haste," said marcel, "we have the fifteen francs required. this is how it happened. i met an antiquary at medicis'. when he saw the coin he was almost taken ill; it was the only one wanting in his cabinet. he had sent everywhere to get this vacancy filled up, and had lost all hope. thus, when he had thoroughly examined my carlovingian crown piece, he did not hesitate for a moment to offer me five francs for it. medicis nudged me with his elbow; a look from him completed the business. he meant, 'share the profits of the sale, and i will bid against him.' we ran it up to thirty francs. i gave the jew fifteen, and here are the rest. now our guests may come; we are in a position to dazzle them. hallo! you have got a swallow-tail!" "yes," said rodolphe, "colline's swallow-tail." and as he was feeling for his handkerchief, rodolphe pulled out a small volume in a tartar dialect, overlooked in the foreign literature pocket. the two friends at once proceeded to make their preparations. the studio was set in order, a fire kindled in the stove, the stretcher of a picture, garnished with composite candles, suspended from the ceiling as a chandelier, and a writing table placed in the middle of the studio to serve as a rostrum for the orators. the solitary armchair, which was to be reserved for the influential critic, was placed in front of it, and upon a table were arranged all the books, romances, poems, pamphlets, &c., the authors of which were to honor the company with their presence. in order to avoid any collision between members of the different schools of literature, the studio had been, moreover, divided into four compartments, at the entrance to each of which could be read, on four hurriedly manufactured placards, the inscriptions--"poets," "prose writers," "classic school," and "romantic school." the ladies were to occupy a space reserved in the middle of the studio. "humph! chairs are lacking," said rodolphe. "oh!" remarked marcel, "there are several on the landing, fastened along the wall. suppose we were to gather them." "certainly, let us gather them by all means," said rodolphe, starting off to seize on the chairs, which belonged to some neighbor. six o'clock struck: the two friends went off to a hasty dinner, and returned to light up the saloons. they were themselves dazzled by the result. at seven o'clock schaunard arrived, accompanied by three ladies, who had forgotten their diamonds and their bonnets. one of them wore a red shawl with black spots. schaunard pointed out this lady particularly to rodolphe. "she is a woman accustomed to the best society," said he, "an englishwoman whom the fall of the stuarts has driven into exile, she lives in a modest way by giving lessons in english. her father was lord chancellor under cromwell, she told me, so we must be polite with her. don't be too familiar." numerous footsteps were heard on the stairs. it was the guests arriving. they seemed astonished to see a fire burning in the stove. rodolphe's swallow-tail went to greet the ladies, and kissed their hands with a grace worthy of the regency. when there was a score of persons present, schaunard asked whether it was not time for a round of drinks. "presently," said marcel. "we are waiting for the arrival of the influential critic to set fire to the punch." at eight o'clock the whole of the guests had arrived, and the execution of the program commenced. each item was alternated with a round of drink of some kind, no one ever knew what. towards ten o'clock the white waistcoat of the influential critic made its appearance. he only stayed an hour, and was very sober in the consumption of refreshments. at midnight, as there was no more wood, and it was very cold, the guests who were seated drew lots as to who should cast his chair into the fire. by one o'clock every one was standing. amiable gaiety did not cease to reign amongst the guests. there were no accidents to be regretted, with the exception of a rent in the foreign languages pocket of colline's swallow-tail and a smack in the face given by schaunard to the daughter of cromwell's lord chancellor. this memorable evening was for a week the staple subject of gossip in the district, and phemie teinturiere, who had been the queen of the fete, was accustomed to remark, when talking it over with her friends,-"it was awfully fine. there were composite candles, my dear." chapter vi mademoiselle musette mademoiselle musette was a pretty girl of twenty who shortly after her arrival in paris had become what many pretty girls become when they have a neat figure, plenty of coquesttishness, a dash of ambition and hardly any education. after having for a long time shone as the star of the supper parties of the latin quarter, at which she used to sing in a voice, still very fresh if not very true, a number of country ditties, which earned her the nickname under which she has since been immortalized by one of our neatest rhymsters, mademoiselle musette suddenly left the rue de la harpe to go and dwell upon the cytherean heights of the breda district. she speedily became one of the foremost of the aristocracy of pleasure and slowly made her way towards that celebrity which consists in being mentioned in the columns devoted to parisian gossip, or lithographed at the printsellers. however mademoiselle musette was an exception to the women amongst whom she lived. of a nature instinctively elegant and poetical, like all women who are really such, she loved luxury and the many enjoyments which it procures; her coquetry warmly coveted all that was handsome and distinguished; a daughter of the people, she would not have been in any way out of her element amidst the most regal sumptuosity. but mademoiselle musette, who was young and pretty, had never consented to be the mistress of any man who was not like herself young and handsome. she had been known bravely to refuse the magnificient offers of an old man so rich that he was styled the peru of the chaussee d'antin, and who had offered a golden ladder to the gratification of her fancies. intelligent and witty, she had also a repugnance for fools and simpletons, whatever might be their age, their title and their name. musette, therefore, was an honest and pretty girl, who in love adopted half of champfort's famous amphoris, "love is the interchange of two caprices." thus her connection had never been preceded by one of those shameful bargains which dishonor modern gallantry. as she herself said, musette played fair and insisted that she should receive full change for her sincerity. but if her fancies were lively and spontaneous, they were never durable enough to reach the height of a passion. and the excessive mobility of her caprices, the little care she took to look at the purse and the boots of those who wished to be considered amongst them, brought about a corresponding mobility in her existence which was a perpetual alternation of blue broughams and omnibuses, first floors and fifth stories, silken gowns and cotton frocks. oh cleaning girl! living poem of youth with ringing laugh and joyous song! tender heart beating for one and all beneath your half-open bodice! ah mademoiselle musette, sister of bernette and mimi pinson, it would need the pen of alfred de musset to fitly narrate your careless and vagabond course amidst the flowery paths of youth; and he would certainly have celebrated you, if like me, he had heard you sing in your pretty false notes, this couplet from one of your favorite ditties: "it was a day in spring when love i strove to sing unto a nut brown maid. o'er face as fair as dawn cast a bewitching shade," the story we are about to tell is one of the most charming in the life of this charming adventuress who wore so many green gowns. at a time when she was the mistress of a young counsellor of state, who had gallantly placed in her hands the key of his ancestral coffers, mademoiselle musette was in the habit of receiving once a week in her pretty drawing room in the rue de la bruyere. these evenings resembled most parisian evenings, with the difference that people amused themselves. when there was not enough room they sat on one another's knees, and it often happened that the same glass served for two. rodolphe, who was a friend of musette and never anything more than a friend, without either of them knowing why--rodolphe asked leave to bring his friend, the painter marcel. "a young fellow of talent," he added, "for whom the future is embroidering his academician's coat." "bring him," said musette. the evening they were to go together to musette's rodolphe called on marcel to fetch him. the artist was at his toilet. "what!" said rodolphe, "you are going into society in a colored shirt?" "does that shock custom?" observed marcel quietly. "shock custom, it stuns it." "the deuce," said marcel, looking at his shirt, which displayed a pattern of boars pursued by dogs, on a blue ground. "i have not another here. oh! bah! so much the worse, i will put on a collar, and as 'methuselah' buttons to the neck no one will see the color of my lines." "what!" said rodolphe uneasy, "you are going to wear 'methuselah'?" "alas!" replied marcel, "i must, god wills it and my tailor too; besides it has a new set of buttons and i have just touched it up with ivory black." "methuselah" was merely marcel's dress coat. he called it so because it was the oldest garment of his wardrobe. "methuselah" was cut in the fashion of four years' before and was, besides of a hideous green, but marcel declared that it looked black by candlelight. in five minutes marcel was dressed, he was attired in the most perfect bad taste, the get-up of an art student going into society. m. casimir bonjour will never be so surprised the day he learns his election as a member of the institute as were rodolphe and marcel on reaching mademoiselle musette's. this is the reason for their astonishment: mademoiselle musette who for some time past had fallen out with her lover the counsellor of state, had been abandoned by him at a very critical juncture. legal proceedings having been taken by her creditors and her landlord, her furniture had been seized and carried down into the courtyard in order to be taken away and sold on the following day. despite this incident mademoiselle musette had not for a moment the idea of giving her guests the slip and did not put off her party. she had the courtyard arranged as a drawing room, spread a carpet on the pavement, prepared everything as usual, dressed to receive company, and invited all the tenants to her little entertainment, towards which heaven contributed its illumination. this jest had immense success, never had musette's evenings displayed such go and gaiety; they were still dancing and singing when the porters came to take away furniture and carpets and the company was obliged to withdraw. musette bowed her guests out, singing: "they will laugh long and loud, tralala, at my thursday night's crowd they will laugh long and loud, tralala." marcel and rodolphe alone remained with musette, who ascended to her room where there was nothing left but the bed. "ah, but my adventure is no longer such a lively one after all," said musette. "i shall have to take up my quarters out of doors." "oh madame!" said marcel, "if i had the gifts of plutus i should like to offer you a temple finer than that of solomon, but--" "you are not plutus. all the same i thank you for your good intentions. ah!" she added, glancing around the room, "i was getting bored here, and then the furniture was old. i had had it nearly six months. but that is not all, after the dance one should sup." "let us sup-pose," said marcel, who had an itch of punning, above all in the morning, when he was terrible. as rodolphe had gained some money at the lansquenet played during the evening, he carried off musette and marcel to a restaurant which was just opening. after breakfast, the three, who had no inclination for sleep, spoke of finishing the day in the country, and as they found themselves close to the railway station they got into the first train that started, which landed them at saint germain. during the whole of the night of the party and all of the rest of the day marcel, who was gunpowder which a single glance sufficed to kindle, had been violently smitten by mademoiselle musette and paid her "highly-colored court," as he put it to rodolphe. he even went so far as to propose to the pretty girl to buy her furniture handsomer than the last with the result of the sale of his famous picture, "the passage of the red sea." hence the artist saw with pain the moment arrive when it became necessary to part from musette, who whilst allowing him to kiss her hands, neck and sundry other accessories, gently repulsed him every time that he tried to violently burgle her heart. on reaching paris, rodolphe left his friend with the girl, who asked the artist to see her to her door. "will you allow me to call on you?" asked marcel, "i will paint your portrait." "my dear fellow," replied she, "i cannot give you my address, since tomorrow i may no longer have one, but i will call and see you, and i will mend your coat, which has a hole so big that one could shoot the moon through it." "i will await your coming like that of the messiah," said marcel. "not quite so long," said musette, laughing. "what a charming girl," said marcel to himself, as he slowly walked away. "she is the goddess of mirth. i will make two holes in my coat." he had not gone twenty paces before he felt himself tapped on the shoulder. it was mademoiselle musette. "my dear monsieur marcel," said she, "are you a true knight?" "i am. 'rubens and my lady,' that is my motto." "well then, hearken to my woes and pity take, most noble sir," returned musette, who was slightly tinged with literature, although she murdered grammar in fine style, "the landlord has taken away the key of my room and it is eleven o'clock at night. do you understand?" "i understand," said marcel, offering musette his arm. he took her to his studio on the quai aux fleurs. musette was hardly able to keep awake, but she still had strength enough to say to marcel, taking him by the hand, "you remember what you have promised?" "oh musette! charming creature!" said the artist in a somewhat moved tone, "you are here beneath a hospitable roof, sleep in peace. good night, i am off." "why so?" said musette, her eyes half closed. "i am not afraid, i can assure you. in the first place, there are two rooms. i will sleep on your sofa." "my sofa is too hard to sleep on, it is stuffed with carded pebbles. i will give you hospitality here, and ask it for myself from a friend who lives on the same landing. it will be more prudent," said he. "i usually keep my word, but i am twenty-two and you are eighteen, musette,--and i am off. good night." the next morning at eight o'clock marcel entered her room with a pot of flowers that he had gone and bought in the market. he found musette, who had thrown herself fully dressed on the bed, and was still sleeping. at the noise made by him she woke, and held out her hand. "what a good fellow," said she. "good fellow," repeated marcel, "is not that a term of ridicule?" "oh!" exclaimed musette, "why should you say that to me? it is not nice. instead of saying spiteful things offer me that pretty pot of flowers." "it is, indeed, for you that i have brought them up," said marcel. "take it, and in return for my hospitality sing me one of your songs, the echo of my garret may perhaps retain something of your voice, and i shall still hear you after you have departed." "oh! so you want to show me the door?" said musette. "listen, marcel, i do not beat about the bush to say what my thoughts are. you like me and i like you. it is not love, but it is perhaps its seed. well, i am not going away, i am going to stop here, and i shall stay here as long as the flowers you have just given me remain unfaded." "ah!" exclaimed marcel, "they will fade in a couple of days. if i had known i would have bought immortelles." * * * * * for a fortnight musette and marcel lived together, and led, although often without money, the most charming life in the world. musette felt for the artist an affection which had nothing in common with her preceding passions, and marcel began to fear that he was seriously in love with his mistress. ignorant that she herself was very much afraid of being equally smitten, he glanced every morning at the condition of the flowers, the death of which was to bring about the severance of their connection, and found it very difficult to account for their continued freshness. but he soon had a key to the mystery. one night, waking up, he no longer found musette beside him. he rose, hastened into the next room, and perceived his mistress, who profited nightly by his slumbers to water the flowers and hinder them from perishing. chapter vii the billows of pactolus it was the nineteenth of march, 184--. should rodolphe reach the age of methuselah, he will never forget the date; for it was on that day, at three in the afternoon, that our friend issued from a banker's where he had just received five hundred francs in current and sounding specie. the first use rodolphe made of this slice of peru which had fallen into his pocket was not to pay his debts, inasmuch as he had sworn to himself to practice economy and go to no extra expense. he had a fixed idea on this subject, and declared that before thinking of superfluities, one ought to provide for necessaries. therefore it was that he paid none of his creditors, and bought a turkish pipe which he had long coveted. armed with this purchase, he directed his steps towards the lodging of his friend marcel, who had for some time given him shelter. as he entered marcel's studio, rodolphe's pockets rang like a village-steeple on a grand holiday. on hearing this unusual sound, marcel supposed it was one of his neighbors, a great speculator, counting his profits on 'change, and muttered, "there's that impertinent fellow next door beginning his music again! if this is to go on, i shall give notice to the landlord. it's impossible to work with such a noise. it tempts one to quit one's condition of poor artist and turn robber, forty times over." so, never suspecting that it was his friend rodolphe changed into a croesus, marcel again set to work on his "passage of the red sea," which had been on his easel nearly three years. rodolphe, who had not yet spoken, meditating an experiment which he was about to make on his friend, said to himself, "we shall laugh in a minute. won't it be fun?" and he let fall a five-franc piece on the floor. marcel raised his eyes and looked at rodolphe, who was as grave as an article in the "revue des deux mondes." then he picked up the piece of money with a well-satisfied air, and made a courteous salute to it; for, vagabond artist as he was, he understood the usages of society, and was very civil to strangers. knowing, moreover, that rodolphe had gone out to look for money, marcel, seeing that his friend had succeeded in his operations, contented himself with admiring the result, without inquiring by what means it had been obtained. accordingly, he went to work again without speaking, and finished drowning an egyptian in the waves of the red sea. as he was terminating this homicide, rodolphe let fall another piece, laughing in his sleeve at the face the painter was going to make. at the sonorous sound of the metal, marcel bounded up as if he had received an electric shock, and cried, "what! number two!" a third piece rolled on the floor, then another, then one more; finally a whole quadrille of five-franc pieces were dancing in the room. marcel began to show evident signs of mental alienation; and rodolphe laughed like the pit of a parisian theatre at the first representation of a very tragical tragedy. suddenly, and without any warning, he plunged both hands into his pockets, and the money rushed out in a supernatural steeple-chase. it was an inundation of pactolus; it was jupiter entering danae's chamber. marcel remained silent, motionless, with a fixed stare; his astonishment was gradually operating upon him a transformation similar to that which the untimely curiosity of lott's wife brought upon her: by the time that rodolphe had thrown his last hundred francs on the floor, the painter was petrified all down one side of his body. rodolphe laughed and laughed. compared with his stormy mirth, the thunder of an orchestra of sax-horns would have been no more than the crying of a child at the breast. stunned, strangled, stupefied by his emotions, marcel thought himself in a dream. to drive away the nightmare, he bit his finger till he brought blood, and almost made himself scream with pain. he then perceived that, though trampling upon money, he was perfectly awake. like a personage in a tragedy, he ejaculated: "can i believe my eyes?" and then seizing rodolphe's hand, he added, "explain to me this mystery." "did i explain it 'twould be one no more." "come, now!" "this gold is the fruit of the sweat of my brow," said rodolphe, picking up the money and arranging it on the table. he then went a few steps and looked respectfully at the five hundred francs ranged in heaps, thinking to himself, "now then, my dreams will be realized!" "there cannot be much less than six thousand francs there," thought marcel to himself, as he regarded the silver which trembled on the table. "i've an idea! i shall ask rodolphe to buy my 'passage of the red sea.'" all at once rodolphe put himself into a theatrical attitude, and, with great solemnity of voice and gesture, addressed the artist: "listen to me, marcel: the fortune which has dazzled your eyes is not the product of vile maneuvers; i have not sold my pen; i am rich, but honest. this gold, bestowed by a generous hand, i have sworn to use in laboriously acquiring a serious position--such as a virtuous man should occupy. labor is the most scared of duties--." "and the horse, the noblest of animals," interrupted marcel. "bah! where did you get that sermon? been through a course of good sense, no doubt." "interrupt me not," replied rodolphe, "and truce to your railleries. they will be blunted against the buckler of invulnerable resolution in which i am from this moment clad." "that will do for prologue. now the conclusion." "this is my design. no longer embarrassed about the material wants of life, i am going seriously to work. first of all, i renounce my vagabond existence: i shall dress like other people, set up a black coat, and go to evening parties. if you are willing to follow in my footsteps, we will continue to live together but you must adopt my program. the strictest economy will preside over our life. by proper management we have before us three months' work without any preoccupation. but we must be economical." "my dear fellow," said marcel, "economy is a science only practicable for rich people. you and i, therefore, are ignorant of its first elements. however, by making an outlay of six francs we can have the works of monsieur jean-baptiste say, a very distinguished economist, who will perhaps teach us how to practice the art. hallo! you have a turkish pipe there!" "yes, i bought it for twenty-five francs." "how is that! you talk of economy, and give twenty-five francs for a pipe!" "and this is an economy. i used to break a two-sous pipe every day, and at the end of the year that came to a great deal more." "true, i should never have thought of that." they heard a neighboring clock strike six. "let us have dinner at once," said rodolphe. "i mean to begin from tonight. talking of dinner, it occurs to me that we lose much valuable time every day in cooking ours; now time is money, so we must economize it. from this day we will dine out." "yes," said marcel, "there is a capital restaurant twenty steps off. it's rather dear, but not far to go, so we shall gain in time what we lose in money." "we will go there today," said rodolphe, "but tomorrow or next day we will adopt a still more economical plan. instead of going to the restaurant, we will hire a cook." "no, no," put in marcel, "we will hire a servant to be cook and everything. just see the immense advantages which will result from it. first of all, our rooms will be always in order; he will clean our boots, go on errands, wash my brushes; i will even try and give him a taste of the fine arts, and make him grind colors. in this way, we shall save at least six hours a day." five minutes after, the two friends were installed in one of the little rooms of the restaurant, and continuing their schemes of economy. "we must get an intelligent lad," said rodolphe, "if he has a sprinkling of spelling, i will teach him to write articles, and make an editor of him." "that will be his resource for his old age," said marcel, adding up the bill. "well, this is dear, rather! fifteen francs! we used both to dine for a franc and a half." "yes," replied rodolphe, "but then we dined so badly that we were obliged to sup at night. so, on the whole, it is an economy." "you always have the best of the argument," muttered the convinced artist. "shall we work tonight?" "no, indeed! i shall go to see my uncle. he is a good fellow, and will give me good advice when i tell him my new position. and you, marcel?" "i shall go to medicis to ask him if he has any restorations of pictures to give me. by the way, give me five francs." "for what?" "to cross the pont des arts." "two sous to cross a bridge when you can go over another for nothing! that is a useless expense; and, though an inconsiderable one, is a violation of our rule." "i am wrong, to be sure," said marcel. "i will take a cab and go by the pont neuf." so the two friends quitted each other in opposite directions, but somehow the different roads brought them to the same place, and they didn't go home till morning. two days after, rodolphe and marcel were completely metamorphosed. dressed like two bridegrooms of the best society, they were so elegant, and neat, and shining, that they hardly recognized each other when they met in the street. still their system of economy was in full blast, though it was not without much difficulty that their "organization of labor" had been realized. they had taken a servant; a big fellow thirty-four years old, of swiss descent, and about as clever as an average donkey. but baptiste was not born to be a servant; he had a soul above his business; and if one of his masters gave him a parcel to carry, he blushed with indignation, and sent it by porter. however, he had some merits; for instance, he could hash hare well and his first profession having been that of distiller, he passed much of his time--or his masters', rather--in trying to invent a new kind of liniment; he also succeeded in the preparation of lamp-black. but where he was unrivalled was in smoking marcel's cigars and lighting them with rodolphe's manuscripts. one day marcel wanted to put baptiste into costume, and make him sit for pharaoh in his "passage of the red sea." to this proposition baptiste replied by a flat refusal, and demanded his wages. "very well," said marcel, "i will settle with you tonight." when rodolphe returned, his friends declared that they must send away baptiste. "he is of no use to us at all." "no, indeed--only an ornament, and not much of that." "awfully stupid." "and equally lazy." "we must turn him off." "let us!" "still, he has some good points. he hashes hare very well." "and the lamp-black! he is a very raphael for that." "yes, but that's all he is good for. we lose time arguing with him." "he keeps us from working." "he is the cause of my 'passage' not being finished in time for the exhibition. he wouldn't sit for pharaoh." "thanks to him, i couldn't finish my article in time. he wouldn't go to the public library and hunt up the notes i wanted." "he is ruining us." "decidedly we can't keep him." "send him away then! but we must pay him." "that we'll do. give me the money, and i will settle accounts with him." "money! but it is not i who keeps the purse, but you." "not at all! it is you who are charged with the financial department." "but i assure you," said marcel, "i have no money." "can there be no more? it is impossible! we can't have spent five hundred francs in eight days, especially living with the most rigid economy as we have done, and confining ourselves to absolute necessaries: [absolute superfluities, he should have said]. we must look over our accounts; and we shall find where the mistake is." "yes, but we shan't find where the money is. however, let us see the account-book, at any rate." and this is the way they kept their accounts which had been begun under the auspices of saint economy: _"march 19. received 500 francs. paid, a turkish pipe, 25 fr.; dinner, 15 fr.; sundries, 40 fr."_ "what are those sundries?" asked rodolphe of marcel, who was reading. "you know very well," replied the other, "that night when we didn't go home till morning. we saved fuel and candles by that." "well, afterwards?" _"march 20. breakfast, 1 fr. 50 c.; tobacco, 20 c.; dinner, 2 fr.; an opera glass, 2 fr. 50 c._--that goes to your account. what did you want a glass for? you see perfectly well." "you know i had to give an account of the exhibition in the 'scarf of iris.' it is impossible to criticize paintings without a glass. the expense is quite legitimate. well?--" "a bamboo cane--" "ah, that goes to your account," said rodolphe. "you didn't want a cane." "that was all we spent the 20th," was marcel's only answer. "the 21st we breakfasted out, dined out, and supped out." "we ought not to have spent much that day." "not much, in fact--hardly thirty francs." "but what for?" "i don't know; it's marked sundries." "vague and treacherous heading!" "'21st. (the day that baptiste came.) _5 francs to him on account of his wages. 50 centimes to the organ man.'"_ "23rd. nothing set down. 24th, ditto. two good days!" _"'25th. baptiste, on account, 3 fr._ it seems to me we give him money very often," said marcel, by way of reflection. "there will be less owing to him," said rodolphe. "go on!" _"'26th. sundries, useful in an artistic point of view, 36 fr.'"_ "what did we buy that was useful? i don't recollect. what can it have been?" "you don't remember! the day we went to the top of notre dame for a bird's-eye view of paris." "but it costs only eight sous to go up the tower." "yes, but then we went to dine at saint germain after we came down." "clear as mud!" "27th. nothing to set down." "good! there's economy for you." _"'28th. baptiste, on account, 6 fr.'"_ "now this time i am sure we owe baptiste nothing more. perhaps he is even in our debt. we must see." "29th. nothing set down, except the beginning of an article on 'social morals.'" "30th. ah! we had company at dinner--heavy expenses the 30th, 55 fr. 31st.--that's today--we have spent nothing yet. you see," continued marcel, "the account has been kept very carefully, and the total does not reach five hundred francs." "then there ought to be money in the drawer." "we can see," said marcel, opening it. "anything there?" "yes, a spider." "a spider in the morning of sorrow is a warning," hummed rodolphe. "where the deuce has all the money gone?" exclaimed marcel, totally upset at the sight of the empty drawer. "very simple," replied rodolphe. "baptiste has had it all." "stop a minute!" cried marcel, rummaging in the drawer, where he perceived a paper. "the bill for last quarter's rent!" "how did it come there?" "and paid, too," added marcel. "you paid the landlord, then!" "me! come now!" said rodolphe. "but what means--" "but i assure you--" "oh, what can be this mystery?" sang the two in chorus to the final air of "the white lady." baptiste, who loved music, came running in at once. marcel showed him the paper. "ah, yes," said baptiste carelessly, "i forgot to tell you. the landlord came this morning while you were out. i paid him, to save him the trouble of coming back." "where did you find the money?" "i took it out of the open drawer. i thought, sir, you had left it open on purpose, and forgot to tell me to pay him, so i did just as if you had told me." "baptiste!" said marcel, in a white heat, "you have gone beyond your orders. from this day you cease to form part of our household. take off your livery!" baptiste took off the glazed leather cap which composed his livery, and handed it to marcel. "very well," said the latter, "now you may go." "and my wages?" "wages? you scamp! you have had fourteen francs in a little more than a week. what do you do with so much money? do you keep a dancer?" "a rope dancer?" suggested rodolphe. "then i am to be left," said the unhappy domestic, "without a covering for my head!" "take your livery," said marcel, moved in spite of himself, and he restored the cap to baptiste. "yet it is that wretch who has wrecked our fortunes," said rodolphe, seeing poor baptiste go out. "where shall we dine today?" "we shall know tomorrow," replied marcel. chapter viii the cost of a five franc piece one saturday evening, at a time when he had not yet gone into housekeeping with mademoiselle mimi, who will shortly make her appearance, rodolphe made the acquaintance at the table d'hote he frequented of a ladies' wardrobe keeper, named mademoiselle laure. having learned that he was editor of "the scarf of iris" and of "the beaver," two fashion papers, the milliner, in hope of getting her goods puffed, commenced a series of significant provocations. to these provocations rodolphe replied by a pyrotechnical display of madrigals, sufficient to make benserade, voiture, and all other dealers in the fireworks of gallantry jealous; and at the end of the dinner, mademoiselle laure, having learned that he was a poet, gave him clearly to understand that she was not indisposed to accept him as her petrarch. she even, without circumlocution, made an appointment with him for the next day. "by jove," said rodolphe to himself, as he saw mademoiselle laure home, "this is certainly a very amiable young person. she seems to me to have a good grammar and a tolerably extensive wardrobe. i am quite disposed to make her happy." on reaching the door of her house, mademoiselle laure relinquished rodolphe's arm, thanking him for the trouble he had taken in accompanying her to such a remote locality. "oh! madame," replied rodolphe, bowing to the ground, "i should like you to have lived at moscow or the islands of the sound, in order to have had the pleasure of being your escort the longer." "that would be rather far," said laure, affectedly. "we could have gone by way of the boulevards, madame," said rodolphe. "allow me to kiss you hand in the shape of your cheek," he added, kissing his companion on the lips before laure could make any resistance. "oh sir!" she exclaimed, "you go too fast." "it is to reach my destination sooner," said rodolphe. "in love, the first stages should be ridden at a gallop." "what a funny fellow," though the milliner, as she entered her dwelling. "a pretty girl," said rodolphe, as he walked away. returning home, he went to bed at once, and had the most delightful dreams. he saw himself at balls, theaters, and public promenades with mademoiselle laure on his arm, clad in dresses more magnificent than those of the girl with the ass's skin of the fairy tale. the next morning at eleven o'clock, according to habit, rodolphe got up. his first thought was for mademoiselle laure. "she is a very well mannered woman," he murmured, "i feel sure that she was brought up at saint denis. i shall at length realize the happiness of having a mistress who is not pitted with the small-pox. decidedly i will make sacrifices for her. i will go and draw my screw at 'the scarf of iris.' i will buy some gloves, and i will take laure to dinner at a restaurant where table napkins are in use. my coat is not up to much," said he as he dressed himself, "but, bah! black is good wear." and he went out to go to the office of "the scarf of iris." crossing the street he came across an omnibus, on the side of which was pasted a bill, with the words, "display of fountains at versailles, today, sunday." a thunderbolt falling at rodolphe's feet would not have produced a deeper impression upon him than the sight of this bill. "today, sunday! i had forgotten it," he exclaimed. "i shall not be able to get any money. today, sunday!!! all the spare coin in paris is on its way to versailles." however, impelled by one of those fabulous hopes to which a man always clings, rodolphe hurried to the office of the paper, reckoning that some happy chance might have taken the cashier there. monsieur boniface had, indeed, looked in for a moment, but had left at once. "for versailles," said the office messenger to rodolphe. "come," said rodolphe, "it is all over!... but let me see," he thought, "my appointment is for this evening. it is noon, so i have five hours to find five francs in--twenty sous an hour, like the horses in the bois du boulogne. forward." as he found himself in a neighborhood where the journalist, whom he styled the influential critic, resided, rodolphe thought of having a try at him. "i am sure to find him in," said he, as he ascended the stairs, "it is the day he writes his criticism--there is no fear of his being out. i will borrow five francs of him." "hallo! it's you, is it?" said the journalist, on seeing rodolphe. "you come at the right moment. i have a slight service to ask of you." "how lucky it falls out," thought the editor of "the scarf of iris." "were you at the odeon theater last night?" "i am always at the odeon." "you have seen the new piece, then?" "who else would have seen it? i am the odeon audience." "that is true," said the critic, "you are one of the caryatides of the theater. it is even rumored that it is you who finds the money for its subvention. well, that is what i want of you, a summary of the plot of the new piece." "that is easy, i have the memory of a creditor." "whom is this piece by?" asked the critic of rodolphe, whilst the latter was writing. "a gentleman." "it cannot be up to much." "well, it is not as strong as a turk." "then it cannot be very robust. the turks, you see, have usurped a reputation for strength. besides, there are no longer any turks except at masked balls and in the champs-elysees where they sell dates. one of my friends knows the east and he assures me that all the natives of it were born in the rue coquenard." "that is smart," said rodolphe. "you think so?" observed the critic, "i will put it in my article." "here is my analysis of the piece, it is to the point," resumed rodolphe. "yes, but it is short." "by putting in dashes and developing your critical opinion it will fill some space." "i have scarcely time, my dear fellow, and then my critical opinion will not fill enough space either." "you can stick in an adjective at every third word." "cannot you tail on to your analysis a little, or rather a long criticism of the piece, eh?" asked the critic. "humph," said rodolphe. "i have certainly some opinions upon tragedy, but i have printed them three times in 'the beaver' and 'the scarf of iris.'" "no matter, how many lines do your opinions fill?" "forty lines." "the deuce, you have strong opinions. well, lend me your forty lines." "good," thought rodolphe, "if i turn out twenty francs' worth of copy for him he cannot refuse me five. i must warn you," said he to the critic, "that my opinions are not quite novel. they are rather worn at the elbows. before printing them i yelled them in every cafe in paris, there is not a waiter who does not know them by heart." "what does that matter to me? you surely do not know me. is there anything new in the world except virtue?" "here you are," said rodolphe, as he finished. "thunder and tempests, there is still nearly a column wanting. how is this chasm to be filled?" exclaimed the critic. "since you are here supply me with some paradoxes." "i have not any about me," said rodolphe, "though i can lend you some. only they are not mine, i bought them for half a franc from one of my friends who was in distress. they have seen very little use as yet." "very good," said the critic. "ah!" said rodolphe to himself, setting to write again. "i shall certainly ask him for ten francs, just now paradoxes are as dear as partridges." and he wrote some thirty lines containing nonsense about pianos, goldfish and rhine wine, which was called toilet wine just as we speak of toilet vinegar. "it is very good," said the critic. "now do me the favor to add that the place where one meets more honest folk than anywhere else is the galleys." "why?" "to fill a couple of lines. good, now it is finished," said the influential critic, summoning his servant to take the article to the printers. "and now," thought rodolphe, "let us strike home." and he gravely proposed his request. "ah! my dear fellow," said the critic, "i have not a sou in the place. lolette ruins me in pommade, and just now she stripped me of my last copper to go to versailles and see the nereids and the brazen monsters spout forth the floods." "to versailles. but it is an epidemic!" exclaimed rodolphe. "but why do you want money?" "that is my story," replied rodolphe, "i have at five this evening an appointment with a lady, a very well bred lady who never goes out save in an omnibus. i wish to unite my fortunes with hers for a few days, and it appears to me the right thing to enable her to take the pleasures of this life. for dinner, dances, &c., &c., i must have five francs, and if i do not find them french literature is dishonoured in my person." "why don't you borrow the sum of the lady herself?" exclaimed the critic. "the first time of meeting, it is hardly possible. only you can get me out of this fix." "by all the mummies of egypt i give you my word of honor that i have not enough to buy a sou pipe. however, i have some books that you can sell." "impossible today, mother mansut's, lebigre's, and all the shops on the quays and in the rue saint jacques are closed. what books are they? volumes of poetry with a portrait of the author in spectacles? but such things never sell." "unless the author is criminally convicted," said the critic. "wait a bit, here are some romances and some concert tickets. by setting about it skillfully you may, perhaps, make money of them." "i would rather have something else, a pair of trowsers, for instance." "come," said the critic, "take this copy of bossuet and this plaster cast of monsieur odilon barrot. on my word of honor, it is the widow's mite." "i see that you are doing your best," said rodolphe. "i will take away these treasures, but if i get thirty sous out of them i shall regard it as the thirteenth labor of hercules." after having covered about four leagues rodolphe, by the aid of an eloquence of which he had the secret on great occasions, succeeded in getting his washerwoman to lend him two francs on the volumes of poetry, the romances and the bust of monsieur barrot. "come," said he, as he recrossed the seine, "here is the sauce, now i must find the dish itself. suppose i go to my uncle." half an hour later he was at his uncle monetti's, who read upon his nephew's face what was the matter. hence he put himself on guard and forestalled any request by a series of complaints, such as: "times are hard, bread is dear, debtors do not pay up, rents are terribly high, commerce decaying, &c., &c.," all the hypocritical litany of shopkeepers. "would you believe it," said the uncle, "that i have been forced to borrow money from my shopman to meet a bill?" "you should have sent to me," said rodolphe. "i would have lent it you, i received two hundred francs three days ago." "thanks, my lad," said the uncle, "but you have need of your fortune. ah! whilst you are here, you might, you who write such a good hand, copy out some bills for me that i want to send out." "my five francs are going to cost me dear," said rodolphe to himself, setting about the task, which he condensed. "my dear uncle," said he to monetti, "i know how fond you are of music and i have brought you some concert tickets." "you are very kind, my boy. will you stay to dinner?" "thanks, uncle, but i am expected at dinner in the faubourg saint germain, indeed, i am rather put out about it for i have not time to run home and get the money to buy gloves." "you have no gloves, shall i lend you mine?" said his uncle. "thanks, we do not take the same size, only you would greatly oblige me by the loan of--" "twenty nine sous to buy a pair? certainly, my boy, here you are. when one goes into society one should be well dressed. better be envied than pitied, as your aunt used to say. come, i see you are getting on in the world, so much the better. i would have given you more," he went on, "but it is all i have in the till. i should have to go upstairs and i cannot leave the shop, customers drop in every moment." "you were saying that business was not flourishing?" uncle monetti pretended not to hear, and said to his nephew who was pocketing the twenty nine sous: "do not be in a hurry about repayment." "what a screw," said rodolphe, bolting. "ah!" he continued, "there are still thirty-one sous lacking. where am i to find them? i know, let's be off to the crossroads of providence." this was the name bestowed by rodolphe on the most central point in paris, that is to say, the palais royal, a spot where it is almost impossible to remain ten minutes without meeting ten people of one's acquaintance, creditors above all. rodolphe therefore went and stationed himself at the entrance to the palais royal. this time providence was long in coming. at last rodolphe caught sight of it. providence had a white hat, a green coat, and a gold headed cane--a well dressed providence. it was a rich and obliging fellow, although a phalansterian. "i am delighted to see you," said he to rodolphe, "come and walk a little way with me; we can have a talk." "so i am to have the infliction of the phalanstere," murmured rodolphe, suffering himself to be led away from the wearer of the white hat, who, indeed, phalanstered him to the utmost. as they drew near the pont des arts rodolphe said to his companion-"i must leave you, not having sufficient to pay the toll." "nonsense," said the other, catching hold of rodolphe and throwing two sous to the toll keeper. "this is the right moment," thought the editor of "the scarf of iris," as they crossed the bridge. arrived at the further end in front of the clock of the institute, rodolphe stopped short, pointed to the dial with a despairing gesture, and exclaimed:-"confound it all, a quarter to five! i am done for." "what is the matter?" cried his astonished friend. "the matter is," said rodolphe, "that, thanks to your dragging me here in spite of myself, i have missed an appointment." "an important one?" "i should think so; money that i was to call for at five o'clock at--batignolles. i shall never be able to get there. hang it; what am i to do?" "why," said the phalansterian, "nothing is simpler; come home with me and i will lend you some." "impossible, you live at montrouge, and i have business at six o'clock at the chaussee d'antin. confound it." "i have a trifle about me," said providence, timidly, "but it is very little." "if i had enough to take a cab i might get to batignolles in time." "here is the contents of my purse, my dear fellow, thirty one sous." "give it to me at once, that i may bolt," said rodolphe, who had just heard five o'clock strike, and who hastened off to keep his appointment. "it has been hard to get," said he, counting out his money. "a hundred sous exactly. at last i am supplied, and laure will see that she has to do with a man who knows how to do things properly. i won't take a centime home this evening. we must rehabilitate literature, and prove that its votaries only need money to be wealthy." rodolphe found mademoiselle laure at the trysting place. "good," said he, "for punctuality she is a feminine chronometer." he spent the evening with her, and bravely melted down his five francs in the crucible of prodigality. mademoiselle laure was charmed with his manners, and was good enough only to notice that rodolphe had not escorted her home at the moment when he was ushering her into his own room. "i am committing a fault," said she. "do not make me repent of it by the ingratitude which is characteristic of your sex." "madame," said rodolphe, "i am known for my constancy. it is such that all my friends are astonished at my fidelity, and have nicknamed me the general bertrand of love." chapter ix the white violets about this time rodolphe was very much in love with his cousin angela, who couldn't bear him; and the thermometer was twelve degrees below freezing point. mademoiselle angela was the daughter of monsieur monetti, the chimney doctor, of whom we have already had occasion to speak. she was eighteen years old, and had just come from burgundy, where she lived five years with a relative who was to leave her all her property. this relative was an old lady who had never been young apparently--certainly never handsome, but had always been very ill-natured, although--or perhaps because--very superstitious. angela, who at her departure was a charming child, and promised to be a charming girl, came back at the end of the five years a pretty enough young lady, but cold, dry, and uninteresting. her secluded provincial life, and the narrow and bigoted education she had received, had filled her mind with vulgar prejudices, shrunk her imagination, and converted her heart into a sort of organ, limited to fulfilling its function of physical balance wheel. you might say that she had holy water in her veins instead of blood. she received her cousin with an icy reserve; and he lost his time whenever he attempted to touch the chord of her recollections--recollections of the time when they had sketched out that flirtation in the paul-and-virginia style which is traditional between cousins of different sexes. still rodolphe was very much in love with his cousin angela, who couldn't bear him; and learning one day that the young lady was going shortly to the wedding ball of one of her friends, he made bold to promise angela a bouquet of violets for the ball. and after asking permission of her father, angela accepted her cousin's gallant offer--always on condition that the violets should be white. overjoyed at his cousin's amiability, rodolphe danced and sang his way back to mount st. bernard, as he called his lodging--why will be seen presently. as he passed by a florist's in crossing the palais royal, he saw some white violets in the showcase, and was curious enough to ask their price. a presentable bouquet could not be had for less than ten francs; there were some that cost more. "the deuce!" exclaimed rodolphe, "ten francs! and only eight days to find this fortune! it will be a hard pull, but never mind, my cousin shall have her flowers." this happened in the time of rodolphe's literary genesis, as the transcendentalists would say. his only income at that period was an allowance of fifteen francs a month, made him by a friend, who, after living a long while in paris as a poet, had, by the help of influential acquaintances, gained the mastership of a provincial school. rodolphe, who was the child of prodigality, always spent his allowance in four days; and, not choosing to abandon his holy but not very profitable profession of elegiac poet, lived for the rest of the month on the rare droppings from the basket of providence. this long lent had no terrors for him; he passed through it gaily, thanks to his stoical temperament and to the imaginary treasures which he expended every day while waiting for the first of the month, that easter which terminated his fast. he lived at this time at the very top of one of the loftiest houses in paris. his room was shaped like a belvidere, and was a delicious habitation in summer, but from october to april a perfect little kamschatka. the four cardinal winds which penetrated by the four windows,--there was one on each of the four sides--made fearful music in it throughout the cold seasons. then in irony as it were, there was a huge fireplace, the immense chimney of which seemed a gate of honor reserved for boreas and his retinue. on the first attack of cold, rodolphe had recourse to an original system of warming; he cut up successively what little furniture he had, and at the end of a week his stock was considerably abridged; in fact, he had only a bed and two chairs left; it should be remarked that these items were insured against fire by their nature, being of iron. this manner of heating himself he called _moving up the chimney_. it was january, and the thermometer, which indicated twelve degrees below freezing point on the spectacle quay, would have stood two or three lower if moved to the belvidere, which rodolphe called indifferently mount st. bernard, spitzenberg, and siberia. the night when he promised his cousin the white violets, he was seized with a great rage on returning home; the four cardinal winds, in playing puss-in-the-corner round his chamber, had broken a pane of glass--the third time in a fortnight. after exploding in a volley of frantic imprecations upon eolus and all his family, and plugging up the breach with a friend's portrait, rodolphe lay down, dressed as he was, between his two mattresses, and dreamed of white violets all night. at the end of five days, rodolphe had found nothing to help him toward realizing his dreams. he must have the bouquet the day after tomorrow. meanwhile, the thermometer fell still lower, and the luckless poet was ready to despair as he thought the violets might have risen higher. finally his good angel had pity on him, and came to his relief as follows. one morning, rodolphe went to take his chance of getting a breakfast from his friend marcel the painter, and found him conversing with a woman in mourning. it was a widow who had just lost her husband, and who wanted to know how much it would cost to paint on the tomb which she had erected, a man's hand, with this inscription beneath: "i wait for her to whom my faith was plighted." to get the work at a cheaper rate, she observed to the artist that when she was called to rejoin her husband, he would have another hand to paint--her hand with a bracelet on the wrist and the supplementary line beneath: "at length, behold us thus once more united." "i shall put this clause in my will," she said, "and require that the task be intrusted to you." "in that case, madame," replied the artist, "i will do it at the price you offer--but only in the hope of seeing your hand. don't go and forget me in your will." "i should like to have this as soon as possible," said the disconsolate one, "nevertheless, take your time to do it well and don't forget the scar on the thumb. i want a living hand." "don't be afraid, madame, it shall be a speaking one," said marcel, as he bowed the widow out. but hardly had she crossed the threshold when she returned, saying, "i have one more thing to ask you, sir: i should like to have inscribed on my husband's tomb something in verse which would tell of his good conduct and his last words. is that good style?" "very good style--they call that an epitaph--the very best style." "you don't know anyone who would do that for me cheap? there is my neighbor monsieur guerin, the public writer, but he asks the clothes off my back." here rodolphe looked at marcel, who understood him at once. "madame," said the artist, pointing to rodolphe, "a happy fortune has conducted hither the very person who can be of service to you in this mournful juncture. this gentleman is a renowned poet; you couldn't find a better one." "i want something very melancholy," said the widow, "and the spelling all right." "madame," replied marcel, "my friend spells like a book. he had all the prizes at school." "indeed!" said the widow, "my grand-nephew had just had a prize too; he is only seven years old." "a very forward child, madame." "but are you sure that the gentleman can make very melancholy verses?" "no one better, madame, for he has undergone much sorrow in his life. the papers always find fault with his verses for being too melancholy." "what!" cried the widow, "do they talk about him in the papers? he must know quite as much, then, as monsieur guerin, the public writer." "and a great deal more. apply to him, madame, and you will not repent of it." after having explained to rodolphe the sort of inscription in verse which she wished to place on her husband's tomb, the widow agreed to give rodolphe ten francs if it suited her--only she must have it very soon. the poet promised she should have it the very next day. "oh good genius of artemisia!" cried rodolphe as the widow disappeared. "i promise you that you shall be suited--full allowance of melancholy lyrics, better got up than a duchess, orthography and all. good old lady! may heaven reward you with a life of a hundred and seven years--equal to that of a good brandy!" "i object," said marcel. "that's true," said rodolphe, "i forgot that you have her hand to paint, and that so long a life would make you lose money." and lifting his hands he gravely ejaculated, "heaven, do not grant my prayer! ah!" he continued, "i was in jolly good luck to come here." "by the way," asked marcel, "what did you want?" "i recollect--and now especially that i have to pass the night in making these verses, i cannot do without what i came to ask you for, namely, first, some dinner; secondly, tobacco and a candle; thirdly, your polar-bear costume." "to go to the masked ball?" "no, indeed, but as you see me here, i am as much frozen up as the grand army in retreat from russia. certainly my green frock-coat and scotch-plaid trowsers are very pretty, but much too summery; they would do to live under the equator; but for one who lodges near the pole, as i do, a white bear skin is more suitable; indeed i may say necessary." "take the fur!" said marcel, "it's a good idea; warm as a dish of charcoal; you will be like a roll in an oven in it." rodolphe was already inside the animal's skin. "now," said he, "the thermometer is going to be really mad." "are you going out so?" said marcel to his friend, after they had finished an ambiguous repast served in a penny dish. "i just am," replied rodolphe. "do you think i care for public opinion? besides, today is the beginning of carnival." he went half over paris with all the gravity of the beast whose skin he occupied. only on passing before a thermometer in an optician's window he couldn't help taking a sight at it. having returned home not without causing great terror to his porter, rodolphe lit his candle, carefully surrounding it with an extempore shade of paper to guard it against the malice of the winds, and set to work at once. but he was not long in perceiving that if his body was almost entirely protected from the cold, his hands were not; a terrible numbness seized his fingers which let the pen fall. "the bravest man cannot struggle against the elements," said the poet, falling back helpless in his chair. "caeser passed the rubicon, but he could not have passed the beresina." all at once he uttered a cry of joy from the depths of his bear-skin breast, and jumped up so suddenly as to overturn some of his ink on its snowy fur. he had an idea! rodolphe drew from beneath his bed a considerable mass of papers, among which were a dozen huge manuscripts of his famous drama, "the avenger." this drama, on which he had spent two years, had been made, unmade, and remade so often that all the copies together weighed fully fifteen pounds. he put the last version on one side, and dragged the others towards the fireplace. "i was sure that with patience i should dispose of it somehow," he exclaimed. "what a pretty fagot! if i could have foreseen what would happen, i could have written a prologue, and then i should have more fuel tonight. but one can't foresee everything." he lit some leaves of the manuscript, in the flame of which he thawed his hands. in five minutes the first act of "the avenger" was over, and rodolphe had written three verses of his epitaph. it would be impossible to describe the astonishment of the four winds when they felt fire in the chimney. "it's an illusion," quoth boreas, as he amused himself by brushing back the hair of rodolphe's bear skin. "let's blow down the pipe," suggested another wind, "and make the chimney smoke." but just as they were about to plague the poor poet, the south wind perceived monsieur arago at a window of the observatory threatening them with his finger; so they all made off, for fear of being put under arrest. meanwhile the second act of "the avenger" was going off with immense success, and rodolphe had written ten lines. but he only achieved two during the third act. "i always thought that third act too short," said rodolphe, "luckily the next one will take longer; there are twenty three scenes in it, including the great one of the throne." as the last flourish of the throne scene went up the chimney in fiery flakes, rodolphe had only three couplets more to write. "now for the last act. this is all monologue. it may last five minutes." the catastrophe flashed and smouldered, and rodolphe in a magnificent transport of poetry had enshrined in lyric stanzas the last words of the illustrious deceased. "there is enough left for a second representation," said he, pushing the remainder of the manuscript under his bed. at eight o'clock next evening, mademoiselle angela entered the ballroom; in her hand was a splendid nosegay of white violets, and among them two budding roses, white also. during the whole night men and women were complimenting the young girl on her bouquet. angela could not but feel a little grateful to her cousin who had procured this little triumph for her vanity; and perhaps she would have thought more of him but for the gallant persecutions of one of the bride's relatives who had danced several times with her. he was a fair-haired youth, with a magnificent moustache curled up at the ends, to hook innocent hearts. the bouquet had been pulled to pieces by everybody; only two white roses were left. the young man asked angela for them; she refused--only to forget them after the ball on a bench, whence the young fair-haired youth hastened to take them. at that moment it was fourteen degrees below freezing point in rodolphe's belvidere. he was leaning against his window looking out at the lights in the ballroom, where his cousin angela, who didn't care for him, was dancing. chapter x the cape of storms in the opening month of each of the four seasons there are some terrible epochs, usually about the 1st and the 15th. rodolphe, who could not witness the approach of one or the other of these two dates without alarm, nicknamed them the cape of storms. on these mornings it is not aurora who opens the portals of the east, but creditors, landlords, bailiffs and their kidney. the day begins with a shower of bills and accounts and winds up with a hailstorm of protests. _dies irae_. now one morning, it was the 15th of april, rodolphe was peacefully slumbering--and dreaming that one of his uncles had just bequeathed him a whole province in peru, the feminine inhabitants included. whilst he was wallowing in this imaginary pacolus, the sound of a key turning in the lock interrupted the heir presumptive just at the most dazzling point of his golden dream. rodolphe sat up in bed, his eyes and mind yet heavy with slumber, and looked about him. he vaguely perceived standing in the middle of his room a man who had just entered. this early visitor bore a bag slung at his back and a large pocketbook in his hand. he wore a cocked hat and a bluish-grey swallow-tailed coat and seemed very much out of breath from ascending the five flights of stairs. his manners were very affable and his steps sounded as sonorously as that of a money-changer's counter on the march. rodolphe was alarmed for a moment, and at the sight of the cocked hat and the coat thought that he had a police officer before him. but the sight of the tolerably well filled bag made him perceive his mistake. "ah! i have it," thought he, "it is something on account of my inheritance, this man comes from the west indies. but in that case why is he not black?" and making a sign to the man, he said, pointing to the bag, "i know all about it. put it down there. thanks." the man was a messenger of the bank of france. he replied to rodolphe's request by holding before his eyes a small strip of paper covered with writing and figures in various colored inks. "you want a receipt," said rodolphe. "that is right. pass me the pen and ink. there, on the table." "no, i have come to take money," replied the messenger. "an acceptance for a hundred and fifty francs. it is the 15th of april." "ah!" observed rodolphe, examining the acceptance. "pay to the order of---birmann. it is my tailor. alas," he added, in melancholy tones casting his eyes alternately upon a frock coat thrown on the bed and upon the acceptance, "causes depart but effects return. what, it is the 15th of april? it is extraordinary, i have not yet had any strawberries this year." the messenger, weary of delay, left the room, saying to rodolphe, "you have till four o'clock to pay." "there is no time like the present," replied rodolphe. "the humbug," he added regretfully, following the cocked hat with his eyes, "he has taken away his bag." rodolphe drew the curtains of his bed and tried to retrace the path to his inheritance, but he made a mistake on the road and proudly entered into a dream in which the manager of the theatre francais came hat in hand to ask him for a drama for his theater, and in which he, aware of the customary practice, asked for an advance. but at the very moment when the manager appeared to be willing to comply the sleeper was again half awakened by the entry of a fresh personage, another creature of the 15th. it was monsieur benoit, landlord of the lodging house in which rodolphe was residing. monsieur benoit was at once the landlord, the bootmaker and the money lender of his lodgers. on this morning he exhaled a frightful odor of bad brandy and overdue rent. he carried an empty bag in his hand. "the deuce," thought rodolphe, "this is not the manager of the theater francais, he would have a white cravat and the bag would be full." "good morning, monsieur rodolphe," said monsieur benoit, approaching the bed. "monsieur benoit! good morning. what has given me the pleasure of this visit?" "i have come to remind you that it is the 15th of april." "already! how time flies, it is extraordinary, i must see about buying a pair of summer trousers. the 15th of april. good heavens! i should never have thought of it but for you, monsieur benoit. what gratitude i owe you for this!" "you also owe me a hundred and sixty-two francs," replied monsieur benoit, "and it is time this little account was settled." "i am not in any absolute hurry--do not put yourself out, monsieur benoit. i will give you time." "but," said the landlord, "you have already put me off several times." "in that case let us come to a settlement, monsieur benoit, let us come to a settlement, it is all the same to me today as tomorrow. besides we are all mortal. let us come to a settlement." an amiable smile smoothed the landlord wrinkles and even his empty bag swelled with hope. "what do i owe you?" asked rodolphe. "in the first place, we have three months' rent at twenty-five francs, that makes seventy-five francs." "errors excepted," said rodolphe. "and then?" "then three pairs of boots at twenty francs." "one moment, one moment, monsieur benoit, do not let us mix matters, this is no longer to do with the landlord but the bootmaker. i want a separate account. accounts are a serious thing, we must not get muddled." "very good," said monsieur benoit, softened by the hope of at length writing "paid" at the foot of his accounts. "here is a special bill for the boots. three pairs of boots at twenty francs, sixty francs." rodolphe cast a look of pity on a pair of worn out boots. "alas!" he thought, "they could not be worse if they had been worn by the wandering jew. yet it was in running after marie that they got so worn out. go on, monsieur benoit." "we were saying sixty francs," replied the latter. "then money lent, twenty seven francs." "stop a bit, monsieur benoit. we agreed that each dog would have his kennel. it is as a friend that you lent me money. therefore, if you please, let us quit the regions of bootmaking and enter those of confidence and friendship which require a separate account. how much does your friendship for me amount to?" "twenty seven francs." "twenty seven francs. you have purchased a friend cheaply, monsieur benoit. in short, we were saying, seventy five, sixty, and twenty seven. that makes altogether---?" "a hundred and sixty two francs," said monsieur benoit, presenting the three bills. "a hundred and sixty two francs," observed rodolphe, "it is extraordinary. what a fine thing arithmetic is. well, monsieur benoit, now that the account is settled we can both rest easy, we know exactly how we stand. next month i will ask you for a receipt, and as during this time the confidence and friendship you must entertain towards me can only increase, you can, in case it should become necessary, grant me a further delay. however, if the landlord and the bootmaker are inclined to be hasty, i would ask the friend to get them to listen to reason. it is extraordinary, monsieur benoit, but every time i think of your triple character as a landlord, a bootmaker, and a friend, i am tempted to believe in the trinity." whilst listening to rodolphe the landlord had turned at one and the same time red, green, white, and yellow, and at each fresh jest from his lodger that rainbow of anger grew deeper and deeper upon his face. "sir," said he, "i do not like to be made game of. i have waited long enough. i give you notice of quit, and unless you let me have some money this evening, i know what i shall have to do." "money! money! am i asking you for money?" said rodolphe. "besides, if i had any, i should not give it to you. on a friday, it would be unlucky." monsieur benoit's wrath grew tempestuous, and if the furniture had not belonged to him he would no doubt have smashed some of it. "you are forgetting your bag," cried rodolphe after him. "what a business," murmured the young fellow, as he found himself alone. "i would rather tame lions. but," he continued, jumping out of bed and dressing hurriedly, "i cannot stay here. the invasion will continue. i must flee; i must even breakfast. suppose i go and see schaunard. i will ask him for some breakfast, and borrow a trifle. a hundred francs will be enough. yes, i'm off to schaunard's." going downstairs, rodolphe met monsieur benoit, who had received further shocks from his other lodgers, as was attested by his empty bag. "if any one asks for me, tell them i have gone into the country--to the alps," said rodolphe. "or stay, tell them that i no longer live here." "i shall tell the truth," murmured monsieur benoit, in a very significant tone. schaunard was living at montmartre. it was necessary to go right through paris. this peregrination was one most dangerous to rodolphe. "today," said he, "the streets are paved with creditors." however, he did not go along by the outer boulevards, as he had felt inclined to. a fanciful hope, on the contrary, urged him to follow the perilous itinerary of central paris. rodolphe thought that on a day when millions were going about the thoroughfares in the money-cases of bank messengers, it might happen that a thousand franc note, abandoned on the roadside, might lie awaiting its good samaritan. thus he walked slowly along with his eyes on the ground. but he only found two pins. after a two hours' walk he got to schaunard's. "ah, it's you," said the latter. "yes, i have come to ask you for some breakfast." "ah, my dear fellow, you come at the wrong time. my mistress has just arrived, and i have not seen her for a fortnight. if you had only called ten minutes earlier." "well, have you got a hundred francs to lend me?" "what! you too!" exclaimed schaunard, in the height of astonishment. "you have come to ask me for money! you, in the ranks of my enemies!" "i will pay you back on monday." "or at the greek calends. my dear fellow, you surely forget what day it is. i can do nothing for you. but there is no reason to despair; the day is not yet over. you may still meet with providence, who never gets up before noon." "ah!" replied rodolphe, "providence has too much to do looking after little birds. i will go and see marcel." marcel was then residing in the rue de breda. rodolphe found him in a very downcast mood, contemplating his great picture that was to represent the passage of the red sea. "what is the matter?" asked rodolphe, as he entered. "you seem quite in the dumps." "alas!" replied the painter, in allegorical language, "for the last fortnight it has been holy week." "red herrings and black radishes. good, i remember." indeed, rodolphe's memory was still salt with the remembrance of a time when he had been reduced to the exclusive consumption of the fish in question. "the deuce," said he, "that is serious. i came to borrow a hundred francs of you." "a hundred francs," said marcel. "you are always in the clouds. the idea of coming and asking me for that mythological amount at a period when one is always under the equator of necessity. you must have been taking hashish." "alas!" said rodolphe, "i have not been taking anything at all." and he left his friend on the banks of the red sea. from noon to four o'clock rodolphe successively steered for every house of his acquaintance. he went through the forty eight districts of paris, and covered about eight leagues, but without any success. the influence of the 15th of april made itself feel with equal severity everywhere. however, dinner time was drawing near. but it scarcely appeared that dinner was likely to follow its example, and it seemed to rodolphe that he was on the raft of the wrecked medusa. as he was crossing the pont neuf an idea all at once occurred to him. "oh! oh!" said he to himself, retracing his steps, "the 15th of april. but i have an invitation to dinner for today." and fumbling in his pocket, he drew out a printed ticket, running as follows: +------------------------------------------------------+ | | | barriere de la villette, | | au grand vainqueur. | | dining room to seat 300 people. | | | | ____________ | | | | anniversary dinner | | in honor of the birth of | | | | the humanitarian messiah | | | | april 15, 184 | | | | _______ | | | | admit one | | n.b.--only half a bottle of wine per head | +------------------------------------------------------+ "i do not share the opinions of the disciples of this messiah," said rodolphe to himself, "but i will willingly share their repast." and with the swiftness of a bird he covered the distance separating him from the barriere de la villette. when he reached the halls of the grand vainqueur, the crowd was enormous. the dining room, seating three hundred, was thronged with five hundred people. a vast horizon of veal and carrots spread itself before the eyes of rodolphe. at length they began to serve the soup. as the guests were carrying their spoons to their lips, five or six people in plain clothes, and several police officers in uniform, pushed into the room, with a commissary of police at their head. "gentlemen," said the commissary, "by order of the authorities, this dinner cannot take place. i call upon you to withdraw." "oh!" said rodolphe, retiring with everyone else. "oh! what a fatality has spoiled my dinner." he sadly resumed the road to his dwelling, and reached it at about eleven at night. monsieur benoit was awaiting him. "ah! it is you," said the landlord. "have you thought of what i told you this morning? have you brought me any money?" "i am to receive some tonight. i will give you some of it tomorrow morning," replied rodolphe, looking for his key and his candlestick in their accustomed place. he did not find them. "monsieur rodolphe," said the landlord, "i am very sorry, but i have let your room, and i have no other vacant now--you must go somewhere else." rodolphe had a lofty soul, and a night in the open air did not alarm him. besides, in the event of bad weather, he could sleep in a box at the odeon theater, as he had already done before. only he claimed "his property" from monsieur benoit, the said property consisting of a bundle of papers. "that is so," said the landlord. "i have no right to detain those things. they are in the bureau. come up with me; if the person who has taken your room has not gone to bed, we can go in." the room had been let during the day to a girl named mimi, with whom rodolphe had formerly begun a love duet. they recognized one another at once. rodolphe began to whisper to mimi and tenderly squeezed her hand. "see how it rains," said he, calling attention to the noise of the storm that had just broken overhead. "sir," said she, pointing to rodolphe, "this is the gentleman i was expecting this evening." "oh!" said monsieur benoit, grinning on the wrong end of his face. whilst mademoiselle mimi was hurriedly getting ready an improvised supper, midnight struck. "ah!" said rodolphe to himself, "the 15th of april is over. i have at length weathered my cape of storms. my dear mimi," said the young man, taking the pretty girl in his arms and kissing her on the back of the neck, "it would have been impossible for you to have allowed me to be turned out of doors. you have the bump of hospitality." chapter xi a bohemian cafe you shall hear how it came to pass that carolus barbemuche, platonist and literary man generally, became a member of the bohemian club, in the twenty-fourth year of his age. at that time, gustave colline, the great philosopher, marcel, the great painter, schaunard, the great musician, and rodolphe, the great poet (as they called one another), regularly frequented the momus cafe, where they were surnamed "the four musqueteers," because they were always seen together. in fact, they came together, went away together, played together, and sometimes didn't pay their shot together, with a unison worthy of the best orchestra. they chose to meet in a room where forty people might have been accommodated, but they were usually there alone, inasmuch as they had rendered the place uninhabitable by its ordinary frequenters. the chance customer who risked himself in this den, became, from the moment of his entrance, the victim of the terrible four; and, in most cases, made his escape without finishing his newspaper and cup of coffee, seasoned as they were by unheard-of maxims on art, sentiment, and political economy. the conversation of the four comrades was of such a nature that the waiter who served them had become an idiot in the prime of his life. at length things reached such a point that the landlord lost all patience and came up one night to make a formal statement of his griefs: "firstly. monsieur rodolphe comes early in the morning to breakfast, and carries off to his room all the papers of the establishment, going so far as to complain if he finds that they have been opened. consequently, the other customers, cut off from the usual channels of public opinion and intelligence, remain until dinner in utter ignorance of political affairs. the bosquet party hardly knows the names of the last cabinet." "monsieur rodolphe has even obliged the cafe to subscribe to 'the beaver,' of which he is chief editor. the master of the establishment at first refused; but as monsieur rodolphe and his party kept calling the waiter every half hour, and crying, 'the beaver! bring us 'the beaver' some other customers, whose curiosity was excited by these obstinate demands, also asked for 'the beaver.' so 'the beaver' was subscribed to--a hatter's journal, which appeared every month, ornamented with a vignette and an article on 'the philosophy of hats and other things in general,' by gustave colline." "secondly. the aforesaid monsieur colline, and his friend monsieur rodolphe, repose themselves from their intellectual labors by playing backgammon from ten in the morning till midnight and as the establishment possess but one backgammon board, they monopolize that, to the detriment of the other amateurs of the game; and when asked for the board, they only answer, 'some one is reading it, call tomorrow.' thus the bosquet party find themselves reduced to playing piquet, or talking about their old love affairs." "thirdly. monsieur marcel, forgetting that a cafe is a public place, brings thither his easel, box of colors, and, in short, all the instruments of his art. he even disregards the usages of society as far as to send for models of different sexes; which might shock the morals of the bosquet party." "fourthly. following the example of his friend, monsieur schaunard talks of bringing his piano to the cafe and he has not scrupled to get up a chorus on a motive from his symphony, 'the influence of blue in art.' monsieur schaunard has gone farther: he has inserted in the lantern which serves the establishment for sign, a transparency with this inscription: 'course of music, vocal and instrumental, for both sexes, gratis. apply at the counter.' in consequence of this, the counter aforesaid is besieged every night by a number of badly dressed individuals, wanting to know where you go in." "moreover, monsieur schaunard gives meetings to a lady calling herself mademoiselle phemie, who always forgets to bring her bonnet. wherefore, monsieur bosquet, jr., has declared that he will never more put foot in an establishment where the laws of nature are thus outraged." "fifthly. not content with being very poor customers, these gentlemen have tried to be still more economical. under pretence of having caught the mocha of the establishment in improper intercourse with chicory, they have brought a lamp with spirits-of-wine, and make their own coffee, sweetening it with their own sugar; all of which is an insult to the establishment." "sixthly. corrupted by the discourse of these gentlemen, the waiter bergami (so called from his whiskers), forgetting his humble origin and defying all control, has dared to address to the mistress of the house a piece of poetry suggestive of the most improper sentiments; by the irregularity of its style, this letter is recognized as a direct emanation from the pernicious influence of monsieur rodolphe and his literature." "consequently, in spite of the regret which he feels, the proprietor of the establishment finds himself obliged to request the colline party to choose some other place for their revolutionary meetings." gustave colline, who was the cicero of the set, took the floor and demonstrated to the landlord that his complaints were frivolous and unfounded; that they did him great honor in making his establishment a home of intellect; that their departure and that of their friends would be the ruin of his house, which their presence elevated to the rank of a literary and artistic club. "but," objected the other, "you and those who come to see you call for so little." "this temperance to which you object," replied colline, "is an argument in favor of our morals. moreover, it depends on yourself whether we spend more or not. you have only to open an account with us." the landlord pretended not to hear this, and demanded some explanation of the incendiary letter addressed by bergami to his wife. rodolphe, accused of acting as secretary to the waiter, strenuously asserted his innocence-"for," said he, "the lady's virtue was a sure barrier--" the landlord would not repress a smile of pride. finally, colline entangled him completely in the folds of his insidious oratory, and everything was arranged, on the conditions that the party should cease making their own coffee, that the establishment should receive "the beaver" gratis, that phemie should come in a bonnet, that the backgammon board should be given up to the bosquets every sunday from twelve to two, and above all, that no one should ask for tick. on this basis everything went well for some time. it was christmas eve. the four friends came to the cafe accompanied by their friends of the other sex. there was marcel's musette, rodolphe's new flame, mimi, a lovely creature, with a voice like a pair of cymbals, and schaunard's idol, phemie teinturiere. that night, phemie, according to agreement, had her bonnet on. as to madame colline that should have been, no one ever saw her; she was always at home, occupied in punctuating her husband's manuscripts. after the coffee, which was on this great occasion escorted by a regiment of small glasses of brandy, they called for punch. the waiter was so little accustomed to the order, that they had to repeat it twice. phemie, who had never been to such a place before, seemed in a state of ecstacy at drinking out of glasses with feet. marcel was quarreling with musette about a new bonnet which he had not given her. mimi and rodolphe, who were in their honeymoon, carried on a silent conversation, alternated with suspicious noises. as to colline, he went about from one to the other, distributing among them all the polite and ornamental phrases which he had picked up in the "muses' almanac." while this joyous company was thus abandoning itself to sport and laughter, a stranger at the bottom of the room, who occupied a table by himself, was observing with extraordinary attention the animated scene before him. for a fortnight or thereabout, he had come thus every night, being the only customer who could stand the terrible row which the club made. the boldest pleasantries had failed to move him; he would remain all the evening, smoking his pipe with mathematical regularity, his eyes fixed as if watching a treasure, and his ears open to all what was said around him. as to his other qualities, he seemed quiet and well off, for he possessed a watch with a gold chain; and one day, marcel, meeting him at the bar, caught him in the act of changing a louis to pay his score. from that moment, the four friends designated him by the name of "the capitalist." suddenly schaunard, who had very good eyes, remarked that the glasses were empty. "yes," exclaimed rodolphe, "and this is christmas eve! we are good christians, and ought to have something extra." "yes, indeed," added marcel, "let's call for something supernatural." "colline," continued rodolphe, "ring a little for the waiter." colline rang like one possessed. "what shall we have?" asked marcel. colline made a low bow and pointed to the women. "it is the business of these ladies to regulate the nature and order of our refreshment." "i," said musette, smacking her lips, "should not be afraid of champagne." "are you crazy?" exclaimed marcel. "champagne! that isn't wine to begin with." "so much the worse; i like it, it makes a noise." "i," said mimi, with a coaxing look at rodolphe, "would like some beaune, in a little basket." "have you lost your senses?" said rodolphe. "no, but i want to lose them," replied mimi. the poet was thunderstruck. "i," said phemie, dancing herself on the elastic sofa, "would rather have parfait amour; it's good for the stomach." schaunard articulated, in a nasal tone, some words which made phemie tremble on her spring foundation. "bah!" said marcel, recovering himself the first. "let us spend a hundred francs for this once!" "yes," said rodolphe, "they complain of our not being good customers. let's astonish them!" "ay," said colline, "let us give ourselves up to the delights of a splendid banquet! do we not owe passive obedience to these ladies? love lies on devotion; wine is the essence of pleasure, pleasure the duty of youth; women are flowers and must be moistened. moisten away! waiter, waiter!" and colline hung upon the bell rope with feverish excitement. swift as the wind, the waiter came. when he heard talk of champagne, burgundy, and various liqueurs, his physiognomy ran through a whole gamut of astonishment. but there was more to come. "i have a hole in my inside," said mimi. "i should like some ham." "and i some sardines, and bread and butter," struck in musette. "and i, radishes," quoth phemie, "and a little meat with them." "we should have no objection," answered they. "waiter!" quoth colline, gravely, "bring us all that is requisite for a good supper." the waiter turned all the colors of the rainbow. he descended slowly to the bar, and informed his master of the extraordinary orders he had received. the landlord took it for a joke; but on a new summons from the bell, he ascended himself and addressed colline, for whom he had a certain respect. colline explained to him that they wished to see christmas in at his house, and that he would oblige them by serving what they had asked for. momus made no answer, but backed out, twisting his napkin. for a quarter of an hour he held a consultation with his wife, who, thanks to her liberal education at the st. denis convent, fortunately had a weakness for arts and letters, and advised him to serve the supper. "to be sure," said the landlord, "they may have money for once, by chance." so he told the waiter to take up whatever they asked for, and then plunged into a game of piquet with an old customer. fatal imprudence! from ten to twelve the waiter did nothing but run up and downstairs. every moment he was asked for something more. musette would eat english fashion, and change her fork at every mouthful. mimi drank all sorts of wine, in all sorts of glasses. schaunard had a quenchless sahara in his throat. colline played a crossfire with his eyes, and while munching his napkin, as his habit was, kept pinching the leg of the table, which he took for phemie's knee. marcel and rodolphe maintained the stirrups of self-possession, expecting the catastrophe, not without anxiety. the stranger regarded the scene with grave curiosity; from time to time he opened his mouth as if for a smile; then you might have heard a noise like that of a window which creaks in shutting. it was the stranger laughing to himself. at a quarter before twelve the bill was sent up. it amounted to the enormous sum of twenty five francs and three-quarters. "come," said marcel, "we will draw lots for who shall go and diplomatize with our host. it is getting serious." they took a set of dominoes; the highest was to go. unluckily, the lot fell upon schaunard, who was an excellent virtuoso, but a very bad ambassador. he arrived, too, at the bar just as the landlord had lost his third game. momus was in a fearful bad humor, and, at schaunard's first words, broke out into a violent rage. schaunard was a good musician, but he had an indifferent temper, and he replied by a double discharge of slang. the dispute grew more and more bitter, till the landlord went upstairs, swearing that he would be paid, and that no one should stir until he was. colline endeavored to interpose his pacifying oratory; but, on perceiving a napkin which colline had made lint of, the host's anger redoubled; and to indemnify himself, he actually dared to lay profane hands on the philosopher's hazel overcoat and the ladies' shawls. a volley of abuse was interchanged by the bohemians and the irate landlord. the women talked to one another of their dresses and their conquests. at this point the stranger abandoned his impassible attitude; gradually he rose, made a step forward, then another, and walked as an ordinary man might do; he approached the landlord, took him aside, and spoke to him in a low tone. rodolphe and marcel followed him with their eyes. at length, the host went out, saying to the stranger: "certainly, i consent, monsieur barbemuche, certainly; arrange it with them yourself." monsieur barbemuche returned to his table to take his hat; put it on, turned around to the right, and in three steps came close to rodolphe and marcel. he took off his hat, bowed to the men, waved a salute to the women, pulled out his handkerchief, blew his nose, and began in a feeble voice: "gentlemen, excuse the liberty i am about to take. for a long time, i have been burning with desire to make your acquaintance, but have never, till now, found a favorable opportunity. will you allow me to seize the present one?" "certainly, certainly," said colline. rodolphe and marcel bowed, and said nothing. the excessive delicacy of schaunard came nigh spoiling everything. "excuse me, sir," said he briskly, "but you have not the honor of knowing us, and the usages of society forbid--would you be so good as to give me a pipeful of tobacco? in other respects i am of my friends' opinion." "gentlemen," continued barbemuche. "i am a disciple of the fine arts, like yourselves. so far as i have been able to judge from what i have heard of your conversation, our tastes are the same. i have a most eager desire to be a friend of yours, and to be able to find you here every night. the landlord is a brute: but i said a word to him, and you are quite free to go. i trust you will not refuse me the opportunity of finding you here again, by accepting this slight service." a blush of indignation mounted to schaunard's face. "he is speculating on our condition," said he. "we cannot accept. he has paid our bill. i will play him at billiards for the twenty five francs and give him points." barbemuche accepted his proposition, and had the good sense to lose. this gained him the esteem of the party. they broke up with the understanding that they were to meet next day. "now," said schaunard, "our dignity is saved. we owe him nothing." "we can almost ask him for another supper," said colline. chapter xii a bohemian "at home" the night when he paid out of his own purse for the supper consumed at the cafe, barbemuche managed to make colline accompany him. since his first presence at the meetings of the four friends whom he had relieved from their embarrassing position, carolus had especially remarked gustave, and already felt an attractive sympathy for this socrates whose plato he was destined to become. it was for this reason he had chosen him to be his introducer. on the way, barbemuche proposed that they should enter a cafe which was still open, and take something to drink. not only did colline refuse, but he doubled his speed in passing the cafe, and carefully pulled down his hyperphysic hat over his face. "but why won't you come in?" politely asked the other. "i have my reasons," replied colline. "there is a barmaid in that establishment who is very much addicted to the exact sciences, and i could not help having a long discussion with her, to avoid which i never pass through this street at noon, or any other time of day. to tell you the truth," added he innocently, "i once lived with marcel in this neighborhood." "still i should be very glad to offer you a glass of punch, and have a few minutes' talk with you. is there no other place in the vicinity where you could step in without being hindered by any mathematical difficulties?" asked barbemuche, who thought it a good opportunity for saying something very clever. colline mused an instant. "there is a little place here," he said, pointing to a wine shop, "where i stand on a better footing." barbemuche made a face, and seemed to hesitate. "is it a respectable place?" he demanded. his cold and reserved attitude, his limited conversation, his discreet smile, and especially his watch chain with charms on it, all led colline to suppose that barbemuche was a clerk in some embassy, and that he feared to compromise himself by going into some wine shop. "there is no danger of anyone seeing us," said he. "all the diplomatic body is in bed by this time." barbemuche made up his mind to go in, though at the bottom of his heart he would have given a good deal for a false nose. for greater security, he insisted on having a private room, and took care to fasten a napkin before the glass door of it. these precautions taken, he appeared more at ease, and called for a bowl of punch. excited a little by the generous beverage, barbemuche became more communicative, and, after giving some autobiographical details, made bold to express the hope he had conceived of being personally admitted a member of the bohemian club, for the accomplishment of which ambitious design he solicited the aid of colline. colline replied that, for his part, he was entirely at the service of barbemuche, but, nevertheless, he could make no positive promise. "i assure you of my vote," said he. "but i cannot take it upon me to dispose of those of my comrades." "but," asked barbemuche, "for what reasons could they refuse to admit me among them?" colline put down the glass which he was just lifting to his mouth, and, in a very serious tone, addressed the rash carolus, saying, "you cultivate the fine arts?" "i labor humble in those noble fields of intelligence," replied the other, who felt bound to hang out the colors of his style. colline found the phrase well turned, and bowed in acknowledgment. "you understand music?" he continued. "i have played on the bass-viol." "a very philosophical instrument. then, if you understand music, you also understand that one cannot, without violation of the laws of harmony, introduce a fifth performer into a quartet; it would cease to be a quartet." "exactly, and become a quintet." "a quintet, very well, now attend to me. you understand astronomy?" "a little, i'm a bachelor of arts." "there is a little song about that," said colline. "'dear bachelor, says lisette'--i have forgotten the tune. well then, you know that there are four cardinal points. now suppose there were to turn up a fifth cardinal point, all the harmony of nature would be upset. what they call a cataclysm--you understand?" "i am waiting for the conclusion," said carolus, whose intelligence began to be a little shaky. "the conclusion--yes, that is the end of the argument, as death is the end of life, and marriage of love. well, my dear sir, i and my friends are accustomed to live together, and we fear to impair, by the introduction of another person, the harmony which reigns in our habits, opinions, tastes, and dispositions. to speak frankly, we are going to be, some day, the four cardinal points of contemporary art; accustomed to this idea, it would annoy us to see a fifth point." "nevertheless," suggested carolus, "where you are four it is easy to be five." "yes, but then we cease to be four." "the objection is a trivial one." "there is nothing trivial in this world; little brooks make great rivers; little syllables make big verses; the very mountains are made of grains of sand--so says 'the wisdom of nations,' of which there is a copy on the quay--tell me, my dear sir, which is the furrow that you usually follow in the noble fields of intelligence?" "the great philosophers and the classic authors are my models. i live upon their study. 'telemachus' first inspired the consuming passion i feel." "'telemachus'--there are lots of him on the quay," said colline. "you can find him there at any time. i have bought him for five sous--a second-hand copy--i would consent to part with it to oblige you. in other respects, it is a great work; very well got up, considering the age." "yes, sir," said carolus. "i aspire to high philosophy and sound literature. according to my idea, art is a priesthood--." "yes, yes," said colline. "there's a song about that too," and he began to hum.... "art's a priesthood, art's a priesthood," to the air of the drinking song in "robert the devil." "i say, then, that art being a solemn mission, writers ought, above all things--" "excuse me," said colline, who heard one of the small hours striking, "but it's getting to be tomorrow morning very fast." "it is late, in fact," said carolus. "let us go." "do you live far off?" "rue royale st. honore, no. 10." colline had once had occasion to visit this house, and remembered that it was a splendid private mansion. "i will mention you to my friends," said he to carolus on parting, "and you may be sure that i shall use all my influence to make them favorably disposed to you. ah, let me give you one piece of advice." "go on," said the other. "be very amiable and polite to mademoiselles mimi, musette and phemie; these ladies exercise an authority over my friends, and by managing to bring their mistresses' influence to bear upon them you will contrive far more easily to obtain what you require from marcel, schaunard and rodolphe." "i'll try," said carolus. next day, colline tumbled in upon the bohemian association. it was the hour of breakfast, and for a wonder, breakfast had come with the hour. the three couples were at table, feasting on artichokes and pepper sauce. "the deuce!" exclaimed the philosopher. "this can't last, or the world would come to an end. i arrive," he continued, "as the ambassador of the generous mortal whom we met last night." "can he be sending already to ask for his money again?" said marcel. "it has nothing to do with that," replied colline. "this young man wishes to be one of us; to have stock in our society, and share the profits, of course." the three men raised their heads and looked at one another. "that's all," concluded colline. "now the question is open." "what is the social position of your principal?" asked rodolphe. "he is no principal of mine," answered the other. "last night he begged me to accompany him, and overflowed me with attentions and good liquor for a while. but i have retained my independence." "good," said schaunard. "sketch us some leading features of his character," said marcel. "grandeur of soul, austerity of manners, afraid to go into wine shops, bachelor of arts, candid as a transparency, plays on the bass-viol, is disposed to change a five franc piece occasionally." "good again!" said schaunard. "what are his hopes?" "as i told you already, his ambition knows no bounds; he aspires to be 'hail-fellow-well-met' with us." "that is to say," answered marcel, "he wishes to speculate upon us, and to be seen riding in our carriages." "what is his profession?" asked rodolphe. "yes," said marcel, "what does he play on?" "literature and mixed philosophy. he calls art a priesthood." "a priesthood!" cried rodolphe, in terror. "so he says." "and what is his road in literature?" "he goes after 'telemachus'." "very good," said schaunard, eating the seed of his artichoke. "very good! you dummy!" broke our marcel. "i advise you not to say that in the street." schaunard relieved his annoyance at this reproof by kicking phemie under the table for taking some of his sauce. "once more," said rodolphe. "what is his condition in the world? what does he live on, and where does he live? and what is his name?" "his station is honorable. he is professor of everything in a rich family. his name is carolus barbemuche. he spends his income in luxurious living and dwells in the rue royale." "furnished lodging?" "no, there is real furniture." "i claim the floor," said marcel. "to me it is evident that colline has been corrupted. he has already sold his vote for so many drinks. don't interrupt me! (colline was rising to protest.) you shall have your turn. colline, mercenary soul that he is, has presented to you this stranger under an aspect too favorable to be true. i told you before; i see through this person's designs. he wants to speculate on us. he says to himself, 'here are some chaps making their way. i must get into their pockets. i shall arrive with them at the goal of fame.'" "bravo!" quoth schaunard, "have you any more sauce there?" "no," replied rodolphe, "the edition is out of print." "looking at the question from another point of view," continued marcel, "this insidious mortal whom colline patronizes, perhaps aspires to our intimacy only from the most culpable motives. gentlemen, we are not alone here!" continued the orator, with an eloquent look at the women. "and colline's client, smuggling himself into our circle under the cloak of literature, may perchance be but a vile seducer. reflect! for one, i vote against his reception." "i demand the floor," said rodolphe, "only for a correction. in his remarkable extemporary speech, marcel has said that this carolus, with the view of dishonoring us, wished to introduce himself under the cloak of literature." "a parliamentary figure." "a very bad figure; literature has no cloak!" "having made a report, as chairman of committee," resumed colline, rising, "i maintain the conclusions therein embodied. the jealousy which consumes him disturbs the reason of our friend marcel; the great artist is beside himself." "order!" cried marcel. "so much so, that, able designer as he is, he has just introduced into his speech a figure the incorrectness of which has been ably pointed out by the talented orator who preceded me." "colline is an ass!" shouted marcel, with a bang of his fist on the table that caused a lively sensation among the plates. "colline knows nothing in an affair of sentiment; he is incompetent to judge of such matters; he has an old book in place of a heart." prolonged laughter from schaunard. during the row, colline kept gravely adjusting the folds of his white cravat as if to make way for the torrents of eloquence contained beneath them. when silence was reestablished, he thus continued: "gentlemen, i intend with one word to banish from your minds the chimerical apprehensions which the suspicions of marcel may have engendered in them respecting carolus." "oh, yes!" said marcel ironically. "it will be as easy as that," continued colline, blowing the match with which he had lighted his pipe. "go on! go on!" cried schaunard, rodolphe, and the women together. "gentlemen! although i have been personally and violently attacked in this meeting, although i have been accused of selling for base liquors the influence which i possess; secure in a good conscience i shall not deign to reply to those assaults on my probity, my loyalty, my morality. [sensation.] but there is one thing which i will have respected. [here the orator, endeavoring to lay his hand on his heart, gave himself a rap in the stomach.] my well tried and well known prudence has been called in question. i have been accused of wishing to introduce among you a person whose intentions were hostile to your happiness--in matters of sentiment. this supposition is an insult to the virtue of these ladies--nay more, an insult to their good taste. carolus barbemuche is decidedly ugly." [visible denial on the face of phemie; noise under the table; it is schaunard kicking her by way of correcting her compromising frankness.] "but," proceeded colline, "what will reduce to powder the contemptible argument with which my opponent has armed himself against carolus by taking advantage of your terrors, is the fact that the said carolus is a platonist." [sensation among the men; uproar among the women.] this declaration of colline's produced a reaction in favor of carolus. the philosopher wished to improve the effect of his eloquent and adroit defense. "now then," he continued, "i do not see what well founded prejudices can exist against this young man, who, after all, has rendered us a service. as to myself, who am accused of acting thoughtlessly in wishing to introduce him among us, i consider this opinion an insult to my dignity. i have acted in the affair with the wisdom of the serpent; if a formal vote does not maintain me this character for prudence, i offer my resignation." "do you make it a cabinet question?" asked marcel. "i do." the three consulted, and agreed by common consent to restore to the philosopher that high reputation for prudence which he claimed. colline then gave the floor to marcel, who, somewhat relieved of his prejudices, declared that he might perhaps favor the adoption of the report. but before the decisive and final vote which should open to carolus the intimacy of the club, he put to the meeting this amendment: "whereas, the introduction of a new member into our society is a grave matter, and a stranger might bring with him some elements of discord through ignorance of the habits, tempers, and opinions of his comrades, resolved, that each member shall pass a say with the said carolus, and investigate his manner of life, tastes, literary capacity, and wardrobe. the members shall afterward communicate their several impressions, and ballot on his admission accordingly. moreover, before complete admission, the said carolus shall undergo a noviciate of one month, during which time he shall not have the right to call us by our first names or take our arm in the street. on the day of reception, a splendid banquet shall be given at the expense of the new member, at a cost of not less than twelve francs." this amendment was adopted by three votes against one. the same night colline went to the cafe early on purpose to be the first to see carolus. he had not long to wait for him. barbemuche soon appeared, carrying in his hand three huge bouquets of roses. "hullo!" cried the astonished colline. "what do you mean to do with that garden?" "i remember what you told me yesterday. your friends will doubtless come with their ladies, and it is on their account that i bring these flowers--very handsome ones." "that they are; they must have cost fifteen sous, at least." "in the month of december! if you said fifteen francs you would have come nearer." "heavens!" cried colline, "three crowns for these simple gifts of flora! you must be related to the cordilleras. well my dear sir, that is fifteen francs which we must throw out of the window." it was barbemuche's turn to be astonished. colline related the jealous suspicions with which marcel had inspired his friends, and informed carolus of the violent discussion which had taken place between them that morning on the subject of his admission. "i protested," said colline, "that your intentions were the purest, but there was strong opposition nevertheless. beware of renewing these suspicions by much politeness to the ladies; and to begin, let us put these bouquets out of the way." he took the roses and hid them in a cupboard. "but this is not all," he resumed. "before connecting themselves intimately with you, these gentlemen desire to make a private examination, each for himself, of your character, tastes, etc." then, lest barbemuche might do something to shock his friends, colline rapidly sketched a moral portrait of each of them. "contrive to agree with them separately," added the philosopher, "and they will end by all liking you." carolus agreed to everything. the three friends soon arrived with their friends of the other sex. rodolphe was polite to carolus, schaunard familiar with him, while marcel remained cold. carolus forced himself to be gay and amiable with the men and indifferent to the women. when they broke up for the night, he asked rodolphe to dine with him the next day, and to come as early as noon. the poet accepted, saying to himself, "good! i am to begin the inquiry, then." next morning at the hour appointed, he called on carolus, who did indeed live in a very handsome private house, where he occupied a sufficiently comfortable room. but rodolphe was surprised to find at that time of day the shutters closed, the curtains drawn, and two lighted candles on the table. he asked barbemuche the reason. "study," replied the other, "is the child of mystery and silence." they sat down and talked. at the end of an hour, carolus, with infinite oratorial address, brought in a phrase which, despite its humble form, was neither more nor less than a summons made to rodolphe to hear a little work, the fruit of barbemuche's vigils. the poet saw himself caught. curious, however, to learn the color of the other's style, he bowed politely, assured him that he was enchanted, that carolus did not wait for him to finish the sentence. he ran to bolt the door, and then took up a small memorandum book, the thinness of which brought a smile of satisfaction to the poet's face. "is that the manuscript of your work?" he asked. "no," replied carolus. "it is the catalog of my manuscripts and i am looking for the one which you will allow me to read you. here it is: 'don lopez or fatality no. 14.' it's on the third shelf," and he proceeded to open a small closet in which rodolphe perceived, with terror, a great quantity of manuscripts. carolus took out one of these, shut the closet, and seated himself in front of the poet. rodolphe cast a glance at one of the four piles of elephant paper of which the work was composed. "come," said he to himself, "it's not in verse, but it's called 'don lopez.'" carolus began to read: "on a cold winter night, two cavaliers, enveloped in large cloaks, and mounted on sluggish mules, were making their way side by side over one of the roads which traverse the frightful solitudes of the sierra morena." "may the lord have mercy on me!" ejaculated rodolphe mentally. carolus continued to read his first chapter, written in the style above throughout. rodolphe listened vaguely, and tried to devise some means of escape. "there is the window, but it's fastened; and beside, we are in the fourth story. ah, now i understand all these precautions." "what do you think of my first chapter?" asked carolus. "do not spare any criticism, i beg of you." rodolphe thought he remembered having heard some scraps of philosophical declamation upon suicide, put forth by the hero of the romance, don lopez, to wit; so he replied at hazard: "the grand figure of don lopez is conscientiously studied; it reminds me of 'savoyard vicar's confession of faith;' the description of don alvar's mule pleases me exceedingly; it is like a sketch of gericault's. there are good lines in the landscape; as to the thoughts, they are seeds of rousseau planted in the soil of lesage. only allow me to make one observation: you use too many stops, and you work the word henceforward too hard. it is a good word, and gives color, but should not be abused." carolus took up a second pile of paper, and repeated the title "don lopez or, fatality." "i knew a don lopez once," said rodolphe. "he used to sell cigarettes and bayonne chocolate. perhaps he was a relative of your man. go on." at the conclusion of the second chapter, the poet interrupted his host: "don't you feel your throat a little dry?" he inquired. "not at all," replied carolus. "we are coming to the history of inesilla." "i am very curious to hear it, nevertheless, if you are tired--" "chapter third!" enunciated carolus in a voice that gave no signs of fatigue. rodolphe took a careful survey of barbemuche and perceived that he had a short neck and a ruddy complexion. "i have one hope left," thought the poet on making this discovery. "he may have an attack of apoplexy." "will you be so good as to tell me what you think of the love scene?" carolus looked at rodolphe to observe in his face what effect the dialogue produced upon him. the poet was bending forward on his chair, with his neck stretched out in the attitude of one who is listening for some distant sound. "what's the matter with you?" "hist!" said rodolphe, "don't you hear? i thought somebody cried fire! suppose we go and see." carolus listened an instant but heard nothing. "it must have been a ringing in my ears," said the other. "go on, don alvar interests me exceedingly; he is a noble youth." carolus continued with all the music that he could put into his voice: "oh inesilla! whatever thou art, angel or demon; and whatever be thy country, my life is thine, and thee will follow, be it to heaven or hell!" someone knocked at the door. "it's my porter," said barbemuche, half opening the door. it was indeed the porter with a letter. "what an unlucky chance!" cried carolus, after he had perused it. "we must put off our reading until some other time. i have to go out immediately. if you please, we will execute this little commission together, as it is nothing private, and then we can come back to dinner." "there," thought rodolphe, "is a letter that has fallen from heaven. i recognize the seal of providence." when he rejoined the comrades that night, the poet was interrogated by marcel and schaunard. "did he treat you well?" they asked. "yes, but i paid dear for it." "how? did carolus make you pay?" demanded schaunard with rising choler. "he read a novel at me, inside of which the people are named don lopez and don alvar; and the tenors call their mistresses 'angel,' or 'demon.'" "how shocking!" cried the bohemians, in chorus. "but otherwise," said colline, "literature apart, what is your opinion of him?" "a very nice young man. you can judge for yourselves; carolus means to treat us all in turn; he invites schaunard to breakfast with him tomorrow. only look out for the closet with the manuscripts in it." schaunard was punctual and went to work with the minuteness of an auctioneer taking an inventory, or a sheriff levying an execution. accordingly he came back full of notes; he had studied carolus chiefly in respect of movables and worldly goods. "this barbemuche," he said, on being asked his opinion, "is a lump of good qualities. he knows the names of all the wines that were ever invented, and made me eat more nice things than my aunt ever did on her birthday. he is on very good terms with the tailors in the rue vivienne, and the bootmakers of the passage des panoramas; and i have observed that he is nearly our size, so that, in case of need, we can lend him our clothes. his habits are less austere than colline chose to represent them; he went wherever i pleased to take him, and gave me breakfast in two acts, the second of which went off in a tavern by the fish market where i am known for some carnival orgies. well, carolus went in there as any ordinary mortal might, and that's all. marcel goes tomorrow." carolus knew that marcel was the one who had made the most objections to his reception. accordingly, he treated him with particular attention, and especially won his heart by holding out the hope of procuring him some sitters in the family of his pupil. when it came to marcel's turn to make his report, there were no traces of his original hostility to carolus. on the fourth day, colline informed barbemuche that he was admitted, but under conditions. "you have a number of vulgar habits," he said, "which must be reformed." "i shall do my best to imitate you," said carolus. during the whole time of his noviciate the platonic philosopher kept company with the bohemians continually, and was thus enabled to study their habits more thoroughly, not without being very much astonished at times. one morning, colline came to see him with a joyful face. "my dear fellow," he said, "it's all over; you are now definitely one of us. it only remains to fix the day and the place of the grand entertainment; i have come to talk with you about it." "that can be arranged with perfect ease," said carolus. "the parents of my pupil are out of town; the young viscount, whose mentor i am, will lend us the apartments for an evening, only we must invite him to the party." "that will be very nice," replied colline. "we will open to him the vistas of literature; but do you think he will consent?" "i am sure of it." "then it only remains to fix the day." "we will settle that tonight at the cafe." carolus then went to find his pupil and announced to him that he had just been elected into a distinguished society of literary men and artists, and that he was going to give a dinner, followed by a little party, to celebrate his admission. he therefore proposed to him to make him one of the guests. "and since you cannot be out late," added carolus, "and the entertainment may last some time, it will be for our convenience to have it here. your servant françois knows how to hold his tongue; your parents will know nothing of it; and you will have made acquaintance with some of the cleverest people in paris, artists and authors." "in print?" asked the youth. "certainly, one of them edits 'the scarf of iris,' which your mother takes in. they are very distinguished persons, almost celebrities, intimate friends of mine, and their wives are charming." "will there be some women?" asked viscount paul. "delightful ones," returned carolus. "oh, dear master, i thank you. the entertainment shall certainly take place here. all the lustres shall be lit up, and i will have the wrappers taken off the furniture." that night at the cafe, barbemuche announced that the party would come off next saturday. the bohemians told their mistresses to think about their toilettes. "do not forget," said they, "that we are going into the real drawing rooms. therefore, make ready; a rich but simple costume." and from that day all the neighborhood was informed that mademoiselles phemie, mimi, and musette were going into society. on the morning of the festivity, colline, schaunard, marcel, and rodolphe called, in a body, on barbemuche, who looked astonished to see them so early. "has anything happened which will oblige us to put it off?" he asked with some anxiety. "yes--that is, no," said colline. "this is how we are placed. among ourselves we never stand on ceremony, but when we are to meet strangers, we wish to preserve a certain decorum." "well?" said the other. "well," continued colline, "since we are to meet tonight, the young gentleman to whom we are indebted for the rooms, out of respect to him and to ourselves, we come simply to ask you if you cannot lend us some becoming toggery. it is almost impossible, you see, for us to enter this gorgeous roof in frock-coats and colored trousers." "but," said carolus, "i have not black clothes for all of you." "we will make do with what you have," said colline. "suit yourselves then," said carolus, opening a well-furnished wardrobe. "what an arsenal of elegancies!" said marcel. "three hats!" exclaimed schaunard, in ecstasy. "can a man want three hats when he had but one head?" "and the boots!" said rodolphe, "only look!" "what a number of boots!" howled colline. in a twinkling of an eye each had selected a complete equipment. "till this evening," said they, taking leave of barbemuche. "the ladies intend to be most dazzling." "but," said barbemuche, casting a glance at the emptied wardrobe. "you have left me nothing. what am i to wear?" "ah, it's different with you," said rodolphe. "you are the master of the house; you need not stand upon etiquette." "but i have only my dressing gown and slippers, flannel waistcoat and trousers with stocking feet. you have taken everything." "never mind; we excuse you beforehand," replied the four. a very good dinner was served at six. the company arrived, marcel limping and out of humor. the young viscount rushed up to the ladies and led them to the best seats. mimi was dressed with fanciful elegance; musette got up with seductive taste; phemie looked like a stained glass window, and hardly dared sit down. the dinner lasted two hours and a half, and was delightfully lively. the young viscount, who sat next to mimi, kept treading on her foot. phemie took twice of every dish. schaunard was in clover. rodolphe improvised sonnets and broke glasses in marking the rhyme. colline talked to marcel, who remained sulky. "what is the matter with you?" asked the philosopher. "my feet are in torture; this carolus has boots like a woman's." "he must be given to understand that, for the future, some of his shoes are to be made a little larger. be easy, i will see to it. but now to the drawing room, where the coffee and liquers await us." the revelry recommenced with increased noise. schaunard seated himself at the piano and executed, with immense spirit, his new symphony, "the death of the damsel." to this succeeded the characteristic piece of "the creditor's march," which was twice encored, and two chords of the piano were broken. marcel was still morose, and replied to the complaints and expostulations of carolus: "my dear sir, we shall never be intimate friends, and for this reason: physical differences are almost always the certain sign of a moral difference; on this point philosophy and medicine agree." "well?" said carolus. "well," continued marcel, showing his feet, "your boots, infinitely too small for me, indicate a radical difference of temper and character; in other respects, your little party has been charming." at one in the morning the guests took leave, and zig-zagged homeward. barbemuche felt very ill, and made incoherent harangues to his pupil, who, for his part, was dreaming of mademoiselle mimi's blue eyes. chapter xiii the house warming this took place some time after the union of the poet rodolphe and mademoiselle mimi. for a week the whole of the bohemian brotherhood were grievously perturbed by the disappearance of rodolphe, who had suddenly become invisible. they had sought for him in all his customary haunts, and had everywhere been met by the same reply-"we have not seen him for a week." gustave colline above all was very uneasy, and for the following reason. a few days previously he had handed to rodolphe a highly philosophical article, which the latter was to insert in the columns of "the beaver," the organ of the hat trade, of which he was editor. had this philosophical article burst upon the gaze of astonished europe? such was the query put to himself by the astonished colline, and this anxiety will be understood when it is explained that the philosopher had never yet had the honor of appearing in print, and that he was consumed by the desire of seeing what effect would be produced by his prose in pica. to procure himself this gratification he had already expended six francs in visiting all the reading rooms of paris without being able to find "the beaver" in any one of them. not being able to stand it any longer, colline swore to himself that he would not take a moment's rest until he had laid hands on the undiscoverable editor of this paper. aided by chances which it would take too long to tell in detail, the philosopher was able to keep his word. within two days he learned rodolphe's abiding place and called on him there at six in the morning. rodolphe was then residing in a lodging house in a deserted street situated in the faubourg saint germain, and was perched on the fifth floor because there was not a sixth. when colline came to his door there was no key in the lock outside. he knocked for ten minutes without obtaining any answer from within; the din he made at this early hour attracted the attention of even the porter, who came to ask him to be quiet. "you see very well that the gentleman is asleep," said he. "that is why i want to wake him up," replied colline, knocking again. "he does not want to answer then," replied the porter, placing before rodolphe's door a pair of patent leather boots and a pair of lady's boots that he had just cleaned. "wait a bit though," observed colline, examining the masculine and feminine foot gear. "new patent leathers! i must have made a mistake; it cannot be here." "yes, by the way," said the porter, "whom do you want?" "a woman's boots!" continued colline, speaking to himself, and thinking of his friends austere manners, "yes, certainly i must have made a mistake. this is not rodolphe's room." "i beg your pardon, sir, it is." "you must be making a mistake, my good man." "what do you mean?" "decidedly you must be making a mistake," said colline, pointing to the patent leather boots. "what are those?" "those are monsieur rodolphe's boots. what is there to be wondered at in that?" "and these?" asked colline, pointing to the lady's boots. "are they monsieur rodolphe's too?" "those are his wife's," said the porter. "his wife's!" exclaimed colline in a tone of stupefaction. "ah! the voluptuary, that is why he will not open the door." "well," said the porter, "he is free to do as he likes about that, sir. if you will leave me your name i will let him know you called." "no," said colline. "now that i know where to find him i will call again." and he at once went off to tell the important news to his friends. rodolphe's patent leathers were generally considered to be a fable due to colline's wealth of imagination, and it was unanimously declared that his mistress was a paradox. this paradox was, however, a truism, for that very evening marcel received a letter collectively addressed to the whole of the set. it was as follows:-"monsieur and madame rodolphe, literati, beg you to favor them with your company at dinner tomorrow evening at five o'clock sharp." "n.b.--there will be plates." "gentlemen," said marcel, when communicating the letter to his comrades, "the news is confirmed, rodolphe has really a mistress; further he invites us to dinner, and the postscript promises crockery. i will not conceal from you that this last paragraph seems to me a lyrical exaggeration, but we shall see." the following day at the hour named, marcel, gustave colline, and alexander schaunard, keen set as on the last day of lent, went to rodolphe's, whom they found playing with a sandy haired cat, whilst a young woman was laying the table. "gentlemen," said rodolphe, shaking his friends' hands and indicating the young lady, "allow me to introduce you to the mistress of the household." "you are the household, are you not?" said colline, who had a mania for this kind of joke. "mimi," replied rodolphe, "i present my best friends; now go and get the soup ready." "oh madame," said alexander schaunard, hastening towards mimi, "you are as fresh as a wild flower." after having satisfied himself that there were really plates on the table, schaunard asked what they were going to have to eat. he even carried his curiosity so far as to lift up the covers of the stewpans in which the dinner was cooking. the presence of a lobster produced a lively impression upon him. as to colline, he had drawn rodolphe aside to ask about his philosophical article. "my dear fellow, it is at the printer's. 'the beaver' appears next thursday." we give up the task of depicting the philosopher's delight. "gentlemen," said rodolphe to his friends. "i ask your pardon for leaving you so long without any news of me, but i was spending my honeymoon." and he narrated the story of his union with the charming creature who had brought him as a dowry her eighteen years and a half, two porcelain cups, and a sandy haired cat named mimi, like herself. "come, gentlemen," said rodolphe, "we are going to celebrate my house warming. i forewarn you, though, that we are about to have merely a family repast; truffles will be replaced by frank cordiality." indeed, that amiable goddess did not cease to reign amongst the guests, who found, however, that the so-called frugal repast did not lack a certain amplitude. rodolphe, indeed, had spread himself out. colline called attention to the fact that the plates were changed, and declared aloud that mademoiselle mimi was worthy of the azure scarf with which the empresses of the cooking stove were adorned, a phrase which was greek to the young girl, and which rodolphe translated by telling her "that she would make a capital cordon bleu." the appearance on the scene of the lobster caused universal admiration. under the pretext that he had studied natural history, schaunard suggested that he should carve it. he even profited by this circumstance to break a knife and to take the largest helping for himself, which excited general indignation. but schaunard had no self respect, above all in the matter of lobsters, and as there was still a portion left, he had the audacity to put it on one side, saying that he would do for a model for a still life piece he had on hand. indulgent friendship feigned to believe this fiction, but fruit of immoderate gluttony. as to colline he reserved his sympathies for the dessert, and was even obstinate enough to cruelly refuse the share of a tipsy cake against a ticket of admission to the orangery of versailles offered to him by schaunard. at this point conversation began to get lively. to three bottles with red seals succeeded three bottles with green seals, in the midst of which shortly appeared one which by its neck topped with a silver helmet, was recognized as belonging to the royal champagne regiment--a fantastic champagne vintaged by saint ouen, and sold in paris at two francs the bottle as bankrupt's stock, so the vendor asserted. but it is not the district that makes the wine, and our bohemians accepted as the authentic growth of ai the liquor that was served out to them in the appropriate glasses, and despite the scant degree of vivacity shown by the cork in popping from its prison, went into ecstacies over the excellence of the vintage on seeing the quality of the froth. schaunard summoned up all his remaining self-possession to make a mistake as regards glasses, and help himself to that of colline, who kept gravely dipping his biscuit in the mustard pot as he explained to mademoiselle mimi the philosophical article that was to appear in "the beaver." all at once he grew pale, and asked leave to go to the window and look at the sunset, although it was ten o'clock at night, and the sun had set long ago. "it is a pity the champagne is not iced," said schaunard, again trying to substitute his empty glass for the full one of his neighbor, an attempt this time without success. "madame," observed colline, who had ceased to take the fresh air, to mimi, "champagne is iced with ice. ice is formed by the condensation of water, in latin aqua. water freezes at two degrees, and there are four seasons, spring, summer, autumn, and winter, which was the cause of the retreat from moscow." all at once colline suddenly slapped rodolphe on the shoulder, and in a thick voice that seemed to mash all the syllables together, said to him-"tomorrow is thursday, is it not?" "no," replied rodolphe. "tomorrow is sunday." "thursday." "no, i tell you. tomorrow is sunday." "sunday!" said colline, wagging his head, "not a bit of it, it is thursday." and he fell asleep, making a mold for a cast of his face in the cream cheese that was before him in his plate. "what is he harping about thursday?" observed marcel. "ah, i have it!" said rodolphe, who began to understand the persistency of the philosopher, tormented by a fixed idea, "it is on account of his article in 'the beaver.' listen, he is dreaming of it aloud." "good," said schaunard. "he shall not have any coffee, eh, madame?" "by the way," said rodolphe, "pour out the coffee, mimi." the latter was about to rise, when colline, who had recovered a little self possession, caught her around the waist and whispered confidentially in her ear: "madame, the coffee plant is a native of arabia, where it was discovered by a goat. its use expanded to europe. voltaire used to drink seventy cups a day. i like mine without sugar, but very hot." "good heavens! what a learned man!" thought mimi as she brought the coffee and pipes. however time was getting on, midnight had long since struck, and rodolphe sought to make his guests understand that it was time for them to withdraw. marcel, who retained all his senses, got up to go. but schaunard perceived that there was still some brandy in a bottle, and declared that it could not be midnight so long as there was any left. as to colline, he was sitting astride his chair and murmuring in a low voice: "monday, tuesday, wednesday, thursday." "hang it all," said rodolphe, greatly embarrassed, "i cannot give them quarters here tonight; formerly it was all very well, but now it is another thing," he added, looking at mimi, whose softly kindling eyes seemed to appeal for solitude for their two selves. "what is to be done? give me a bit of advice, marcel. invent a trick to get rid of them." "no, i won't invent," replied marcel, "but i will imitate. i remember a play in which a sharp servant manages to get rid of three rascals as drunk as silenus who are at his master's." "i recollect it," said rodolphe, "it is in 'kean.' indeed, the situation is the same." "well," said marcel, "we will see if the stage holds the glass up to human nature. stop a bit, we will begin with schaunard. here, i say, schaunard." "eh? what is it?" replied the latter, who seemed to be floating in the elysium of mild intoxication. "there is nothing more to drink here, and we are all thirsty." "yes," said schaunard, "bottles are so small." "well," continued marcel, "rodolphe has decided that we shall pass the night here, but we must go and get something before the shops are shut." "my grocer lives at the corner of the street," said rodolphe. "do you mind going there, schaunard? you can fetch two bottles of rum, to be put down to me." "oh! yes, certainly," said schaunard, making a mistake in his greatcoat and taking that of colline, who was tracing figures on the table cloth with his knife. "one," said marcel, when schaunard had gone. "now let us tackle colline, that will be a harder job. ah! an idea. hi, hi, colline," he continued, shaking the philosopher. "what? what? what is it?" "schaunard has just gone, and has taken your hazel overcoat by mistake." colline glanced round again, and perceived indeed in the place of his garment, schaunard's little plaid overcoat. a sudden idea flashed across his mind and filled him with uneasiness. colline, according to his custom, had been book-hunting during the day, and had bought for fifteen sous a finnish grammar and a little novel of nisard's entitled "the milkwoman's funeral." these two acquisitions were accompanied by seven or eight volumes of philosophy that he had always about him as an arsenal whence to draw reasons in case of an argument. the idea of this library being in the hands of schaunard threw him into a cold perspiration. "the wretch!" exclaimed colline, "what did he take my greatcoat for?" "it was by mistake." "but my books. he may put them to some improper purpose." "do not be afraid, he will not read them," said rodolphe. "no, but i know him; he is capable of lighting his pipe with them." "if you are uneasy you can catch him up," said rodolphe. "he has only just this moment gone out, you will overtake him at the street door." "certainly i will overtake him," replied colline, putting on his hat, the brim of which was so broad that tea for six people might have been served upon it. "two," said marcel to rodolphe, "now you are free. i am off, and i will tell the porter not to open the outer door if anyone knocks." "goodnight and thanks," said rodolphe. as he was showing his friend out rodolphe heard on the staircase a prolonged mew, to which his carroty cat replied by another, whilst trying at the same time to slip out adroitly by the half-opened door. "poor romeo!" said rodolphe, "there is his juliet calling him. come, off with you," he added opening the door to the enamored beast, who made a single leap down the stairs into its lover's arms. left alone with his mistress, who standing before the glass was curling her hair in a charmingly provocative attitude, rodolphe approached mimi and passed his arms around her. then, like a musician, who before commencing a piece, strikes a series of notes to assure himself of the capacity of the instrument, rodolphe drew mimi onto his knee, and printed on her shoulder a long and sonorous kiss, which imparted a sudden vibration to the frame of the youthful beauty. the instrument was in tune. chapter xiv mademoiselle mimi oh! my friend rodolphe, what has happened to change you thus? am i to believe the rumors that are current, and that this misfortune has broken down to such a degree your robust philosophy? how can i, the historian in ordinary of your bohemian epic, so full of joyous bursts of laughter, narrate in a sufficiently melancholy tone the painful adventure which casts a veil over your constant gaiety, and suddenly checks the ringing flow of your paradoxes? oh! rodolphe, my friend, i admit that the evil is serious, but there, really it is not worthwhile throwing oneself into the water about it. so i invite you to bury the past as soon as possible. shun above all the solitude peopled with phantoms who would help to render your regrets eternal. shun the silence where the echoes of recollection would still be full of your past joys and sorrows. cast boldly to all the winds of forgetfulness the name you have so fondly cherished, and with it all that still remains to you of her who bore it. curls pressed by lips mad with desire, a venice flask in which there still lurks a remainder of perfume, which at this moment it would be more dangerous for you to breathe than all the poisons in the world. to the fire with the flowers, the flowers of gauze, silk and velvet, the white geraniums, the anemones empurpled by the blood of adonis, the blue forget-me-nots and all those charming bouquets that she put together in the far off days of your brief happiness. then i loved her too, your mimi, and saw no danger in your loving her. but follow my advice--to the fire with the ribbons, the pretty pink, blue, and yellow ribbons which she wore round her neck to attract the eye; to the fire with the lace, the caps, the veils and all the coquettish trifles with which she bedecked herself to go love-making with monsieur cesar, monsieur jerome, monsieur charles, or any other gallant in the calendar, whilst you were awaiting her at your window, shivering from the wintry blast. to the fire, rodolphe, and without pity, with all that belonged to her and could still speak to you of her; to the fire with the love letters. ah! here is one of them, and your tears have bedewed it like a fountain. oh! my unhappy friend! "as you have not come in, i am going out to call on my aunt. i have taken what money there was for a cab." "lucille." that evening, oh! rodolphe, you had, do you not recollect, to go without your dinner, and you called on me and let off a volley of jests which fully attested your tranquillity of mind. for you believed lucille was at her aunt's, and if i had not told you that she was with monsieur cesar or with an actor of the montparnasse theater, you would have cut my throat! to the fire, too, with this other note, which has all the laconic affection of the first. "i am gone out to order some boots, you must find the money for me to go and fetch them tomorrow." ah! my friend, those boots have danced many quadrilles in which you did not figure as a partner. to the flames with all these remembrances and to the winds with their ashes. but in the first place, oh rodolphe! for the love of humanity and the reputation of "the scarf of iris" and "the beaver," resume the reins of good taste that you have egotistically dropped during your sufferings, or else horrible things may happen for which you will be responsible. we may go back to leg-of-mutton sleeves and frilled trousers, and some fine day see hats come into fashion which would afflict the universe and call down the wrath of heaven. and now the moment is come to relate the loves of our friend rodolphe and mimi. it was just as he was turned four and twenty that rodolphe was suddenly smitten with the passion that had such an influence upon his life. at the time he met mimi he was leading that broken and fantastic existence that we have tried to describe in the preceding chapters of this book. he was certainly one of the gayest endurers of poverty in the world of bohemia. when in course of the day he had made a poor dinner and a smart remark, he walked more proudly in his black coat (pleading for help through every gaping seam) along the pavement that often promised to be his only resting place for the night, than an emperor in his purple robe. in the group amongst whom rodolphe lived, they affected, after a fashion common enough amongst some young fellows, to treat love as a thing of luxury, a pretext for jesting. gustave colline, who had for a long time past been in intimate relations with a waistcoat maker, whom he was rendering deformed in mind and body by obliging her to sit day and night copying the manuscripts of his philosophical works, asserted that love was a kind of purgative, good to take at the beginning of each season in order to get rid of humors. amidst all these false sceptics rodolphe was the only one who dared to talk of love with some reverence, and when they had the misfortune to let him harp on this string, he would go on for an hour plaintively wurbling elegies on the happiness of being loved, the deep blue of the peaceful lake, the song of the breeze, the harmony of the stars, &c., &c. this mania had caused him to be nicknamed the harmonica by schaunard. marcel had also made on this subject a very neat remark when, alluding to the teutonically sentimental tirades of rodolphe and to his premature calvity, he called him the bald forget-me-not. the real truth was this. rodolphe then seriously believed he had done with all things of youth and love; he insolently chanted a _de profundis_ over his heart, which he thought dead when it was only silent, yet still ready to awake, still accessible to joy, and more susceptible than ever to all the sweet pangs that he no longer hoped for, and that were now driving him to despair. you would have it, rodolphe, and we shall not pity you, for the disease from which you are suffering is one of those we long for most, above all when we know that we are cured of it forever. rodolphe then met mimi, whom he had formerly known when she was the mistress of one of his friends; and he made her his own. there was at first a great outcry amongst rodolphe's friends when they learned of this union, but as mademoiselle mimi was very taking, not at all prudish, and could stand tobacco smoke and literary conversations without a headache, they became accustomed to her and treated her as a comrade. mimi was a charming girl, and especially adapted for both the plastic and poetical sympathies of rodolphe. she was twenty two years of age, small, delicate, and arch. her face seemed the first sketch of an aristocratic countenance, but her features, extremely fine in outline, and as it were, softly lit up by the light of her clear blue eyes, wore, at certain moments of weariness or ill-humor, an expression of almost savage brutality, in which a physiologist would perhaps have recognized the indication of profound egotism or great insensibility. but hers was usually a charming head, with a fresh and youthful smile and glances either tender or full of imperious coquetry. the blood of youth flowed warm and rapid in her veins, and imparted rosy tints to her transparent skin of camellia-like whiteness. this unhealthy beauty captivated rodolphe, and he often during the night spent hours in covering with kisses the pale forehead of his slumbering mistress, whose humid and weary eyes shone half-closed beneath the curtain of her magnificent brown hair. but what contributed above all to make rodolphe madly in love with mademoiselle mimi were her hands, which in spite of household cares, she managed to keep as white as those of the goddess of idleness. however, these hands so frail, so tiny, so soft to the lips; these child-like hands in which rodolphe had placed his once more awakened heart; these white hands of mademoiselle mimi were soon to rend that heart with their rosy nails. at the end of a month rodolphe began to perceive that he was wedded to a thunderstorm, and that his mistress had one great fault. she was a "gadabout," as they say, and spent a great part of her time amongst the kept women of the neighborhood, whose acquaintance she had made. the result that rodolphe had feared, when he perceived the relations contracted by his mistress, soon took place. the variable opulence of some of her new friends caused a forest of ambitious ideas to spring up in the mind of mademoiselle mimi, who up until then had only had modest tastes, and was content with the necessaries of life that rodolphe did his best to procure for her. mimi began to dream of silks, velvets, and lace. and, despite rodolphe's prohibition, she continued to frequent these women, who were all of one mind in persuading her to break off with the bohemian who could not even give her a hundred and fifty francs to buy a stuff dress. "pretty as you are," said her advisers, "you can easily secure a better position. you have only to look for it." and mademoiselle mimi began to look. a witness of her frequent absences, clumsily accounted for, rodolphe entered upon the painful track of suspicion. but as soon as he felt himself on the trail of some proof of infidelity, he eagerly drew a bandage over his eyes in order to see nothing. however, a strange, jealous, fantastic, quarrelsome love which the girl did not understand, because she then only felt for rodolphe that lukewarm attachment resulting from habit. besides, half of her heart had already been expended over her first love, and the other half was still full of the remembrance of her first lover. eight months passed by in this fashion, good and evil days alternating. during this period rodolphe was a score of times on the point of separating from mademoiselle mimi, who had for him all the clumsy cruelties of the woman who does not love. properly speaking, this life had become a hell for both. but rodolphe had grown accustomed to these daily struggles, and dreaded nothing so much as a cessation of this state of things; for he felt that with it would cease forever the fever and agitations of youth that he had not felt for so long. and then, if everything must be told, there were hours in which mademoiselle mimi knew how to make rodolphe forget all the suspicions that were tearing at his heart. there were moments when she caused him to bend like a child at her knee beneath the charm of her blue eyes--the poet to whom she had given back his lost poetry--the young man to whom she had restored his youth, and who, thanks to her, was once more beneath love's equator. two or three times a month, amidst these stormy quarrels, rodolphe and mimi halted with one accord at the verdant oasis of a night of love, and for whole hours would give himself up to addressing her in that charming yet absurd language that passion improvises in its hour of delirium. mimi listened calmly at first, rather astonished than moved, but, in the end, the enthusiastic eloquence of rodolphe, by turns tender, lively, and melancholy, won on her by degrees. she felt the ice of indifference that numbed her heart melt at the contact of the love; she would throw herself on rodolphe's breast, and tell him by kisses all that she was unable to tell him in words. and dawn surprised them thus enlaced together--eyes fixed on eyes, hands clasped in hands--whilst their moist and burning lips were still murmuring that immortal word "that for five thousand years has lingered nightly on lovers' lips." but the next day the most futile pretext brought about a quarrel, and love alarmed fled again for some time. in the end, however, rodolphe perceived that if he did not take care the white hands of mademoiselle mimi would lead him to an abyss in which he would leave his future and his youth. for a moment stern reason spoke in him more strongly than love, and he convinced himself by strong arguments, backed up by proofs, that his mistress did not love him. he went so far as to say to himself, that the hours of love she granted him were nothing but a mere sensual caprice such as married women feel for their husbands when they long for a cashmere shawl or a new dress, or when their lover is away, in accordance with the proverb that half a loaf is better than no bread. in short, rodolphe could forgive his mistress everything except not being loved. he therefore took a supreme resolution, and announced to mademoiselle mimi that she would have to look out for another lover. mimi began to laugh and to utter bravados. in the end, seeing that rodolphe was firm in his resolve, and greeted her with extreme calmness when she returned home after a day and a night spent out of the house, she began to grow a little uneasy in face of this firmness, to which she was not accustomed. she was then charming for two or three days. but her lover did not go back on what he had said, and contented himself with asking whether she had found anyone. "i have not even looked," she replied. however, she had looked, and even before rodolphe had advised her to do so. in a fortnight she had made two essays. one of her friends had helped her, and had at first procured her the acquaintance of a very tender youth, who had unfolded before mimi's eyes a horizon of indian cashmeres and suites of furniture in rosewood. but in the opinion of mimi herself this young schoolboy, who might be very good at algebra, was not very advanced in the art of love, and as she did not like undertaking education, she left her amorous novice on the lurch, with his cashmeres still browsing on the plains of tibet, and his rosewood furniture still growing in the forests of the new world. the schoolboy was soon replaced by a breton gentleman, with whom mimi was soon rapidly smitten, and she had no need to pray long before becoming his nominal countess. despite his mistress's protestations, rodolphe had wind of some intrigue. he wanted to know exactly how matters stood, and one morning, after a night during which mademoiselle mimi had not returned, hastened to the place where he suspected her to be. there he was able to strike home at his heart with one of those proofs to which one must give credence in spite of oneself. he saw mademoiselle mimi, with two eyes encircled with an aureola of satisfied voluptuousness, leaving the residence in which she had acquired her title of nobility, on the arm of her new lord and master, who, to tell the truth, appeared far less proud of her new conquest than paris after the rape of helen. on seeing her lover appear, mademoiselle mimi seemed somewhat surprised. she came up to him, and for five minutes they talked very quietly together. they then parted, each on their separate way. their separation was agreed upon. rodolphe returned home, and spent the day in packing up all the things belonging to his mistress. during the day that followed his divorce, he received the visit of several friends, and announced to them what had happened. every one congratulated him on this event as on a piece of great good fortune. "we will aid you, oh poet!" said one of those who had been the most frequent spectator of the annoyances mademoiselle mimi had made rodolphe undergo, "we will help you to free your heart from the clutches of this evil creature. in a little while you will be cured, and quite ready to rove with another mimi along the green lanes of aulnay and fontenay-aux-roses." rodolphe swore that he had forever done with regrets and despair. he even let himself be led away to the bal mabille, when his dilapidated get-up did scant honor to "the scarf of iris," his editorship of which procured him free admission to this garden of elegance and pleasure. there rodolphe met some fresh friends, with whom he began to drink. he related to them his woes an unheard of luxury of imaginative style, and for an hour was perfectly dazzling with liveliness and go. "alas!" said the painter marcel, as he listened to the flood of irony pouring from his friend's lips, "rodolphe is too lively, far too lively." "he is charming," replied a young woman to whom rodolphe had just offered a bouquet, "and although he is very badly got up i would willingly compromise myself by dancing with him if he would invite me." two seconds later rodolphe, who had overheard her, was at her feet, enveloping his invitation in a speech, scented with all the musk and benjamin of a gallantry at eighty degrees richelieu. the lady was confounded by the language sparkling with dazzling adjectives and phrases modelled on those in vogue during the regency, and the invitation was accepted. rodolphe was as ignorant of the elements of dancing as of the rule of three. but he was impelled by an extraordinary audacity. he did not hesitate, but improvised a dance unknown to all bygone choreography. it was a step the originality of which obtained an incredible success, and that has been celebrated under the title of "regrets and sighs." it was all very well for the three thousand jets of gas to blink at him, rodolphe went on at it all the same, and continued to pour out a flood of novel madrigals to his partner. "well," said marcel, "this is incredible. rodolphe reminds me of a drunken man rolling amongst broken glass." "at any rate he has got hold of a deuced fine woman," said another, seeing rodolphe about to leave with his partner. "won't you say good night?" cried marcel after him. rodolphe came back to the artist and held out his hand, it was cold and damp as a wet stone. rodolphe's companion was a strapping normandy wench, whose native rusticity had promptly acquired an aristocratic tinge amidst the elegancies of parisian luxury and an idle life. she was styled madame seraphine, and was for the time being mistress of an incarnate rheumatism in the shape of a peer of france, who gave her fifty louis a month, which she shared with a counter-jumper who gave her nothing but hard knocks. rodolphe had pleased her, she hoped that he would not think of giving her anything, and took him off home with her. "lucille," said she to her waiting maid, "i am not at home to anyone." and passing into her bedroom, she came out ten minutes later, in a special costume. she found rodolphe dumb and motionless, for since he had come in he had been plunged, despite himself, into a gloom full of silent sobs. "why you no longer look at me or speak to me!" said the astonished seraphine. "come," said rodolphe to himself, lifting his head. "let us look at her, but only for the sake of art." "and then what a sight met his eyes," as raoul says in "the huguenots." seraphine was admirable beautiful. her splendid figure, cleverly set off by the cut of her solitary garment, showed itself provocatively through the half-transparent material. all the imperious fever of desire woke afresh in rodolphe's veins. a warm mist mounted to his brain. he looked at seraphine otherwise than from a purely aesthetic point of view and took the pretty girl's hands in his own. they were divine hands, and might have been wrought by the purest chisels of grecian statuary. rodolphe felt these admirable hands tremble in his own, and feeling less and less of an art critic, he drew towards him seraphine, whose face was already tinged with that flush which is the aurora of voluptuousness. "this creature is a true instrument of pleasure, a real stradivarius of love, and one on which i would willingly play a tune," thought rodolphe, as he heard the fair creature's heart beating a hurried charge in a very distinct fashion. at that moment there was a violent ring at the door of the rooms. "lucile, lucile," cried seraphine to the waiting maid, "do not let anyone in, say i am not home yet." at the name of lucile uttered twice, rodolphe rose. "i do not wish to incommode you in any way, madame," said he. "besides, i must take my leave, it is late and i live a long way off. good evening." "what! you are going?" exclaimed seraphine, augmenting the fire of her glances. "why, why should you go? i am free, you can stay." "impossible," replied rodolphe, "i am expecting one of my relatives who is coming from terra del fuego this evening, and he would disinherit me if he did not find me waiting to receive him. good evening, madame." and he quitted the room hurriedly. the servant went to light him out. rodolphe accidentally cast his eye on her. she was a delicate looking girl, with slow movements; her extremely pale face offered a charming contrast to her dark and naturally curling hair, whilst her blue eyes resembled two sickly stars. "oh phantom!" exclaimed rodolphe, shrinking from one who bore the name and the face of his mistress. "away, what would you with me?" and he rushed down the stairs. "why, madame," said the lady's maid, returning to her mistress's room. "the young fellow is mad." "say rather that he is a fool," claimed the exasperated seraphine. "oh!" she continued, "this will teach me to show kindness. if only that brute of a leon had the sense to drop in now!" leon was the gentleman whose love carried a whip. rodolphe ran home without waiting to take breath. going upstairs he found his carroty-haired cat giving vent to piteous mewings. for two nights already it has thus been vainly summoning its faithless love, an agora manon lescaut, who had started on a campaign of gallantry on the house-tops adjacent. "poor beast," said rodolphe, "you have been deceived. your mimi has jilted you like mine has jilted me. bah! let us console ourselves. you see, my poor fellow, the hearts of women and she-cats are abysses that neither men nor toms will ever fathom." when he entered his room, although it was fearfully hot, rodolphe seemed to feel a cloak of ice about his shoulders. it was the chill of solitude, that terrible nocturnal solitude that nothing disturbs. he lit his candle and then perceived the ravaged room. the gaping drawers in the furniture showed empty, and from floor to ceiling sadness filled the little room that seemed to rodolphe vaster than a desert. stepping forward he struck his foot against the parcels containing the things belonging to mademoiselle mimi, and he felt an impulse of joy to find that she had not yet come to fetch them as she had told him in the morning she would do. rodolphe felt that, despite all his struggles, the moment of reaction was at hand, and readily divined that a cruel night was to expiate all the bitter mirth that he had dispensed in the course of the evening. however, he hoped that his body, worn out with fatigue, would sink to sleep before the reawakening of the sorrows so long pent back in his heart. as he approached the couch, and on drawing back the curtains saw the bed that had not been disturbed for two days, the pillows placed side by side, beneath one of which still peeped out the trimming of a woman's night cap, rodolphe felt his heart gripped in the pitiless vice of that desolate grief that cannot burst forth. he fell at the foot of the bed, buried his face in his hands, and, after having cast a glance round the desolate room, exclaimed: "oh! little mimi, joy of my home, is it really true that you are gone, that i have driven you away, and that i shall never see you again, my god. oh! pretty brown curly head that has slept so long on this spot, will you never come back to sleep here again? oh! little white hands with the blue veins, little white hands to whom i had affianced my lips, have you too received my last kiss?" and rodolphe, in delirious intoxication, plunged his head amongst the pillows, still impregnated with the perfume of his love's hair. from the depth of the alcove he seemed to see emerge the ghosts of the sweet nights he had passed with his young mistress. he heard clear and sonorous, amidst the nocturnal silence, the open-hearted laugh of mademoiselle mimi, and he thought of the charming and contagious gaiety with which she had been able so many times to make him forget all the troubles and all the hardships of their hazardous existence. throughout the night he kept passing in review the eight months that he had just spent with this girl, who had never loved him perhaps, but whose tender lies had restored to rodolphe's heart its youth and virility. dawn surprised him at the moment when, conquered by fatigue, he had just closed his eyes, red from the tears shed during the night. a doleful and terrible vigil, yet such a one as even the most sneering and sceptical amongst us may find in the depths of their past. when his friends called on him in the morning they were alarmed at the sight of rodolphe, whose face bore the traces of all the anguish that had awaited him during his vigil in the gethsemane of love. "good!" said marcel, "i was sure of it; it is his mirth of yesterday that has turned in his heart. things must not go on like this." and in concert with two or three comrades he began a series of privately indiscreet revelations respecting mademoiselle mimi, every word of which pierced like a thorn in rodolphe's heart. his friends "proved" to him that all the time his mistress had tricked him like a simpleton at home and abroad, and that this fair creature, pale as the angel of phthisis, was a casket filled with evil sentiments and ferocious instincts. one and another they thus took it in turns at the task they had set themselves, which was to bring rodolphe to that point at which soured love turns to contempt; but this object was only half attained. the poet's despair turned to wrath. he threw himself in a rage upon the packages which he had done up the day before, and after having put on one side all the objects that his mistress had in her possession when she came to him, kept all those he had given her during their union, that is to say, by far the greater number, and, above all, the articles connected with the toilette to which mademoiselle mimi was attached by all the fibers of a coquetry that had of late become insatiable. mademoiselle mimi called in course of the next day to take away her things. rodolphe was at home and alone. it needed all his powers of self esteem to keep him from throwing himself upon his mistress's neck. he gave her a reception full of silent insult, and mademoiselle mimi replied by those cold and keen scoffs that drive the weakest and most timid to show their teeth. in face of the contempt with which his mistress flagellated him with insolent hardihood, rodolphe's anger broke out fearfully and brutally. for a moment mimi, white with terror, asked herself whether she would escape from his hands alive. at the cries she uttered some neighbors rushed in and dragged her out of rodolphe's room. two days later a female friend of mimi came to ask rodolphe whether he would give up the things he had kept. "no," he replied. and he got his mistress's messenger to talk about her. she informed him that mimi was in a very unfortunate condition, and that she would soon find herself without a lodging. "and the lover of whom she is so fond?" "oh!" replied amelie, the friend in question, "the young fellow has no intention of taking her for his mistress. he has been keeping another for a long time past, and he does not seem to trouble much about mimi, who is living at my expense, which causes me a great deal of embarrassment." "let her do as she can," said rodolphe. "she would have it,--it is no affair of mine." and he began to sing madrigals to mademoiselle amelie, and persuaded her that she was the prettiest woman in the world. amelie informed mimi of her interview with rodolphe. "what did he say? what is he doing? did he speak to you about me?" asked mimi. "not at all; you are already forgotten, my dear. rodolphe has a fresh mistress, and he has bought her a superb outfit, for he has received a great deal of money, and is himself dressed like a prince. he is a very amiable fellow, and said a lot of nice things to me." "i know what all that means," thought mimi. every day mademoiselle amelie called to see rodolphe on some pretext or other, and however much the latter tried he could not help speaking of mimi to her. "she is very lively," replied her friend, "and does not seem to trouble herself about her position. besides she declares that she will come back to you whenever she chooses, without making any advances and merely for the sake of vexing your friends." "very good," said rodolphe, "let her come and we shall see." and he began to pay court to amelie, who went off to tell everything to mimi, and to assure her that rodolphe was very much in love with herself. "he kissed me again on the hand and the neck; see it is quite red," said she. "he wants to take me to a dance tomorrow." "my dear friend," said mimi, rather vexed, "i see what you are driving at, to make me believe that rodolphe is in love with you and thinks no more about me. but you are wasting your time both for him and me." the fact was that rodolphe only showed himself amiable towards amelie to get her to call on him the oftener, and to have the opportunity of speaking to her about his mistress. but with a machiavelism that had perhaps its object, and whilst perceiving very well that rodolphe still loved mimi, and that the latter was not indisposed to rejoin him, amelie strove, by ingeniously inventive reports, to fend off everything that might serve to draw the pair together again. the day on which she was to go to the ball amelie called in the morning to ask rodolphe whether the engagement still held good. "yes," he replied, "i do not want to miss the opportunity of being the cavalier of the most beautiful woman of the day." amelie assumed the coquettish air that she had put on the occasion of her solitary appearance at a suburban theater as fourth chambermaid, and promised to be ready that evening. "by the way," said rodolphe, "tell mademoiselle mimi that if she will be guilty of an infidelity to her lover in my favor, and come and pass a night with me, i will give her up all her things." amelie executed rodolphe's commission, and gave to his words quite another meaning than that which she had guessed they bore. "your rodolphe is a rather base fellow," said she to mimi. "his proposal is infamous. he wishes by this step to make you descend to the rank of the vilest creatures, and if you go to him not only will he not give you your things, but he will show you up as a jest to all his comrades. it is a plot arranged amongst them." "i will not go," said mimi, and as she saw amelie engaged in preparing her toilette, she asked her whether she was going to the ball. "yes," replied the other. "with rodolphe?" "yes, he is to wait for me this evening twenty yards or so from here." "i wish you joy," said mimi, and seeing the hour of the appointment approach, she hurried off to mademoiselle amelie's lover, and informed him that the latter was engaged in a little scheme to deceive him with her own old lover. the gentleman, jealous as a tiger and brutal to boot, called at once on mademoiselle amelie, and announced that he would like her to spend the evening in his company. at eight o'clock mimi flew to the spot at which rodolphe was to meet amelie. she saw her lover pacing up and down after the fashion of a man waiting for some one, and twice passed close to him without daring to address him. rodolphe was very well dressed that evening, and the violent crises through which he had passed during the week had imparted great character on his face. mimi was singularly moved. at length she made up her mind to speak to him. rodolphe received her without anger, and asked how she was, after which he inquired as to the motive that had brought her to him, in mild voice, in which there was an effort to check a note of sadness. "it is bad news that i come to bring you. mademoiselle amelie cannot come to the ball with you. her lover is keeping her." "i shall go to the ball alone, then." here mademoiselle mimi feigned to stumble, and leaned against rodolphe's shoulder. he took her arm and proposed to escort her home. "no," said mimi. "i am living with amelie, and as her lover is there i cannot go in until he has left." "listen to me, then," said the poet. "i made a proposal to you today through mademoiselle amelie. did she transmit it to you?" "yes," said mimi, "but in terms which, even after what has happened, i could not credit. no, rodolphe, i could not believe that, despite all that you might have to reproach me with, you thought me so worthless as to accept such a bargain." "you did not understand me, or the message has been badly conveyed to you. my offer holds good," said rodolphe. "it is nine o'clock. you still have three hours for reflection. the door will be unlocked until midnight. good night. farewell, or--till we meet again." "farewell, then," said mimi, in trembling tones. and they separated. rodolphe went home and threw himself, without undressing, upon his bed. at half past eleven, mademoiselle mimi entered his room. "i have come to ask your hospitality," said she. "amelie's lover has stayed with her, and i cannot get in." they talked together until three in the morning--an explanatory conversation which grew gradually more familiar. at four o'clock their candle went out. rodolphe wanted to light another. "no," said mimi, "it is not worth the trouble. it is quite time to go to bed." five minutes later her pretty brown curly head had once more resumed its place on the pillow, and in a voice full of affection she invited rodolphe's lips to feast on her little white hand with their blue veins, the pearly pallor of which vied with the whiteness of the sheets. rodolphe did not light the candle. in the morning rodolphe got up first, and pointing out several packages to mimi, said to her, very gently, "there is what belongs to you. you can take it away. i keep my word." "oh!" said mimi. "i am very tired, you see, and i cannot carry all these heavy parcels away at once. i would rather call again." and when she was dressed she only took a collar and a pair of cuffs. "i will take away the rest by degrees," she added, smiling. "come," said rodolphe, "take away all or take away none, and let there be an end of it." "let it, on the contrary, begin again, and, above all, let it last," said mimi, kissing rodolphe. after breakfasting together they started off for a day in the country. crossing the luxembourg gardens rodolphe met a great poet who had always received him with charming kindness. out of respect for the conventionalities rodolphe was about to pretend not to see him but the poet did not give him time, and passing by him greeted him with a friendly gesture and his companion with a smile. "who is that gentleman?" asked mimi. rodolphe answered her by mentioning a name which made her blush with pleasure and pride. "oh!" said rodolphe. "our meeting with the poet who has sung of love so well is a good omen, and will bring luck to our reconciliation." "i do love you," said mimi, squeezing his hand, although they were in the midst of the crowd. "alas!" thought rodolphe. "which is better; to allow oneself always to be deceived through believing, or never to believe for fear of always being deceived?" chapter xv donec gratus we have told how the painter marcel made the acquaintance of mademoiselle musette. united one morning by the ministry of caprice, the registrar of the district, they had fancied, as often happens, that their union did not extend to their hearts. but one evening when, after a violent quarrel, they resolved to leave one another on the spot, they perceived that their hands, which they had joined in a farewell clasp, would no longer quit one another. almost in spite of themselves fancy had become love. both, half laughingly, acknowledged it. "this is very serious. what has happened to us?" said marcel. "what the deuce have we been up to?" "oh!" replied musette. "we must have been clumsy over it. we did not take enough precautions." "what is the matter?" asked rodolphe, who had become marcel's neighbor, entering the room. "the matter is," replied marcel, "that this lady and myself have just made a pretty discovery. we are in love with one another. we must have been attacked by the complaint whilst asleep." "oh oh! i don't think that it was whilst you were asleep," observed rodolphe. "but what proves that you are in love with one another? possibly you exaggerate the danger." "we cannot bear one another," said marcel. "and we cannot leave one another," added musette. "there, my children, your business is plain. each has tried to play cunning, and both have lost. it is the story of mimi and myself. we shall soon have run through two almanacs quarrelling day and night. it is by that system that marriages are rendered eternal. wed a 'yes' to a 'no,' and you obtain the union of philemon and baucis. your domestic interior will soon match mine, and if schaunard and phemie come and live in the house, as they have threatened, our trio of establishments will render it a very pleasant place of residence." at that moment gustave colline came in. he was informed of the accident that had befallen musette and marcel. "well, philosopher," said the latter, "what do you think of this?" colline rubbed the hat that served him for a roof, and murmured, "i felt sure of it beforehand. love is a game of chance. he who plays at bowls may expect rubbers. it is not good for man to live alone." that evening, on returning home, rodolphe said to mimi-"there is something new. musette dotes on marcel, and will not leave him." "poor girl!" replied mimi. "she who has such a good appetite, too." "and on his side, marcel is hard and fast in love with musette." "poor fellow!" said mimi. "he who is so jealous." "that is true," observed rodolphe. "he and i are pupils of othello." shortly afterwards the households of rodolphe and marcel were reinforced by the household of schaunard, the musician, moving into the house with phemie teinturiere. from that day all the other inhabitants slept upon a volcano, and at quarter day sent in a unanimous notice of their intention to move to the landlord. indeed, hardly a day passed without a storm breaking out in one of these households. now it was mimi and rodolphe who, no longer having strength to speak, continued their conversation with the aid of such missiles as came under their hands. but more frequently it was schaunard addressing a few observations to the melancholy phemie with the end of a walking stick. as to marcel and musette, their arguments were carried on in private sittings; they took at least the precaution to close their doors and windows. if by chance peace reigned in the three households, the other lodgers were not the less victims of this temporary concord. the indiscretion of partition walls allowed all the secrets of bohemian family life to transpire, and initiated them, in spite of themselves, into all its mysteries. thus more than one neighbor preferred the _casus belli_ to the ratification of treaties of peace. it was, in truth, a singular life that was led for six months. the most loyal fraternity was practiced without any fuss in this circle, in which everything was for all, and good or evil fortune shared. there were in the month certain days of splendor, when no one would have gone out without gloves--days of enjoyment, when dinner lasted all day long. there were others when one would have almost gone to court without boots; lenten days, when, after going without breakfast in common, they failed to dine together, or managed by economic combination to furnish forth one of those repasts at which plates and knives were "resting," as mademoiselle mimi put it, in theatrical parlance. but the wonderful thing is that this partnership, in which there were three young and pretty women, no shadow of discord was found amongst the men. they often yielded to the most futile fancies of their mistresses, but not one of them would have hesitated for a moment between the mistress and the friend. love is born above all from spontaneity--it is an improvisation. friendship, on the contrary, is, so to say, built up. it is a sentiment that progresses with circumspection. it is the egoism of the mind, whilst love is the egoism of the heart. the bohemians had known one another for six years. this long period of time spent in a daily intimacy had, without altering the well-defined individuality of each, brought about between them a concord of ideas--a unity which they would not have found elsewhere. they had manners that were their own, a tongue amongst themselves to which strangers would not have been able to find the key. those who did not know them very well called their freedom of manner cynicism. it was however, only frankness. with minds impatient of imposed control, they all hated what was false, and despised what was low. accused of exaggerated vanity, they replied by proudly unfurling the program of their ambition, and, conscious of their worth, held no false estimate of themselves. during the number of years that they had followed the same life together, though often placed in rivalry by the necessities of their profession, they had never let go one another's hands, and had passed without heeding them over personal questions of self-esteem whenever an attempt had been made to raise these between them in order to disunite them. besides, they each esteemed one another at their right worth, and pride, which is the counter poison of envy, preserved them from all petty professional jealousy. however, after six months of life in common, an epidemic of divorce suddenly seized on the various households. schaunard opened the ball. one day he perceived that phemie teinturiere had one knee better shaped than the other, and as his was an austere purism as regards plastics, he sent phemie about her business, giving her as a souvenir the cane with which he had addressed such frequent remarks to her. then he went back to live with a relative who offered him free quarters. a fortnight later mimi left rodolphe to step into the carriage of the young vicomte paul, the ex-pupil of carolus barbemuche, who had promised her dresses to her heart's desire. after mimi it was musette who went off, and returned with a grand flourish of trumpets amongst the aristocracy of the world of gallantry which she had left to follow marcel. this separation took place without quarrel, shock or premeditation. born of a fancy that had become love, this union was broken off by another fancy. one evening during the carnival, at the masked ball at the opera, whither she had gone with marcel, mimi, musette had for her _vis-a-vis_ in a quadrille a young man who had formerly courted her. they recognized one another, and, whilst dancing exchanged a few words. unintentionally, perhaps, whilst informing the young man of her present condition in life, she may have dropped a word of regret as to her past one. at any rate, at the end of the quadrille musette made a mistake, and instead of giving her hand to marcel, who was her partner, give it to her _vis-a-vis_, who led her off, and disappeared with her in the crowd. marcel looked for her, feeling somewhat uneasy. in an hour's time he found her on the young man's arm; she was coming out of the cafe de l'opera, humming a tune. on catching sight of marcel, who had stationed himself in a corner with folded arms, she made him a sign of farewell, saying--"i shall be back." "that is to say, 'do not expect me,'" translated marcel. he was jealous but logical, and knew musette, hence he did not wait for her, but went home with a full heart and an empty stomach. he looked into the cupboard to see whether there were not a few scraps to eat, and perceived a bit of stale bread as hard as granite and a skeleton-like red herring. "i cannot fight against truffles," he thought. "at any rate, musette will have some supper." and after passing his handkerchief over his eyes under pretext of wiping his nose, he went to bed. two days later musette woke up in a boudoir with rose-covered hangings. a blue brougham was at her door, and all the fairies of fashion had been summoned to lay their wonders at her feet. musette was charming, and her youth seemed yet further rejuvenated in this elegant setting. then she began her old life again, was present at every festivity, and re-conquered her celebrity. she was spoken of everywhere--in the lobbies of the bourse, and even at the parliamentary refreshment bars. as to her new lover, monsieur alexis, he was a charming young fellow. he often complained to musette of her being somewhat frivolous and inattentive when he spoke to her of his love. then musette would look at him laughingly, and say-"what would you have, my dear fellow? i stayed six months with a man who fed me on salad and soup without butter, who dressed me in a cotton gown, and usually took me to the odeon because he was not well off. as love costs nothing, and as i was wildly in love with this monster, we expended a great deal of it together. i have scarcely anything but its crumbs left. pick them up, i do no hinder you. besides, i have not deceived you about it; if ribbons were not so dear i should still be with my painter. as to my heart, since i have worn an eighty franc corset i do not hear it, and i am very much afraid that i have left it in one of marcel's drawers." the disappearance of the three bohemian households was the occasion of a festival in the house they had inhabited. as a token of rejoicing the landlord gave a grand dinner, and the lodgers lit up their windows. rodolphe and marcel went to live together. each had taken a new idol whose name they were not exactly acquainted with. sometimes it happened that one spoke of musette and the other of mimi, and then they had a whole evening of it. they recalled to one another their old life, the songs of musette and the songs of mimi, nights passed without sleep, idle mornings, and dinners only partaken of in dreams. one by one they hummed over in these recolletive ducts all the bygone hours, and they usually wound up by saying that after all they were still happy to find themselves together, their feet on the fender, stirring the december log, smoking their pipes, and having as a pretext for open conversation between them that which they whispered to themselves when alone--that they had dearly loved these beings who had vanished, bearing away with them a part of their youth, and that perhaps they loved them still. one evening when passing along the boulevard, marcel perceived a few paces ahead of him a young lady who, in alighting from a cab, exposed the lower part of a white stocking of admirable shape. the very driver himself devoured with his eyes this charming gratification in excess of his fare. "by jove," said marcel. "that is a neat leg, i should like to offer it my arm. come, now, how shall i manage to accord it? ha! i have it--it is a fairly novel plan. excuse me, madame," continued he, approaching the fair unknown, whose face at the outset he could not at first get a full view of, "but you have not by chance found my handkerchief?" "yes, sir," replied the young lady, "here it is." and she placed in marcel's hand a handkerchief she had been holding in her own. the artist rolled into an abyss of astonishment. but all at once a burst of laughter full in his face recalled him to himself. by this joyous outbreak he recognized his old love. it was mademoiselle musette. "ah!" she exclaimed. "monsieur marcel in quest of gallant adventures. what do you think of this one, eh? it does not lack fun." "i think it endurable," replied marcel. "where are you going so late in this region?" asked musette. "i am going into that edifice," said the artist, pointing to a little theater where he was on the free list. "for the sake of art?" "no, for the sake of laura." "who is laura?" continued musette, whose eyes shot forth notes of interrogation. marcel kept up the tone. "she is a chimera whom i am pursuing, and who plays here." and he pretended to pull out an imaginary shirt frill. "you are very witty this evening," said musette. "and you very curious," observed marcel. "do no speak so loud, everyone can hear us, and they will take us for two lovers quarrelling." "it would not be the first time that that happened," said marcel. musette read a challenge in this sentence, and quickly replied, "and it will not perhaps be the last, eh?" her words were plain, they whizzed past marcel's ear like a bullet. "splendors of heaven," said he, looking up at the stars, "you are witness that it is not i who opened fire. quick, my armor." from that moment the firing began. it was now only a question of finding some appropriate pretext to bring about an agreement between these two fancies that had just woke up again so lively. as they walked along, musette kept looking at marcel, and marcel kept looking at musette. they did not speak, but their eyes, those plenipotentiaries of the heart, often met. after a quarter of an hour's diplomacy this congress of glances had tacitly settled the matter. there was nothing to be done save to ratify it. the interrupted conversation was renewed. "candidly now," said musette to marcel, "where were you going just now?" "i told you, to see laura." "is she pretty?" "her mouth is a nest of smiles." "oh! i know all that sort of thing." "but you yourself," said marcel, "whence came you on the wings of this four-wheeler?" "i came back from the railway station where i had been to see off alexis, who is going on a visit to his family." "what sort of man is alexis?" in turn musette sketched a charming portrait of her present lover. whilst walking along marcel and musette continued thus on the open boulevard the comedy of reawakening love. with the same simplicity, in turn tender and jesting, they went verse by verse through that immortal ode in which horace and lydia extol with such grace the charms of their new loves, and end by adding a postscript to their old ones. as they reached the corner of the street a rather strong picket of soldiers suddenly issued from it. musette struck an attitude of alarm, and clutching hold of marcel's arm said, "ah! good heavens! look there, soldiers; there is going to be another revolution. let us bolt off, i am awfully afraid. see me indoors." "but where shall we go?" asked marcel. "to my place," said musette. "you shall see how nice it is. i invite you to supper. we will talk politics." "no," replied marcel, who thought of monsieur alexis. "i will not go to your place, despite your offer of a supper. i do not like to drink my wine out of another's glass." musette was silent in face of this refusal. then through the mist of her recollections she saw the poor home of the artist, for marcel had not become a millionaire. she had an idea, and profiting by meeting another picket she manifested fresh alarm. "they are going to fight," she exclaimed. "i shall never dare go home. marcel, my dear fellow, take me to one of my lady friends, who must be living in your neighborhood." as they were crossing the pont neuf musette broke into a laugh. "what is it?" asked marcel. "nothing," replied musette, "only i remember that my friend has moved. she is living at batignolles." on seeing marcel and musette arrive arm in arm rodolphe was not astonished. "it is always so," said he, "with these badly buried loves." chapter xvi the passage of the red sea for five or six years marcel had worked at the famous painting which (he said) represented the passage of the red sea; and for five or six years, this masterpiece of color had been obstinately refused by the jury. in fact, by dint of going and returning so many times from the artist's study to the exhibition, and from the exhibition to the study, the picture knew the road to the louvre well enough to have gone thither of itself, if it had been put on wheels. marcel, who had repainted the canvas ten times over, from top to bottom, attributed to personal hostility on the part of the jury the ostracism which annually repulsed him from the large saloon; nevertheless he was not totally discouraged by the obstinate rejection which greeted him at every exhibition. he was comfortably established in the persuasion that his picture was, on a somewhat smaller scale, the pendant required by "the marriage of cana," that gigantic masterpiece whose astonishing brilliancy the dust of three centuries has not been able to tarnish. accordingly, every year at the epoch of the exhibition, marcel sent his great work to the jury of examiners; only, to deceive them, he would change some details of his picture, and the title of it, without disturbing the general composition. thus, it came before the jury once, under the name of "the passage of the rubicon," but pharaoh, badly disguised under the mantle of caeser, was recognized and rejected with all the honors due him. next year, marcel threw a coat of white over the foreground, to imitate snow, planted a fir tree in one corner, and dressing an egyptian like a grenadier of the imperial guard, christened his picture, "the passage of the beresina." but the jury had wiped its glasses that day, and were not to be duped by this new stratagem. it recognized the pertinacious picture by a thundering big pie-bald horse that was prancing on top of a wave of the red sea. the skin of this horse served marcel for all his experiments in coloring; he used to call it, familiarly, his "synoptic table of fine tones," because it reproduced the most varied combinations of color, with the different plays of light and shade. once again, however, the jury could not find black balls enough to refuse "the passage of beresina." "very well," said marcel, "i thought so! next year, i shall send it under the title of 'the passage of the panoramas.'" "they're going to be jolly caught--caught!" sang schaunard to a new air of his own composition; a terrible air, like a gamut of thunder-claps, the accompaniment whereof was a terror to all pianos within hearing. "how can they refuse it, without all the vermilion of my red sea mounting to their cheeks, and covering them with the blush of shame?" ejaculated the artist, as he gazed on his picture. "when i think that there is five hundred francs' worth of color there, and at least a million of genius, without counting my lovely youth, now as bald as my old hat! but they shan't get the better of me! till my dying day, i will send them my picture. it shall be engraved on their memories." "the surest way of ever having it engraved," said colline, in a plaintive tone, and then added to himself, "very neat, that; i shall repeat it in society!" marcel continued his imprecations, which schaunard continued to put to music. "ah they won't admit me! the government pays them, lodges them, and gives them decorations, on purpose to refuse me once a year; every first of march! i see their idea! i see it clearly! they want to make me burn my brushes. they hope that when my red sea is refused, i will throw myself out of the window of despair. but they little know the heart of man, if they think to take me thus. i will not wait for the opening of the exhibition. from today, my work shall be a picture of damocles, eternally suspended over their existence. i will send it once a week to each of them, at his home in the bosom of his family; in the very heart of his private life. it shall trouble their domestic joys; they shall find their roasts burnt, their wines sour, and their wives bitter! they will grow mad rapidly, and go to the institute in strait-waistcoats. ha! ha! the thought consoles me." some days later, when marcel had already forgotten his terrible plans of vengeance against his persecutors, he received a visit from father medicis. so the club called a jew, named salomon, who at that time was well known to all the vagabond of art and literature, and had continual transactions with them. father medicis traded in all sorts of trumpery. he sold complete sets of furniture from twelve francs up to five thousand; he bought everything, and knew how to dispose of it again, at a profit. proudhon's bank of exchange was nothing in comparison with the system practiced by medicis, who possessed the genius of traffic to a degree at which the ablest of his religion had never before arrived. his shop was a fairy region where you found anything you wished for. every product of nature, every creation of art; whatever issued from the bowels of the earth or the head of man, was an object of commerce for him. his business included everything; literally everything that exists; he even trafficked in the ideal. he bought ideas to sell or speculate in them. known to all literary men and all artists, intimate with the palette and familiar with the desk, he was the very asmodeus of the arts. he would sell you cigars for a column of your newspaper, slippers for a sonnet, fresh fish for paradoxes; he would talk, for so much an hour, with the people who furnished fashionable gossip to the journals. he would procure you places for the debates in the chambers, and invitations to parties. he lodged wandering artistlings by the day, week, or month, taking for pay, copies of the pictures in the louvre. the green room had no mysteries for him. he would get your pieces into the theater, or yourself into the boudoir of an actress. he had a copy of the "almanac of twenty five thousand addresses" in his head, and knew the names, residences, and secrets of all celebrities, even those who were not celebrated. a few pages copied from his waste book, will give a better idea of the universality of his operations than the most copious explanation could. "march 20, 184--." "sold to m. l----, antiquary, the compass which archimedes used at the siege of syracuse. 75 fr. bought of m. v----, journalist, the entire works, uncut, of m. x----, member of the academy. 10 fr. sold to the same, a criticism of the complete works of m. x----, of the academy. 30 fr. bought of m. r----, literary man, a critical article on the complete works of m. y----, of the academy. 10 fr., plus half a cwt. of charcoal and 4 lbs. of coffee. sold to m. y----, of the academy, a laudatory review (twelve columns) of his complete works. 250 fr. sold to m. g----, a porcelain vase which had belonged to madame dubarry. 18 fr. bought of little d----, her hair. 15 fr. bought of m. b----, a lot of articles on society, and the last three mistakes in spelling made by the prefect of the seine. 6 fr, plus a pair of naples shoes. sold to mdlle. o----, a flaxen head of hair. 120 fr. bought of m. m----, historical painter, a series of humorous designs. 25 fr. informed m. ferdinand the time when mme. la baronne de t---goes to mass, and let him for the day the little room in the faubourg montmartre: together 30 fr. bought of m. j----, artist, a portrait of m. isidore as apollo. 6 fr. sold to mdlle r---a pair of lobsters and six pair of gloves. 36 fr. received 3 fr. for the same, procured a credit of six months with mme. z----, dressmaker. (price not settled.) procured for mme. z----, dressmaker, the custom of mdlle. r----. received for this three yards of velvet, and three yards of lace. bought of m. r----, literary man, a claim of 120 fr. against the----newspaper. 5 fr., plus 2 lbs. of tobacco. sold m. ferdinand two love letters. 12 fr. sold m. isidore his portrait as apollo. 30 fr. bought of m. m----, a cwt. and a half of his work, entitled 'submarine revolutions.' 15 fr. lent mme la comtesse de g---a service of dresden china. 20 fr. bought of m. g----, journalist, fifty-two lines in his article of town talk. 100 fr., plus a set of chimney ornaments. sold to messrs. o---and co., fifty-two lines in the town talk of the----. 300 fr., plus two sets of chimney ornaments. let to mdlle. s. g---a bed and a brougham for the day (nothing). see mdlle. s. g----'s account in private ledger, folios 26 and 27. bought of m. gustave c--a treatise on the flax and linen trade. 50 fr., and a rare edition of josephus. sold mdlle. s. g---a complete set of new furniture. 5000 fr. for the same, paid an apothecary's bill. 75 fr. for the same, paid a milkman's bill. 3 fr. 85 c." those quotations show what an extensive range the operations of the jew medici covered. it may be added, that although some articles of his commerce were decidedly illicit, he had never got himself into any trouble. the jew comprehended, on his entrance, that he had come at a favorable time. in fact, the four friends were at that moment in council, under the auspices of a ferocious appetite, discussing the grave question of meat and drink. it was a sunday at the end of the month--sinister day. the arrival of medicis was therefore hailed by a joyous chorus, for they knew that he was too saving of his time to spend it in visits of polite ceremony; his presence announced business. "good evening, gentlemen!" said the jew. "how are you all?" "colline!" said rodolphe, who was studying the horizontal line at full length on his bed. "do the hospitable. give our guest a chair; a guest is sacred. i salute abraham in you," added he. colline took an arm chair about as soft as iron, and shoved it towards the jew, saying: "suppose, for once, you were cinna, (you _are_ a great sinner, you know), and take this seat." "oh, oh, oh!" shouted the others, looking at the floor to see if it would not open and swallow up the philosopher. meanwhile the jew let himself fall into the arm chair, and was just going to cry out at its hardness, when he remembered that it was one which he himself had sold to colline for a deputy's speech. as the jew sat down, his pockets re-echoed with a silvery sound; melodious symphony, which threw the four friends into a reverie of delight. "the accompaniment seems pretty," said rodolphe aside to marcel. "now for the air!" "monsieur marcel," said medicis, "i have merely come to make your fortune; that is to say, i offer you a superb opportunity of making your entry into the artistic world. art, you know, is a barren route, of which glory is the oasis." "father medicis," cried marcel, on the tenter-hooks of impatience, "in the name of your revered patron, st. fifty-percent, be brief!" "here it is," continued medicis, "a rich amateur, who is collecting a gallery destined to make the tour of europe, has charged me to procure him a series of remarkable works. i come to offer you admission into this museum--in a word, to buy your 'passage of the red sea.'" "money down?" asked marcel. "specie," replied the jew, making the orchestra pockets strike up. "do you accept this serious offer?" asked colline. "of course i do!" shouted rodolphe, "don't you see, you wretch, that he is talking of 'tin'? is there nothing sacred for you, atheist that you are?" colline mounted on a table and assumed the attitude of harpocrates, the god of silence. "push on, medicis!" said marcel, exhibiting his picture. "i wish to leave you the honor of fixing the price of this work, which is above all price." the jew placed on the table a hundred and fifty francs in new coin. "well, what more?" said marcel, "that's only the prologue." "monsieur marcel," replied the jew, "you know that my first offer is my last. i shall add nothing. reflect, a hundred and fifty francs; that is a sum, it is!" "a very small sum," said the artist. "there is that much worth of cobalt in my pharaoh's robe. make it a round sum, at any rate! square it off; say two hundred!" "i won't add a sou!" said medicis. "but i stand dinner for the company, wine to any extent." "going, going, going!" shouted colline, with three blows of his fist on the table, "no one speaks?--gone!" "well it's a bargain!" said marcel. "i will send for the picture tomorrow," said the jew, "and now, gentlemen, to dinner!" the four friends descended the staircase, singing the chorus of "the huguenots"--"_a table! a table!_" medicis treated the bohemians in a really magnificent way, and gave them their choice of a number of dishes, which until then were completely unknown to them. henceforward hot lobster ceased to be a myth with schaunard, who contracted a passion for it that bordered on delirium. the four friends departed from the gorgeous banquet as drunk as a vintage-day. marcel's intoxication was near having the most deplorable consequences. in passing by his tailor's, at two in the morning, he absolutely wanted to wake up his creditor, and pay him the hundred and fifty francs on account. a ray of reason which flashed across the mind of colline, stopped the artist on the border of this precipice. a week after, marcel discovered in what gallery his picture had been placed. while passing through the faubourg st. honore, he stopped in the midst of a group which seemed to regard with curiosity a sign that was being put up over a shop door. the sign was neither more nor less than marcel's picture, which medicis had sold to a grocer. only "the passage of the red sea" had undergone one more alteration, and been given one more new name. it had received the addition of a steamboat and was called "the harbor of marseilles." the curious bystanders were bestowing on it a flattering ovation. marcel returned home in ecstacy at his triumph, muttering to himself, _vox populi, voz dei_. chapter xvii the toilette of the graces mademoiselle mimi, who was accustomed to sleep far into the day, woke up one morning at ten o'clock, and was greatly surprised not to find rodolphe beside her, nor even in the room. the preceding night, before falling to sleep, she had, however, seen him at his desk, preparing to spend the night over a piece of literary work which had been ordered of him, and in the completion of which mimi was especially interested. in fact, the poet had given his companion hopes that out of the fruit of his labors he would purchase a certain summer gown, that she had noticed one day at the "deux magots," a famous drapery establishment, to the window of which mimi's coquetry used very frequently to pay its devotions. hence, ever since the work in question had been begun, mimi had been greatly interested in its progress. she would often come up to rodolphe whilst he was writing, and leaning her head on his shoulder would say to him in serious tones-"well, is my dress getting on?" "there is already enough for a sleeve, so be easy," replied rodolphe. one night having heard rodolphe snap his fingers, which usually meant that he was satisfied with his work, mimi suddenly sat up in bed and passing her head through the curtains said, "is my dress finished?" "there," replied rodolphe, showing her four large sheets of paper, covered with closely written lines. "i have just finished the body." "how nice," said mimi. "then there is only the skirt now left to do. how many pages like that are wanted for the skirt?" "that depends; but as you are not tall, with ten pages of fifty lines each, and eight words to the line, we can get a decent skirt." "i am not very tall, it is true," said mimi seriously, "but it must not look as if we had skimped the stuff. dresses are worn full, and i should like nice large folds so that it may rustle as i walk." "very good," replied rodolphe, seriously. "i will squeeze another word in each line and we shall manage the rustling." mimi fell asleep again quite satisfied. as she had been guilty of the imprudence of speaking of the nice dress that rodolphe was engaged in making for her to mademoiselles musette and phemie, these two young persons had not failed to inform messieurs marcel and schaunard of their friend's generosity towards his mistress, and these confidences had been followed by unequivocal challenges to follow the example set by the poet. "that is to say," added mademoiselle musette, pulling marcel's moustache, "that if things go on like this a week longer i shall be obliged to borrow a pair of your trousers to go out in." "i am owed eleven francs by a good house," replied marcel. "if i get it in i will devote it to buying you a fashionable fig leaf." "and i," said phemie to schaunard, "my gown is in ribbons." schaunard took three sous from his pocket and gave them to his mistress, saying, "here is enough to buy a needle and thread with. mend your gown, that will instruct and amuse you at the same time, _utile dulci_." nevertheless, in a council kept very secret, marcel and schaunard agreed with rodolphe that each of them should endeavor to satisfy the justifiable coquetry of their mistresses. "these poor girls," said rodolphe, "a trifle suffices to adorn them, but then they must have this trifle. latterly fine arts and literature have been flourishing; we are earning almost as much as street porters." "it is true that i ought not to complain," broke in marcel. "the fine arts are in a most healthy condition, one might believe oneself under the sway of leo the tenth." "in point of fact," said rodolphe. "musette tells me that for the last week you have started off every morning and do not get home till about eight in the evening. have you really got something to do?" "my dear fellow, a superb job that medicis got me. i am painting at the ave maria barracks. eight grenadiers have ordered their portraits at six francs a head taken all round, likenesses guaranteed for a year, like a watch. i hope to get the whole regiment. i had the idea, on my own part, of decking out musette when medicis pays me, for it is with him i do business and not my models." "as to me," observed schaunard carelessly, "although it may not look like it, i have two hundred francs lying idle." "the deuce, let us stir them up," said rodolphe. "in two or three days i count on drawing them," replied schaunard. "i do not conceal from you that on doing so i intend to give a free rein to some of my passions. there is, above all, at the second hand clothes shop close by a nankeen jacket and a hunting horn, that have for a long time caught my eye. i shall certainly present myself with them." "but," added marcel and rodolphe together, "where do you hope to draw this amount of capital from?" "hearken gentlemen," said schaunard, putting on a serious air, and sitting down between his two friends, "we must not hide from one another that before becoming members of the institute and ratepayers, we have still a great deal of rye bread to eat, and that daily bread is hard to get. on the other hand, we are not alone; as heaven has created us sensitive to love, each of us has chosen to share his lot." "which is little," interrupted marcel. "but," continued schaunard, "whilst living with the strictest economy, it is difficult when one has nothing to put anything on one side, above all if one's appetite is always larger than one's plate." "what are you driving at?" asked rodolphe. "this," resumed schaunard, "that in our present situation we should all be wrong to play the haughty when a chance offers itself, even outside our art, of putting a figure in front of the cypher that constitutes our capital." "well!" said marcel, "which of us can you reproach with playing the haughty. great painter as i shall be some day, have i not consented to devote my brush to the pictorial reproduction of french soldiers, who pay me out of their scanty pocket money? it seems to me that i am not afraid to descend the ladder of my future greatness." "and i," said rodolphe, "do not you know that for the past fortnight i have been writing a medico-chirurgical epic for a celebrated dentist, who has hired my inspiration at fifteen sous the dozen lines, about half the price of oysters? however, i do not blush; rather than let my muse remain idle, i would willingly put a railway guide into verse. when one has a lyre it is meant to be made use of. and then mimi has a burning thirst for boots." "then," said schaunard, "you will not be offended with me when you know the source of that pactolus, the overflowing of which i am awaiting." the following is the history of schaunard's two hundred francs:-about a fortnight before he had gone into the shop of a music publisher who had promised to procure him amongst his customers' pupils for pianoforte lessons or pianofortes to tune. "by jove!" said the publisher, on seeing him enter the shop, "you are just in time. a gentleman has been here who wants a pianist; he is an englishman, and will probably pay well. are you really a good one?" schaunard reflected that a modest air might injure him in the publisher's estimation. indeed, a modest musician, and especially a modest pianist, is a rare creation. accordingly, he replied boldly: "i am a first rate one; if i only had a lung gone, long hair and a black coat, i should be famous as the sun in the heavens; and instead of asking me eight hundred francs to engrave my composition 'the death of the damsel,' you would come on your knees to offer me three thousand for it on a silver plate." the person whose address schaunard took was an englishman, named birne. the musician was first received by a servant in blue, who handed him over to a servant in green, who passed him on to a servant in black, who introduced him into a drawing room, where he found himself face to face with a briton coiled up in an attitude which made him resemble hamlet mediating on human nothingness. schaunard was about to explain the reason of his presence, when a sudden volley of shrill cries cut short his speech. these horrid and ear piercing sounds proceeded from a parrot hung out on the balcony of the story below. "oh! that beast, that beast!" exclaimed the englishman, with a bound on his arm chair, "it will kill me." thereupon the bird began to repeat its vocabulary, much more extensive than that of ordinary pollies; and schaunard stood stupefied when he heard the animal, prompted by a female voice, reciting the speech of theramenes with all the professional intonations. this parrot was the favorite of an actress who was then a great favorite herself, and very much the rage--in her own boudoir. she was one of those women who, no one knows why, was quoted at fancy prices on the 'change of dissipation, and whose names are inscribed on the bills of fare of young noblemen's suppers, where they form the living dessert. it gives a christian standing now-a-days to be seen with one of these pagans, who often have nothing of antiquity about them except their age. when they are handsome, there is no such great harm after all; the worst one risks is to sleep on straw in return for making them sleep on rosewood. but when their beauty is bought by the ounce at the perfumer's, and will not stand three drops of water on a rag; then their wit consists in a couplet of a farce, and their talent lies in the hand of the _claqueur_, it is hard indeed to understand how respectable men with good names, ordinary sense, and decent coats, can let themselves be carried away by a common place passion for these most mercenary creatures. the actress in question was one of these belles of the day. she called herself delores, and professed to be a spaniard, although she was born in that parisian andalusia known as the rue coquenard. from there to the rue de provence is about ten minute's walk, but it had cost her seven years to make the transit. her prosperity had begun with the decline of her personal charms. she had a horse the day when her first false tooth was inserted, and a pair the day of her second. now she was living at a great rate, lodging in a palace, driving four horses on holidays, and giving balls to which all paris came--the "all paris" of these ladies--that is to say, that collection of lazy seekers after jokes and scandal; the "all paris" that plays lansquenet; the sluggards of head and hand, who kill their own time and other people's; the writers who turn literary men to get some use out of the feather which nature placed on their backs; the bullies of the revel, the clipped and sweated gentlemen, the chevaliers of doubtful orders, all the vagabonds of kid-glove-dom, that come from god knows where, and go back tither again some day; all the marked and remarked notorieties; all those daughters of eve who retail what they once sold wholesale; all that race of beings, corrupt from their cradle to their coffin, whom one sees on first nights at the theater, with golconda on foreheads and thibet on their shoulders, and for whom, notwithstanding, bloom the first violets of spring and the first passions of youth--all this world which the chronicles of gossip call "all paris," was received by delores who owned the parrot aforesaid. this bird, celebrated for its oratorical talents among all the neighbors, had gradually become the terror of the nearest. hung out on the balcony, it made a pulpit of its perch and spouted interminable harangues from morning to night. it had learned certain parliamentary topics from some political friends of the mistress, and was very strong on the sugar question. it knew all the actress's repertory by heart, and declaimed it well enough to have been her substitute, in case of indisposition. moreover, as she was rather polyglot in her flirtations, and received visitors from all parts of the world, the parrot spoke all languages, and would sometimes let out a _lingua franca_ of oaths enough to shock the sailors to whom "vert-vert" owed his profitable education. the company of this bird, which might be instructive and amusing for ten minutes, became a positive torture when prolonged. the neighbors had often complained; the actress insolently disregarded their complaints. two or three other tenants of the house, respectable fathers of families, indignant at the scandalous state of morals into which they were initiated by the indiscretions of the parrot, had given warning to the landlord. but the actress had got on his weak side; whoever might go, she stayed. the englishman whose sitting room schaunard now entered, had suffered with patience for three months. one day he concealed his fury, which was ready to explode, under a full dress suit and sent in his card to mademoiselle dolores. when she beheld him enter, arrayed almost as he would have been to present himself before queen victoria, she at first thought it must be hoffmann, in his part of lord spleen; and wishing to be civil to a fellow artist, she offered him some breakfast. the englishman understood french. he had learned it in twenty five lessons from a spanish refugee. accordingly he replied: "i accept your invitation on condition of our eating this disagreeable bird," and he pointed to the cage of the parrot, who, having smelled an englishman, saluted him by whistling "god save the king." dolores thought her neighbor was quizzing her, and was beginning to get angry, when mr. birne added: "as i am very rich, i will buy the animal. put your price on it." dolores answered that she valued the bird, and liked it, and would not wish to see it pass into the hands of another. "oh, it's not in my hands i want to put it," replied the englishman, "but under my feet--so--," and he pointed to the heels of his boots. dolores shuddered with indignation and would probably have broken out, when she perceived on the englishman's finger a ring, the diamond of which represented an income of twenty five hundred francs. the discovery was like a shower bath to her rage. she reflected that it might be imprudent to quarrel with a man who carried fifty thousand francs on his little finger. "well, sir," she said, "as poor coco annoys you, i will put him in a back room, where you cannot hear him." the englishman made a gesture of satisfaction. "however," added he, pointing once more to his boots, "i should have preferred--." "don't be afraid. where i mean to put him it will be impossible for him to trouble milord." "oh! i am not a lord; only an esquire." with that, mr. birne was retiring, after a very low bow, when delores, who never neglected her interests, took up a small pocket from a work table and said: "tonight sir, is my benefit at the theater. i am to play in three pieces. will you allow me to offer you some box tickets? the price has been but very slightly raised." and she put a dozen boxes into the briton's hand. "after showing myself so prompt to oblige him," thought she, "he cannot refuse, if he is a gentleman, and if he sees me play in my pink costume, who knows? he is very ugly, to be sure, and very sad looking, but he might furnish me the means of going to england without being sea sick." the englishman having taken the tickets, had their purport explained to him a second time. he then asked the price. "the boxes are sixty francs each, and there are ten there, but no hurry," said added, seeing the englishman take out his pocketbook. "i hope that as we are neighbors, this is not the last time i shall have the honor of a visit from you." "i do not like to run up bills," replied mr. birne and drawing from the pocketbook a thousand franc note, he laid it on the table and slid the tickets into his pockets. "i will give you change," said dolores, opening a little drawer. "never mind," said the englishman, "the rest will do for a drink," and he went off leaving dolores thunder struck at his last words. "for a drink!" she exclaimed. "what a clown! i will send him back his money." but her neighbor's rudeness had only irritated the epidermis of her vanity; reflection calmed her. she thought that a thousand francs made a very nice "pile," after all, and that she had already put up with impertinences at a cheaper rate. "bah!" she said to herself. "it won't do to be so proud. no one was by, and this is my washerwoman's mouth. and this englishman speaks so badly, perhaps he only means to pay me a compliment." so she pocketed her bank note joyfully. but that night after the theater she returned home furious. mr. birne had made no use of the tickets, and the ten boxes had remained vacant. thus on appearing on the stage, the unfortunate _beneficiaire_ read on the countenances of her lady friends, the delight they felt at seeing the house so badly filled. she even heard an actress of her acquaintance say to another, as she pointed to the empty boxes, "poor dolores, she has only planted one stage box." "true, the boxes are scarcely occupied," was the rejoinder. "the stalls, too, are empty." "well, when they see her name on the bill, it acts on the house like an air pump." "hence, what an idea to put up the price of the seats!" "a fine benefit. i will bet that the takings would not fill a money box or the foot of a stocking." "ah! there she is in her famous red velvet costume." "she looks like a lobster." "how much did you make out of your last benefit?" said another actress to her companion. "the house was full, my dear, and it was a first night; chairs in the gangway were worth a louis. but i only got six francs; my milliner had all the rest. if i was not afraid of chilblains, i would go to saint petersburg." "what, you are not yet thirty, and are already thinking of doing your russia?" "what would you have?" said the other, and she added, "and you, is your benefit soon coming on?" "in a fortnight, i have already three thousand francs worth of tickets taken, without counting my young fellows from saint cyr." "hallo, the stalls are going out." "it is because dolores is singing." in fact, dolores, as red in the face as her costume, was warbling her verses with a vinegary voice. just as she was getting though it with difficulty, two bouquets fell at her feet, thrown by two actresses, her dear friends, who advanced to the front of their box, exclaiming--: "bravo, dolores!" the fury of the latter may be readily imagined. thus, on returning home, although it was the middle of the night, she opened the window and woke up coco, who woke up the honest mr. birne, who had dropped off to sleep on the faith of her promise. from that day war was declared between the actress and the englishman; a war to the knife, without truce or repose, the parties engaged in which recoiled before no expense or trouble. the parrot took finishing lessons in english and abused his neighbor all day in it, and in his shrillest falsetto. it was something awful. dolores suffered from it herself, but she hoped that one day or other mr. birne would give warning. it was on that she had set her heart. the englishman, on his part, began by establishing a school of drummers in his drawing room, but the police interfered. he then set up a pistol gallery; his servants riddled fifty cards a day. again the commissary of police interposed, showing him an article in the municipal code, which forbids the usage of firearms indoors. mr. birne stopped firing, but a week after, dolores found it was raining in her room. the landlord went to visit mr. birne, and found him taking saltwater baths in his drawing room. this room, which was very large, had been lined all round with sheets of metal, and had had all the doors fastened up. into this extempore pond some hundred pails of water were poured, and a few tons of salt were added to them. it was a small edition of the sea. nothing was lacking, not even fishes. mr. birne bathed there everyday, descending into it by an opening made in the upper panel of the center door. before long an ancient and fish-like smell pervaded the neighborhood, and dolores had half an inch of water in her bedroom. the landlord grew furious and threatened mr. birne with an action for damages done to his property. "have i not a right," asked the englishman, "to bathe in my rooms?" "not in that way, sir." "very well, if i have no right to, i won't," said the briton, full of respect for the laws of the country in which he lived. "it's a pity; i enjoyed it very much." that very night he had his ocean drained off. it was full time: there was already an oyster bed forming on the floor. however, mr. birne had not given up the contest. he was only seeking some legal means of continuing his singular warfare, which was "nuts" to all the paris loungers, for the adventure had been blazed about in the lobbies of the theaters and other public places. dolores felt equally bound to come triumphant out of the contest. not a few bets were made upon it. it was then that mr. birne thought of the piano as an instrument of warfare. it was not so bad an idea, the most disagreeable of instruments being well capable of contending against the most disagreeable of birds. as soon as this lucky thought occurred to him, he hastened to put it into execution, hired a piano, and inquired for a pianist. the pianist, it will be remembered, was our friend schaunard. the englishman recounted to him his sufferings from the parrot, and what he had already done to come to terms with the actress. "but milord," said schaunard, "there is a sure way to rid yourself of this creature--parsley. the chemists are unanimous in declaring that this culinary plant is prussic acid to such birds. chop up a little parsley, and shake it out of the window on coco's cage, and the creature will die as certainly as if pope alexander vi had invited it to dinner." "i thought of that myself," said the englishman, "but the beast is taken good care of. the piano is surer." schaunard looked at the other without catching his meaning at once. "see here," resumed the englishman, "the actress and her animal always sleep till twelve. follow my reasoning--" "go on. i am at the heels of it." "i intend to disturb their sleep. the law of the country authorizes me to make music from morning to night. do you understand?" "but that will not be so disagreeable to her, if she hears me play the piano all day--for nothing, too. i am a first-rate hand, if i only had a lung gone--." "exactly, but i don't want you to make good music. you must only strike on your instrument thus," trying a scale, "and always the same thing without pity, only one scale. i understand medicine a little; that drives people mad. they will both go mad; that is what i look for. come, mr. musician, to work at once. you shall be well paid." "and so," said schaunard, who had recounted the above details to his friends, "this is what i have been doing for the last fortnight. one scale continually from seven in the morning till dark. it is not exactly serious art. but then the englishman pays me two hundred francs a month for my noise; it would be cutting one's throat to refuse such a windfall. i accepted, and in two or three days i take my first month's money." it was after those mutual confidences that the three friends agreed amongst themselves to profit by the general accession of wealth to give their mistresses the spring outfit that the coquetry of each of them had been wishing for so long. it was further agreed that whoever pocketed his money first should wait for the others, so that the purchases should be made at the same time, and that mademoiselle mimi, musette, and phemie should enjoy the pleasure of casting their old skins, as schaunard put it, together. well, two or three days after this council rodolphe came in first; his dental poem had been paid for; it weighed in eighty francs. the next day marcel drew from medicis the price of eighteen corporal's likenesses, at six francs each. marcel and rodolphe had all the difficulty in the world to hide their good fortune. "it seems to me that i sweat gold," said the poet. "it is the same with me," said marcel. "if schaunard delays much longer, it would be impossible for me to continue to play the part of the anonymous croesus." but the very next morning saw schaunard arrive, splendidly attired in a bright yellow nankeen jacket. "good heavens!" exclaimed phemie, dazzled on seeing her lover so elegantly got up, "where did you find that jacket?" "i found it amongst my papers," replied the musician, making a sign to his two friends to follow him. "i have drawn the coin," said he, when they were alone. "behold it," and he displayed a handful of gold. "well," exclaimed marcel, "forward, let us sack the shops. how happy musette will be." "how pleased mimi will be," added rodolphe. "come, are you coming schaunard?" "allow me to reflect," replied the musician. "in decking out these ladies with the thousand caprices of fashion, we shall perhaps be guilty of a mistake. think on it. are you not afraid that when they resemble the engravings in 'the scarf of iris,' these splendors will exercise a deplorable influence upon their characters, and does it suit young fellows like us to behave towards women as if we were aged and wrinkled dotards? it is not that i hesitate about sacrificing fifteen or eighteen francs to dress phemie; but i tremble. when she has a new bonnet she will not even recognize me, perhaps. she looks so well with only a flower in her hair. what do you think about it, philosopher?" broke off schaunard, addressing colline, who had come in within the last few minutes. "ingratitude is the offspring of kindness," observed the philosopher. "on the other hand," continued schaunard, "when your mistresses are well dressed, what sort of figure will you cut beside them in your dilapidated costumes? you will look like their waiting maids. i do not speak for myself," he broke off, drawing himself up in his nankeen jacket, "for thank heaven, i could go anywhere now." however, despite the spirit of opposition shown by schaunard, it was once more agreed that the next day all the shops of the neighborhood should be ransacked to the advantage of the ladies. and, indeed, the next day, at the very moment that we have seen, at the beginning of this chapter, mademoiselle mimi wakes up very much astonished at rodolphe's absence, the poet and his two friends were ascending the stairs, accompanied by a shopman from the deux magots and a milliner with specimens. schaunard, who had bought the famous hunting horn, marched before them playing the overture to "the caravan." musette and phemie, summoned by mimi, who was living on the lower floor, descended the stairs with the swiftness of avalanches on hearing the news that the bonnets and dresses had been brought for them. seeing this poor wealth spread out before them, the three women went almost mad with joy. mimi was seized with a fit of hysterical laughter, and skipped about like a kid, waving a barege scarf. musette threw her arms around marcel's neck, with a little green boot in each hand, which she smote together like cymbals. phemie looked at schaunard and sobbed. she could only say, "oh alexander, alexander!" "there is no danger of her refusing the presents of artaxerxes," murmured colline the philosopher. after the first outbursts of joy were over, when the choices had been made and the bills settled, rodolphe announced to the three girls that they would have to make arrangements to try on their new things the next morning. "we will go into the country," said he. "a fine thing to make a fuss of," exclaimed musette. "it is not the first time that i have bought, cut out, sewn together, and worn a dress the same day. besides, we have the night before us, too. we shall be ready, shall we not, ladies?" "oh yes! we shall be ready," exclaimed mimi and phemie together. they at once set to work, and for sixteen hours did not lay aside scissors or needle. the next day was the first of may. the easter bells had rung in the resurrection of spring a few days before, and she had come eager and joyful. she came, as the german ballad says, light-hearted as the young lover who is going to plant a maypole before the window of his betrothed. she painted the sky blue, the trees green, and all things in bright colors. she aroused the torpid sun, who was sleeping in his bed of mists, his head resting on the snow leaden clouds that served him as a pillow, and cried to him, "hi! hi! my friend, time is up, and i am here; quick to work. put on your fine dress of fresh rays without further delay, and show yourself at once on your balcony to announce my arrival." upon which the sun had indeed set out, and was marching along as proud and haughty as some great lord of the court. the swallows, returned from their eastern pilgrimage, filled the air with their flight, the may whitened the bushes, the violets scented the woods, in which the birds were leaving their nests each with a roll of music under its wings. it was spring indeed, the true spring of poets and lovers, and not the spring of the almanac maker--an ugly spring with a red nose and frozen fingers, which still keeps poor folk shivering at the chimney corner when the last ashes of the last log have long since burnt out. the balmy breeze swept through the transparent atmosphere and scattered throughout the city the first scent of the surrounding country. the rays of the sun, bright and warm, tapped at the windows. to the invalid they cried, "open, we are health," and at the garret of the young girl bending towards her mirror, innocent first love of the most innocent, they said, "open darling, that we may light up your beauty. we are the messengers of fine weather. you can now put on your cotton frock and your straw hat, and lace your smart boots; the groves in which folk foot it are decked with bright new flowers, and the violins are tuning for the sunday dance. good morning, my dear!" when the angelus rang out from the neighboring church, the three hard working coquettes, who had had scarcely time to sleep a few hours, were already before their looking glasses, giving their final glance at their new attire. they were all three charming, dressed alike, and wearing on their faces the same glow of satisfaction imparted by the realization of a long cherished wish. musette was, above all, dazzlingly beautiful. "i have never felt so happy," said she to marcel. "it seems to me that god has put into this hour all the happiness of my life, and i am afraid that there will be no more left me. ah bah! when there is no more left, there will still be some more. we have the receipt for making it," she added, gaily kissing him. as to phemie, one thing vexed her. "i am very fond of green grass and the little birds," said she, "but in the country one never meets anyone, and there will be no one to see my pretty bonnet and my nice dress. suppose we went into the country on the boulevards?" at eight in the morning the whole street was in commotion, due to the blasts from schaunard's horn giving the signal to start. all the neighbors were at their windows to see the bohemians go by. colline, who was of the party, brought up the rear, carrying the ladies' parasols. an hour later the whole of the joyous band were scattered about the fields at fontenay-aux-roses. when they returned home, very late at night, colline, who during the day had discharged the duties of treasurer, stated that they had omitted to spend six francs, and placed this balance on the table. "what shall we do with it?" asked marcel. "suppose we invest it in government stock," said schaunard. chapter xviii francine's muff among the true bohemians of the real bohemia i used to know one, named jacques d. he was a sculptor, and gave promise of great talent. but poverty did not give him time to fulfill this promise. he died of debility in march, 184-, at the saint louis hospital, on bed no. 14 in the sainte victoria ward. i made the acquaintance of jacques at the hospital, when i was detained there myself by a long illness. jacques had, as i have said, the makings of a great talent, and yet he was quite unassuming about it. during the two months i spent in his company, and during which he felt himself cradled in the arms of death, i never once heard him complain or give himself up to those lamentations which render the unappreciated artist so ridiculous. he died without attitudinizing. his death brings to my mind, too, one of the most horrible scenes i ever saw in that caravanserai of human sufferings. his father, informed of the event, came to reclaim the body, and for a long time haggled over giving the thirty-six francs demanded by the hospital authorities. he also haggled over the funeral service, and so persistently that they ended by knocking off six francs. at the moment of putting the corpse into the coffin, the male nurse took off the hospital sheet, and asked one of the deceased's friends who was there for money for a shroud. the poor devil, who had not a sou, went to jacques' father, who got into a fearful rage, and asked when they would finish bothering him. the sister of charity, who was present at this horrible discussion, cast a glance at the corpse, and uttered these simple and feeling words: "oh! sir, you cannot have him buried like that, poor fellow, it is so cold. give him at least a shirt, that he may not arrive quite naked before his god." the father gave five francs to the friend to get a shirt, but recommended him to go to a wardrobe shop in the rue grace-aux-belles, where they sold second-hand linen. "it will be cheaper there," said he. this cruelty on the part of jacques' father was explained to me later on. he was furious because his son had chosen an artistic career, and his anger remained unappeased even in the presence of a coffin. but i am not very far from mademoiselle francine and her muff. i will return to them. mademoiselle francine was the first and only mistress of jacques, who did not die very old, for he was scarcely three and twenty when his father would have had him laid naked in the earth. the story of his love was told me by jacques himself when he was no. 14 and i was no. 16 in the sainte victoire ward--an ugly spot to die in. ah reader! before i begin this story, which would be a touching one if i could tell it as it was told to me by my friend jacques, let me take a pull or two at the old clay pipe he gave me on the day that the doctor forbade its use by him. yet at night, when the male nurse was asleep, my friend jacques would borrow his pipe with a little tobacco from me. it is so wearisome at night in those vast wards, when one suffers and cannot sleep. "only two or three whiffs," he would say, and i would let him have it; and sister sainte-genevieve did not seem to notice the smoke when she made her round. ah, good sister! how kind you were, and how beautiful you looked, too, when you came to sprinkle us with holy water. we could see you approaching, walking slowly along the gloomy aisles, draped in your white veil, which fell in such graceful folds, and which our friend jacques admired so much. ah kind sister! you were the beatrice of that inferno. so sweet were your consolations that we were always complaining in order to be consoled by you. if my friend jacques had not died one snowy day he would have carved you a nice little virgin mary to put in your cell, good sister sainte-genevieve. well, and the muff? i do not see anything of the muff. _another reader_: and mademoiselle francine, where about is she, then? _first reader_: this story is not very lively. _second reader_: we shall see further on. i really beg your pardon, gentlemen, it is my friend jacques' pipe that has led me away into these digressions. but, besides, i am not pledged to make you laugh. times are not always gay in bohemia. jacques and francine had met in a house in the rue de la tour-d'auvergne, into which they had both moved at the same time at the april quarter. the artist and the young girl were a week without entering on those neighborly relations which are almost always forced on one when dwelling on the same floor. however, without having exchanged a word, they were already acquainted with one another. francine knew that her neighbor was a poor devil of an artist, and jacques had learned that his was a little seamstress who had quitted her family to escape the ill-usage of a stepmother. she accomplished miracles of economy to make both ends meet, and, as she had never known pleasure, had no longing for it. this is how the pair came under the common law of partition walls. one evening in april, jacques came home worn out with fatigue, fasting since morning, and profoundly sad with one of those vague sadnesses which have no precise cause, and which seize on you anywhere and at all times; a kind of apoplexy of the heart to which poor wretches living alone are especially subject. jacques, who felt stifling in his narrow room, opened the window to breathe a little. the evening was a fine one, and the setting sun displayed its melancholy splendors above the hills of montmartre. jacques remained pensively at his window listening to the winged chorus of spring harmony which added to his sadness. seeing a raven fly by uttering a croak, he thought of the days when ravens brought food to elijah, the pious recluse, and reflected that these birds were no longer so charitable. then, not being able to stand it any longer, he closed his window, drew the curtain, and, as he had not the wherewithal to buy oil for his lamp, lit a resin taper that he had brought back from a trip to the grande-chartreuse. sadder than ever he filled his pipe. "luckily, i still have enough tobacco to hide the pistol," murmured he, and he began to smoke. my friend jacques must have been very sad that evening to think about hiding the pistol. it was his supreme resource on great crises, and was usually pretty successful. the plan was as follows. jacques smoked tobacco on which he used to sprinkle a few drops of laudanum, and he would smoke until the cloud of smoke from his pipe became thick enough to veil from him all the objects in his little room, and, above all, a pistol hanging on the wall. it was a matter of half a score pipes. by the time the pistol was wholly invisible it almost always happened that the smoke and the laudanum combined would send jacques off to sleep, and it also often happened that his sadness left him at the commencement of his dreams. but on this particular evening he had used up all his tobacco; the pistol was completely hidden, and yet jacques was still bitterly sad. that evening, on the contrary mademoiselle francine was extremely light-hearted when she came home, and like jacques' sadness, her light-heartedness was without cause. it was one of those joys that come from heaven, and that god scatters amongst good hearts. so mademoiselle francine was in a good temper, and sang to herself as she came upstairs. but as she was going to open her door a puff of wind, coming through the open staircase window, suddenly blew out her candle. "oh, what a nuisance!" exclaimed the girl, "six flights of stairs to go down and up again." but, noticing the light coming from under jacques' door, the instinct of idleness grafted on a feeling of curiosity, advised her to go and ask the artist for a light. "it is a service daily rendered among neighbors," thought she, "and there is nothing compromising about it." she tapped twice, therefore, at the door, and jacques opened it, somewhat surprised at this late visit. but scarcely had she taken a step into the room than the smoke that filled it suddenly choked her, and, before she was able to speak a word, she sank fainting into a chair, dropping her candle and her room door key onto the ground. it was midnight, and everyone in the house was asleep. jacques thought it better not to call for help. he was afraid, in the first place, of compromising his neighbor. he contented himself, therefore, with opening the window to let in a little fresh air, and, after having sprinkled a few drops of water on the girl's face, saw her open her eyes and by degrees come to herself. when, at the end of five minutes' time, she had wholly recovered consciousness, francine explained the motive that had brought her into the artist's room, and made many excuses for what had happened. "now, then, i am recovered," said she. "i can go into my own room." he had already opened the door, when she perceived that she was not only forgetting to light her candle, but that she had not the key of her room. "silly thing that i am," said she, putting her candle to the flame of the resin taper, "i came in here to get a light, and i was going away without one." but at the same moment the draft caused by the door and window, both of which had remained open, suddenly blew out the taper, and the two young folk were left in darkness. "one would think that it was done on purpose," said francine. "forgive me sir, for all the trouble i am giving you, and be good enough to strike a light so that i may find my key." "certainly mademoiselle," answered jacques, feeling for the matches. he had soon found them. but a singular idea flashed across his mind, and he put the matches in his pocket saying, "dear me, mademoiselle, here is another trouble. i have not a single match here. i used the last when i came in." "oh!" said francine, "after all i can very well find my way without a light, my room is not big enough for me to lose myself in it. but i must have my key. will you be good enough, sir, to help me to look for it? it must have fallen to the ground." "let us look for it, mademoiselle," said jacques. and both of them began to seek the lost article in the dark, but as though guided by a common instinct, it happened during this search, that their hands, groping in the same spot, met ten times a minute. and, as they were both equally awkward, they did not find the key. "the moon, which is hidden just now by the clouds, shines right into the room," said jacques. "let us wait a bit; by-and-by it will light up the room and may help us." and, pending the appearance of the moon, they began to talk. a conversation in the dark, in a little room, on a spring night; a conversation which, at the outset trifling and unimportant, gradually enters on the chapter of personal confidences. you know what that leads to. language by degrees grows confused, full of reticences; voices are lowered; words alternate with sighs. hands meeting complete the thought which from the heart ascends to the lips, and--. seek the conclusion in your recollection, young couples. do you remember, young man. do you remember, young lady, you who now walk hand-in-hand, and who, up to two days back, had never seen one another? at length the moon broke through the clouds, and her bright light flooded the room. mademoiselle francine awoke from her reverie uttering a faint cry. "what is the matter?" asked jacques, putting his arm around her waist. "nothing," murmured francine. "i thought i heard someone knock." and, without jacques noticing it, she pushed the key that she had just noticed under some of the furniture. she did not want to find it now. * * * * * _first reader_: i certainly will not let my daughter read this story. _second reader_: up till now i have not caught a glimpse of a single hair of mademoiselle francine's muff; and, as to the young woman herself, i do not know any better what she is like, whether she is fair or dark. patience, readers, patience. i have promised you a muff, and i will give you one later on, as my friend jacques did to his poor love francine, who had become his mistress, as i have explained in the line left blank above. she was fair was francine, fair and lovely, which is not usual. she had remained ignorant of love until she was twenty, but a vague presentiment of her approaching end counselled her not to delay if she would become acquainted with it. she met jacques and loved him. their connection lasted six months. they had taken one another in the spring; they were parted in the autumn. francine was consumptive. she knew it and her lover jacques knew it too; a fortnight after he had taken up with her he had learned it from one of his friends, who was a doctor. "she will go with the autumn leaves," said the latter. francine heard this confidence, and perceived the grief it caused her lover. "what matters the autumn leaves?" said she, putting the whole of her love into a smile. "what matters the autumn; it is summer, and the leaves are green; let us profit by that, love. when you see me ready to depart from this life, you shall take me in your arms and kiss me, and forbid me to go. i am obedient you know, and i will stay." and for five months this charming creature passed through the miseries of bohemian life, a smile and a song on her lips. as to jacques, he let himself be deluded. his friend often said to him, "francine is worse, she must be attended to." then jacques went all over paris to obtain the wherewithal for the doctor's prescription, but francine would not hear of it, and threw the medicine out of the window. at night, when she was seized with a fit of coughing, she would leave the room and go out on the landing, so that jacques might not hear her. one day, when they had both gone into the country, jacques saw a tree the foliage of which was turning to yellow. he gazed sadly at francine, who was walking slowly and somewhat dreamily. francine saw jacques turn pale and guessed the reason of his pallor. "you are foolish," said she, kissing him, "we are only in july, it is three months to october, loving one another day and night as we do, we shall double the time we have to spend together. and then, besides, if i feel worse when the leaves turn yellow, we will go and live in a pine forest, the leaves are always green there." * * * * * in october francine was obliged to keep her bed. jacques' friend attended her. the little room in which they lived was situated at the top of the house and looked into a court, in which there was a tree, which day by day grew barer of foliage. jacques had put a curtain to the window to hide this tree from the invalid, but francine insisted on its being drawn back. "oh my darling!" said she to jacques. "i will give you a hundred times more kisses than there are leaves." and she added, "besides i am much better now. i shall soon be able to go out, but as it will be cold and i do not want to have red hands, you must buy me a muff." during the whole of her illness this muff was her only dream. the day before all saints', seeing jacques more grief stricken than ever, she wished to give him courage, and to prove to him that she was better she got up. the doctor arrived at that moment and forced her to go to bed again. "jacques," whispered he in the artist's ear, "you must summon up your courage. all is over; francine is dying." jacques burst into tears. "you may give her whatever she asks for now," continued the doctor, "there is no hope." francine heard with her eyes what the doctor had said to her lover. "do not listen to him," she exclaimed, holding out her arm to jacques, "do not listen to him; he is not speaking the truth. we will go out tomorrow--it is all saints' day. it will be cold--go buy me a muff, i beg of you. i am afraid of chilblains this winter." jacques was going out with his friend, but francine detained the doctor. "go and get my muff," said she to jacques. "get a nice one, so that it may last a good while." when she was alone she said to the doctor. "oh sir! i am going to die, and i know it. but before i pass away give me something to give me strength for a night, i beg of you. make me well for one more night, and let me die afterwards, since god does not wish me to live longer." as the doctor was doing his best to console her, the wind carried into the room and cast upon the sick girl's bed a yellow leaf, torn from the tree in the little courtyard. francine opened the curtain, and saw the tree entirely bare. "it is the last," said she, putting the leaf under her pillow. "you will not die until tomorrow," said the doctor. "you have a night before you." "ah, what happiness!" exclaimed the poor girl. "a winter's night--it will be a long one." jacques came back. he brought a muff with him. "it is very pretty," said francine. "i will wear it when i go out." so passed the night with jacques. the next day--all saints'--about the middle of the day, the death agony seized on her, and her whole body began to quiver. "my hands are cold," she murmured. "give me my muff." and she buried her poor hands in the fur. "it is the end," said the doctor to jacques. "kiss her for the last time." jacques pressed his lips to those of his love. at the last moment they wanted to take away her muff, but she clutched it with her hands. "no, no," she said, "leave it me; it is winter, it is cold. oh my poor jacques! my poor jacques! what will become of you? oh heavens!" and the next day jacques was alone. _first reader_: i told you that this was not a very lively story. what would you have, reader? we cannot always laugh. it was the morning of all saints. francine was dead. two men were watching at the bedside. one of them standing up was the doctor. the other, kneeling beside the bed, was pressing his lips to the dead girl's hands, and seemed to rivet them there in a despairing kiss. it was jacques, her lover. for more than six hours he had been plunged in a state of heart broken insensibility. an organ playing under the windows had just roused him from it. this organ was playing a tune that francine was in the habit of singing of a morning. one of those mad hopes that are only born out of deep despair flashed across jacques' mind. he went back a month in the past--to the period when francine was only sick unto death; he forgot the present, and imagined for a moment that the dead girl was but sleeping, and that she would wake up directly, her mouth full of her morning song. but the sounds of the organ had not yet died away before jacques had already come back to the reality. francine's mouth was eternally closed to all songs, and the smile that her last thought had brought to her lips was fading away from them beneath death's fingers. "take courage, jacques," said the doctor, who was the sculptor's friend. jacques rose, and said, looking fixedly at him, "it is over, is it not--there is no longer any hope?" without replying to this wild inquiry, jacques' friend went and drew the curtains of the bed, and then, returning to the sculptor, held out his hand. "francine is dead," said he. "we were bound to expect it, though heaven knows that we have done what we could to save her. she was a good girl, jacques, who loved you very dearly--dearer and better than you loved her yourself, for hers was love alone, while yours held an alloy. francine is dead, but all is not over yet. we must now think about the steps necessary for her burial. we must set about that together, and we will ask one of the neighbors to keep watch here while we are away." jacques allowed himself to be led away by his friend. they passed the day between the registrar of deaths, the undertaker, and the cemetery. as jacques had no money, the doctor pawned his watch, a ring, and some clothes, to cover the cost of the funeral, that was fixed for the next day. they both got in late at night. the neighbor who had been watching tried to make jacques eat a little. "yes," said he. "i will. i am very cold and i shall need a little strength for my work tonight." the neighbor and the doctor did not understand him. jacques sat down at the table and ate a few mouthfuls so hurriedly that he was almost choked. then he asked for drink. but on lifting his glass to his lips he let it fall. the glass, which broke on the floor, had awakened in the artist's mind a recollection which itself revived his momentary dulled pain. the day on which francine had called on him for the first time she had felt ill, and he had given her to drink out of this glass. later, when they were living together, they had regarded it as a love token. during his rare moments of wealth the artist would buy for his love one or two bottles of the strengthening wine prescribed for her, and it was from this glass that francine used to sip the liquid whence her love drew a charming gaiety. jacques remained for more than half an hour staring without uttering a word at the scattered fragments of this frail and cherished token. it seemed to him that his heart was also broken, and that he could feel the fragments tearing his breast. when he had recovered himself, he picked up the pieces of glass and placed them in a drawer. then he asked the neighbor to fetch him two candles, and to send up a bucket of water by the porter. "do not go away," said he to the doctor, who had no intention of doing so. "i shall want you presently." the water and the candles were brought and the two friends left alone. "what do you want to do?" asked the doctor, watching jacques, who after filling a wooden bowl with water was sprinkling powdered plaster of paris into it. "what do i mean to do?" asked the artist, "cannot you guess? i am going to model francine's head, and as my courage would fail me if i were left alone, you must stay with me." jacques then went and drew the curtains of the bed and turned down the sheet that had been pulled up over the dead girl's face. his hand began to tremble and a stifled sob broke from his lips. "bring the candles," he cried to his friend, "and come and hold the bowl for me." one of the candles was placed at the head of the bed so as to shed its light on francine's face, the other candle was placed at the foot. with a brush dipped in olive oil the artist coated the eye-brows, the eye-lashes and the hair, which he arranged as francine usually wore it. "by doing this she will not suffer when we remove the mold," murmured jacques to himself. these precautions taken and after arranging the dead girl's head in a favorable position, jacques began to lay on the plaster in successive coats until the mold had attained the necessary thickness. in a quarter of an hour the operation was over and had been thoroughly successful. by some strange peculiarity a change had taken place in francine's face. the blood, which had not had time to become wholly congealed, warmed no doubt by the warmth of the plaster, had flowed to the upper part of the corpse and a rosy tinge gradually showed itself on the dead whiteness of the cheeks and forehead. the eyelids, which had lifted when the mold was removed, revealed the tranquil blue eyes in which a vague intelligence seemed to lurk; from out the lips, parted by the beginning of a smile, there seemed to issue that last word, forgotten during the last farewell, that is only heard by the heart. who can affirm that intelligence absolutely ends where insensibility begins? who can say that the passions fade away and die exactly at the last beat of the heart which they have agitated? cannot the soul sometimes remain a voluntary captive within the corpse already dressed for the coffin, and note for a moment from the recesses of its fleshly prison house, regrets and tears? those who depart have so many reasons to mistrust those who remain behind. at the moment when jacques sought to preserve her features by the aid of art who knows but that a thought of after life had perhaps returned to awaken francine in her first slumber of the sleep that knows no end. perhaps she had remembered the he whom she had just left was an artist at the same time as a lover, that he was both because he could not be one without the other, that for him love was the soul of heart and that if he had loved her so, it was because she had been for him a mistress and a woman, a sentiment in form. and then, perhaps, francine, wishing to leave jacques the human form that had become for him an incarnate ideal, had been able though dead and cold already to once more clothe her face with all the radiance of love and with all the graces of youth, to resuscitate the art treasure. and perhaps too, the poor girl had thought rightly, for there exist among true artists singular pygmalions who, contrary to the original one, would like to turn their living galateas to marble. in presence of the serenity of this face on which the death pangs had no longer left any trace, no one would have believed in the prolonged sufferings that had served as a preface to death. francine seemed to be continuing a dream of love, and seeing her thus one would have said that she had died of beauty. the doctor, worn out with fatigue, was asleep in a corner. as to jacques, he was again plunged in doubt. his mind beset with hallucinations, persisted in believing that she whom he had loved so well was on the point of awakening, and as faint nervous contractions, due to the recent action of the plaster, broke at intervals the immobility of the corpse, this semblance of life served to maintain jacques in his blissful illusion, which lasted until morning, when a police official called to verify the death and authorize internment. besides, if it needed all the folly of despair to doubt of her death on beholding this beautiful creature, it also needed all the infallibility of science to believe it. while the neighbor was putting francine into her shroud, jacques was led away into the next room, where he found some of his friends who had come to follow the funeral. the bohemians desisted as regards jacques, whom, however, they loved in brotherly fashion, from all those consolations which only serve to irritate grief. without uttering one of those remarks so hard to frame and so painful to listen to, they silently shook their friend by the hand in turn. "her death is a great misfortune for jacques," said one of them. "yes," replied the painter lazare, a strange spirit who had been able at the very outset to conquer all the rebellious impulses of youth by the inflexibility of one set purpose, and in whom the artist had ended by stifling the man, "yes, but it is a misfortune that he incurred voluntarily. since he knew francine, jacques has greatly altered." "she made him happy," said another. "happy," replied lazare, "what do you call happy? how can you call a passion, which brings a man to the condition in which jacques is at this moment, happiness? show him a masterpiece and he would not even turn his eyes to look at it; on a titian or a raphael. my mistress is immortal and will never deceive me. she dwells in the louvre, and her name is joconde." while lazare was about to continue his theories on art and sentiment, it was announced that it was time to start for the church. after a few prayers the funeral procession moved on to the cemetery. as it was all souls' day an immense crowd filled it. many people turned to look at jacques walking bareheaded in rear of the hearse. "poor fellow," said one, "it is his mother, no doubt." "it is his father," said another. "it is his sister," was elsewhere remarked. a poet, who had come there to study the varying expressions of regret at this festival of recollections celebrated once a year amidst november fogs, alone guessed on seeing him pass that he was following the funeral of his mistress. when they came to the grave the bohemians ranged themselves about it bareheaded, jacques stood close to the edge, his friend the doctor holding him by the arm. the grave diggers were in a hurry and wanted to get things over quickly. "there is to be no speechifying," said one of them. "well, so much the better. heave, mate, that's it." the coffin taken out of the hearse was lowered into the grave. one man withdrew the ropes and then with one of his mates took a shovel and began to cast in the earth. the grave was soon filled up. a little wooden cross was planted over it. in the midst of his sobs the doctor heard jacques utter this cry of egoism-"oh my youth! it is you they are burying." jacques belonged to a club styled the water drinkers, which seemed to have been founded in imitation of the famous one of the rue des quatre-vents, which is treated of in that fine story _"un grand homme de province."_ only there was a great difference between the heroes of the latter circle and the water drinkers who, like all imitators, had exaggerated the system they sought to put into practice. this difference will be understood by the fact that in balzac's book the members of the club end by attaining the object they proposed to themselves, while after several years' existence the club of the water drinkers was naturally dissolved by the death of all its members, without the name of anyone of them remaining attached to a work attesting their existence. during his union with francine, jacques' intercourse with the water drinkers had become more broken. the necessities of life had obliged the artist to violate certain conditions solemnly signed and sworn by the water drinkers the day the club was founded. perpetually perched on the stilts of an absurd pride, these young fellows had laid down as a sovereign principle in their association, that they must never abandon the lofty heights of art; that is to say, that despite their mortal poverty, not one of them would make any concession to necessity. thus the poet melchior would never have consented to abandon what he called his lyre, to write a commercial prospectus or an electoral address. that was all very well for the poet rodolphe, a good-for-nothing who was ready to turn his hand to anything, and who never let a five franc piece flit past him without trying to capture it, no matter how. the painter lazare, a proud wearer of rags, would never have soiled his brushes by painting the portrait of a tailor holding a parrot on his forefinger, as our friend the painter marcel had once done in exchange for the famous dress coat nicknamed methuselah, which the hands of each of his sweethearts had starred over with darns. all the while he had been living in communion of thought with the water drinkers, the sculptor jacques had submitted to the tyranny of the club rules; but when he made the acquaintance of francine, he would not make the poor girl, already ill, share of the regimen he had accepted during his solitude. jacques' was above all an upright and loyal nature. he went to the president of the club, the exclusive lazare, and informed him that for the future he would accept any work that would bring him in anything. "my dear fellow, your declaration of love is your artistic renunciation. we will remain your friends if you like, but we shall no longer be your partners. work as you please, for me you are no longer a sculptor, but a plasterer. it is true that you may drink wine, but we who continue to drink our water, and eat our dry bread, will remain artists." whatever lazare might say about it, jacques remained an artist. but to keep francine with him he undertook, when he had a chance, any paying work. it is thus that he worked for a long time in the workshop of the ornament maker romagnesi. clever in execution and ingenious in invention, jacques, without relinquishing high art, might have achieved a high reputation in those figure groups that have become one of the chief elements in this commerce. but jacques was lazy, like all true artists, and a lover after the fashion of poets. youth in him had awakened tardily but ardent, and, with a presentiment of his approaching end, he had sought to exhaust it in francine's arms. thus it happened that good chances of work knocked at his door without jacques answering, because he would have had to disturb himself, and he found it more comfortable to dream by the light of his beloved's eyes. when francine was dead the sculptor went to see his old friends the water drinkers again. but lazare's spirit predominated in this club, in which each of the members lived petrified in the egoism of art. jacques did not find what he came there in search of. they scarcely understood his despair, which they strove to appease by argument, and seeing this small degree of sympathy, jacques preferred to isolate his grief rather than see it laid bare by discussion. he broke off, therefore, completely with the water drinkers and went away to live alone. five or six days after francine's funeral, jacques went to a monumental mason of the montparnasse cemetery and offered to conclude the following bargain with him. the mason was to furnish francine's grave with a border, which jacques reserved the right of designing, and in addition to supply the sculptor with a block of white marble. in return for this jacques would place himself for three months at his disposition, either as a journeyman stone-cutter or sculptor. the monumental mason then had several important orders on hand. he visited jacques' studio, and in presence of several works begun there, had proof that the chance which gave him the sculptor's services was a lucky one for him. a week later, francine's grave had a border, in the midst of which the wooden cross had been replaced by a stone one with her name graven on it. jacques had luckily to do with an honest fellow who understood that a couple of hundredweight of cast iron, and three square feet of pyrenean marble were no payment for three months' work by jacques, whose talent had brought him in several thousand francs. he offered to give the artist a share in the business, but jacques would not consent. the lack of variety in the subjects for treatment was repugnant to his inventive disposition, besides he had what he wanted, a large block of marble, from the recesses of which he wished to evolve a masterpiece destined for francine's grave. at the beginning of spring jacques' position improved. his friend the doctor put him in relation with a great foreign nobleman who had come to settle in paris, and who was having a magnificent mansion built in one of the most fashionable districts. several celebrated artists had been called in to contribute to the luxury of this little palace. a chimney piece was commissioned from jacques. i can still see his design, it was charming; the whole poetry of winter was expressed in the marble that was to serve as a frame to the flames. jacques' studio was too small, he asked for and obtained a room in the mansion, as yet uninhabited, to execute his task in. a fairly large sum was even advanced him on the price agreed on for his work. jacques began by repaying his friend the doctor the money the latter had lent him at francine's death, then he hurried to the cemetery to cover the earth, beneath which his mistress slept, with flowers. but spring had been there before him, and on the girl's grave a thousand flowers were springing at hazard amongst the grass. the artist had not the courage to pull them up, for he thought that these flowers might perhaps hold something of his dead love. as the gardener asked him what was to be done with the roses and pansies he had brought with him, jacques bade him plant them on a neighboring grave, newly dug, the poor grave of some poor creature, without any border and having no other memorial over it than a piece of wood stuck in the ground and surmounted by a crown of flowers in blackened paper, the scant offering of some pauper's grief. jacques left the cemetery in quite a different frame of mind to what he had entered it. he looked with happy curiosity at the bright spring sunshine, the same that had so often gilded francine's locks when she ran about the fields culling wildflowers with her white hands. quite a swarm of pleasant thoughts hummed in his heart. passing by a little tavern on the outer boulevard he remembered that one day, being caught by a storm, he had taken shelter there with francine, and that they had dined there. jacques went in and had dinner served at the same table. his dessert was served on a plate with a pictorial pattern; he recognized it and remembered that francine had spent half an hour in guessing the rebus painted on it, and recollected, too, a song sung by her when inspired by the violet hued wine which does not cost much and has more gaiety in it than grapes. but this flood of sweet remembrances recalled his love without reawakening his grief. accessible to superstition, like all poetical and dreamy intellects, jacques fancied that it was francine, who, hearing his step beside her, had wafted him these pleasant remembrances from her grave, and he would not damp them with a tear. he quitted the tavern with firm step, erect head, bright eye, beating heart, and almost a smile on his lips, murmuring as he went along the refrain of francine's song- "love hovers round my dwelling my door must open be." this refrain in jacques' mouth was also a recollection, but then it was already a song, and perhaps without suspecting it he took that evening the first step along the road which leads from sorrow to melancholy, and thence onward to forgetfulness. alas! whatever one may wish and whatever one may do the eternal and just law of change wills it so. even as the flowers, sprung perhaps from francine, had sprouted on her tomb the sap of youth stirred in the heart of jacques, in which the remembrance of the old love awoke new aspirations for new ones. besides jacques belonged to the race of artists and poets who make passion an instrument of art and poetry, and whose mind only shows activity in proportion as it is set in motion by the motive powers of the heart. with jacques invention was really the daughter of sentiment, and he put something of himself into the smallest things he did. he perceived that souvenirs no longer sufficed him, and that, like the millstone which wears itself away when corn runs short, his heart was wearing away for want of emotion. work had no longer any charm for him, his power of invention, of yore feverish and spontaneous, now only awoke after much patient effort. jacques was discontented, and almost envied the life of his old friends, the water drinkers. he sought to divert himself, held out his hand to pleasure, and made fresh acquaintances. he associated with the poet rodolphe, whom he had met at a cafe, and each felt a warm sympathy towards the other. jacques explained his worries, and rodolphe was not long in understanding their cause. "my friend," said he, "i know what it is," and tapping him on the chest just over the heart he added, "quick, you must rekindle the fire there, start a little love affair at once, and ideas will recur to you." "ah!" said jacques. "i loved francine too dearly." "it will not hinder you from still always loving her. you will embrace her on another's lips." "oh!" said jacques. "if i could only meet a girl who resembled her." and he left rodolphe deep in thought. * * * * * six weeks later jacques had recovered all his energy, rekindled by the tender glances of a young girl whose name was marie, and whose somewhat sickly beauty recalled that of poor francine. nothing, indeed, could be prettier than this pretty marie, who was within six weeks of being eighteen years of age, as she never failed to mention. her love affair with jacques had its birth by moonlight in the garden of an open air ball, to the strains of a shrill violin, a grunting double bass, and a clarinet that trilled like a blackbird. jacques met her one evening when gravely walking around the space reserved for the dancers. seeing him pass stiffly in his eternal black coat buttoned to the throat, the pretty and noisy frequenters of the place, who knew him by sight, used to say amongst themselves, "what is that undertaker doing here? is there anyone who wants to be buried?" and jacques walked on always alone, his heart bleeding within him from the thorns of a remembrance which the orchestra rendered keener by playing a lively quadrille which sounded to his ears as mournful as a _de profundis_. it was in the midst of this reverie that he noticed marie, who was watching him from a corner, and laughing like a wild thing at his gloomy bearing. jacques raised his eyes and saw this burst of laughter in a pink bonnet within three paces of him. he went up to her and made a few remarks, to which she replied. he offered her his arm for a stroll around the garden which she accepted. he told her that he thought her as beautiful as an angel, and she made him repeat it twice over. he stole some green apples hanging from the trees of the garden for her, and she devoured them eagerly to the accompaniment of that ringing laugh which seemed the burden of her constant mirth. jacques thought of the bible, and thought that we should never despair as regards any woman, and still less as regards those who love apples. he took another turn round the garden with the pink bonnet, and it is thus that arriving at the ball alone he did not return from it so. however, jacques had not forgotten francine; bearing in mind rodolphe's words he kissed her daily on marie's lips, and wrought in secret at the figure he wished to place on the dead girl's grave. one day when he received some money jacques bought a dress for marie--a black dress. the girl was pleased, only she thought that black was not very lively for summer wear. but jacques told her that he was very fond of black, and that she would please him by wearing this dress every day. marie obeyed. one saturday jacques said to her: "come early tomorrow, we will go into the country." "how nice!" said marie. "i am preparing a surprise for you. you shall see. it will be sunshiny tomorrow." marie spent the night at home finishing a new dress that she had bought out of her savings--a pretty pink dress. and on sunday she arrived clad in her smart purchase at jacques' studio. the artist received her coldly, almost brutally. "i thought i should please you by making this bright toilette," said marie, who could not understand his coolness. "we cannot go into the country today," replied he. "you had better be off. i have some work today." marie went home with a full heart. on the way she met a young man who was acquainted with jacques' story, and who had also paid court to herself. "ah! mademoiselle marie, so you are no longer in mourning?" said he. "mourning?" asked marie. "for whom?" "what, did you not know? it is pretty generally known, though, the black dress that jacques gave you--." "well, what of it?" asked marie. "it was mourning. jacques made you wear mourning for francine." from that day jacques saw no more of marie. this rupture was unlucky for him. evil days returned; he had no more work, and fell into such a fearful state of wretchedness that, no longer knowing what would become of him, he begged his friend the doctor to obtain him admission to a hospital. the doctor saw at first glance that this admission would not be difficult to obtain. jacques, who did not suspect his condition, was on the way to rejoin francine. as he could still move about, jacques begged the superintendent of the hospital to let him have a little unused room, and he had a stand, some tools, and some modelling clay brought there. during the first fortnight he worked at the figure he intended for francine's grave. it was an angel with outspread wings. this figure, which was francine's portrait, was never quite finished, for jacques could soon no longer mount the stairs, and in short time could not leave his bed. one day the order book fell into his hands, and seeing the things prescribed for himself, he understood that he was lost. he wrote to his family, and sent for sister sainte-genevieve, who looked after him with charitable care. "sister," said jacques, "there is upstairs in the room that was lent me, a little plaster cast. this statuette, which represents an angel, was intended for a tomb, but i had not time to execute it in marble. yes, i had a fine block--white marble with pink veins. well, sister, i give you my little statuette for your chapel." jacques died a few days later. as the funeral took place on the very day of the opening of the annual exhibition of pictures, the water drinkers were not present. "art before all," said lazare. jacques' family was not a rich one, and he did not have a grave of his own. he is buried somewhere. chapter xix musette's fancies it may be, perhaps, remembered how the painter marcel sold the jew medici his famous picture of "the passage of the red sea," which was destined to serve as the sign of a provision dealer's. on the morrow of this sale, which had been followed by a luxurious dinner stood by the jew to the bohemians as a clincher to the bargain, marcel, schaunard, colline, and rodolphe woke up very late. still bewildered by the fumes of their intoxication of the day before, at first they no longer remembered what had taken place, and as noon rung out from a neighboring steeple, they all looked at one another with a melancholy smile. "there goes the bell that piously summons humanity to refresh itself," said marcel. "in point of fact," replied rodolphe, "it is the solemn hour when honest folk enter their dining-room." "we must try and become honest folk," murmured colline, whose patron saint was saint appetite. "ah, milk jug of my nursery!--ah! four square meals of my childhood, what has become of you?" said schaunard. "what has become of you?" he repeated, to a soft and melancholy tune. "to think that at this hour there are in paris more than a hundred thousand chops on the gridiron," said marcel. "and as many steaks," added rodolphe. by an ironical contrast, while the four friends were putting to one another the terrible daily problem of how to get their breakfast, the waiters of a restaurant on the lower floor of the house kept shouting out the customers' orders. "will those scoundrels never be quiet?" said marcel. "every word is like the stroke of a pick, hollowing out my stomach." "the wind is in the north," said colline, gravely, pointing to a weathercock on a neighboring roof. "we shall not breakfast today, the elements are opposed to it." "how so?" inquired marcel. "it is an atmospheric phenomenon i have noted," said the philosopher. "a wind from the north almost always means abstinence, as one from the south usually means pleasure and good cheer. it is what philosophy calls a warning from above." gustave colline's fasting jokes were savage ones. at that moment schaunard, who had plunged one of his hands into the abyss that served him as a pocket, withdrew it with a yell of pain. "help, there is something in my coat!" he cried, trying to free his hand, nipped fast in the claws of a live lobster. to the cry he had uttered, another one replied. it came from marcel, who, mechanically putting his hand into his pocket, had there discovered a silver mine that he had forgotten--that is to say, the hundred and fifty francs which medici had given him the day before in payment for "the passage of the red sea." memory returned at the same moment to the bohemians. "bow down, gentlemen," said marcel, spreading out on the table a pile of five-franc pieces, amongst which glittered some new louis. "one would think they were alive," said colline. "sweet sounds!" said schaunard, chinking the gold pieces together. "how pretty these medals are!" said rodolphe. "one would take them for fragments of sunshine. if i were a king i would have no other small change, and would have them stamped with my mistress's portrait." "to think that there is a country where there are mere pebbles," said schaunard. "the americans used to give four of them for two sous. i had an ancestor who went to america. he was interred by the savages in their stomachs. it was a misfortune for the family." "ah, but where does this animal come from?" inquired marcel, looking at the lobster which had began to crawl about the room. "i remember," said schaunard, "that yesterday i took a turn in medicis' kitchen, i suppose the reptile accidentally fell into my pocket; these creatures are very short-sighted. since i have got it," added he, "i should like to keep it. i will tame it and paint it red, it will look livelier. i am sad since phemie's departure; it will be a companion to me." "gentlemen," exclaimed colline, "notice, i beg of you, that the weathercock has gone round to the south, we shall breakfast." "i should think so," said marcel, taking up a gold piece, "here is something we will cook with plenty of sauce." they proceeded to a long and serious discussion on the bill of fare. each dish was the subject of an argument and a vote. omelette soufflé, proposed by schaunard, was anxiously rejected, as were white wines, against which marcel delivered an oration that brought out his oenophilistic knowledge. "the first duty of wine is to be red," exclaimed he, "don't talk to me about your white wines." "but," said schaunard, "champagne--" "bah! a fashionable cider! an epileptic licorice-water. i would give all the cellars of epernay and ai for a single burgundian cask. besides, we have neither grisettes to seduce, nor a vaudeville to write. i vote against champagne." the program once agreed upon, schaunard and colline went to the neighboring restaurant to order the repast. "suppose we have some fire," said marcel. "as a matter of fact," said rodolphe, "we should not be doing wrong, the thermometer has been inviting us to it for some time past. let us have some fire and astonish the fireplace." he ran out on the landing and called to colline to have some wood sent in. a few minutes later schaunard and colline came up again, followed by a charcoal dealer bearing a heavy bundle of firewood. as marcel was looking in a drawer for some spare paper to light the fire, he came by chance across a letter, the handwriting of which made him start, and which he began to read unseen by his friends. it was a letter in pencil, written by musette when she was living with marcel and dated day for day a year ago. it only contained these words:- "my dear love, do not be uneasy about me, i shall be in shortly. i have gone out to warm myself a bit by walking, it is freezing indoors and the wood seller has cut off credit. i broke up the last two rungs of the chair, but they did not burn long enough to cook an egg by. besides, the wind comes in through the window as if it were at home, and whispers a great deal of bad advice which it would vex you if i were to listen to. i prefer to go out a bit; i shall take a look at the shops. they say that there is some velvet at ten francs a yard. it is incredible, i must see it. i shall be back for dinner. musette" "poor girl," said marcel, putting the letter in his pocket. and he remained for a short time pensive, his head resting on his hands. at this period the bohemians had been for some time in a state of widowhood, with the exception of colline, whose sweetheart, however, had still remained invisible and anonymous. phemie herself, schaunard's amiable companion, had met with a simple soul who had offered her his heart, a suite of mahogany furniture, and a ring with his hair--red hair--in it. however, a fortnight after these gifts, phemie's lover wanted to take back his heart and his furniture, because he noticed on looking at his mistress's hands that she wore a ring set with hair, but black hair this time, and dared to suspect her of infidelity. yet phemie had not ceased to be virtuous, only as her friends had chaffed her several times about her ring with red hair, she had had it dyed black. the gentleman was so pleased that he bought phemie a silk dress; it was the first she had ever had. the day she put it on for the first time the poor girl exclaimed: "now i can die happy." as to musette, she had once more become almost an official personage, and marcel had not met her for three or four months. as to mimi, rodolphe had not heard her even mentioned, save by himself when alone. "hallo!" suddenly exclaimed rodolphe, seeing marcel squatting dreamily beside the hearth. "won't the fire light?" "there you are," said the painter, setting light to the wood, which began to crackle and flame. while his friends were sharpening their appetites by getting ready the feast, marcel had again isolated himself in a corner and was putting the letter he had just found by chance away with some souvenirs that musette had left him. all at once he remembered the address of a woman who was the intimate friend of his old love. "ah!" he exclaimed, loud enough to be overheard. "i know where to find her." "find what?" asked rodolphe. "what are you up to?" he added, seeing the artist getting ready to write. "nothing, only an urgent letter i had forgotten," replied marcel, and he wrote:- "my dear girl, i have wealth in my desk, an apoplectic stroke of fortune. we have a big feed simmering, generous wines, and have lit fires like respectable citizens. you should only just see it, as you used to say. come and pass an hour with us. you will find rodolphe, colline and schaunard. you shall sing to us at dessert, for dessert will not be wanting. while we are there we shall probably remain at table for a week. so do not be afraid of being too late. it is so long since i heard you laugh. rodolphe will compose madrigals to you, and we will drink all manner of things to our dead and gone loves, with liberty to resuscitate them. between people like ourselves--the last kiss is never the last. ah! if it had not been so cold last year you might not have left me. you jilted me for a faggot and because you were afraid of having red hands; you were right. i am no more vexed with you over it this time than over the others, but come and warm yourself while there is a fire. with as many kisses as you like, marcel." this letter finished, marcel wrote another to madame sidonie, musette's friend, begging her to forward the one enclosed in it. then he went downstairs to the porter to get him to take the letters. as he was paying him beforehand, the porter noticed a gold coin in the painter's hand, and before starting on his errand went up to inform the landlord, with whom marcel was behind with his rent. "sir," said he, quite out of breath, "the artist on the sixth floor has money. you know the tall fellow who laughs in my face when i take him his bill?" "yes," said the landlord, "the one who had the imprudence to borrow money of me to pay me something on account with. he is under notice to quit." "yes sir. but he is rolling in gold today. i caught sight of it just now. he is giving a party. it is a good time--" "you are right," said the landlord. "i will go up and see for myself by-and-by." madame sidonie, who was at home when marcel's letter was brought, sent on her maid at once with the one intended for musette. the latter was then residing in a charming suite of rooms in the chaussee d'antin. at the moment marcel's letter was handed to her, she had company, and, indeed, was going to give a grand dinner party that evening. "here is a miracle," she exclaimed, laughing like a mad thing. "what is it?" asked a handsome young fellow, as stiff as a statuette. "it is an invitation to dinner," replied the girl. "how well it falls out." "how badly," said the young man. "why so?" asked musette. "what, do you think of going?" "i should think so. arrange things as you please." "but, my dear, it is not becoming. you can go another time." "ah, that is very good, another time. it is an old acquaintance, marcel, who invites me to dinner, and that is sufficiently extraordinary for me to go and have a look at it. another time! but real dinners in that house are as rare as eclipses." "what, you would break your pledge to us to go and see this individual," said the young man, "and you tell me so--" "whom do you want me to tell it to, then? to the grand turk? it does not concern him." "this is strange frankness." "you know very well that i do nothing like other people." "but what would you think of me if i let you go, knowing where you are going to? think a bit, musette, it is very unbecoming both to you and myself; you must ask this young fellow to excuse you--" "my dear monsieur maurice," said mademoiselle musette, in very firm tones, "you knew me before you took up with me, you knew that i was full of whims and fancies, and that no living soul can boast of ever having made me give one up." "ask of me whatever you like," said maurice, "but this! there are fancies and fancies." "maurice, i shall go and see marcel. i am going," she added, putting on her bonnet. "you may leave me if you like, but it is stronger than i am; he is the best fellow in the world, and the only one i have ever loved. if his head had been gold he would have melted it down to give me rings. poor fellow," said she, showing the letter, "see, as soon as he has a little fire, he invites me to come and warm myself. ah, if he had not been so idle, and if there had not been so much velvet and silk in the shops! i was very happy with him, he had the gift of making me feel; and it is he who gave me the name of musette on account of my songs. at any rate, going to see him you may be sure that i shall return to you... unless you shut your door in my face." "you could not more frankly acknowledge that you do not love me," said the young man. "come, my dear maurice, you are too sensible a man for us to begin a serious argument on that point," rejoined musette. "you keep me like a fine horse in your stable--and i like you because i love luxury, noise, glitter, and festivity, and that sort of thing; do not let us go in for sentiment, it would be useless and ridiculous." "at least let me come with you." "but you would not enjoy yourself at all," said musette, "and would hinder us from enjoying ourselves. remember that he will necessarily kiss me." "musette," said maurice. "have you often found such accommodating people as myself?" "viscount," replied musette, "one day when i was driving in the champs elysees with lord _____, i met marcel and his friend rodolphe, both on foot, both ill dressed, muddy as water-dogs, and smoking pipes. i had not seen marcel for three months, and it seemed to me as if my heart was going to jump out of the carriage window. i stopped the carriage, and for half an hour i chatted with marcel before the whole of paris, filing past in its carriages. marcel offered me a sou bunch of violets that i fastened in my waistband. when he took leave of me, lord _____ wanted to call him back to invite him to dinner with us. i kissed him for that. that is my way, my dear monsieur maurice, if it does not suit you you should say so at once, and i will take my slippers and my nightcap." "it is sometimes a good thing to be poor then," said vicomte maurice, with a look of envious sadness. "no, not at all," said musette. "if marcel had been rich i should never have left him." "go, then," said the young fellow, shaking her by the hand. "you have put your new dress on," he added, "it becomes you splendidly." "that is so," said musette. "it is a kind of presentiment i had this morning. marcel will have the first fruits of it. goodbye, i am off to taste a little of the bread of gaiety." musette was that day wearing a charming toilette. never had the poem of her youth and beauty been set off by a more seductive binding. besides, musette had the instinctive genius of taste. on coming into the world, the first thing she had looked about for had been a looking glass to settle herself in her swaddling clothes by, and before being christened she had already been guilty of the sin of coquetry. at the time when her position was of the humblest, when she was reduced to cotton print frocks, little white caps and kid shoes, she wore in charming style this poor and simple uniform of the grisettes, those pretty girls, half bees, half grasshoppers, who sang at their work all week, only asked god for a little sunshine on sunday, loved with all their heart, and sometimes threw themselves out of a window. a breed that is now lost, thanks to the present generation of young fellows, a corrupted and at the same time corrupting race, but, above everything, vain, foolish and brutal. for the sake of uttering spiteful paradoxes, they chaffed these poor girls about their hands, disfigured by the sacred scars of toil, and as a consequence these soon no longer earned even enough to buy almond paste. by degrees they succeeded in inoculating them with their own foolishness and vanity, and then the grisette disappeared. it was then that the lorette sprung up. a hybrid breed of impertinent creatures of mediocre beauty, half flesh, half paint, whose boudoir is a shop in which they sell bits of their heart like slices of roast beef. the majority of these girls who dishonor pleasure, and are the shame of modern gallantry, are not always equal in intelligence to the very birds whose feathers they wear in their bonnets. if by chance they happen to feel, not love nor even a caprice, but a common place desire, it is for some counter jumping mountebank, whom the crowd surrounds and applauds at public balls, and whom the papers, courtiers of all that is ridiculous, render celebrated by their puffs. although she was obliged to live in this circle musette had neither its manners nor its ways, she had not the servile cupidity of those creatures who can only read cocker and only write in figures. she was an intelligent and witty girl, and some drops of the blood of mansu in her veins and, rebellious to all yokes, she had never been able to help yielding to a fancy, whatever might be the consequences. marcel was really the only man she had ever loved. he was at any rate the only one for whose sake she had really suffered, and it had needed all the stubbornness of the instincts that attracted her to all that glittered and jingled to make her leave him. she was twenty, and for her luxury was almost a matter of existence. she might do without it for a time, but she could not give it up completely. knowing her inconstancy, she had never consented to padlock her heart with an oath of fidelity. she had been ardently loved by many young fellows for whom she had herself felt a strong fancy, and she had always acted towards them with far-sighted probity; the engagements into which she entered were simple, frank and rustic as the love-making of moliere's peasants. "you want me and i should like you too, shake hands on it and let us enjoy ourselves." a dozen times if she had liked musette could have secured a good position, which is termed a future, but she did not believe in the future and professed the scepticism of figaro respecting it. "tomorrow," she sometimes remarked, "is an absurdity of the almanac, it is a daily pretext that men have invented in order to put off their business today. tomorrow may be an earthquake. today, at any rate, we are on solid ground." one day a gentleman with whom she had stayed nearly six months, and who had become wildly in love with her, seriously proposed marriage. musette burst out laughing in his face at this offer. "i imprison my liberty in the bonds of matrimony? never," said she. "but i pass my time in trembling with fear of losing you." "it would be worse if i were your wife. do not let us speak about that any more. besides, i am not free," she added, thinking no doubt of marcel. thus she passed her youth, her mind caught by every straw blown by the breeze of fancy, causing the happiness of a great many and almost happy herself. vicomte maurice, under whose protection she then was, had a great deal of difficulty in accustoming himself to her untamable disposition, intoxicated with freedom, and it was with jealous impatience that he awaited the return of musette after having seen her start off to marcel's. "will she stay there?" he kept asking himself all the evening. "poor maurice," said musette to herself on her side. "he thinks it rather hard. bah! young men must go through their training." then her mind turning suddenly to other things, she began to think of marcel to whom she was going, and while running over the recollections reawakened by the name of her erst adorer, asked herself by what miracle the table had been spread at his dwelling. she re-read, as she went along, the letter that the artist had written to her, and could not help feeling somewhat saddened by it. but this only lasted a moment. musette thought aright, that it was less than ever an occasion for grieving, and at that moment a strong wind spring up she exclaimed: "it is funny, even if i did not want to go to marcel's, this wind would blow me there." and she went on hurriedly, happy as a bird returning to its first nest. all at once snow began to fall heavy. musette looked for a cab. she could not see one. as she happened to be in the very street in which dwelt her friend madame sidonie, the same who had sent on marcel's letter to her, musette decided to run in for a few minutes until the weather cleared up sufficiently to enable her to continue her journey. when musette entered madame sidonie's rooms she found a gathering there. they were going on with a game of lansquenet that had lasted three days. "do not disturb yourselves," said musette. "i have only just popped in for a moment." "you got marcel's letter all right?" whispered madame sidonie to her. "yes, thanks," replied musette. "i am going to his place, he has asked me to dinner. will you come with me? you would enjoy yourself." "no, i can't," said madame sidonie, pointing to the card table. "think of my rent." "there are six louis," said the banker. "i'll go two of them," exclaimed madame sidonie. "i am not proud, i'll start at two," replied the banker, who had already dealt several times. "king and ace. i am done for," he continued, dealing the cards. "i am done for, all the kings are out." "no politics," said a journalist. "and the ace is the foe of my family," continued the banker, who then turned up another king. "long live the king! my dear sidonie, hand me over two louis." "put them down," said sidonie, vexed at her loss. "that makes four hundred francs you owe me, little one," said the banker. "you would run it up to a thousand. i pass the deal." sidonie and musette were chatting together in a low tone. the game went on. at about the same time the bohemians were sitting down to table. during the whole of the repast marcel seemed uneasy. everytime a step sounded on the stairs he started. "what is the matter?" asked rodolphe of him. "one would think you were expecting someone. are we not all here?" but at a look from the artist the poet understood his friend's preoccupation. "true," he thought, "we are not all here." marcel's look meant musette, rodolphe's answering glance, mimi. "we lack ladies," said schaunard, all at once. "confound it," yelled colline, "will you hold your tongue with your libertine reflections. it was agreed that we should not speak of love, it turns the sauces." and the friends continued to drink fuller bumpers, whilst without the snow still fell, and on the hearth the logs flamed brightly, scattering sparks like fireworks. just as rodolphe was thundering out a song which he had found at the bottom of his glass, there came several knocks at the door. marcel, torpid from incipient drunkenness, leaped up from his chair, and ran to open it. musette was not there. a gentleman appeared on the threshold; he was not only bad looking, but his dressing gown was wretchedly made. in his hand he held a slip of paper. "i am glad to see you so comfortable," he said, looking at the table on which were the remains of a magnificent leg of mutton. "the landlord!" cried rodolphe. "let us receive him with the honors due to his position!" and he commenced beating on his plate with his knife and fork. colline handed him a chair, and marcel cried: "come, schaunard! pass us a clean glass. you are just in time," he continued to the landlord, "we were going to drink to your health. my friend there, monsieur colline, was saying some touching things about you. as you are present, he will begin over again, out of compliment to you. do begin again, colline." "excuse me, gentlemen," said the landlord, "i don't wish to trouble you, but---" and he unfolded the paper which he had in his hand. "what's the document?" asked marcel. the landlord, who had cast an inquisitive glance around the room, perceived some gold on the chimney piece. "it is your receipt," he said hastily, "which i had the honor of sending you once already." "my faithful memory recalls the circumstance," replied the artist. "it was on friday, the eighth of the month, at a quarter past twelve." "it is signed, you see, in due form," said the landlord, "and if it is agreeable to you--" "i was intending to call upon you," interrupted marcel. "i have a great deal to talk to you about." "at your service." "oblige me by taking something," continued the painter, forcing a glass of wine on the landlord. "now, sir," he continued, "you sent me lately a little paper, with a picture of a lady and a pair of scales on it. it was signed godard." "the lawyer's name." "he writes a very bad hand; i had to get my friend here, who understands all sorts of hieroglyphics and foreign languages,"--and he pointed to colline--"to translate it for me." "it was a notice to quit; a precautionary measure, according to the rule in such cases." "exactly. now i wanted to have a talk with you about this very notice, for which i should like to substitute a lease. this house suits me. the staircase is clean, the street gay, and some of my friends live near; in short, a thousand reasons attach me to these premises." "but," and the landlord unfolded his receipt again, "there is that last quarter's rent to pay." "we shall pay it, sir. such is our fixed intention." nevertheless, the landlord kept his eye glued to the money on the mantelpiece and such was the steady pertinacity of his gaze that the coins seemed to move towards him of themselves. "i am happy to have come at a time when, without inconveniencing yourself, you can settle this little affair," he said, again producing his receipt to marcel, who, not being able to parry the assault, again avoided it. "you have some property in the provinces, i think," he said. "very little, very little. a small house and farm in burgundy; very trifling returns; the tenants pay so badly, and therefore," he added, pushing forward his receipt again, "this small sum comes just in time. sixty francs, you know." "yes," said marcel, going to the mantelpiece and taking up three pieces of gold. "sixty, sixty it is," and he placed the money on the table just out of the landlord's reach. "at last," thought the latter. his countenance lighted up, and he too laid down his receipt on the table. schaunard, colline, and rodolphe looked anxiously on. "well, sir," quoth marcel, "since you are a burgundian, you will not be sorry to see a countryman of yours." he opened a bottle of old macon, and poured out a bumper. "ah, perfect!" said the landlord. "really, i never tasted better." "an uncle of mine who lives there, sends me a hamper or two occasionally." the landlord rose, and was stretching out his hand towards the money, when marcel stopped him again. "you will not refuse another glass?" said he, pouring one out. the landlord did not refuse. he drank the second glass, and was once more attempting to possess himself of the money, when marcel called out: "stop! i have an idea. i am rather rich just now, for me. my uncle in burgundy has sent me something over my usual allowance. now i may spend this money too fast. youth has so many temptations, you know. therefore, if it is all the same to you, i will pay a quarter in advance." he took sixty francs in silver and added them to the three louis which were on the table. "then i will give you a receipt for the present quarter," said the landlord. "i have some blank ones in my pocketbook. i will fill it up and date it ahead. after all," thought he, devouring the hundred and twenty francs with his eyes, "this tenant is not so bad." meanwhile, the other three bohemians, not understanding marcel's diplomacy, remained utterly stupefied. "but this chimney smokes, which is very disagreeable." "why didn't you tell me before? i will send the workmen in tomorrow," answered the landlord, not wishing to be behindhand in this contest of good offices. he filled up the second receipt, pushed the two over to marcel, and stretched out his hand once more towards the heap of money. "you don't know how timely this sum comes in," he continued, "i have to pay some bills for repairs, and was really quite short of cash." "very sorry to have made you wait." "oh, it's no matter now! permit me."--and out went his hand again. "permit me," said marcel. "we haven't finished with this yet. you know the old saying, 'when the wine is drawn--'" and he filled the landlord's glass a third time. "one must drink it," remarked the other, and he did so. "exactly," said the artist, with a wink at his friends, who now understood what he was after. the landlord's eyes began to twinkle strangely. he wriggled on his chair, began to talk loosely, in all senses of the word, and promised marcel fabulous repairs and embellishments. "bring up the big guns," said the artist aside to the poet. rodolphe passed along a bottle of rum. after the first glass the landlord sang a ditty, which absolutely made schaunard blush. after the second, he lamented his conjugal infelicity. his wife's name being helen, he compared himself to menelaus. after the third, he had an attack of philosophy, and threw up such aphorisms as these: "life is a river." "happiness depends not on wealth." "man is a transitory creature." "love is a pleasant feeling." finally, he made schaunard his confidant, and related to him how he had "put into mahogany" a damsel named euphemia. of this young person and her loving simplicity he drew so detailed a portrait, that schaunard began to be assailed by a fearful suspicion, which suspicion was reduced to a certainty when the landlord showed him a letter. "cruel woman!" cried the musician, as he beheld the signature. "it is like a dagger in my heart." "what is the matter!" exclaimed the bohemians, astonished at this language. "see," said schaunard, "this letter is from phemie. see the blot that serves her for a signature." and he handed round the letter of his ex-mistress, which began with the words, "my dear old pet." "i am her dear old pet," said the landlord, vainly trying to rise from his chair. "good," said marcel, who was watching him. "he has cast anchor." "phemie, cruel phemie," murmured schaunard. "you have wounded me deeply." "i have furnished a little apartment for her at 12, rue coquenard," said the landlord. "pretty, very pretty. it cost me lots of money. but such love is beyond price and i have twenty thousand francs a year. she asks me for money in her letter. poor little dear, she shall have this," and he stretched out his hand for the money--"hallo! where is it?" he added in astonishment feeling on the table. the money had disappeared. "it is impossible for a moral man to become an accomplice in such wickedness," said marcel. "my conscience forbids me to pay money to this old profligate. i shall not pay my rent, but my conscience will at any rate be clear. what morals, and in a bald headed man too." by this time the landlord was completely gone, and talked at random to the bottles. he had been there nearly two hours, when his wife, alarmed at his prolonged absence, sent the maid after him. on seeing her master in such a state, she set up a shriek, and asked, "what are they doing to him?" "nothing," answered marcel. "he came a few minutes ago to ask for the rent. as we had no money we begged for time." "but he's been and got drunk," said the servant. "very likely," replied rodolphe. "most of that was done before he came here. he told us that he had been arranging his cellar." "and he had so completely lost his head," added colline, "that he wanted to leave the receipt without the money." "give these to his wife," said marcel, handing over the receipts. "we are honest folk, and do not wish to take advantage of his condition." "good heavens! what will madame say?" exclaimed the maid, leading, or rather dragging off her master, who had a very imperfect idea of the use of his legs. "so much for him!" ejaculated marcel. "he has smelt money," said rodolphe. "he will come again tomorrow." "when he does, i will threaten to tell his wife about phemie and he will give us time enough." when the landlord had been got outside, the four friends went on smoking and drinking. marcel alone retained a glimmer of lucidity in his intoxication. from time to time, at the slightest sound on the staircase, he ran and opened the door. but those who were coming up always halted at one of the lower landings, and then the artist would slowly return to his place by the fireside. midnight struck, and musette had not come. "after all," thought marcel, "perhaps she was not in when my letter arrived. she will find it when she gets home tonight, and she will come tomorrow. we shall still have a fire. it is impossible for her not to come. tomorrow." and he fell asleep by the fire. at the very moment that marcel fell asleep dreaming of her, mademoiselle musette was leaving the residence of her friend madame sidonie, where she had been staying up till then. musette was not alone, a young man accompanied her. a carriage was waiting at the door. they got into it and went off at full speed. the game at lansquenet was still going on in madame sidonie's room. "where is musette?" said someone all at once. "where is young seraphin?" said another. madame sidonie began to laugh. "they had just gone off together," said she. "it is a funny story. what a strange being musette is. just fancy...." and she informed the company how musette, after almost quarreling with vicomte maurice and starting off to find marcel, had stepped in there by chance and met with young seraphin. "i suspected something was up," she continued. "i had an eye on them all the evening. he is very sharp, that youngster. in short, they have gone off on the quiet, and it would take a sharp one to catch them up. all the same, it is very funny when one thinks how fond musette is of her marcel." "if she is so fond of him, what is the use of seraphin, almost a lad, and who had never had a mistress?" said a young fellow. "she wants to teach him to read, perhaps," said the journalist, who was very stupid when he had been losing. "all the same," said sidonie, "what does she want with seraphin when she is in love with marcel? that is what gets over me." * * * * * for five days the bohemians went on leading the happiest life in the world without stirring out. they remained at table from morning till night. an admired disorder reigned in the room which was filled with a pantagruelic atmosphere. on a regular bed of oyster shells reposed an army of empty bottles of every size and shape. the table was laden with fragments of every description, and a forest of wood blazed in the fireplace. on the sixth day colline, who was director of ceremonies, drew up, as was his wont every morning, the bill of fare for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and supper, and submitted it to the approval of his friends, who each initialed it in token of approbation. but when colline opened the drawer that served as a cashbox, in order to take the money necessary for the day's consumption, he started back and became as pale as banquo's ghost. "what is the matter?" inquired the others, carelessly. "the matter is that there are only thirty sous left," replied the philosopher. "the deuce. that will cause some modification in our bill of fare. well, thirty sous carefully laid out--. all the same it will be difficult to run to truffles," said the others. a few minutes later the table was spread. there were three dishes most symmetrically arranged--a dish of herrings, a dish of potatoes, and a dish of cheese. on the hearth smoldered two little brands as big as one's fist. snow was still falling without. the four bohemians sat down to table and gravely unfolded their napkins. "it is strange," said marcel, "this herring has a flavor of pheasant." "that is due to the way in which i cooked it," replied colline. "the herring has never been properly appreciated." at that moment a joyous song rose on the staircase, and a knock came at the door. marcel, who had not been able to help shuddering, ran to open it. musette threw her arms round his neck and held him in an embrace for five minutes. marcel felt her tremble in his arms. "what is the matter?" he asked. "i am cold," said musette, mechanically drawing near the fireplace. "ah!" said marcel. "and we had such a rattling good fire." "yes," said musette, glancing at the remains of the five days' festivity, "i have come too late." "why?" said marcel. "why?" said musette, blushing slightly. she sat down on marcel's knee. she was still shivering, and her hands were blue. "you were not free, then," whispered marcel. "i, not free!" exclaimed the girl. "ah marcel! if i were seated amongst the stars in paradise and you made me a sign to come down to you i should do so. i, not free!" she began to shiver again. "there are five chairs here," said rodolphe, "which is an odd number, without reckoning that the fifth is of a ridiculous shape." and breaking the chair against the wall, he threw the fragments into the fireplace. the fire suddenly burst forth again in a bright and merry flame, then making a sign to colline and schaunard, the poet took them off with him. "where are you going?" asked marcel. "to buy some tobacco," they replied. "at havana," added schaunard, with a sign of intelligence to marcel, who thanked him with a look. "why did you not come sooner?" he asked musette when they were alone together. "it is true, i am rather behindhand." "five days to cross the pont neuf. you must have gone round by the pyrenees?" musette bowed her head and was silent. "ah, naughty girl," said the artist, sadly tapping his hand lightly on his mistress' breast, "what have you got inside here?" "you know very well," she retorted quickly. "but what have you been doing since i wrote to you?" "do not question me," said musette, kissing him several times. "do not ask me anything, but let me warm myself beside you. you see i put on my best dress to come. poor maurice, he could not understand it when i set off to come here, but it was stronger than myself, so i started. the fire is nice," she added, holding out her little hand to the flames, "i will stay with you till tomorrow if you like." "it will be very cold here," said marcel, "and we have nothing for dinner. you have come too late," he repeated. "ah, bah!" said musette. "it will be all the more like old times." * * * * * rodolphe, colline, and schaunard, took twenty-four hours to get their tobacco. when they returned to the house marcel was alone. after an absence of six days vicomte maurice saw musette return. he did not in any way reproach her, and only asked her why she seemed sad. "i quarreled with marcel," said she. "we parted badly." "and yet, who knows," said maurice. "but you will again return to him." "what would you?" asked musette. "i need to breathe the air of that life from time to time. my life is like a song, each of my loves is a verse, but marcel is the refrain." chapter xx mimi in fine feather "no, no, no, you are no longer lisette! no, no, no, you are no longer mimi. you are today, my lady the viscomtess, the day after tomorrow you may, perhaps, be your grace the duchess; the doorway of your dreams has at length been thrown wide open before you, and you have passed through it victorious and triumphant. i felt certain you would end up by doing so, some night or other. it was bound to be; besides, your white hands were made for idleness, and for a long time past have called for the ring of some aristocratic alliance. at length you have a coat of arms. but, we still prefer the one which youth gave to your beauty, when your blue eyes and your pale face seemed to quarter azure on a lily field. noble or serf, you are ever charming, and i readily recognized you when you passed by in the street the other evening, with rapid and well-shod foot, aiding the wind with your gloved hand in lifting the skirts of your new dress, partly in order not to let it be soiled, but a great deal more in order to show your embroidered petticoats and open-worked stockings. you had on a wonderful bonnet, and even seemed plunged in deep perplexity on the subject of the veil of costly lace which floated over this bonnet. a very serious trouble indeed, for it was a question of deciding which was best and most advantageous to your coquetry, to wear this veil up or down. by wearing it down, you risked not being recognized by those of your friends whom you might meet, and who certainly would have passed by you ten times without suspecting that this costly envelope hid mademoiselle mimi. on the other hand, by wearing this veil up, it was it that risked escaping notice, and in that case, what was the good of having it? you had cleverly solved the difficulty by alternately raising and lowering at every tenth step; this wonderful tissue, woven no doubt, in that country of spiders, called flanders, and which of itself cost more than the whole of your former wardrobe." "ah, mimi! forgive me--i should say, ah, vicomtess! i was quite right, you see, when i said to you: 'patience, do not despair, the future is big with cashmere shawls, glittering jewels, supper parties, and the like.' you would not believe me, incredulous one. well, my predictions are, however, realized, and i am worth as much, i hope, as your 'ladies' oracle,' a little octavo sorcerer you bought for five sous at a bookstall on the pont neuf, and which you wearied with external questions. again, i ask, was i not right in my prophecies; and would you believe me now, if i tell you that you will not stop at this? if i told you that listening, i can hear faintly in the depths of your future, the tramp and neighing of the horses harnessed to blue brougham, driven by a powdered coachmen, who lets down the steps, saying, 'where to madam?' would you believe me if i told you, too, that later on--ah, as late as possible, i trust--attaining the object of a long cherished ambition, you will have a table d'hote at belleville batignolles, and will be courted by the old soldiers and bygone dandies who will come there to play lansquenet or baccarat on the sly? but, before arriving at this period, when the sun of your youth shall have already declined, believe me, my dear child, you will wear out many yards of silk and velvet, many inheritances, no doubt, will be melted down in the crucibles of your fancies, many flowers will fade about your head, many beneath your feet, and you will change your coat of arms many times. on your head will glitter in turn the coronets of baroness, countess, and marchioness, you will take for your motto, 'inconstancy,' and you will, according to caprice or to necessity, satisfy each in turn, or even all at once, all the numerous adorers who will range themselves in the ante-chamber of your heart as people do at the door of a theater at which a popular piece is being played. go on then, go straight onward, your mind lightened of recollections which have been replaced by ambition; go, the road is broad, and we hope it will long be smooth to your feet, but we hope, above all, that all these sumptuosities, these fine toilettes, may not too soon become the shroud in which your liveliness will be buried." thus spoke the painter marcel to mademoiselle mimi, whom he had met three or four days after her second divorce from the poet rodolphe. although he was obliged to veil the raillery with which he besprinkled her horoscope, mademoiselle mimi was not the dupe of marcel's fine words, and understood perfectly well that with little respect for her new title, he was chaffing her to bits. "you are cruel towards me, marcel," said mademoiselle mimi, "it is wrong. i was always very friendly with you when i was rodolphe's mistress, and if i have left him, it was, after all, his fault. it was he who packed me off in a hurry, and, besides, how did he behave to me during the last few days i spent with him. i was very unhappy, i can tell you. you do not know what a man rodolphe was; a mixture of anger and jealousy, who killed me by bits. he loved me, i know, but his love was as dangerous as a loaded gun. what a life i led for six months. ah, marcel! i do not want to make myself out better than i am, but i suffered a great deal with rodolphe; you know it too, very well. it is not poverty that made me leave him, no i assure you i had grown accustomed to it, and i repeat it was he who sent me away. he trampled on my self-esteem; he told me that he no longer loved me; that i must get another lover. he even went so far as to indicate a young man who was courting me, and by his taunts, he served to bring me and this young man together. i went with him as much out of spite as from necessity, for i did not love him. you know very well yourself that i do not care for such very young fellows. they are as wearisome and sentimental as harmonicas. well, what is done is done. i do not regret it, and i would do the same over again. now that he no longer has me with him, and knows me to be happy with another, rodolphe is furious and very unhappy. i know someone who met him the other day; his eyes were quite red. that does not astonish me. i felt quite sure it would come to this, and that he would run after me, but you can tell him that he will only lose his time, and that this time it is quite in earnest and for good. is it long since you saw him, marcel and is it true that he is much altered?" inquired mimi in quite another tone. "he is greatly altered indeed," replied marcel. "he is grieving, that is certain, but what am i to do? so much the worse for him, he would have it so. it had to come to an end somehow. try to console him." "oh!" answered marcel quickly. "the worst of the job is over. do not disturb yourself about it, mimi." "you are not telling the truth, my dear fellow," said mimi, with an ironical little pout. "rodolphe will not be so quickly consoled as all that. if you knew what a state he was in the night before i left. it was a friday, i would not stay that night at my new lover's because i am superstitious, and friday is an unlucky day." "you are wrong, mimi, in love affairs friday is a lucky day; the ancients called it dies veneris." "i do not know latin," said mademoiselle mimi, continuing her narration. "i was coming back then from paul's and found rodolphe waiting for me in the street. it was late, past midnight, and i was hungry for i had had no dinner. i asked rodolphe to go and get something for supper. he came back half an hour later, he had run about a great deal to get nothing worth speaking of, some bread, wine, sardines, cheese, and an apple tart. i had gone to bed during his absence, and he laid the table beside the bed. i pretended not to notice him, but i could see him plainly, he was pale as death. he shuddered and walked about the room like a man who does not know what he wants to do. he noticed several packages of clothes on the floor in one corner. the sight of them seemed to annoy him, and he placed the screen in front of them in order not to see them. when all was ready we began to sup, he tried to make me drink, but i was no longer hungry or thirsty, and my heart was quite full. he was cold, for we had nothing to make a fire of, and one could hear the wind whistling in the chimney. it was very sad. rodolphe looked at me, his eyes were fixed; he put his hand in mine and i felt it tremble, it was burning and icy all at once. 'this is the funeral supper of our loves,' he said to me in a low tone. i did not answer, but i had not the courage to withdraw my hand from his. 'i am sleepy,' said i at last, 'it is late, let us go to sleep.' rodolphe looked at me. i had tied one of his handkerchiefs about my head on account of the cold. he took it off without saying a word. 'why do you want to take that off?' said i. 'i am cold.' 'oh, mimi!' said he. 'i beg of you, it will not matter to you, to put on your little striped cap for tonight.' it was a nightcap of striped cotton, white and brown. rodolphe was very fond of seeing me in this cap, it reminded him of several nights of happiness, for that was how we counted our happy days. when i thought it was the last time that i should sleep beside him i dared not refuse to satisfy this fancy of his. i got up and hunted out my striped cap that was at the bottom of one of my packages." "out of forgetfulness i forgot to replace the screen. rodolphe noticed it and hid the packages just as he had already done before. 'good night,' said he. 'good night,' i answered. i thought that he was going to kiss me and i should not have hindered him, but he only took my hand, which he carried to his lips. you know, marcel, how fond he was of kissing my hands. i heard his teeth chatter and i felt his body as cold as marble. he still held my hand and he laid his head on my shoulder, which was soon quite wet. rodolphe was in a fearful state. he bit the sheets to avoid crying out, but i could plainly hear his stifled sobs and i still felt his tears flowing on my shoulder, which was first scalded and then chilled. at that moment i needed all my courage and i did need it, i can tell you. i had only to say a word, i had only to turn my head, and my lips would have met those of rodolphe, and we should have made it up once more. ah! for a moment i really thought that he was going to die in my arms, or that, at least, he would go mad, as he almost did once before, you remember? i felt i was going to yield, i was going to recant first, i was going to clasp him in my arms, for really one must have been utterly heartless to remain insensible to such grief. but i recollected the words he had said to me the day before, 'you have no spirit if you stay with me, for i no longer love you,' ah! as i recalled those bitter words i would have seen rodolphe ready to die, and if it had only needed a kiss from me to save him, i would have turned away my lips and let him perish." "at last, overcome by fatigue, i sank into a half-sleep. i could still hear rodolphe sobbing, and i can swear to you, marcel, that this sobbing went on all night long, and that when day broke and i saw in the bed, in which i had slept for the last time, the lover whom i was going to leave for another's arms, i was terribly frightened to see the havoc wrought by this grief on rodolphe's face. he got up, like myself, without saying a word, and almost fell flat at the first steps he took, he was so weak and downcast. however, he dressed himself very quickly, and only asked me how matters stood and when i was going to leave. i told him that i did not know. he went off without bidding goodbye or shaking hands. that is how we separated. what a blow it must have been to his heart no longer to find me there on coming home, eh?" "i was there when rodolphe came in," said marcel to mimi, who was out of breath from speaking so long. "as he was taking his key from the landlady, she said, 'the little one has left.' 'ah!' replied rodolphe. 'i am not astonished, i expected it.' and he went up to his room, whither i followed him, fearing some crisis, but nothing occurred. 'as it is too late to go and hire another room this evening we will do so tomorrow morning,' said he, 'we will go together. now let us see after some dinner.' i thought that he wanted to get drunk, but i was wrong. we dined very quietly at a restaurant where you have sometimes been with him. i had ordered some beaune to stupefy rodolphe a bit. 'this was mimi's favorite wine,' said he, 'we have often drunk it together at this very table. i remember one day she said to me, holding out her glass, which she had already emptied several times, 'fill up again, it is good for one's bones.' a poor pun, eh? worthy, at the most, of the mistress of a farce writer. ah! she could drink pretty fairly.'" "seeing that he was inclined to stray along the path of recollection i spoke to him about something else, and then it was no longer a question of you. he spent the whole evening with me and seemed as calm as the mediterranean. but what astonished me most was, that this calmness was not at all affected. it was genuine indifference. at midnight we went home. 'you seem surprised at my coolness in the position in which i find myself,' said he to me, 'well, let me point out a comparison to you, my dear fellow, it if is commonplace it has, at least, the merit of being accurate. my heart is like a cistern the tap of which has been turned on all night, in the morning not a drop of water is left. my heart is really the same, last night i wept away all the tears that were left me. it is strange, but i thought myself richer in grief, and yet by a single night of suffering i am ruined, cleaned out. on my word of honor it is as i say. now, in the very bed in which i all but died last night beside a woman who was no more moved than a stone, i shall sleep like a deck laborer after a hard day's work, while she rests her head on the pillow of another.' 'hambug,' i thought to myself. 'i shall no sooner have left him than he will be dashing his head against the wall.' however, i left rodolphe alone and went to my own room, but i did not go to bed. at three in the morning i thought i heard a noise in rodolphe's room and i went down in a hurry, thinking to find him in a desperate fever." "well?" said mimi. "well my dear, rodolphe was sleeping, the bed clothes were quite in order and everything proved that he had soon fallen asleep, and that his slumbers had been calm." "it is possible," said mimi, "he was so worn out by the night before, but the next day?" "the next day rodolphe came and roused me up early and we went and took rooms in another house, into which we moved the same evening." "and," asked mimi, "what did he do on leaving the room we had occupied, what did he say on abandoning the room in which he had loved me so?" "he packed up his things quietly," replied marcel, "and as he found in a drawer a pair of thread gloves you had forgotten, as well as two or three of your letters--" "i know," said mimi in a tone which seemed to imply, "i forgot them on purpose so that he might have some souvenir of me left! what did he do with them?" she added. "if i remember rightly," said marcel, "he threw the letters into the fireplace and the gloves out of the window, but without any theatrical effort, and quite naturally, as one does when one wants to get rid of something useless." "my dear monsieur marcel, i assure you that from the bottom of my heart i hope that this indifference may last. but, once more in all sincerity, i do not believe in such a speedy cure and, in spite of all you tell me, i am convinced that my poet's heart is broken." "that may be," replied marcel, taking leave of mimi, "but unless i may be very much mistaken, the pieces are still good for something." during this colloquy in a public thoroughfare, vicomte paul was awaiting his new mistress, who was behindhand in her appointment, and decidedly disagreeable towards him. he seated himself at her feet and warbled his favorite strain, namely, that she was charming, fair as a lily, gentle as a lamb, but that he loved her above all on account of the beauties of her soul. "ah!" thought mimi, loosening the waves of her dark hair over her snowy shoulders, "my lover rodolphe, was not so exclusive." as marcel had stated, rodolphe seemed to be radically cured of his love for mademoiselle mimi, and three or four days after his separation, the poet reappeared completely metamorphosed. he was attired with an elegance that must have rendered him unrecognizable by his very looking glass. nothing, indeed, about him seemed to justify the fear that he intended to commit suicide, as mademoiselle mimi had started the rumor, with all kinds of hypocritical condolences. rodolphe was, in fact, quite calm. he listened with unmoved countenance to all the stories told him about the new and sumptuous existence led by his mistress--who took pleasure in keeping him informed on these points--by a young girl who had remained her confidant, and who had occasion to see rodolphe almost every evening. "mimi is very happy with vicomte paul," the poet was told. "she seems thoroughly smitten with him, only one thing causes her any uneasiness, she is afraid least you should disturb her tranquillity by coming after her, which by the way, would be dangerous for you, for the vicomte worships his mistress and is a good fencer." "oh," said rodolphe. "she can sleep in peace, i have no wish to go and cast vinegar over the sweetness of her honeymoon. as to her young lover, he can leave his dagger at home like gastibelza. i have no wish to attempt the life of a young gentleman who has still the happiness of being nursed by illusions." as they did not fail to carry back to mimi the way in which her ex-lover received all these details, she on her part did not forget to reply, shrugging her shoulders: "that is all very well, you will see what will come of it in a day or two." however, rodolphe was himself, and more than any one else, astonished at this sudden indifference which, without passing through the usual transitions of sadness and melancholy, had followed the stormy feelings by which he had been stirred only a few days before. forgetfulness, so slow to come--above all for the virtues of love--that forgetfulness which they summon so loudly and repulse with equal loudness when they feel it approaching, that pitiless consoler that had all at once, and without his being able to defend himself from it, invaded rodolphe's heart, and the name of the woman he so dearly loved could now be heard without awakening any echo in it. strange fact; rodolphe, whose memory was strong enough to recall to mind things that had occurred in the farthest days of his past and beings who had figured in or influenced his most remote existence--rodolphe could not, whatever efforts he might make, recall with clearness after four days' separation, the features of that mistress who had nearly broken his life between her slender fingers. he could no longer recall the softness of the eyes by the light of which he had so often fallen asleep. he could no longer remember the notes of that voice whose anger and whose caressing utterances had alternately maddened him. a poet, who was a friend of his, and who had not seen him since his absence, met him one evening. rodolphe seemed busy and preoccupied, he was walking rapidly along the street, twirling his cane. "hallo," said the poet, holding out his hand, "so here you are," and he looked curiously at rodolphe. seeing that the latter looked somewhat downcast he thought it right to adopt a consoling tone. "come, courage, my dear fellow. i know that it is hard, but then it must always have come to this. better now than later on; in three months you will be quite cured." "what are you driving at?" said rodolphe. "i am not ill, my dear fellow." "come," said the other, "do not play the braggart. i know the whole story and if i did not, i could read it in your face." "take care, you are making a mistake," said rodolphe, "i am very much annoyed this evening, it is true, but you have not exactly hit on the cause of my annoyance." "good, but why defend yourself? it is quite natural. a connection that has lasted a couple of years cannot be broken off so readily." "everyone tells me the same thing," said rodolphe, getting impatient. "well, upon my honor, you make a mistake, you and the others. i am very vexed, and i look like it, that is possible, but this is the reason why; i was expecting my tailor with a new dress coat today, and he had not come. that is what i am annoyed about." "bad, bad," said the other laughing. "not at all bad, but good on the contrary, very good, excellent in fact. follow my argument and you shall see." "come," said the poet, "i will listen to you. just prove to me how any one can in reason look so wretched because a tailor has failed to keep his word. come, come, i am waiting." "well," said rodolphe, "you know very well that the greatest effects spring from the most trifling causes. i ought this evening to pay a very important visit, and i cannot do so for want of a dress coat. now do you see it?" "not at all. there is up to this no sufficient reason shown for a state of desolation. you are in despair because---. you are very silly to try to deceive. that is my opinion." "my friend," said rodolphe, "you are very opinionated. it is always enough to vex us when we miss happiness, and at any rate pleasure, because it is almost always so much lost for ever, and we are wrong in saying, 'i will make up for it another time.' i will resume; i had an appointment this evening with a lady. i was to meet her at a friend's house, whence i should, perhaps taken her home to mine, if it were nearer than her own, and even if it were not. at this house there was a party. at parties one must wear a dress coat. i have no dress coat. my tailor was to bring me one; he does not do so. i do not go to the party. i do not meet the lady who is, perhaps, met by someone else. i do not see her home either to my place or hers, and she is, perhaps, seen home by another. so as i told you, i have lost an opportunity of happiness and pleasure; hence i am vexed; hence i look so, and quite naturally." "very good," said his friend, "with one foot just out of one hell, you want to put the other foot in another; but, my dear fellow, when i met you, you seemed to be waiting for some one." "so i was." "but," continued the other, "we are in the neighborhood in which your ex-mistress is living. what is there to prove that you were not waiting for her?" "although separated from her, special reasons oblige me to live in this neighborhood. but, although neighbors, we are as distant as if she were at one pole and i at the other. besides, at this particular moment, my ex-mistress is seated at her fireside taking lessons in french grammar from vicomte paul, who wishes to bring her back to the paths of virtue by the road of orthography. good heavens, how he will spoil her! however, that regards himself, now that he is editor-in-chief of her happiness. you see, therefore, that your reflections are absurd, and that, instead of following up the half-effaced traces of my old love, i am on the track of my new one, who is already to some extent my neighbor, and will become yet more so: for i am willing to take all the necessary steps, and if she will take the rest, we shall not be long in coming to an understanding." "really," said the poet, "are you in love again already?" "this is what it is," replied rodolphe, "my heart resembles those lodgings that are advertised to let as soon as a tenant leaves them. as soon as one love leaves my heart, i put up a bill for another. the locality besides is habitable and in perfect repair." "and who is this new idol? where and when did you make her acquaintance?" "come," said rodolphe, "let us go through things in order. when mimi went away i thought that i should never be in love again in my life, and imagined that my heart was dead of fatigue, exhaustion, whatever you like. it had been beating so long and so fast, too fast, that the thing was probable. in short i believed it dead, quite dead, and thought of burying it like marlborough. in honor of the occasion i gave a little funeral dinner, to which i invited some of my friends. the guests were to assume a melancholy air, and the bottles had crape around their necks." "you did not invite me." "excuse me, but i did not know your address in that part of cloudland which you inhabit. one of the guests had brought a young lady, a young woman also abandoned a short time before by her lover. she was told my story. it was one of my friends who plays very nicely upon the violoncello of sentiment who did this. he spoke to the young widow of the qualities of my heart, the poor defunct whom we were about to inter, and invited her to drink to its eternal repose. 'come now,' said she, raising her glass, 'i drink, on the contrary, to its very good health,' and she gave me a look, enough, as they say, to awake the dead. it was indeed the occasion to say so, for she had scarcely finished her toast than i heard my heart singing the _o filii_ of the resurrection. what would you have done in my place?" "a pretty question--what is her name?" "i do not know yet, i shall only ask her at the moment we sign our lease. i know very well that in the opinion of some people i have overstepped the legal delays, but you see i plead in my own court, and i have granted a dispensation. what i do know is that she brings me as a dowry cheerfulness, which is the health of the soul, and health which is the cheerfulness of the body." "is she pretty?" "very pretty, especially as regards her complexion; one would say that she made up every morning with watteau's palate, 'she is fair, and her conquering glances kindle love in every heart.' as witness mine." "a blonde? you astonish me." "yes. i have had enough of ivory and ebony; i am going in for a blonde," and rodolphe began to skip about as he sang: "praises sing unto my sweet, she is fair, yellow as the ripening wheat is her hair." "poor mimi," said his friend, "so soon forgotten." this name cast into rodolphe's mirthsomeness, suddenly gave another turn to the conversation. rodolphe took his friend by the arm, and related to him at length the causes of his rupture with mademoiselle mimi, the terrors that had awaited him when she had left; how he was in despair because he thought that she had carried off with her all that remained to him of youth and passion, and how two days later he had recognized his mistake on feeling the gunpowder in his heart, though swamped with so many sobs and tears, dry, kindle, and explode at the first look of love cast at him by the first woman he met. he narrated the sudden and imperious invasion of forgetfulness, without his even having summoned it in aid of his grief, and how this grief was dead and buried in the said forgetfulness. "is it not a miracle?" said he to the poet, who, knowing by heart and from experience all the painful chapters of shattered loves, replied: "no, no, my friend, there is no more of a miracle for you than for the rest of us. what has happened to you has happened to myself. the women we love, when they become our mistresses, cease to be for us what they really are. we do not see them only with a lover's eyes, but with a poet's. as a painter throws on the shoulders of a lay figure the imperial purple or the star-spangled robe of a holy virgin, so we have always whole stores of glittering mantles and robes of pure white linen which we cast over the shoulders of dull, sulky, or spiteful creatures, and when they have thus assumed the garb in which our ideal loves float before us in our waking dreams, we let ourselves be taken in by this disguise, we incarnate our dream in the first corner, and address her in our language, which she does not understand. however, let this creature at whose feet we live prostrate, tear away herself the dense envelope beneath which we have hidden her, and reveal to us her evil nature and her base instincts; let her place our hands on the spot where her heart should be, but where nothing beats any longer, and has perhaps never beaten; let her open her veil, and show us her faded eyes, pale lips, and haggard features; we replace that veil and exclaim, 'it is not true! it is not true! i love you, and you, too, love me! this white bosom holds a heart that has all its youthfulness; i love you, and you love me! you are beautiful, you are young. at the bottom of all your vices there is love. i love you, and you love me!' then in the end, always quite in the end, when, after having all very well put triple bandages over our eyes, we see ourselves the dupes of our mistakes, we drive away the wretch who was our idol of yesterday; we take back from her the golden veils of poesy, which, on the morrow, we again cast on the shoulders of some other unknown, who becomes at once an aureola-surrounded idol. that is what we all are--monstrous egoists--who love love for love's sake--you understand me? we sip the divine liquor from the first cup that comes to hand. 'what matter the bottle, so long as we draw intoxication from it?'" "what you say is as true as that two and two make four," said rodolphe to the poet. "yes," replied the latter, "it is true, and as sad as three quarters of the things that are true. good night." two days later mademoiselle mimi learned that rodolphe had a new mistress. she only asked one thing--whether he kissed her hands as often as he used to kiss her own? "quite as often," replied marcel. "in addition, he is kissing the hairs of her head one after the other, and they are to remain with one another until he has finished." "ah!" replied mimi, passing her hand through her own tresses. "it was lucky he did not think of doing the same with me, or we should have remained together all our lives. do you think it is really true that he no longer loves me at all?" "humph--and you, do you still love him?" "i! i never loved him in my life." "yes, mimi, yes. you loved him at those moments when a woman's heart changes place. you loved him; do nothing to deny it; it is your justification." "bah!" said mimi, "he loves another now." "true," said marcel, "but no matter. later on the remembrance of you will be to him like the flowers that we place fresh and full of perfume between the leaves of a book, and which long afterwards we find dead, discolored, and faded, but still always preserving a vague perfume of their first freshness." * * * * * one evening, when she was humming in a low tone to herself, vicomte paul said to mimi, "what are you singing, dear?" "the funeral chant of our loves, that my lover rodolphe has lately composed." and she began to sing:- "i have not a sou now, my dear, and the rule in such a case surely is soon to forget, so tearless, for she who would weep is a fool, you'll blot out all mem'ry of me, eh, my pet? well, still all the same we have spent as you know some days that were happy--and each with its night, they did not last long, but, alas, here below, the shortest are ever those we deem most bright." chapter xxi romeo and juliet attired like a fashion plate out of his paper, the "scarf of iris," with new gloves, polished boots, freshly shaven face, curled hair, waxed moustache, stick in hand, glass in eye, smiling, youthful, altogether nice looking, in such guise our friend, the poet rodolphe, might have been seen one november evening on the boulevard waiting for a cab to take him home. rodolphe waiting for a cab? what cataclysm had then taken place in his existence? at the very hour that the transformed poet was twirling his moustache, chewing the end of an enormous regalia, and charming the fair sex, one of his friends was also passing down the boulevard. it was the philosopher, gustave colline. rodolphe saw him coming, and at once recognized him; as indeed, who would not who had once seen him? colline as usual was laden with a dozen volumes. clad in that immortal hazel overcoat, the durability of which makes one believe that it must have been built by the romans, and with his head covered by his famous broad brimmed hat, a dome of beaver, beneath which buzzed a swarm of hyperphysical dreams, and which was nicknamed mambrino's helmet of modern philosophy, gustave colline was walking slowly along, chewing the cud of the preface of a book that had already been in the press for the last three months--in his imagination. as he advanced towards the spot where rodolphe was standing, colline thought for a moment that he recognized him, but the supreme elegance displayed by the poet threw the philosopher into a state of doubt and uncertainty. "rodolphe with gloves and a walking stick. chimera! utopia! mental aberration! rodolphe curled and oiled; he who has not so much as father time. what could i be thinking of? besides, at this present moment my unfortunate friend is engaged in lamentations, and is composing melancholy verses upon the departure of mademoiselle mimi, who, i hear, has thrown him over. well, for my part, i too, regret the loss of that young woman. she was a dab hand at making coffee, which is the beverage of serious minds. but i trust that rodolphe will console himself, and soon get another kettle-holder." colline was so delighted with his wretched joke, that he would willingly have applauded it, had not the stern voice of philosophy woke up within him, and put an energetic stop to this perversion of wit. however, as he halted close to rodolphe, colline was forced to yield to evidence. it was certainly rodolphe, curled, gloved, and with a cane. it was impossible, but it was true. "eh! eh! by jove!" said colline. "i am not mistaken. it is you, i am certain." "so am i," replied rodolphe. colline began to look at his friend, imparting to his countenance the expression pictorially made use of by m. lebrun, the king's painter in ordinary, to express surprise. but all at once he noted two strange articles with which rodolphe was laden--firstly, a rope ladder, and secondly, a cage, in which some kind of a bird was fluttering. at this sight, gustave colline's physiognomy expressed a sentiment which monsieur lebrun, the king's painter in ordinary, forgot to depict in his picture of "the passions." "come," said rodolphe to his friend, "i see very plainly the curiosity of your mind peeping out through the window of your eyes; and i am going to satisfy it, only, let us quit the public thoroughfare. it is cold enough here to freeze your questions and my answers." and they both went into a cafe. colline's eyes remained riveted on the rope ladder as well as the cage, in which the bird, thawed by the atmosphere of the cafe, began to sing in a language unknown to colline, who was, however, a polyglottist. "well then," said the philosopher pointing to the rope ladder, "what is that?" "a connecting link between my love and me," replied rodolphe, in lute like accents. "and that?" asked colline, pointing to the bird. "that," said the poet, whose voice grew soft as the summer breeze, "is a clock." "tell me without parables--in vile prose, but truly." "very well. have you read shakespeare?" "have i read him? 'to be or not to be?' he was a great philosopher. yes, i have read him." "do your remember _romeo and juliet_?" "do i remember?" said colline, and he began to recite: "wilt thou begone? it is not yet day, it was the nightingale, and not the lark." "i should rather think i remember. but what then?" "what!" said rodolphe, pointing to the ladder and the bird. "you do not understand! this is the story: i am in love, my dear fellow, in love with a girl named juliet." "well, what then?" said colline impatiently. "this. my new idol being named juliet, i have hit on a plan. it is to go through shakespeare's play with her. in the first place, my name is no longer rodolphe, but romeo montague, and you will oblige me by not calling me otherwise. besides, in order that everyone may know it, i have had some new visiting cards engraved. but that is not all. i shall profit by the fact that we are not in carnival time to wear a velvet doublet and a sword." "to kill tybalt with?" said colline. "exactly," continued rodolphe. "finally, this ladder that you see is to enable me to visit my mistress, who, as it happens, has a balcony." "but the bird, the bird?" said the obstinate colline. "why, this bird, which is a pigeon, is to play the part of the nightingale, and indicate every morning the precise moment when, as i am about to leave her loved arms, my mistress will throw them about my neck and repeat to me in her sweet tones the balcony scene, 'it is not yet near day,' that is to say, 'it is not yet eleven, the streets are muddy, do not go yet, we are comfortable here.' in order to perfect the imitation, i will try to get a nurse, and place her under the orders of my beloved and i hope that the almanac will be kind enough to grant me a little moonlight now and then, when i scale my juliet's balcony. what do you say to my project, philosopher?" "it is very fine," said colline, "but could you also explain to me the mysteries of this splendid outer covering that rendered you unrecognizable? you have become rich, then?" rodolphe did not reply, but made a sign to one of the waiters, and carelessly threw down a louis, saying: "take for what we have had." then he tapped his waistcoat pocket, which gave forth a jingling sound. "have you got a bell in your pocket, for it to jingle as loud as that?" "only a few louis." "louis! in gold?" said colline, in a voice choked with wonderment. "let me see what they are like." after which the two friends parted, colline to go and relate the opulent ways and new loves of rodolphe, and the latter to return home. this took place during the week that had followed the second rupture between rodolphe and mademoiselle mimi. the poet, when he had broken off with his mistress, felt a need of change of air and surroundings, and accompanied by his friend marcel, he left the gloomy lodging house, the landlord of which saw both him and marcel depart without overmuch regret. both, as we have said, sought quarters elsewhere, and hired two rooms in the same house and on the same floor. the room chosen by rodolphe was incomparably more comfortable than any he had inhabited up till then. there were articles of furniture almost imposing, above all a sofa covered with red stuff, that was intended to imitate velvet, and did not. there were also on the mantelpiece two china vases, painted with flowers, between an elaborate clock, with fearful ornamentation. rodolphe put the vases in a cupboard, and when the landlord came to wind up the clock, begged him to do nothing of the kind. "i am willing to leave the clock on the mantel shelf," said he, "but only as an object of art. it points to midnight--a good hour; let it stick to it. the day it marks five minutes past i will move. a clock," continued rodolphe, who had never been able to submit to the imperious tyranny of the dial, "is a domestic foe who implacably reckons up to your existence hour by hour and minute by minute, and says to you every moment, 'here is a fraction of your life gone.' i could not sleep in peace in a room in which there was one of these instruments of torture, in the vicinity of which carelessness and reverie are impossible. a clock, the hands of which stretch to your bed and prick yours whilst you are still plunged in the soft delights of your first awakening. a clock, whose voice cries to you, 'ting, ting, ting; it is the hour for business. leave your charming dream, escape from the caresses of your visions, and sometimes of realities. put on your hat and boots. it is cold, it rains, but go about your business. it is time--ting, ting.' it is quite enough already to have an almanac. let my clock remain paralyzed, or---." whilst delivering this monologue he was examining his new dwelling, and felt himself moved by the secret uneasiness which one almost always feels when going into a fresh lodging. "i have noticed," he reflected, "that the places we inhabit exercise a mysterious influence upon our thoughts, and consequently upon our actions. this room is cold and silent as a tomb. if ever mirth reigns here it will be brought in from without, and even then it will not be for long, for laughter will die away without echoes under this low ceiling, cold and white as a snowy sky. alas! what will my life be like within these four walls?" however, a few days later this room, erst so sad, was full of light, and rang with joyous sounds, it was the house warming, and numerous bottles explained the lively humor of the guests. rodolphe allowed himself to be won upon by the contagious good humor of his guests. isolated in a corner with a young woman who had come there by chance, and whom he had taken possession of, the poet was sonnetteering with her with tongue and hands. towards the close of the festivities he had obtained a rendezvous for the next day. "well!" said he to himself when he was alone, "the evening hasn't been such a bad one. my stay here hasn't begun amiss." the next day mademoiselle juliet called at the appointed hour. the evening was spent only in explanations. juliet had learned the recent rupture of rodolphe with the blue eyed girl whom he had so dearly loved; she knew that after having already left her once before rodolphe had taken her back, and she was afraid of being the victim of a similar reawakening of love. "you see," said she, with a pretty little pout, "i don't at all care about playing a ridiculous part. i warn you that i am very forward, and once _mistress_ here," and she underlined by a look the meaning she gave to the word, "i remain, and do not give up my place." rodolphe summoned all his eloquence to the rescue to convince her that her fears were without foundation, and the girl, having on her side a willingness to be convinced, they ended by coming to an understanding. only they were no longer at an understanding when midnight struck, for rodolphe wanted juliet to stay, and she insisted on going. "no," she said to him as he persisted in trying to persuade her. "why be in such a hurry? we shall always arrive in time at what we want to, provided you do not halt on the way. i will return tomorrow." and she returned thus every evening for a week, to go away in the same way when midnight struck. this delay did not annoy rodolphe very much. in matters of love, and even of mere fancy, he was one of that school of travelers who prolong their journey and render it picturesque. the little sentimental preface had for its result to lead on rodolphe at the outset further than he meant to go. and it was no doubt to lead him to that point at which fancy, ripened by the resistance opposed to it, begins to resemble love, that mademoiselle juliet had made use of this stratagem. at each fresh visit that she paid to rodolphe, juliet remarked a more pronounced tone of sincerity in what he said. he felt when she was a little behindhand in keeping her appointment an impatience that delighted her, and he even wrote her letters the language of which was enough to give her hopes that she would speedily become his legitimate mistress. when marcel, who was his confidant, once caught sight of one of rodolphe's epistles, he said to him: "is it an exercise of style, or do you really think what you have said here?" "yes, i really think it," replied rodolphe, "and i am even a bit astonished at it: but it is so. i was a week back in a very sad state of mind. the solitude and silence that had so abruptly succeeded the storms and tempests of my old household alarmed me terribly, but juliet arrived almost at the moment. i heard the sounds of twenty year old laughter ring in my ears. i had before me a rosy face, eyes beaming with smiles, a mouth overflowing with kisses, and i have quietly allowed myself to glide down the hill of fancy that might perhaps lead me on to love. i love to love." however, rodolphe was not long in perceiving that it only depended upon himself to bring this little romance to a crisis, and it was than that he had the notion of copying from shakespeare the scene of the love of _romeo and juliet_. his future mistress had deemed the notion amusing, and agreed to share in the jest. it was the very evening that the rendezvous was appointed for that rodolphe met the philosopher colline, just as he had bought the rope ladder that was to aid him to scale juliet's balcony. the birdseller to whom he had applied not having a nightingale, rodolphe replaced it by a pigeon, which he was assured sang every morning at daybreak. returned home, the poet reflected that to ascend a rope ladder was not an easy matter, and that it would be a good thing to rehearse the balcony scene, if he would not in addition to the chances of a fall, run the risk of appearing awkward and ridiculous in the eyes of her who was awaiting him. having fastened his ladder to two nails firmly driven into the ceiling, rodolphe employed the two hours remaining to him in practicing gymnastics, and after an infinite number of attempts, succeeded in managing after a fashion to get up half a score of rungs. "come, that is all right," he said to himself, "i am now sure of my affair and besides, if i stuck half way, 'love would lend me his wings.'" and laden with his ladder and his pigeon cage, he set out for the abode of juliet, who lived near. her room looked into a little garden, and had indeed a balcony. but the room was on the ground floor, and the balcony could be stepped over as easily as possible. hence rodolphe was completely crushed when he perceived this local arrangement, which put to naught his poetical project of an escalade. "all the same," said he to juliet, "we can go through the episode of the balcony. here is a bird that will arouse us tomorrow with his melodious notes, and warn us of the exact moment when we are to part from one another in despair." and rodolphe hung up the cage beside the fireplace. the next day at five in the morning the pigeon was exact to time, and filled the room with a prolonged cooing that would have awakened the two lovers--if they had gone to sleep. "well," said juliet, "this is the moment to go into the balcony and bid one another despairing farewells--what do you think of it?" "the pigeon is too fast," said rodolphe. "it is november, and the sun does not rise till noon." "all the same," said juliet, "i am going to get up." "why?" "i feel quite empty, and i will not hide from you the fact that i could very well eat a mouthfull." "the agreement that prevails in our sympathies is astonishing. i am awfully hungry too," said rodolphe, also rising and hurriedly slipping on his clothes. juliet had already lit a fire, and was looking in her sideboard to see whether she could find anything. rodolphe helped her in this search. "hullo," said he, "onions." "and some bacon," said juliet. "some butter." "bread." alas! that was all. during the search the pigeon, a careless optimist, was singing on its perch. romeo looked at juliet, juliet looked at romeo, and both looked at the pigeon. they did not say anything, but the fate of the pigeon-clock was settled. even if he had appealed it would have been useless, hunger is such a cruel counsellor. rodolphe had lit some charcoal, and was turning bacon in the spluttering butter with a solemn air. juliet was peeling onions in a melancholy attitude. the pigeon was still singing, it was the song of the swan. to these lamentations was joined the spluttering of the butter in the stew pan. five minutes later the butter was still spluttering, but the pigeon sang no longer. romeo and juliet grilled their clock. "he had a nice voice," said juliet sitting down to table. "he is very tender," said rodolphe, carving his alarum, nicely browned. the two lovers looked at one another, and each surprised a tear in the other's eye. hypocrites, it was the onions that made them weep. chapter xxii epilogue to the loves of rodolphe and mademoiselle mimi shortly after his final rupture with mademoiselle mimi, who had left him, as may be remembered, to ride in the carriage of vicomte paul, the poet rodolphe had sought to divert his thoughts by taking a new mistress. she was the same blonde for whom we have seen him masquerading as romeo. but this union, which was on the one part only a matter of spite, and on the other one of fancy, could not last long. the girl was after all only a light of love, warbling to perfection the gamut of trickery, witty enough to note the wit of others and to make use of it on occasion, and with only enough heart to feel heartburn when she had eaten too much. add to this unbridled self-esteem and a ferocious coquetry, which would have impelled her to prefer a broken leg for her lover rather than a flounce the less to her dress, or a faded ribbon to her bonnet. a commonplace creature of doubtful beauty, endowed by nature with every evil instinct, and yet seductive from certain points of view and at certain times. she was not long in perceiving that rodolphe had only taken her to help him forget the absent, whom she made him on the contrary regret, for his old love had never been so noisy and so lively in his heart. one day juliet, rodolphe's new mistress, was talking about her lover, the poet, with a medical student who was courting her. the student replied,-"my dear child, that fellow only makes use of you as they use nitrate to cauterize wounds. he wants to cauterize his heart and nerve. you are very wrong to bother yourself about being faithful to him." "ah, ah!" cried the girl, breaking into a laugh. "do you really think that i put myself out about him?" and that very evening she gave the student a proof to the contrary. thanks to the indiscretion of one of those officious friends who are unable to retain unpublished news capable of vexing you, rodolphe soon got wind of the matter, and made it a pretext for breaking off with his temporary mistress. he then shut himself up in positive solitude, in which all the flitter-mice of _ennui_ soon came and nested, and he called work to his aid but in vain. every evening, after wasting as much perspiration over the job as he did in ink, he produced a score of lines in which some old idea, as worn out as the wandering jew, and vilely clad in rags cribbed from the literary dust heap, danced clumsily on the tight rope of paradox. on reading through these lines rodolphe was as bewildered as a man who sees nettles spring up in a bed in which he thought he had planted roses. he would then tear up the paper, on which he had just scattered this chaplet of absurdities, and trample it under foot in a rage. "come," said he, striking himself on the chest just above the heart, "the cord is broken, there is nothing but to resign ourselves to it." and as for some time past a like failure followed all his attempts at work, he was seized with one of those fits of depression which shake the most stubborn pride and cloud the most lucid intellects. nothing is indeed more terrible than these hidden struggles that sometimes take place between the self-willed artist and his rebellious art. nothing is more moving than these fits of rage alternating with invocation, in turn supplicating or imperative, addressed to a disdainful or fugitive muse. the most violent human anguish, the deepest wounds to the quick of the heart, do not cause suffering approaching that which one feels in these hours of doubt and impatience, so frequent for those who give themselves up to the dangerous calling of imagination. to these violent crises succeeded painful fits of depression. rodolphe would then remain for whole hours as though petrified in a state of stupefied immobility. his elbows upon the table, his eyes fixed upon the luminous patch made by the rays of the lamp falling upon the sheet of paper,--the battlefield on which his mind was vanquished daily, and on which his pen had become foundered in its attempts to pursue the unattainable idea--he saw slowly defile before him, like the figures of dissolving views with which the children are amused, fantastic pictures which unfolded before him the panorama of his past. it was at first the laborious days in which each hour marked the accomplishment of some task, the studious nights spent in _tete-a-tete_ with the muse who came to adorn with her fairy visions his solitary and patient poverty. and he remembered then with envy the pride of skill that intoxicated him of yore when he had completed the task imposed on him by his will. "oh, nothing is equal to you!" he exclaimed. "voluptuous fatigues of labor which render the mattresses of idleness so sweet. not the satisfaction of self-esteem nor the feverish slumbers stifled beneath the heavy drapery of mysterious alcoves equals that calm and honest joy, that legitimate self satisfaction which work bestows on the laborer as a first salary." and with eyes still fixed on these visions which continued to retrace for him the scenes of bygone days, he once more ascended the six flights of stairs of all the garrets in which his adventurous existence had been spent, in which the muse, his only love in those days, a faithful and persevering sweetheart had always followed him, living happily with poverty and never breaking off her song of hope. but, lo, in the midst of this regular and tranquil life there suddenly appears a woman's face, and seeing her enter the dwelling where she had been until then sole queen and mistress, the poet's muse rose sadly and gave place to the new-comer in whom she had divined a rival. rodolphe hesitated a moment between the muse to whom his look seemed to say, "stay," whilst a gesture addressed to the stranger said, "come." and how could he repulse her, this charming creature who came to him armed with all the seductions of a beauty at its dawn? tiny mouth and rosy lips, speaking in bold and simple language, full of coaxing promises. how refuse his hand to this little white one, delicately veined with blue, that was held out to him full of caresses? how say, "get you gone," to these eighteen years, the presence of which already filled the home with a perfume of youth and gaiety? and then with her sweet voice, tenderly thrilling, she sang the cavatina of temptation so well. with her bright and sparkling eyes she said so clearly, "i am love," with her lips, where kisses nestled, "i am pleasure," with her whole being, in short, "i am happiness," that rodolphe let himself be caught by them. and, besides, was not this young girl after all real and living poetry, had he not owed her his freshest inspirations, had she not often initiated him into enthusiasms which bore him so far afield in the ether of reverie that he lost sight of all things of earth? if he had suffered deeply on account of her, was not this suffering the expiation of the immense joys she had bestowed upon him? was it not the ordinary vengeance of human fate which forbids absolute happiness as an impiety? if the law of christianity forgives those who have much loved, it is because they have also much suffered, and terrestrial love never became a divine passion save on condition of being purified by tears. as one grows intoxicated by breathing the odor of faded roses, rodolphe again became so by reviving in recollection that past life in which every day brought about a fresh elegy, a terrible drama, or a grotesque comedy. he went through all the phases of his strange love from their honeymoon to the domestic storms that had brought about their last rupture, he recalled all the tricks of his ex-mistress, repeated all her witty sayings. he saw her going to and fro about their little household, humming her favorite song, and facing with the same careless gaiety good or evil days. and in the end he arrived at the conclusion that common sense was always wrong in love affairs. what, indeed, had he gained by their rupture? at the time when he was living with mimi she deceived him, it was true, but if he was aware of this it was his fault after all that he was so, and because he gave himself infinite pains to become aware of it, because he passed his time on the alert for proofs, and himself sharpened the daggers which he plunged into his heart. besides, was not mimi clever enough to prove to him at need that he was mistaken? and then for whose sake was she false to him? it was generally a shawl or a bonnet--for the sake of things and not men. that calm, that tranquillity which he had hoped for on separating from his mistress, had he found them again after her departure? alas, no! there was only herself the less in the house. of old his grief could find vent, he could break into abuse, or representations--he could show all he suffered and excite the pity of her who caused his sufferings. but now his grief was solitary, his jealousy had become madness, for formerly he could at any rate, when he suspected anything, hinder mimi from going out, keep her beside him in his possession, and now he might meet her in the street on the arm of her new lover, and must turn aside to let her pass, happy no doubt, and bent upon pleasure. this wretched life lasted three or four months. by degrees he recovered his calmness. marcel, who had undertaken a long journey to drive musette out of his mind, returned to paris, and again came to live with rodolphe. they consoled one another. one sunday, crossing the luxembourg gardens, rodolphe met mimi resplendently dressed. she was going to a public ball. she nodded to him, to which he responded by a bow. this meeting gave him a great shock, but his emotion was less painful than usual. he walked about for a little while in the gardens, and then returned home. when marcel came in that evening he found him at work. "what!" said marcel, leaning over his shoulder. "you are working--verses?" "yes," replied rodolphe cheerfully, "i believe that the machine will still work. during the last four hours i have once more found the go of bygone time, i have seen mimi." "ah!" said marcel uneasily. "on what terms are you?" "do not be afraid," said rodolphe, "we only bowed to one another. it went no further than that." "really and truly?" asked marcel. "really and truly. it is all over between us, i feel it; but if i can get to work again i forgive her." "if it is so completely finished," said marcel, who had read through rodolphe's verses, "why do you write verses about her?" "alas!" replied the poet, "i take my poetry where i can find it." for a week he worked at this little poem. when he had finished it he read it to marcel, who expressed himself satisfied with it, and who encouraged rodolphe to utilize in other ways the poetical vein that had come back to him. "for," remarked he, "it was not worth while leaving mimi if you are always to live under her shadow. after all, though," he continued, smiling, "instead of lecturing others, i should do well to lecture myself, for my heart is still full of musette. well, after all, perhaps we shall not always be young fellows in love with such imps." "alas!" said rodolphe, "there is no need to say in one's youth, 'be off with you.'" "that is true," observed marcel, "but there are days on which i feel i should like to be a respectable old fellow, a member of the institute, decorated with several orders, and, having done with the musettes of this circle of society; the devil fly away with me if i would return to it. and you," he continued, laughing, "would you like to be sixty?" "today," replied rodolphe, "i would rather have sixty francs." a few days later, mademoiselle mimi having gone into a cafe with young vicomte paul, opened a magazine, in which the verses rodolphe had written on her were printed. "good," said she, laughing at first, "here is my friend rodolphe saying nasty things of me in the papers." but when she finished the verses she remained intent and thoughtful. vicomte paul guessing that she was thinking of rodolphe, sought to divert her attention. "i will buy you a pair of earrings," said he. "ah!" said mimi, "you have money, you have." "and a leghorn straw hat," continued the viscount. "no," said mimi. "if you want to please me, buy me this." and she showed him the magazine in which she had just been reading rodolphe's poetry. "oh! as to that, no," said the viscount, vexed. "very well," said mimi coldly. "i will buy it myself with money i will earn. in point of fact, i would rather that it was not with yours." and for two days mimi went back to her old flower maker's workrooms, where she earned enough to buy this number. she learned rodolphe's poetry by heart, and, to annoy vicomte paul, repeated it all day long to her friends. the verses were as follows: when i was seeking where to pledge my truth chance brought me face to face with you one day; once i offered you my heart, my youth, "do with them what you will," i dared to say. but "what you would," was cruel, dear; alas! the youth i trusted with you is no more: the heart is shattered like a fallen glass, and the wind sings a funeral mass on the deserted chamber floor, where he who loved you ne'er may pass. between us now, my dear, 'tis all up, i am a spectre and a phantom you, our love is dead and buried; if you agree, we'll sing around its tombstone dirges due. but let us take an air in a low key, lest we should strain our voices, more or less; some solemn minor, free from flourishes; i'll take the bass, sing you the melody. mi, re, mi, do, re, la,--ah! not that song! hearing the song that once you used to sing my heart would palpitate--though dead so long- and, at the _de profundis_, upward spring. do, mi, fa, sol, mi, do,--this other brings back to the mind a valse of long ago, the fife's shrill laughter mocked the sounding strings that wept their notes of crystal to the bow. sol, do, do, si, si, la,--ah! stay your hand! this is the air we sang last year in chorus, with germans shouting for their fatherland in meudon woods, while summer's moon stood o'er us. well, well, we will not sing nor speculate, but--since we know they never more may be- on our lost loves, without a grudge or hate, drop, while we smile, a final memory. what times we had up there; do you remember? when on your window panes the rain would stream, and, seated by the fire, in dark december, i felt your eyes inspire me many a dream. the live coal crackled, kindling with the heat, the kettle sang, melodious and sedate, a music for the visionary feet of salamanders leaping in the grate: languid and lazy, with an unread book, you scarcely tried to keep your lids apart, while to my youthful love new growth i took, kissing your hands and yielding you my heart. in merely entering one night believe, one felt a scent of love and gaiety, which filled our little room from morn to eve, for fortune loved our hospitality. and winter went: then, through the open sash, spring flew, to say the year's long night was done; we heard the call, and ran with impulse rash in the green country side to meet the sun. it was the friday of the holy week, the weather, for a wonder, mild and fair; from hill to valley, and from plain to peak, we wandered long, delighting in the air. at length, exhausted by the pilgrimage, we found a sort of natural divan, whence we could view the landscape, or engage our eyes in rapture on the heaven's wide span. hand clasped in hand, shoulder on shoulder laid, with sense of something ventured, something missed, our two lips parted, each; no word was said, and silently we kissed. around us blue-bell and shy violet their simple incense seemed to wave on high; surely we saw, with glances heavenward set, god smiling from his azure balcony. "love on!" he seemed to say, "i make more sweet the road of life you are to wander by, spreading the velvet moss beneath your feet; kiss, if you will; i shall not play the spy." love on, love on! in murmurs of the breeze, in limpid stream, and in the woodland screen that burgeons fresh in the renovated green, in stars, in flowers, and music of the trees, love on, love on! but if my golden sun, my spring, that comes once more to gladden earth, if these should move your breasts to grateful mirth, i ask no thanksgiving, your kiss is one. a month passed by; and, when the roses bloomed in beds that we had planted in the spring, when least of all i thought my love was doomed, you cast it from you like a noisome thing. not that your scorn was all reserved for me, it flies about the world by fits and starts; your changeful fancy fits impartially from knave of diamonds to knave of hearts. and now you are happy, with a brilliant suite of bowing slaves and insincere gallants; go where you will, you see them at your feet; a bed of perfumed posies round you flaunts: the ball's your garden: an admiring globe of lovers rolls about the lit saloon, and, at the rustling of your silken robe, the pack, in chorus, bay you like the moon. shod in the softness of a supple boot which cinderella would have found too small, one scarcely sees your little pointed foot flash in the flashing circle of the ball. shod in the softness of a supple boot which cinderella would have found too small, one scarcely sees your little pointed foot flash in the flashing circle of the ball. in the soft baths that indolence has brought your once brown hands have got the ivory white, the pallor of the lily which has caught the silver moonbeam of a summer night: on your white arm half clouded, and half clear, pearls shine in bracelets made of chiselled gold; on your trim waist a shawl of true cashmere aesthetically falls in waving fold: honiton point and costly mechlin lace, with gothic guipure of a creamy white- the matchless cobwebs of long vanished days- combine to make your presence rich and bright. but i preferred a simpler guise than that, your frock of muslin or plain calico, simple adornments, with a veilless hat, boots, black or grey, a collar white and low. the splendor your admirers now adore will never bring me back my ancient heats; and you are dead and buried, all the more for the silk shroud where heart no longer beats. so when i worked at this funereal dirge, where grief for a lost lifetime stands confessed, i wore a clerk's costume of sable serge, though not gold eye glasses or pleated vest. my penholder was wrapped in mournful crape, the paper with black lines was bordered round on which i labored to provide escape for love's last memory hidden in the ground. and now, when all the heart that i can save is used to furnish forth its epitaph. gay as a sexton digging his own grave i burst into a wild and frantic laugh; a laugh engendered by a mocking vein; the pen i grasped was trembling as i wrote; and even while i laughed, a scalding rain of tears turned all the writing to a blot. it was the 24th of december, and that evening the latin quarter bore a special aspect. since four o'clock in the afternoon the pawnbroking establishments and the shops of the second hand clothes dealers and booksellers had been encumbered by a noisy crowd, who, later in the evening, took the ham and beef shops, cook shops, and grocers by assault. the shopmen, even if they had had a hundred arms, like briareus, would not have sufficed to serve the customers who struggled with one another for provisions. at the baker's they formed a string as in times of dearth. the wine shop keepers got rid of the produce of three vintages, and a clever statistician would have found it difficult to reckon up the number of knuckles of ham and of sausages which were sold at the famous shop of borel, in the rue dauphine. in this one evening daddy cretaine, nicknamed petit-pain, exhausted eighteen editions of his cakes. all night long sounds of rejoicing broke out from the lodging houses, the windows of which were brilliantly lit up, and an atmosphere of revelry filled the district. the old festival of christmas eve was being celebrated. that evening, towards ten o'clock, marcel and rodolphe were proceeding homeward somewhat sadly. passing up the rue dauphine they noticed a great crowd in the shop of a provision dealer, and halted a moment before the window. tantalized by the sight of the toothsome gastronomic products, the two bohemians resembled, during this contemplation, that person in a spanish romance who caused hams to shrink only by looking at them. "that is called a truffled turkey," said marcel, pointing to a splendid bird, showing through its rosy and transparent skin the perigordian tubercles with which it was stuffed. "i have seen impious folk eat it without first going down on their knees before it," added the painter, casting upon the turkey looks capable of roasting it. "and what do you think of that modest leg of salt marsh mutton?" asked rodolphe. "what fine coloring! one might think it was just unhooked from that butcher's shop in one of jordaen's pictures. such a leg of mutton is the favorite dish of the gods, and of my godmother madame chandelier." "look at those fish!" resumed marcel, pointing to some trout. "they are the most expert swimmers of the aquatic race. those little creatures, without any appearance of pretension, could, however, make a fortune by the exhibition of their skill; fancy, they can swim up a perpendicular waterfall as easily as we should accept an invitation to supper. i have almost had a chance of tasting them." "and down there--those large golden fruit, the foliage of which resembles a trophy of savage sabre blades! they are called pineapples, and are the pippins of the tropics." "that is a matter of indifference to me," said marcel. "so far as fruits are concerned, i prefer that piece of beef, that ham, or that simple gammon of bacon, cuirassed with jelly as transparent as amber." "you are right," replied rodolphe. "ham is the friend of man, when he has one. however, i would not repulse that pheasant." "i should think not; it is the dish of crowned heads." and as, continuing on their way, they met joyful processions proceeding homewards, to do honor to momus, bacchus, comus, and all the other divinities with names ending in "us," they asked themselves who was the gamacho whose wedding was being celebrated with such a profusion of victuals. marcel was the first who recollected the date and its festival. "it is christmas eve," said he. "do you remember last year's?" inquired rodolphe. "yes," replied marcel. "at momus's. it was barbemuche who stood treat. i should never have thought that a delicate girl like phemie could have held so much sausage." "what a pity that momus has cut off our credit," said rodolphe. "alas," said marcel, "calendars succeed but do not resemble one another." "would not you like to keep christmas eve?" asked rodolphe. "with whom and with what?" inquired the painter. "with me." "and the coin?" "wait a moment," said rodolphe, "i will go into the cafe, where i know some people who play high. i will borrow a few sesterces from some favorite of fortune, and i will get something to wash down a sardine or a pig's trotter." "go," said marcel. "i am as hungry as a dog. i will wait for you here," rodolphe went into the cafe where he knew several people. a gentleman who had just won three hundred francs at cards made a regular treat of lending the poet a forty sous piece, which he handed over with that ill humor caused by the fever of play. at another time and elsewhere than at a card-table, he would very likely have been good for forty francs. "well?" inquired marcel, on seeing rodolphe return. "here are the takings," said the poet, showing the money. "a bite and a sup," said marcel. with this small sum they were however able to obtain bread, wine, cold meat, tobacco, fire and light. they returned home to the lodging-house in which each had a separate room. marcel's, which also served him as a studio, being the larger, was chosen as the banquetting hall, and the two friends set about the preparations for their feast there. but to the little table at which they were seated, beside a fireplace in which the damp logs burned away without flame or heat, came a melancholy guest, the phantom of the vanished past. they remained for an hour at least, silent, and thoughtful, but no doubt preoccupied by the same idea and striving to hide it. it was marcel who first broke silence. "come," said he to rodolphe, "this is not what we promised ourselves." "what do you mean?" asked rodolphe. "oh!" replied marcel. "do not try to pretend with me now. you are thinking of that which should be forgotten and i too, by jove, i do not deny it." "well?" "well, it must be for the last time. to the devil with recollections that make wine taste sour and render us miserable when everybody else are amusing themselves," exclaimed marcel, alluding to the joyful shouts coming from the rooms adjoining theirs. "come, let us think of something else, and let this be the last time." "that is what we always say and yet--," said rodolphe, falling anew into the reverie. "and yet we are continually going back to it," resumed marcel. "that is because instead of frankly seeking to forget, we make the most trivial things a pretext to recall remembrances, which is due above all to the fact that we persist in living amidst the same surroundings in which the beings who have so long been our torment lived. we are less the slaves of passion than of habit. it is this captivity that must be escaped from, or we shall wear ourselves out in a ridiculous and shameful slavery. well, the past is past, we must break the ties that still bind us to it. the hour has come to go forward without looking backward; we have had our share of youth, carelessness, and paradox. all these are very fine--a very pretty novel could be written on them; but this comedy of amourous follies, this loss of time, of days wasted with the prodigality of people who believe they have an eternity to spend--all this must have an end. it is no longer possible for us to continue to live much longer on the outskirts of society--on the outskirts of life almost--under the penalty of justifying the contempt felt for us, and of despising ourselves. for, after all, is it a life we lead? and are not the independence, the freedom of mannerism of which we boast so loudly, very mediocre advantages? true liberty consists of being able to dispense with the aid of others, and to exist by oneself, and have we got to that? no, the first scoundrel, whose name we would not bear for five minutes, avenges himself for our jests, and becomes our lord and master the day on which we borrow from him five francs, which he lends us after having made us dispense the worth of a hundred and fifty in ruses or in humiliations. for my part, i have had enough of it. poetry does not alone exist in disorderly living, touch-and-go happiness, loves that last as long as a bedroom candle, more or less eccentric revolts against those prejudices which will eternally rule the world, for it is easier to upset a dynasty than a custom, however ridiculous it may be. it is not enough to wear a summer coat in december to have talent; one can be a real poet or artist whilst going about well shod and eating three meals a day. whatever one may say, and whatever one may do, if one wants to attain anything one must always take the commonplace way. this speech may astonish you, friend rodolphe; you may say that i am breaking my idols, you will call me corrupted; and yet what i tell you is the expression of my sincere wishes. despite myself, a slow and salutary metamorphosis has taken place within me; reason has entered my mind--burglariously, if you like, and perhaps against my will, but it has got in at last--and has proved to me that i was on a wrong track, and that it would be at once ridiculous and dangerous to persevere in it. indeed, what will happen if we continue this monotonous and idle vagabondage? we shall get to thirty, unknown, isolated, disgusted with all things and with ourselves, full of envy towards all those whom we see reach their goal, whatever it may be, and obliged, in order to live, to have recourse to shameful parasitism. do not imagine that this is a fancy picture i have conjured up especially to frighten you. the future does not systematically appear to be all black, but neither does it all rose colored; i see it clearly as it is. up till now the life we have led has been forced upon us--we had the excuse of necessity. now we are no longer to be excused, and if we do not re-enter the world, it will be voluntarily, for the obstacles against which we have had to struggle no longer exist." "i say," said rodolphe, "what are you driving at? why and wherefore this lecture?" "you thoroughly understand me," replied marcel, in the same serious tones. "just now i saw you, like myself, assailed by recollections that made you regret the past. you were thinking of mimi and i was thinking of musette. like me, you would have liked to have had your mistress beside you. well, i tell you that we ought neither of us to think of these creatures; that we were not created and sent into the world solely to sacrifice our existence to these commonplace manon lescaut's, and that the chevalier desgrieux, who is so fine, so true, and so poetical, is only saved from being ridiculous by his youth and the illusions he cherishes. at twenty he can follow his mistress to america without ceasing to be interesting, but at twenty-five he would have shown manon the door, and would have been right. it is all very well to talk; we are old, my dear fellow; we have lived too fast, our hearts are cracked, and no longer ring truly; one cannot be in love with a musette or a mimi for three years with impunity. for me it is all over, and i wish to be thoroughly divorced from her remembrance. i am now going to commit to the flames some trifles that she has left me during her various stays, and which oblige me to think of her when i come across them." and marcel, who had risen, went and took from a drawer a little cardboard box in which were the souvenirs of musette--a faded bouquet, a sash, a bit of ribbon, and some letters. "come," said he to the poet, "follow my example, rodolphe." "very well, then," said the latter, making an effort, "you are right. i too will make an end of it with that girl with the white hands." and, rising suddenly, he went and fetched a small packet containing souvenirs of mimi of much the same kind as those of which marcel was silently making an inventory. "this comes in handy," murmured the painter. "this trumpery will help us to rekindle the fire which is going out." "indeed," said rodolphe, "it is cold enough here to hatch polar bears." "come," said marcel, "let us burn in a duet. there goes musette's prose; it blazes like punch. she was very fond of punch. come rodolphe, attention!" and for some minutes they alternately emptied into the fire, which blazed clear and noisily, the reliquaries of their past love. "poor musette!" murmured marcel to himself, looking at the last object remaining in his hands. it was a little faded bouquet of wildflowers. "poor musette, she was very pretty though, and she loved me dearly, is it not so, little bouquet? her heart told you so the day she wore you at her waist. poor little bouquet, you seem to be pleading for mercy; well, yes; but on one condition; it is that you will never speak to me of her any more, never, never!" and profiting by a moment when he thought himself unnoticed by rodolphe, he slipped the bouquet into his breast pocket. "so much the worse, it is stronger than i am. i am cheating," thought the painter. and as he cast a furtive glance towards rodolphe, he saw the poet, who had come to the end of his auto-da-fe, putting quietly into his own pocket, after having tenderly kissed it, a little night cap that had belonged to mimi. "come," muttered marcel, "he is as great a coward as i am." at the very moment that rodolphe was about to return to his room to go to bed, there were two little taps at marcel's door. "who the deuce can it be at this time of night?" said the painter, going to open it. a cry of astonishment burst from him when he had done so. it was mimi. as the room was very dark rodolphe did not at first recognize his mistress, and only distinguishing a woman, he thought that it was some passing conquest of his friend's, and out of discretion prepared to withdraw. "i am disturbing you," said mimi, who had remained on the threshold. at her voice rodolphe dropped on his chair as though thunderstruck. "good evening," said mimi, coming up to him and shaking him by the hand which he allowed her to take mechanically. "what the deuce brings you here and at this time of night?" asked marcel. "i was very cold," said mimi shivering. "i saw a light in your room as i was passing along the street, and although it was very late i came up." she was still shivering, her voice had a cristalline sonority that pierced rodolphe's heart like a funeral knell, and filled it with a mournful alarm. he looked at her more attentively. it was no longer mimi, but her ghost. marcel made her sit down beside the fire. mimi smiled at the sight of the flame dancing merrily on the hearth. "it is very nice," said she, holding out her poor hands blue with cold. "by the way, monsieur marcel, you do not know why i have called on you?" "no, indeed." "well," said mimi, "i simply came to ask you whether you could get them to let me a room here. i have just been turned out of my lodgings because i owe a month's rent and i do not know where to go to." "the deuce!" said marcel, shaking his head, "we are not in very good odor with our landlord and our recommendation would be a most unfortunate one, my poor girl." "what is to be done then?" said mimi. "the fact is i have nowhere to go." "ah!" said marcel. "you are no longer a viscountess, then?" "good heavens, no! not at all." "but since when?" "two months ago, already." "have you been playing tricks on the viscount, then?" "no," said she, glancing at rodolphe, who had taken his place in the darkest corner of the room, "the viscount kicked up a row with me on account of some verses that were written about me. we quarrelled, and i sent him about his business. he is a nice skin flint, i can tell you." "but," said marcel, "he had rigged you out very finely, judging by what i saw the day i met you." "well," said mimi, "would you believe it, that he took everything away from me when i left him, and i have since heard that he raffled all my clothes at a wretched table d'hote where he used to take me to dine. he is wealthy enough, though, and yet with all his fortune he is as miserly as a clay fireball and as stupid as an owl. he would not allow me to drink wine without water, and made me fast on fridays. would you believe it, he wanted me to wear black stockings, because they did not want washing as often as white ones. you have no idea of it, he worried me nicely i can tell you. i can well say that i did my share of purgatory with him." "and does he know your present situation?" asked marcel. "i have not seen him since and i do not want to," replied mimi. "it makes me sick when i think of him. i would rather die of hunger than ask him for a sou." "but," said marcel, "since you left him you have not been living alone." "yes, i assure you, monsieur marcel," exclaimed mimi quickly. "i have been working to earn my living, only as artificial flower making was not a very flourishing business i took up another. i sit to painters. if you have any jobs to give me," she added gaily. and having noticed a movement on the part of rodolphe, whom she did not take her eyes off whilst talking to his friend, mimi went on: "ah, but i only sit for head and hands. i have plenty to do, and i am owed money by two or three, i shall have some in a couple of days, it is only for that interval that i want to find a lodging. when i get the money i shall go back to my own. ah!" said she, looking at the table, which was still laden with the preparation for the modest feast which the two friends had scarcely touched, "you were going to have supper?" "no," said marcel, "we are not hungry." "you are very lucky," said mimi simply. at this remark rodolphe felt a horrible pang in his heart, he made a sign to marcel, which the latter understood. "by the way," said the artist, "since you are here mimi, you must take pot luck with us. we were going to keep christmas eve, and then--why--we began to think of other things." "then i have come at the right moment," said mimi, casting an almost famished glance at the food on the table. "i have had no dinner," she whispered to the artist, so as not to be heard by rodolphe, who was gnawing his handkerchief to keep him from bursting into sobs. "draw up, rodolphe," said marcel to his friend, "we will all three have supper together." "no," said the poet remaining in his corner. "are you angry, rodolphe, that i have come here?" asked mimi gently. "where could i go to?" "no, mimi," replied rodolphe, "only i am grieved to see you like this." "it is my own fault, rodolphe, i do not complain, what is done is done, so think no more about it than i do. cannot you still be my friend, because you have been something else? you can, can you not? well then, do not frown on me, and come and sit down at the table with us." she rose to take him by the hand, but was so weak, that she could not take a step, and sank back into her chair. "the heat has dazed me," she said, "i cannot stand." "come," said marcel to rodolphe, "come and join us." the poet drew up to the table, and began to eat with them. mimi was very lively. "my dear girl, it is impossible for us to get you a room in the house." "i must go away then," said she, trying to rise. "no, no," said marcel. "i have another way of arranging things, you can stay in my room, and i will go and sleep with rodolphe." "it will put you out very much, i am afraid," said mimi, "but it will not be for long, only a couple of days." "it will not put us out at all in that case," replied marcel, "so it is understood, you are at home here, and we are going to rodolphe's room. good night, mimi, sleep well." "thanks," said she, holding out her hand to marcel and rodolphe, who moved away together. "do you want to lock yourself in?" asked marcel as he got to the door. "why?" said mimi, looking at rodolphe, "i am not afraid." when the two friends were alone in rodolphe's room, which was on the same floor, marcel abruptly said to his friend, "well, what are you going to do now?" "i do not know," stammered rodolphe. "come, do not shilly-shally, go and join mimi! if you do, i prophecy that tomorrow you will be living together again." "if it were musette who had returned, what would you do?" inquired rodolphe of his friend. "if it were musette that was in the next room," replied marcel, "well, frankly, i believe that i should not have been in this one for a quarter of an hour past." "well," said rodolphe, "i will be more courageous than you, i shall stay here." "we shall see that," said marcel, who had already got into bed. "are you coming to bed?" "certainly," replied rodolphe. but in the middle of the night, marcel waking up, perceived that rodolphe had left him. in the morning, he went and tapped discreetly at the door of the room in which mimi was. "come in," said she, and on seeing him, she made a sign to him to speak low in order not to wake rodolphe who was asleep. he was seated in an arm chair, which he had drawn up to the side of the bed, his head resting on a pillow beside that of mimi. "it is like that that you passed the night?" said marcel in great astonishment. "yes," replied the girl. rodolphe woke up all at once, and after kissing mimi, held out his hand to marcel, who seemed greatly puzzled. "i am going to find some money for breakfast," said he to the painter. "you will keep mimi company." "well," asked marcel of the girl when they were alone together, "what took place last night?" "very sad things," said mimi. "rodolphe still loves me." "i know that very well." "yes, you wanted to separate him from me. i am not angry about it, marcel, you were quite right, i have done no good to the poor fellow." "and you," asked marcel, "do you still love him?" "do i love him?" said she, clasping her hands. "it is that that tortures me. i am greatly changed, my friend, and it needed but little time for that." "well, now he loves you, you love him and you cannot do without one another, come together again and try and remain." "it is impossible," said mimi. "why?" inquired marcel. "certainly it would be more sensible for you to separate, but as for your not meeting again, you would have to be a thousand leagues from one another." "in a little while i shall be further off than that." "what do you mean?" "do not speak of it to rodolphe, it would cause him too much pain, but i am going away forever." "but whither?" "look here, marcel," said mimi sobbing, "look." and lifting up the sheet of the bed a little she showed the artist her shoulders, neck and arms. "good heavens!" exclaimed marcel mournfully, "poor girl." "is it not true, my friend, that i do not deceive myself and that i am soon going to die." "but how did you get into such a state in so short a time?" "ah!" replied mimi, "with the life i have been leading for the past two months it is not astonishing; nights spent in tears, days passed in posing in studios without any fire, poor living, grief, and then you do not know all, i tried to poison myself with eau de javelle. i was saved but not for long as you see. besides i have never been very strong, in short it is my fault, if i had remained quietly with rodolphe i should not be like this. poor fellow, here i am again upon his hands, but it will not be for long, the last dress he will give me will be all white, marcel, and i shall be buried in it. ah! if you knew how i suffer because i am going to die. rodolphe knows that i am ill, he remained for over an hour without speaking last night when he saw my arms and shoulders so thin. he no longer recognized his mimi. alas! my very looking glass does not know me. ah! all the same i was pretty and he did love me. oh, god!" she exclaimed, burying her face in marcel's hands. "i am going to leave you and rodolphe too, oh god!" and sobs choked her voice. "come, mimi," said marcel, "never despair, you will get well, you only want care and rest." "ah, no!" said mimi. "it is all over, i feel it. i have no longer any strength, and when i came here last night it took me over an hour to get up the stairs. if i found a woman here i should have gone down by way of the window. however, he was free since we were no longer together, but you see, marcel, i was sure he loved me still. it was on account of that," she said, bursting into tears, "it is on account of that that i do not want to die at once, but it is all over with me. he must be very good, poor fellow, to take me back after all the pain i have given him. ah! god is not just, since he does not leave me only the time to make rodolphe forget the grief i caused him. he does not know the state in which i am. i would not have him lie beside me, for i feel as if the earthworms were already devouring my body. we passed the night in weeping and talking of old times. ah! how sad it is, my friend, to see behind one the happiness one has formerly passed by without noticing it. i feel as if i had fire in my chest, and when i move my limbs it seems as if they were going to snap. hand me my dress, i want to cut the cards to see whether rodolphe will bring in any money. i should like to have a good breakfast with you, like we used to; that would not hurt me. god cannot make me worse than i am. see," she added, showing marcel the pack of cards she had cut, "spades--it is the color of death. clubs," she added more gaily, "yes we shall have some money." marcel did not know what to say in presence of the lucid delirium of this poor creature, who already felt, as she said, the worms of the grave. in an hour's time rodolphe was back. he was accompanied by schaunard and gustave colline. the musician wore a summer jacket. he had sold his winter suit to lend money to rodolphe on learning that mimi was ill. colline on his side had gone and sold some books. if he could have got anyone to buy one of his arms or legs he would have agreed to the bargain rather than part with his cherished volumes. but schaunard had pointed out to him that nothing could be done with his arms or his legs. mimi strove to recover her gaiety to greet her old friends. "i am no longer naughty," said she to them, "and rodolphe has forgiven me. if he will keep me with him i will wear wooden shoes and a mob-cap, it is all the same to me. silk is certainly not good for my health," she added with a frightful smile. at marcel's suggestion, rodolphe had sent for one of his friends who had just passed as a doctor. it was the same who had formerly attended francine. when he came they left him alone with mimi. rodolphe, informed by marcel, was already aware of the danger run by his mistress. when the doctor had spoken to mimi, he said to rodolphe: "you cannot keep her here. save for a miracle she is doomed. you must send her to the hospital. i will give you a letter for la pitie. i know one of the house surgeons there; she will be well looked after. if she lasts till the spring we may perhaps pull her through, but if she stays here she will be dead in a week." "i shall never dare propose it to her," said rodolphe. "i spoke to her about it," replied the doctor, "and she agreed. tomorrow i will send you the order of admission to la pitie." "my dear," said mimi to rodolphe, "the doctor is right; you cannot nurse me here. at the hospital they may perhaps cure me, you must send me there. ah! you see i do so long to live now, that i would be willing to end my days with one hand in a raging fire and the other in yours. besides, you will come and see me. you must not grieve, i shall be well taken care of: the doctor told me so. you get chicken at the hospital and they have fires there. whilst i am taking care of myself there, you will work to earn money, and when i am cured i will come back and live with you. i have plenty of hope now. i shall come back as pretty as i used to be. i was very ill in the days before i knew you, and i was cured. yet i was not happy in those days, i might just as well have died. now that i have found you again and that we can be happy, they will cure me again, for i shall fight hard against my illness. i will drink all the nasty things they give me, and if death seizes on me it will be by force. give me the looking glass: it seems to me that i have little color in my cheeks. yes," said she, looking at herself in the glass, "my color is coming back, and my hands, see, they are still pretty; kiss me once more, it will not be the last time, my poor darling," she added, clasping rodolphe round the neck, and burying his face in her loosened tresses. before leaving for the hospital, she wanted her friends the bohemians to stay and pass the evening with her. "make me laugh," said she, "cheerfulness is health to me. it is that wet blanket of a viscount made me ill. fancy, he wanted to make me learn orthography; what the deuce should i have done with it? and his friends, what a set! a regular poultry yard, of which the viscount was the peacock. he marked his linen himself. if he ever marries i am sure that it will be he who will suckle the children." nothing could be more heart breaking than the almost posthumous gaiety of poor mimi. all the bohemians made painful efforts to hide their tears and continue the conversation in the jesting tone started by the unfortunate girl, for whom fate was so swiftly spinning the linen of her last garment. the next morning rodolphe received the order of admission to the hospital. mimi could not walk, she had to be carried down to the cab. during the journey she suffered horribly from the jolts of the vehicle. admist all her sufferings the last thing that dies in woman, coquetry, still survived; two or three times she had the cab stopped before the drapers' shops to look at the display in the windows. on entering the ward indicated in the letter of admission mimi felt a terrible pang at her heart, something within her told her that it was between these bare and leprous walls that her life was to end. she exerted the whole of the will left her to hide the mournful impression that had chilled her. when she was put to bed she gave rodolphe a final kiss and bid him goodbye, bidding him come and see her the next sunday which was a visitors' day. "it does not smell very nice here," said she to him, "bring me some flowers, some violets, there are still some about." "yes," said rodolphe, "goodbye till sunday." and he drew together the curtains of her bed. on hearing the departing steps of her lover, mimi was suddenly seized with an almost delirious attack of fever. she suddenly opened the curtains, and leaning half out of bed, cried in a voice broken with tears: "rodolphe, take me home, i want to go away." the sister of charity hastened to her and tried to calm her. "oh!" said mimi, "i am going to die here." on sunday morning, the day he was to go and see mimi, rodolphe remembered that he had promised her some violets. with poetic and loving superstition he went on foot in horrible weather to look for the flowers his sweetheart had asked him for, in the woods of aulnay and fontenay, where he had so often been with her. the country, so lively and joyful in the sunshine of the bright days of june and july, he found chill and dreary. for two hours he beat the snow covered thickets, lifting the bushes with a stick, and ended by finding a few tiny blossoms, and as it happened, in a part of the wood bordering the le plessis pool, which had been their favorite spot when they came into the country. passing through the village of chatillon to get back to paris, rodolphe met in the square before the church a baptismal procession, in which he recognized one of his friends who was the godfather, with a singer from the opera. "what the deuce are you doing here?" asked the friend, very much surprised to see rodolphe in those parts. the poet told him what had happened. the young fellow, who had known mimi, was greatly saddened at this story, and feeling in his pocket took out a bag of christening sweetmeats and handed it to rodolphe. "poor mimi, give her this from me and tell her i will come and see her." "come quickly, then, if you would come in time," said rodolphe, as he left him. when rodolphe got to the hospital, mimi, who could not move, threw her arms about him in a look. "ah, there are my flowers!" said she, with the smile of satisfied desire. rodolphe related his pilgrimage into that part of the country that had been the paradise of their loves. "dear flowers," said the poor girl, kissing the violets. the sweetmeats greatly pleased her too. "i am not quite forgotten, then. the young fellows are good. ah! i love all your friends," said she to rodolphe. this interview was almost merry. schaunard and colline had rejoined rodolphe. the nurses had almost to turn them out, for they had overstayed visiting time. "goodbye," said mimi. "thursday without fail, and come early." the following day on coming home at night, rodolphe received a letter from a medical student, a dresser at the hospital, to whose care he had recommended the invalid. the letter only contained these words:-"my dear friend, i have very bad news for you. no. 8 is dead. this morning on going through the ward i found her bed vacant." rodolphe dropped on to a chair and did not shed a tear. when marcel came in later he found his friend in the same stupefied attitude. with a gesture the poet showed him the latter. "poor girl!" said marcel. "it is strange," said rodolphe, putting his hand to his heart; "i feel nothing here. was my love killed on learning that mimi was to die?" "who knows?" murmured the painter. mimi's death caused great mourning amongst the bohemians. a week later rodolphe met in the street the dresser who had informed him of his mistress's death. "ah, my dear rodolphe!" said he, hastening up to the poet. "forgive me the pain i caused you by my heedlessness." "what do you mean?" asked rodolphe in astonishment. "what," replied the dresser, "you do not know? you have not seen her again?" "seen whom?" exclaimed rodolphe. "her, mimi." "what?" said the poet, turning deadly pale. "i made a mistake. when i wrote you that terrible news i was the victim of an error. this is how it was. i had been away from the hospital for a couple of days. when i returned, on going the rounds with the surgeons, i found mimi's bed empty. i asked the sister of charity what had become of the patient, and she told me that she had died during the night. this is what had happened. during my absence mimi had been moved to another ward. in no. 8 bed, which she left, they put another woman who died the same day. that will explain the mistake into which i fell. the day after that on which i wrote to you, i found mimi in the next ward. your absence had put her in a terrible state; she gave me a letter for you and i took it on to your place at once." "good god!" said rodolphe. "since i thought mimi dead i have not dared to go home. i have been sleeping here and there at friends' places. mimi alive! good heavens! what must she think of my absence? poor girl, poor girl! how is she? when did you see her last?" "the day before yesterday. she was neither better nor worse, but very uneasy; she fancies you must be ill." "let us go to la pitie at once," said rodolphe, "that i may see her." "stop here for a moment," said the dresser, when they reached the entrance to the hospital, "i will go and ask the house surgeon for permission for you to enter." rodolphe waited in the hall for a quarter of an hour. when the dresser returned he took him by the hand and said these words: "my friend, suppose that the letter i wrote to you a week ago was true?" "what!" exclaimed rodolphe, leaning against a pillar, "mimi--" "this morning at four o'clock." "take me to the amphitheatre," said rodolphe, "that i may see her." "she is no longer there," said the dresser. and pointing out to the poet a large van which was in the courtyard drawn up before a building above which was inscribed, "amphiteatre," he added, "she is there." it was indeed the vehicle in which the corpses that are unclaimed are taken to their pauper's grave. "goodbye," said rodolphe to the dresser. "would you like me to come with you a bit?" suggested the latter. "no," said rodolphe, turning away, "i need to be alone." chapter xxiii youth is fleeting a year after mimi's death rodolphe and marcel, who had not quitted one another, celebrated by a festival their entrance into the official world. marcel, who had at length secured admission to the annual exhibition of pictures, had had two paintings hung, one of which had been bought by a rich englishman, formerly musette's protector. with the product of this sale, and also of a government order, marcel had partly paid off his past debts. he had furnished decent rooms, and had a real studio. almost at the same time schaunard and rodolphe came before the public who bestow fame and fortune--the one with an album of airs that were sung at all the concerts, and which gave him the commencement of a reputation; the other with a book that occupied the critics for a month. as to barbemuche he had long since given up bohemianism. gustave colline had inherited money and made a good marriage. he gave evening parties with music and light refreshments. one evening rodolphe, seated in his own armchair with his feet on his own rug, saw marcel come in quite flurried. "you do not know what has just happened to me," said he. "no," replied the poet. "i know that i have been to your place, that you were at home, and that you would not answer the door." "yes, i heard you. but guess who was with me." "how do i know?" "musette, who burst upon me last evening like a bombshell, got up as a _debardeur_." "musette! you have once more found musette!" said rodolphe, in a tone of regret. "do not be alarmed. hostilities were not resumed. musette came to pass with me her last night of bohemianism." "what?" "she is going to be married." "bah!" said rodolphe. "who is the victim?" "a postmaster who was her last lover's guardian; a queer sort of fellow, it would seem. musette said to him, 'my dear sir, before definitely giving you my hand and going to the registrar's i want to drink my last glass of champagne, dance my last quadrille, and embrace for the last time my lover, marcel, who is now a gentleman, like everybody else is seems.' and for a week the dear creature has been looking for me. hence it was that she burst upon me last evening, just at the moment i was thinking of her. ah, my friend! altogether we had a sad night of it. it was not at all the same thing it used to be, not at all. we were like some wretched copy of a masterpiece? i have even written on the subject of this last separation a little ballad which i will whine out to you if you will allow me," and marcel began to chant the following verses:- i saw a swallow yesterday, he brought spring's promise to the air; "remember her," he seemed to say, "who loved you when she'd time to spare;" and all the day i sate before the almanac of yonder year, when i did nothing but adore, and you were pleased to hold me dear. but do not think my love is dead, or to forget you i begin. if you sought entry to my shed my heart would leap to let you in: since at your name it trembles still- muse of oblivious fantasy!- return and share, if share you will, joy's consecrated bread with me. the decorations of the nest which saw our mutual ardor burn, already seem to wear their best at the mere hope of return. come, see if you can recognize things your departure reft of glee, the bed, the glass of extra size, in which you often drank for me. you shall resume the plain white gown you used to look so nice in, then; on sunday we can still run down to wander in the woods again. beneath the bower, at evening, again we'll drink the liquid bright in which your song would dip its wing before in air it took to flight. musette, who has at last confessed the carnival of life was gone, came back, one morning, to the nest whence, like a wild bird, she had flown: but, while i kissed the fugitive, my heart no more emotion knew, for, she had ceased, for me, to live, and "you," she said, "no more are you." "heart of my heart!" i answered, "go! we cannot call the dead love back; best let it lie, interred, below the tombstone of the almanac perhaps a spirit that remembers the happy time it notes for me may find some day among its embers of a lost paradise the key." "well," said marcel, when he had finished, "you may feel reassured now, my love for musette is dead and buried here," he added ironically, indicating the manuscript of the poem. "poor lad," said rodolphe, "your wit is fighting a duel with your heart, take care it does not kill it." "that is already lifeless," replied the painter, "we are done for, old fellow, we are dead and buried. youth is fleeting! where are you going to dine this evening?" "if you like," said rodolphe, "we will go and dine for twelve sous at our old restaurant in the rue du four, where they have plates of huge crockery, and where we used to feel so hungry when we had done dinner." "no," replied marcel, "i am quite willing to look back at that past, but it must be through the medium of a bottle of good wine and sitting in a comfortable armchair. what would you, i am corrupted. i only care for what is good!" aaron's rod by d. h. lawrence contents i. the blue ball ii. royal oak iii. “the lighted tree” iv. “the pillar of salt” v. at the opera vi. talk vii. the dark square garden viii. a punch in the wind ix. low-water mark x. the war again xi. more pillar of salt xii. novara xiii. wie es ihnen gefaellt xiv. xx settembre xv. a railway journey xvi. florence xvii. high up over the cathedral square xviii. the marchesa xix. cleopatra, but not anthony xx. the broken rod xxi. words chapter i. the blue ball there was a large, brilliant evening star in the early twilight, and underfoot the earth was half frozen. it was christmas eve. also the war was over, and there was a sense of relief that was almost a new menace. a man felt the violence of the nightmare released now into the general air. also there had been another wrangle among the men on the pit-bank that evening. aaron sisson was the last man on the little black railway-line climbing the hill home from work. he was late because he had attended a meeting of the men on the bank. he was secretary to the miners union for his colliery, and had heard a good deal of silly wrangling that left him nettled. he strode over a stile, crossed two fields, strode another stile, and was in the long road of colliers' dwellings. just across was his own house: he had built it himself. he went through the little gate, up past the side of the house to the back. there he hung a moment, glancing down the dark, wintry garden. “my father--my father's come!” cried a child's excited voice, and two little girls in white pinafores ran out in front of his legs. “father, shall you set the christmas tree?” they cried. “we've got one!” “afore i have my dinner?” he answered amiably. “set it now. set it now.--we got it through fred alton.” “where is it?” the little girls were dragging a rough, dark object out of a corner of the passage into the light of the kitchen door. “it's a beauty!” exclaimed millicent. “yes, it is,” said marjory. “i should think so,” he replied, striding over the dark bough. he went to the back kitchen to take off his coat. “set it now, father. set it now,” clamoured the girls. “you might as well. you've left your dinner so long, you might as well do it now before you have it,” came a woman's plangent voice, out of the brilliant light of the middle room. aaron sisson had taken off his coat and waistcoat and his cap. he stood bare-headed in his shirt and braces, contemplating the tree. “what am i to put it in?” he queried. he picked up the tree, and held it erect by the topmost twig. he felt the cold as he stood in the yard coatless, and he twitched his shoulders. “isn't it a beauty!” repeated millicent. “ay!--lop-sided though.” “put something on, you two!” came the woman's high imperative voice, from the kitchen. “we aren't cold,” protested the girls from the yard. “come and put something on,” insisted the voice. the man started off down the path, the little girls ran grumbling indoors. the sky was clear, there was still a crystalline, non-luminous light in the under air. aaron rummaged in his shed at the bottom of the garden, and found a spade and a box that was suitable. then he came out to his neat, bare, wintry garden. the girls flew towards him, putting the elastic of their hats under their chins as they ran. the tree and the box lay on the frozen earth. the air breathed dark, frosty, electric. “hold it up straight,” he said to millicent, as he arranged the tree in the box. she stood silent and held the top bough, he filled in round the roots. when it was done, and pressed in, he went for the wheelbarrow. the girls were hovering excited round the tree. he dropped the barrow and stooped to the box. the girls watched him hold back his face--the boughs pricked him. “is it very heavy?” asked millicent. “ay!” he replied, with a little grunt. then the procession set off--the trundling wheel-barrow, the swinging hissing tree, the two excited little girls. they arrived at the door. down went the legs of the wheel-barrow on the yard. the man looked at the box. “where are you going to have it?” he called. “put it in the back kitchen,” cried his wife. “you'd better have it where it's going to stop. i don't want to hawk it about.” “put it on the floor against the dresser, father. put it there,” urged millicent. “you come and put some paper down, then,” called the mother hastily. the two children ran indoors, the man stood contemplative in the cold, shrugging his uncovered shoulders slightly. the open inner door showed a bright linoleum on the floor, and the end of a brown side-board on which stood an aspidistra. again with a wrench aaron sisson lifted the box. the tree pricked and stung. his wife watched him as he entered staggering, with his face averted. “mind where you make a lot of dirt,” she said. he lowered the box with a little jerk on to the spread-out newspaper on the floor. soil scattered. “sweep it up,” he said to millicent. his ear was lingering over the sudden, clutching hiss of the tree-boughs. a stark white incandescent light filled the room and made everything sharp and hard. in the open fire-place a hot fire burned red. all was scrupulously clean and perfect. a baby was cooing in a rocker-less wicker cradle by the hearth. the mother, a slim, neat woman with dark hair, was sewing a child's frock. she put this aside, rose, and began to take her husband's dinner from the oven. “you stopped confabbing long enough tonight,” she said. “yes,” he answered, going to the back kitchen to wash his hands. in a few minutes he came and sat down to his dinner. the doors were shut close, but there was a draught, because the settling of the mines under the house made the doors not fit. aaron moved his chair, to get out of the draught. but he still sat in his shirt and trousers. he was a good-looking man, fair, and pleasant, about thirty-two years old. he did not talk much, but seemed to think about something. his wife resumed her sewing. she was acutely aware of her husband, but he seemed not very much aware of her. “what were they on about today, then?” she said. “about the throw-in.” “and did they settle anything?” “they're going to try it--and they'll come out if it isn't satisfactory.” “the butties won't have it, i know,” she said. he gave a short laugh, and went on with his meal. the two children were squatted on the floor by the tree. they had a wooden box, from which they had taken many little newspaper packets, which they were spreading out like wares. “don't open any. we won't open any of them till we've taken them all out--and then we'll undo one in our turns. then we s'll both undo equal,” millicent was saying. “yes, we'll take them all out first,” re-echoed marjory. “and what are they going to do about job arthur freer? do they want him?” a faint smile came on her husband's face. “nay, i don't know what they want.--some of 'em want him--whether they're a majority, i don't know.” she watched him closely. “majority! i'd give 'em majority. they want to get rid of you, and make a fool of you, and you want to break your heart over it. strikes me you need something to break your heart over.” he laughed silently. “nay,” he said. “i s'll never break my heart.” “you'll go nearer to it over that, than over anything else: just because a lot of ignorant monkeys want a monkey of their own sort to do the union work, and jabber to them, they want to get rid of you, and you eat your heart out about it. more fool you, that's all i say--more fool you. if you cared for your wife and children half what you care about your union, you'd be a lot better pleased in the end. but you care about nothing but a lot of ignorant colliers, who don't know what they want except it's more money just for themselves. self, self, self--that's all it is with them--and ignorance.” “you'd rather have self without ignorance?” he said, smiling finely. “i would, if i've got to have it. but what i should like to see is a man that has thought for others, and isn't all self and politics.” her color had risen, her hand trembled with anger as she sewed. a blank look had come over the man's face, as if he did not hear or heed any more. he drank his tea in a long draught, wiped his moustache with two fingers, and sat looking abstractedly at the children. they had laid all the little packets on the floor, and millicent was saying: “now i'll undo the first, and you can have the second. i'll take this--” she unwrapped the bit of newspaper and disclosed a silvery ornament for a christmas tree: a frail thing like a silver plum, with deep rosy indentations on each side. “oh!” she exclaimed. “isn't it lovely!” her fingers cautiously held the long bubble of silver and glowing rose, cleaving to it with a curious, irritating possession. the man's eyes moved away from her. the lesser child was fumbling with one of the little packets. “oh!”--a wail went up from millicent. “you've taken one!--you didn't wait.” then her voice changed to a motherly admonition, and she began to interfere. “this is the way to do it, look! let me help you.” but marjory drew back with resentment. “don't, millicent!--don't!” came the childish cry. but millicent's fingers itched. at length marjory had got out her treasure--a little silvery bell with a glass top hanging inside. the bell was made of frail glassy substance, light as air. “oh, the bell!” rang out millicent's clanging voice. “the bell! it's my bell. my bell! it's mine! don't break it, marjory. don't break it, will you?” marjory was shaking the bell against her ear. but it was dumb, it made no sound. “you'll break it, i know you will.--you'll break it. give it me--” cried millicent, and she began to take away the bell. marjory set up an expostulation. “let her alone,” said the father. millicent let go as if she had been stung, but still her brassy, impudent voice persisted: “she'll break it. she'll break it. it's mine--” “you undo another,” said the mother, politic. millicent began with hasty, itching fingers to unclose another package. “aw--aw mother, my peacock--aw, my peacock, my green peacock!” lavishly she hovered over a sinuous greenish bird, with wings and tail of spun glass, pearly, and body of deep electric green. “it's mine--my green peacock! it's mine, because marjory's had one wing off, and mine hadn't. my green peacock that i love! i love it!” she swung it softly from the little ring on its back. then she went to her mother. “look, mother, isn't it a beauty?” “mind the ring doesn't come out,” said her mother. “yes, it's lovely!” the girl passed on to her father. “look, father, don't you love it!” “love it?” he re-echoed, ironical over the word love. she stood for some moments, trying to force his attention. then she went back to her place. marjory had brought forth a golden apple, red on one cheek, rather garish. “oh!” exclaimed millicent feverishly, instantly seized with desire for what she had not got, indifferent to what she had. her eye ran quickly over the packages. she took one. “now!” she exclaimed loudly, to attract attention. “now! what's this?--what's this? what will this beauty be?” with finicky fingers she removed the newspaper. marjory watched her wide-eyed. millicent was self-important. “the blue ball!” she cried in a climax of rapture. “i've got the blue ball.” she held it gloating in the cup of her hands. it was a little globe of hardened glass, of a magnificent full dark blue color. she rose and went to her father. “it was your blue ball, wasn't it, father?” “yes.” “and you had it when you were a little boy, and now i have it when i'm a little girl.” “ay,” he replied drily. “and it's never been broken all those years.” “no, not yet.” “and perhaps it never will be broken.” to this she received no answer. “won't it break?” she persisted. “can't you break it?” “yes, if you hit it with a hammer,” he said. “aw!” she cried. “i don't mean that. i mean if you just drop it. it won't break if you drop it, will it?” “i dare say it won't.” “but will it?” “i sh'd think not.” “should i try?” she proceeded gingerly to let the blue ball drop, it bounced dully on the floor-covering. “oh-h-h!” she cried, catching it up. “i love it.” “let me drop it,” cried marjory, and there was a performance of admonition and demonstration from the elder sister. but millicent must go further. she became excited. “it won't break,” she said, “even if you toss it up in the air.” she flung it up, it fell safely. but her father's brow knitted slightly. she tossed it wildly: it fell with a little splashing explosion: it had smashed. it had fallen on the sharp edge of the tiles that protruded under the fender. “now what have you done!” cried the mother. the child stood with her lip between her teeth, a look, half, of pure misery and dismay, half of satisfaction, on her pretty sharp face. “she wanted to break it,” said the father. “no, she didn't! what do you say that for!” said the mother. and millicent burst into a flood of tears. he rose to look at the fragments that lay splashed on the floor. “you must mind the bits,” he said, “and pick 'em all up.” he took one of the pieces to examine it. it was fine and thin and hard, lined with pure silver, brilliant. he looked at it closely. so--this was what it was. and this was the end of it. he felt the curious soft explosion of its breaking still in his ears. he threw his piece in the fire. “pick all the bits up,” he said. “give over! give over! don't cry any more.” the good-natured tone of his voice quieted the child, as he intended it should. he went away into the back kitchen to wash himself. as he was bending his head over the sink before the little mirror, lathering to shave, there came from outside the dissonant voices of boys, pouring out the dregs of carol-singing. “while shep-ep-ep-ep-herds watched--” he held his soapy brush suspended for a minute. they called this singing! his mind flitted back to early carol music. then again he heard the vocal violence outside. “aren't you off there!” he called out, in masculine menace. the noise stopped, there was a scuffle. but the feet returned and the voices resumed. almost immediately the door opened, boys were heard muttering among themselves. millicent had given them a penny. feet scraped on the yard, then went thudding along the side of the house, to the street. to aaron sisson, this was home, this was christmas: the unspeakably familiar. the war over, nothing was changed. yet everything changed. the scullery in which he stood was painted green, quite fresh, very clean, the floor was red tiles. the wash-copper of red bricks was very red, the mangle with its put-up board was white-scrubbed, the american oil-cloth on the table had a gay pattern, there was a warm fire, the water in the boiler hissed faintly. and in front of him, beneath him as he leaned forward shaving, a drop of water fell with strange, incalculable rhythm from the bright brass tap into the white enamelled bowl, which was now half full of pure, quivering water. the war was over, and everything just the same. the acute familiarity of this house, which he had built for his marriage twelve years ago, the changeless pleasantness of it all seemed unthinkable. it prevented his thinking. when he went into the middle room to comb his hair he found the christmas tree sparkling, his wife was making pastry at the table, the baby was sitting up propped in cushions. “father,” said millicent, approaching him with a flat blue-and-white angel of cotton-wool, and two ends of cotton--“tie the angel at the top.” “tie it at the top?” he said, looking down. “yes. at the very top--because it's just come down from the sky.” “ay my word!” he laughed. and he tied the angel. coming downstairs after changing he went into the icy cold parlour, and took his music and a small handbag. with this he retreated again to the back kitchen. he was still in trousers and shirt and slippers: but now it was a clean white shirt, and his best black trousers, and new pink and white braces. he sat under the gas-jet of the back kitchen, looking through his music. then he opened the bag, in which were sections of a flute and a piccolo. he took out the flute, and adjusted it. as he sat he was physically aware of the sounds of the night: the bubbling of water in the boiler, the faint sound of the gas, the sudden crying of the baby in the next room, then noises outside, distant boys shouting, distant rags of carols, fragments of voices of men. the whole country was roused and excited. the little room was hot. aaron rose and opened a square ventilator over the copper, letting in a stream of cold air, which was grateful to him. then he cocked his eye over the sheet of music spread out on the table before him. he tried his flute. and then at last, with the odd gesture of a diver taking a plunge, he swung his head and began to play. a stream of music, soft and rich and fluid, came out of the flute. he played beautifully. he moved his head and his raised bare arms with slight, intense movements, as the delicate music poured out. it was sixteenth-century christmas melody, very limpid and delicate. the pure, mindless, exquisite motion and fluidity of the music delighted him with a strange exasperation. there was something tense, exasperated to the point of intolerable anger, in his good-humored breast, as he played the finely-spun peace-music. the more exquisite the music, the more perfectly he produced it, in sheer bliss; and at the same time, the more intense was the maddened exasperation within him. millicent appeared in the room. she fidgetted at the sink. the music was a bugbear to her, because it prevented her from saying what was on her own mind. at length it ended, her father was turning over the various books and sheets. she looked at him quickly, seizing her opportunity. “are you going out, father?” she said. “eh?” “are you going out?” she twisted nervously. “what do you want to know for?” he made no other answer, and turned again to the music. his eye went down a sheet--then over it again--then more closely over it again. “are you?” persisted the child, balancing on one foot. he looked at her, and his eyes were angry under knitted brows. “what are you bothering about?” he said. “i'm not bothering--i only wanted to know if you were going out,” she pouted, quivering to cry. “i expect i am,” he said quietly. she recovered at once, but still with timidity asked: “we haven't got any candles for the christmas tree--shall you buy some, because mother isn't going out?” “candles!” he repeated, settling his music and taking up the piccolo. “yes--shall you buy us some, father? shall you?” “candles!” he repeated, putting the piccolo to his mouth and blowing a few piercing, preparatory notes. “yes, little christmas-tree candles--blue ones and red ones, in boxes--shall you, father?” “we'll see--if i see any--” “but shall you?” she insisted desperately. she wisely mistrusted his vagueness. but he was looking unheeding at the music. then suddenly the piccolo broke forth, wild, shrill, brilliant. he was playing mozart. the child's face went pale with anger at the sound. she turned, and went out, closing both doors behind her to shut out the noise. the shrill, rapid movement of the piccolo music seemed to possess the air, it was useless to try to shut it out. the man went on playing to himself, measured and insistent. in the frosty evening the sound carried. people passing down the street hesitated, listening. the neighbours knew it was aaron practising his piccolo. he was esteemed a good player: was in request at concerts and dances, also at swell balls. so the vivid piping sound tickled the darkness. he played on till about seven o'clock; he did not want to go out too soon, in spite of the early closing of the public houses. he never went with the stream, but made a side current of his own. his wife said he was contrary. when he went into the middle room to put on his collar and tie, the two little girls were having their hair brushed, the baby was in bed, there was a hot smell of mince-pies baking in the oven. “you won't forget our candles, will you, father?” asked millicent, with assurance now. “i'll see,” he answered. his wife watched him as he put on his overcoat and hat. he was well-dressed, handsome-looking. she felt there was a curious glamour about him. it made her feel bitter. he had an unfair advantage--he was free to go off, while she must stay at home with the children. “there's no knowing what time you'll be home,” she said. “i shan't be late,” he answered. “it's easy to say so,” she retorted, with some contempt. he took his stick, and turned towards the door. “bring the children some candles for their tree, and don't be so selfish,” she said. “all right,” he said, going out. “don't say all right if you never mean to do it,” she cried, with sudden anger, following him to the door. his figure stood large and shadowy in the darkness. “how many do you want?” he said. “a dozen,” she said. “and holders too, if you can get them,” she added, with barren bitterness. “yes--all right,” he turned and melted into the darkness. she went indoors, worn with a strange and bitter flame. he crossed the fields towards the little town, which once more fumed its lights under the night. the country ran away, rising on his right hand. it was no longer a great bank of darkness. lights twinkled freely here and there, though forlornly, now that the war-time restrictions were removed. it was no glitter of pre-war nights, pit-heads glittering far-off with electricity. neither was it the black gulf of the war darkness: instead, this forlorn sporadic twinkling. everybody seemed to be out of doors. the hollow dark countryside re-echoed like a shell with shouts and calls and excited voices. restlessness and nervous excitement, nervous hilarity were in the air. there was a sense of electric surcharge everywhere, frictional, a neurasthenic haste for excitement. every moment aaron sisson was greeted with good-night--good-night, aaron--good-night, mr. sisson. people carrying parcels, children, women, thronged home on the dark paths. they were all talking loudly, declaiming loudly about what they could and could not get, and what this or the other had lost. when he got into the main street, the only street of shops, it was crowded. there seemed to have been some violent but quiet contest, a subdued fight, going on all the afternoon and evening: people struggling to buy things, to get things. money was spent like water, there was a frenzy of money-spending. though the necessities of life were in abundance, still the people struggled in frenzy for cheese, sweets, raisins, pork-stuff, even for flowers and holly, all of which were scarce, and for toys and knick-knacks, which were sold out. there was a wild grumbling, but a deep satisfaction in the fight, the struggle. the same fight and the same satisfaction in the fight was witnessed whenever a tram-car stopped, or when it heaved its way into sight. then the struggle to mount on board became desperate and savage, but stimulating. souls surcharged with hostility found now some outlet for their feelings. as he came near the little market-place he bethought himself of the christmas-tree candles. he did not intend to trouble himself. and yet, when he glanced in passing into the sweet-shop window, and saw it bare as a board, the very fact that he probably _could not_ buy the things made him hesitate, and try. “have you got any christmas-tree candles?” he asked as he entered the shop. “how many do you want?” “a dozen.” “can't let you have a dozen. you can have two boxes--four in a box--eight. six-pence a box.” “got any holders?” “holders? don't ask. haven't seen one this year.” “got any toffee--?” “cough-drops--two-pence an ounce--nothing else left.” “give me four ounces.” he watched her weighing them in the little brass scales. “you've not got much of a christmas show,” he said. “don't talk about christmas, as far as sweets is concerned. they ought to have allowed us six times the quantity--there's plenty of sugar, why didn't they? we s'll have to enjoy ourselves with what we've got. we mean to, anyhow.” “ay,” he said. “time we had a bit of enjoyment, this christmas. they ought to have made things more plentiful.” “yes,” he said, stuffing his package in his pocket. chapter ii. royal oak the war had killed the little market of the town. as he passed the market place on the brow, aaron noticed that there were only two miserable stalls. but people crowded just the same. there was a loud sound of voices, men's voices. men pressed round the doorways of the public-houses. but he was going to a pub out of town. he descended the dark hill. a street-lamp here and there shed parsimonious light. in the bottoms, under the trees, it was very dark. but a lamp glimmered in front of the “royal oak.” this was a low white house sunk three steps below the highway. it was darkened, but sounded crowded. opening the door, sisson found himself in the stone passage. old bob, carrying three cans, stopped to see who had entered--then went on into the public bar on the left. the bar itself was a sort of little window-sill on the right: the pub was a small one. in this window-opening stood the landlady, drawing and serving to her husband. behind the bar was a tiny parlour or den, the landlady's preserve. “oh, it's you,” she said, bobbing down to look at the newcomer. none entered her bar-parlour unless invited. “come in,” said the landlady. there was a peculiar intonation in her complacent voice, which showed she had been expecting him, a little irritably. he went across into her bar-parlour. it would not hold more than eight or ten people, all told--just the benches along the walls, the fire between--and two little round tables. “i began to think you weren't coming,” said the landlady, bringing him a whiskey. she was a large, stout, high-coloured woman, with a fine profile, probably jewish. she had chestnut-coloured eyes, quick, intelligent. her movements were large and slow, her voice laconic. “i'm not so late, am i?” asked aaron. “yes, you are late, i should think.” she looked up at the little clock. “close on nine.” “i did some shopping,” said aaron, with a quick smile. “did you indeed? that's news, i'm sure. may we ask what you bought?” this he did not like. but he had to answer. “christmas-tree candles, and toffee.” “for the little children? well you've done well for once! i must say i recommend you. i didn't think you had so much in you.” she sat herself down in her seat at the end of the bench, and took up her knitting. aaron sat next to her. he poured water into his glass, and drank. “it's warm in here,” he said, when he had swallowed the liquor. “yes, it is. you won't want to keep that thick good overcoat on,” replied the landlady. “no,” he said, “i think i'll take it off.” she watched him as he hung up his overcoat. he wore black clothes, as usual. as he reached up to the pegs, she could see the muscles of his shoulders, and the form of his legs. her reddish-brown eyes seemed to burn, and her nose, that had a subtle, beautiful hebraic curve, seemed to arch itself. she made a little place for him by herself, as he returned. she carried her head thrown back, with dauntless self-sufficiency. there were several colliers in the room, talking quietly. they were the superior type all, favoured by the landlady, who loved intellectual discussion. opposite, by the fire, sat a little, greenish man--evidently an oriental. “you're very quiet all at once, doctor,” said the landlady in her slow, laconic voice. “yes.--may i have another whiskey, please?” she rose at once, powerfully energetic. “oh, i'm sorry,” she said. and she went to the bar. “well,” said the little hindu doctor, “and how are things going now, with the men?” “the same as ever,” said aaron. “yes,” said the stately voice of the landlady. “and i'm afraid they will always be the same as ever. when will they learn wisdom?” “but what do you call wisdom?” asked sherardy, the hindu. he spoke with a little, childish lisp. “what do i call wisdom?” repeated the landlady. “why all acting together for the common good. that is wisdom in my idea.” “yes, very well, that is so. but what do you call the common good?” replied the little doctor, with childish pertinence. “ay,” said aaron, with a laugh, “that's it.” the miners were all stirring now, to take part in the discussion. “what do i call the common good?” repeated the landlady. “that all people should study the welfare of other people, and not only their own.” “they are not to study their own welfare?” said the doctor. “ah, that i did not say,” replied the landlady. “let them study their own welfare, and that of others also.” “well then,” said the doctor, “what is the welfare of a collier?” “the welfare of a collier,” said the landlady, “is that he shall earn sufficient wages to keep himself and his family comfortable, to educate his children, and to educate himself; for that is what he wants, education.” “ay, happen so,” put in brewitt, a big, fine, good-humoured collier. “happen so, mrs. houseley. but what if you haven't got much education, to speak of?” “you can always get it,” she said patronizing. “nay--i'm blest if you can. it's no use tryin' to educate a man over forty--not by book-learning. that isn't saying he's a fool, neither.” “and what better is them that's got education?” put in another man. “what better is the manager, or th' under-manager, than we are?--pender's yaller enough i' th' face.” “he is that,” assented the men in chorus. “but because he's yellow in the face, as you say, mr. kirk,” said the landlady largely, “that doesn't mean he has no advantages higher than what you have got.” “ay,” said kirk. “he can ma'e more money than i can--that's about a' as it comes to.” “he can make more money,” said the landlady. “and when he's made it, he knows better how to use it.” “'appen so, an' a'!--what does he do, more than eat and drink and work?--an' take it out of hisself a sight harder than i do, by th' looks of him.--what's it matter, if he eats a bit more or drinks a bit more--” “no,” reiterated the landlady. “he not only eats and drinks. he can read, and he can converse.” “me an' a',” said tom kirk, and the men burst into a laugh. “i can read--an' i've had many a talk an' conversation with you in this house, mrs. houseley--am havin' one at this minute, seemingly.” “seemingly, you are,” said the landlady ironically. “but do you think there would be no difference between your conversation, and mr. pender's, if he were here so that i could enjoy his conversation?” “an' what difference would there be?” asked tom kirk. “he'd go home to his bed just the same.” “there, you are mistaken. he would be the better, and so should i, a great deal better, for a little genuine conversation.” “if it's conversation as ma'es his behind drop--” said tom kirk. “an' puts th' bile in his face--” said brewitt. there was a general laugh. “i can see it's no use talking about it any further,” said the landlady, lifting her head dangerously. “but look here, mrs. houseley, do you really think it makes much difference to a man, whether he can hold a serious conversation or not?” asked the doctor. “i do indeed, all the difference in the world--to me, there is no greater difference, than between an educated man and an uneducated man.” “and where does it come in?” asked kirk. “but wait a bit, now,” said aaron sisson. “you take an educated man--take pender. what's his education for? what does he scheme for?--what does he contrive for? what does he talk for?--” “for all the purposes of his life,” replied the landlady. “ay, an' what's the purpose of his life?” insisted aaron sisson. “the purpose of his life,” repeated the landlady, at a loss. “i should think he knows that best himself.” “no better than i know it--and you know it,” said aaron. “well,” said the landlady, “if you know, then speak out. what is it?” “to make more money for the firm--and so make his own chance of a rise better.” the landlady was baffled for some moments. then she said: “yes, and suppose that he does. is there any harm in it? isn't it his duty to do what he can for himself? don't you try to earn all you can?” “ay,” said aaron. “but there's soon a limit to what i can earn.--it's like this. when you work it out, everything comes to money. reckon it as you like, it's money on both sides. it's money we live for, and money is what our lives is worth--nothing else. money we live for, and money we are when we're dead: that or nothing. an' it's money as is between the masters and us. there's a few educated ones got hold of one end of the rope, and all the lot of us hanging on to th' other end, an' we s'll go on pulling our guts out, time in, time out--” “but they've got th' long end o' th' rope, th' masters has,” said brewitt. “for as long as one holds, the other will pull,” concluded aaron sisson philosophically. “an' i'm almighty sure o' that,” said kirk. there was a little pause. “yes, that's all there is in the minds of you men,” said the landlady. “but what can be done with the money, that you never think of--the education of the children, the improvement of conditions--” “educate the children, so that they can lay hold of the long end of the rope, instead of the short end,” said the doctor, with a little giggle. “ay, that's it,” said brewitt. “i've pulled at th' short end, an' my lads may do th' same.” “a selfish policy,” put in the landlady. “selfish or not, they may do it.” “till the crack o' doom,” said aaron, with a glistening smile. “or the crack o' th' rope,” said brewitt. “yes, and then what?” cried the landlady. “then we all drop on our backsides,” said kirk. there was a general laugh, and an uneasy silence. “all i can say of you men,” said the landlady, “is that you have a narrow, selfish policy.--instead of thinking of the children, instead of thinking of improving the world you live in--” “we hang on, british bulldog breed,” said brewitt. there was a general laugh. “yes, and little wiser than dogs, wrangling for a bone,” said the landlady. “are we to let t' other side run off wi' th' bone, then, while we sit on our stunts an' yowl for it?” asked brewitt. “no indeed. there can be wisdom in everything.--it's what you do with the money, when you've got it,” said the landlady, “that's where the importance lies.” “it's missis as gets it,” said kirk. “it doesn't stop wi' us.” “ay, it's the wife as gets it, ninety per cent,” they all concurred. “and who should have the money, indeed, if not your wives? they have everything to do with the money. what idea have you, but to waste it!” “women waste nothing--they couldn't if they tried,” said aaron sisson. there was a lull for some minutes. the men were all stimulated by drink. the landlady kept them going. she herself sipped a glass of brandy--but slowly. she sat near to sisson--and the great fierce warmth of her presence enveloped him particularly. he loved so to luxuriate, like a cat, in the presence of a violent woman. he knew that tonight she was feeling very nice to him--a female glow that came out of her to him. sometimes when she put down her knitting, or took it up again from the bench beside him, her fingers just touched his thigh, and the fine electricity ran over his body, as if he were a cat tingling at a caress. and yet he was not happy--nor comfortable. there was a hard, opposing core in him, that neither the whiskey nor the woman could dissolve or soothe, tonight. it remained hard, nay, became harder and more deeply antagonistic to his surroundings, every moment. he recognised it as a secret malady he suffered from: this strained, unacknowledged opposition to his surroundings, a hard core of irrational, exhausting withholding of himself. irritating, because he still wanted to give himself. a woman and whiskey, these were usually a remedy--and music. but lately these had begun to fail him. no, there was something in him that would not give in--neither to the whiskey, nor the woman, nor even the music. even in the midst of his best music, it sat in the middle of him, this invisible black dog, and growled and waited, never to be cajoled. he knew of its presence--and was a little uneasy. for of course he _wanted_ to let himself go, to feel rosy and loving and all that. but at the very thought, the black dog showed its teeth. still he kept the beast at bay--with all his will he kept himself as it were genial. he wanted to melt and be rosy, happy. he sipped his whiskey with gratification, he luxuriated in the presence of the landlady, very confident of the strength of her liking for him. he glanced at her profile--that fine throw-back of her hostile head, wicked in the midst of her benevolence; that subtle, really very beautiful delicate curve of her nose, that moved him exactly like a piece of pure sound. but tonight it did not overcome him. there was a devilish little cold eye in his brain that was not taken in by what he saw. a terrible obstinacy located itself in him. he saw the fine, rich-coloured, secretive face of the hebrew woman, so loudly self-righteous, and so dangerous, so destructive, so lustful--and he waited for his blood to melt with passion for her. but not tonight. tonight his innermost heart was hard and cold as ice. the very danger and lustfulness of her, which had so pricked his senses, now made him colder. he disliked her at her tricks. he saw her once too often. her and all women. bah, the love game! and the whiskey that was to help in the game! he had drowned himself once too often in whiskey and in love. now he floated like a corpse in both, with a cold, hostile eye. and at least half of his inward fume was anger because he could no longer drown. nothing would have pleased him better than to feel his senses melting and swimming into oneness with the dark. but impossible! cold, with a white fury inside him, he floated wide eyed and apart as a corpse. he thought of the gentle love of his first married years, and became only whiter and colder, set in more intense obstinacy. a wave of revulsion lifted him. he became aware that he was deadly antagonistic to the landlady, that he disliked his whole circumstances. a cold, diabolical consciousness detached itself from his state of semi-intoxication. “is it pretty much the same out there in india?” he asked of the doctor, suddenly. the doctor started, and attended to him on his own level. “probably,” he answered. “it is worse.” “worse!” exclaimed aaron sisson. “how's that?” “why, because, in a way the people of india have an easier time even than the people of england. because they have no responsibility. the british government takes the responsibility. and the people have nothing to do, except their bit of work--and talk perhaps about national rule, just for a pastime.” “they have to earn their living?” said sisson. “yes,” said the little doctor, who had lived for some years among the colliers, and become quite familiar with them. “yes, they have to earn their living--and then no more. that's why the british government is the worst thing possible for them. it is the worst thing possible. and not because it is a bad government. really, it is not a bad government. it is a good one--and they know it--much better than they would make for themselves, probably. but for that reason it is so very bad.” the little oriental laughed a queer, sniggering laugh. his eyes were very bright, dilated, completely black. he was looking into the ice-blue, pointed eyes of aaron sisson. they were both intoxicated--but grimly so. they looked at each other in elemental difference. the whole room was now attending to this new conversation: which they all accepted as serious. for aaron was considered a special man, a man of peculiar understanding, even though as a rule he said little. “if it is a good government, doctor, how can it be so bad for the people?” said the landlady. the doctor's eyes quivered for the fraction of a second, as he watched the other man. he did not look at the landlady. “it would not matter what kind of mess they made--and they would make a mess, if they governed themselves, the people of india. they would probably make the greatest muddle possible--and start killing one another. but it wouldn't matter if they exterminated half the population, so long as they did it themselves, and were responsible for it.” again his eyes dilated, utterly black, to the eyes of the other man, and an arch little smile flickered on his face. “i think it would matter very much indeed,” said the landlady. “they had far better not govern themselves.” she was, for some reason, becoming angry. the little greenish doctor emptied his glass, and smiled again. “but what difference does it make,” said aaron sisson, “whether they govern themselves or not? they only live till they die, either way.” and he smiled faintly. he had not really listened to the doctor. the terms “british government,” and “bad for the people--good for the people,” made him malevolently angry. the doctor was nonplussed for a moment. then he gathered himself together. “it matters,” he said; “it matters.--people should always be responsible for themselves. how can any people be responsible for another race of people, and for a race much older than they are, and not at all children.” aaron sisson watched the other's dark face, with its utterly exposed eyes. he was in a state of semi-intoxicated anger and clairvoyance. he saw in the black, void, glistening eyes of the oriental only the same danger, the same menace that he saw in the landlady. fair, wise, even benevolent words: always the human good speaking, and always underneath, something hateful, something detestable and murderous. wise speech and good intentions--they were invariably maggoty with these secret inclinations to destroy the man in the man. whenever he heard anyone holding forth: the landlady, this doctor, the spokesman on the pit bank: or when he read the all-righteous newspaper; his soul curdled with revulsion as from something foul. even the infernal love and good-will of his wife. to hell with good-will! it was more hateful than ill-will. self-righteous bullying, like poison gas! the landlady looked at the clock. “ten minutes to, gentlemen,” she said coldly. for she too knew that aaron was spoiled for her for that night. the men began to take their leave, shakily. the little doctor seemed to evaporate. the landlady helped aaron on with his coat. she saw the curious whiteness round his nostrils and his eyes, the fixed hellish look on his face. “you'll eat a mince-pie in the kitchen with us, for luck?” she said to him, detaining him till last. but he turned laughing to her. “nay,” he said, “i must be getting home.” he turned and went straight out of the house. watching him, the landlady's face became yellow with passion and rage. “that little poisonous indian viper,” she said aloud, attributing aaron's mood to the doctor. her husband was noisily bolting the door. outside it was dark and frosty. a gang of men lingered in the road near the closed door. aaron found himself among them, his heart bitterer than steel. the men were dispersing. he should take the road home. but the devil was in it, if he could take a stride in the homeward direction. there seemed a wall in front of him. he veered. but neither could he take a stride in the opposite direction. so he was destined to veer round, like some sort of weather-cock, there in the middle of the dark road outside the “royal oak.” but as he turned, he caught sight of a third exit. almost opposite was the mouth of shottle lane, which led off under trees, at right angles to the highroad, up to new brunswick colliery. he veered towards the off-chance of this opening, in a delirium of icy fury, and plunged away into the dark lane, walking slowly, on firm legs. chapter iii. “the lighted tree” it is remarkable how many odd or extraordinary people there are in england. we hear continual complaints of the stodgy dullness of the english. it would be quite as just to complain of their freakish, unusual characters. only _en masse_ the metal is all britannia. in an ugly little mining town we find the odd ones just as distinct as anywhere else. only it happens that dull people invariably meet dull people, and odd individuals always come across odd individuals, no matter where they may be. so that to each kind society seems all of a piece. at one end of the dark tree-covered shottle lane stood the “royal oak” public house; and mrs. houseley was certainly an odd woman. at the other end of the lane was shottle house, where the bricknells lived; the bricknells were odd, also. alfred bricknell, the old man, was one of the partners in the colliery firm. his english was incorrect, his accent, broad derbyshire, and he was not a gentleman in the snobbish sense of the word. yet he was well-to-do, and very stuck-up. his wife was dead. shottle house stood two hundred yards beyond new brunswick colliery. the colliery was imbedded in a plantation, whence its burning pit-hill glowed, fumed, and stank sulphur in the nostrils of the bricknells. even war-time efforts had not put out this refuse fire. apart from this, shottle house was a pleasant square house, rather old, with shrubberies and lawns. it ended the lane in a dead end. only a field-path trekked away to the left. on this particular christmas eve alfred bricknell had only two of his children at home. of the others, one daughter was unhappily married, and away in india weeping herself thinner; another was nursing her babies in streatham. jim, the hope of the house, and julia, now married to robert cunningham, had come home for christmas. the party was seated in the drawing-room, that the grown-up daughters had made very fine during their periods of courtship. its walls were hung with fine grey canvas, it had a large, silvery grey, silky carpet, and the furniture was covered with dark green silky material. into this reticence pieces of futurism, omega cushions and van-gogh-like pictures exploded their colours. such _chic_ would certainly not have been looked for up shottle lane. the old man sat in his high grey arm-chair very near an enormous coal fire. in this house there was no coal-rationing. the finest coal was arranged to obtain a gigantic glow such as a coal-owner may well enjoy, a great, intense mass of pure red fire. at this fire alfred bricknell toasted his tan, lambs-wool-lined slippers. he was a large man, wearing a loose grey suit, and sprawling in the large grey arm-chair. the soft lamp-light fell on his clean, bald, michael-angelo head, across which a few pure hairs glittered. his chin was sunk on his breast, so that his sparse but strong-haired white beard, in which every strand stood distinct, like spun glass lithe and elastic, curved now upwards and inwards, in a curious curve returning upon him. he seemed to be sunk in stern, prophet-like meditation. as a matter of fact, he was asleep after a heavy meal. across, seated on a pouffe on the other side of the fire, was a cameo-like girl with neat black hair done tight and bright in the french mode. she had strangely-drawn eyebrows, and her colour was brilliant. she was hot, leaning back behind the shaft of old marble of the mantel-piece, to escape the fire. she wore a simple dress of apple-green satin, with full sleeves and ample skirt and a tiny bodice of green cloth. this was josephine ford, the girl jim was engaged to. jim bricknell himself was a tall big fellow of thirty-eight. he sat in a chair in front of the fire, some distance back, and stretched his long legs far in front of him. his chin too was sunk on his breast, his young forehead was bald, and raised in odd wrinkles, he had a silent half-grin on his face, a little tipsy, a little satyr-like. his small moustache was reddish. behind him a round table was covered with cigarettes, sweets, and bottles. it was evident jim bricknell drank beer for choice. he wanted to get fat--that was his idea. but he couldn't bring it off: he was thin, though not too thin, except to his own thinking. his sister julia was bunched up in a low chair between him and his father. she too was a tall stag of a thing, but she sat bunched up like a witch. she wore a wine-purple dress, her arms seemed to poke out of the sleeves, and she had dragged her brown hair into straight, untidy strands. yet she had real beauty. she was talking to the young man who was not her husband: a fair, pale, fattish young fellow in pince-nez and dark clothes. this was cyril scott, a friend. the only other person stood at the round table pouring out red wine. he was a fresh, stoutish young englishman in khaki, julia's husband, robert cunningham, a lieutenant about to be demobilised, when he would become a sculptor once more. he drank red wine in large throatfuls, and his eyes grew a little moist. the room was hot and subdued, everyone was silent. “i say,” said robert suddenly, from the rear--“anybody have a drink? don't you find it rather hot?” “is there another bottle of beer there?” said jim, without moving, too settled even to stir an eye-lid. “yes--i think there is,” said robert. “thanks--don't open it yet,” murmured jim. “have a drink, josephine?” said robert. “no thank you,” said josephine, bowing slightly. finding the drinks did not go, robert went round with the cigarettes. josephine ford looked at the white rolls. “thank you,” she said, and taking one, suddenly licked her rather full, dry red lips with the rapid tip of her tongue. it was an odd movement, suggesting a snake's flicker. she put her cigarette between her lips, and waited. her movements were very quiet and well bred; but perhaps too quiet, they had the dangerous impassivity of the bohemian, parisian or american rather than english. “cigarette, julia?” said robert to his wife. she seemed to start or twitch, as if dazed. then she looked up at her husband with a queer smile, puckering the corners of her eyes. he looked at the cigarettes, not at her. his face had the blunt voluptuous gravity of a young lion, a great cat. she kept him standing for some moments impassively. then suddenly she hung her long, delicate fingers over the box, in doubt, and spasmodically jabbed at the cigarettes, clumsily raking one out at last. “thank you, dear--thank you,” she cried, rather high, looking up and smiling once more. he turned calmly aside, offering the cigarettes to scott, who refused. “oh!” said julia, sucking the end of her cigarette. “robert is so happy with all the good things--aren't you dear?” she sang, breaking into a hurried laugh. “we aren't used to such luxurious living, we aren't--are we dear--no, we're not such swells as this, we're not. oh, robbie, isn't it all right, isn't it just all right?” she tailed off into her hurried, wild, repeated laugh. “we're so happy in a land of plenty, aren't we dear?” “do you mean i'm greedy, julia?” said robert. “greedy!--oh, greedy!--he asks if he's greedy?--no you're not greedy, robbie, you're not greedy. i want you to be happy.” “i'm quite happy,” he returned. “oh, he's happy!--really!--he's happy! oh, what an accomplishment! oh, my word!” julia puckered her eyes and laughed herself into a nervous twitching silence. robert went round with the matches. julia sucked her cigarette. “give us a light, robbie, if you are happy!” she cried. “it's coming,” he answered. josephine smoked with short, sharp puffs. julia sucked wildly at her light. robert returned to his red wine. jim bricknell suddenly roused up, looked round on the company, smiling a little vacuously and showing his odd, pointed teeth. “where's the beer?” he asked, in deep tones, smiling full into josephine's face, as if she were going to produce it by some sleight of hand. then he wheeled round to the table, and was soon pouring beer down his throat as down a pipe. then he dropped supine again. cyril scott was silently absorbing gin and water. “i say,” said jim, from the remote depths of his sprawling. “isn't there something we could do to while the time away?” everybody suddenly laughed--it sounded so remote and absurd. “what, play bridge or poker or something conventional of that sort?” said josephine in her distinct voice, speaking to him as if he were a child. “oh, damn bridge,” said jim in his sleep-voice. then he began pulling his powerful length together. he sat on the edge of his chair-seat, leaning forward, peering into all the faces and grinning. “don't look at me like that--so long--” said josephine, in her self-contained voice. “you make me uncomfortable.” she gave an odd little grunt of a laugh, and the tip of her tongue went over her lips as she glanced sharply, half furtively round the room. “i like looking at you,” said jim, his smile becoming more malicious. “but you shouldn't, when i tell you not,” she returned. jim twisted round to look at the state of the bottles. the father also came awake. he sat up. “isn't it time,” he said, “that you all put away your glasses and cigarettes and thought of bed?” jim rolled slowly round towards his father, sprawling in the long chair. “ah, dad,” he said, “tonight's the night! tonight's some night, dad.--you can sleep any time--” his grin widened--“but there aren't many nights to sit here--like this--eh?” he was looking up all the time into the face of his father, full and nakedly lifting his face to the face of his father, and smiling fixedly. the father, who was perfectly sober, except for the contagion from the young people, felt a wild tremor go through his heart as he gazed on the face of his boy. he rose stiffly. “you want to stay?” he said. “you want to stay!--well then--well then, i'll leave you. but don't be long.” the old man rose to his full height, rather majestic. the four younger people also rose respectfully--only jim lay still prostrate in his chair, twisting up his face towards his father. “you won't stay long,” said the old man, looking round a little bewildered. he was seeking a responsible eye. josephine was the only one who had any feeling for him. “no, we won't stay long, mr. bricknell,” she said gravely. “good night, dad,” said jim, as his father left the room. josephine went to the window. she had rather a stiff, _poupee_ walk. “how is the night?” she said, as if to change the whole feeling in the room. she pushed back the thick grey-silk curtains. “why?” she exclaimed. “what is that light burning? a red light?” “oh, that's only the pit-bank on fire,” said robert, who had followed her. “how strange!--why is it burning now?” “it always burns, unfortunately--it is most consistent at it. it is the refuse from the mines. it has been burning for years, in spite of all efforts to the contrary.” “how very curious! may we look at it?” josephine now turned the handle of the french windows, and stepped out. “beautiful!” they heard her voice exclaim from outside. in the room, julia laid her hand gently, protectively over the hand of cyril scott. “josephine and robert are admiring the night together!” she said, smiling with subtle tenderness to him. “naturally! young people always do these romantic things,” replied cyril scott. he was twenty-two years old, so he could afford to be cynical. “do they?--don't you think it's nice of them?” she said, gently removing her hand from his. his eyes were shining with pleasure. “i do. i envy them enormously. one only needs to be sufficiently naive,” he said. “one does, doesn't one!” cooed julia. “i say, do you hear the bells?” said robert, poking his head into the room. “no, dear! do you?” replied julia. “bells! hear the bells! bells!” exclaimed the half-tipsy and self-conscious jim. and he rolled in his chair in an explosion of sudden, silent laughter, showing his mouthful of pointed teeth, like a dog. then he gradually gathered himself together, found his feet, smiling fixedly. “pretty cool night!” he said aloud, when he felt the air on his almost bald head. the darkness smelt of sulphur. josephine and robert had moved out of sight. julia was abstracted, following them with her eyes. with almost supernatural keenness she seemed to catch their voices from the distance. “yes, josephine, wouldn't that be awfully romantic!”--she suddenly called shrilly. the pair in the distance started. “what--!” they heard josephine's sharp exclamation. “what's that?--what would be romantic?” said jim as he lurched up and caught hold of cyril scott's arm. “josephine wants to make a great illumination of the grounds of the estate,” said julia, magniloquent. “no--no--i didn't say it,” remonstrated josephine. “what josephine said,” explained robert, “was simply that it would be pretty to put candles on one of the growing trees, instead of having a christmas-tree indoors.” “oh, josephine, how sweet of you!” cried julia. cyril scott giggled. “good egg! champion idea, josey, my lass. eh? what--!” cried jim. “why not carry it out--eh? why not? most attractive.” he leaned forward over josephine, and grinned. “oh, no!” expostulated josephine. “it all sounds so silly now. no. let us go indoors and go to bed.” “no, josephine dear--no! it's a lovely idea!” cried julia. “let's get candles and lanterns and things--” “let's!” grinned jim. “let's, everybody--let's.” “shall we really?” asked robert. “shall we illuminate one of the fir-trees by the lawn?” “yes! how lovely!” cried julia. “i'll fetch the candles.” “the women must put on warm cloaks,” said robert. they trooped indoors for coats and wraps and candles and lanterns. then, lighted by a bicycle lamp, they trooped off to the shed to twist wire round the candles for holders. they clustered round the bench. “i say,” said julia, “doesn't cyril look like a pilot on a stormy night! oh, i say--!” and she went into one of her hurried laughs. they all looked at cyril scott, who was standing sheepishly in the background, in a very large overcoat, smoking a large pipe. the young man was uncomfortable, but assumed a stoic air of philosophic indifference. soon they were busy round a prickly fir-tree at the end of the lawn. jim stood in the background vaguely staring. the bicycle lamp sent a beam of strong white light deep into the uncanny foliage, heads clustered and hands worked. the night above was silent, dim. there was no wind. in the near distance they could hear the panting of some engine at the colliery. “shall we light them as we fix them,” asked robert, “or save them for one grand rocket at the end?” “oh, as we do them,” said cyril scott, who had lacerated his fingers and wanted to see some reward. a match spluttered. one naked little flame sprang alight among the dark foliage. the candle burned tremulously, naked. they all were silent. “we ought to do a ritual dance! we ought to worship the tree,” sang julia, in her high voice. “hold on a minute. we'll have a little more illumination,” said robert. “why yes. we want more than one candle,” said josephine. but julia had dropped the cloak in which she was huddled, and with arms slung asunder was sliding, waving, crouching in a _pas seul_ before the tree, looking like an animated bough herself. jim, who was hugging his pipe in the background, broke into a short, harsh, cackling laugh. “aren't we fools!” he cried. “what? oh, god's love, aren't we fools!” “no--why?” cried josephine, amused but resentful. but jim vouchsafed nothing further, only stood like a red indian gripping his pipe. the beam of the bicycle-lamp moved and fell upon the hands and faces of the young people, and penetrated the recesses of the secret trees. several little tongues of flame clipped sensitive and ruddy on the naked air, sending a faint glow over the needle foliage. they gave a strange, perpendicular aspiration in the night. julia waved slowly in her tree dance. jim stood apart, with his legs straddled, a motionless figure. the party round the tree became absorbed and excited as more ruddy tongues of flame pricked upward from the dark tree. pale candles became evident, the air was luminous. the illumination was becoming complete, harmonious. josephine suddenly looked round. “why-y-y!” came her long note of alarm. a man in a bowler hat and a black overcoat stood on the edge of the twilight. “what is it?” cried julia. “_homo sapiens_!” said robert, the lieutenant. “hand the light, cyril.” he played the beam of light full on the intruder; a man in a bowler hat, with a black overcoat buttoned to his throat, a pale, dazed, blinking face. the hat was tilted at a slightly jaunty angle over the left eye, the man was well-featured. he did not speak. “did you want anything?” asked robert, from behind the light. aaron sisson blinked, trying to see who addressed him. to him, they were all illusory. he did not answer. “anything you wanted?” repeated robert, military, rather peremptory. jim suddenly doubled himself up and burst into a loud harsh cackle of laughter. whoop! he went, and doubled himself up with laughter. whoop! whoop! he went, and fell on the ground and writhed with laughter. he was in that state of intoxication when he could find no release from maddening self-consciousness. he knew what he was doing, he did it deliberately. and yet he was also beside himself, in a sort of hysterics. he could not help himself in exasperated self-consciousness. the others all began to laugh, unavoidably. it was a contagion. they laughed helplessly and foolishly. only robert was anxious. “i'm afraid he'll wake the house,” he said, looking at the doubled up figure of jim writhing on the grass and whooping loudly. “or not enough,” put in cyril scott. he twigged jim's condition. “no--no!” cried josephine, weak with laughing in spite of herself. “no--it's too long--i'm like to die laughing--” jim embraced the earth in his convulsions. even robert shook quite weakly with laughter. his face was red, his eyes full of dancing water. yet he managed to articulate. “i say, you know, you'll bring the old man down.” then he went off again into spasms. “hu! hu!” whooped jim, subsiding. “hu!” he rolled over on to his back, and lay silent. the others also became weakly silent. “what's amiss?” said aaron sisson, breaking this spell. they all began to laugh again, except jim, who lay on his back looking up at the strange sky. “what're you laughing at?” repeated aaron. “we're laughing at the man on the ground,” replied josephine. “i think he's drunk a little too much.” “ay,” said aaron, standing mute and obstinate. “did you want anything?” robert enquired once more. “eh?” aaron looked up. “me? no, not me.” a sort of inertia kept him rooted. the young people looked at one another and began to laugh, rather embarrassed. “another!” said cyril scott cynically. they wished he would go away. there was a pause. “what do you reckon stars are?” asked the sepulchral voice of jim. he still lay flat on his back on the grass. josephine went to him and pulled at his coat. “get up,” she said. “you'll take cold. get up now, we're going indoors.” “what do you reckon stars are?” he persisted. aaron sisson stood on the edge of the light, smilingly staring at the scene, like a boy out of his place, but stubbornly keeping his ground. “get up now,” said josephine. “we've had enough.” but jim would not move. robert went with the bicycle lamp and stood at aaron's side. “shall i show you a light to the road--you're off your track,” he said. “you're in the grounds of shottle house.” “i can find my road,” said aaron. “thank you.” jim suddenly got up and went to peer at the stranger, poking his face close to aaron's face. “right-o,” he replied. “you're not half a bad sort of chap--cheery-o! what's your drink?” “mine--whiskey,” said aaron. “come in and have one. we're the only sober couple in the bunch--what?” cried jim. aaron stood unmoving, static in everything. jim took him by the arm affectionately. the stranger looked at the flickering tree, with its tiers of lights. “a christmas tree,” he said, jerking his head and smiling. “that's right, old man,” said jim, seeming thoroughly sober now. “come indoors and have a drink.” aaron sisson negatively allowed himself to be led off. the others followed in silence, leaving the tree to flicker the night through. the stranger stumbled at the open window-door. “mind the step,” said jim affectionately. they crowded to the fire, which was still hot. the newcomer looked round vaguely. jim took his bowler hat and gave him a chair. he sat without looking round, a remote, abstract look on his face. he was very pale, and seemed-inwardly absorbed. the party threw off their wraps and sat around. josephine turned to aaron sisson, who sat with a glass of whiskey in his hand, rather slack in his chair, in his thickish overcoat. he did not want to drink. his hair was blond, quite tidy, his mouth and chin handsome but a little obstinate, his eyes inscrutable. his pallor was not natural to him. though he kept the appearance of a smile, underneath he was hard and opposed. he did not wish to be with these people, and yet, mechanically, he stayed. “do you feel quite well?” josephine asked him. he looked at her quickly. “me?” he said. he smiled faintly. “yes, i'm all right.” then he dropped his head again and seemed oblivious. “tell us your name,” said jim affectionately. the stranger looked up. “my name's aaron sisson, if it's anything to you,” he said. jim began to grin. “it's a name i don't know,” he said. then he named all the party present. but the stranger hardly heeded, though his eyes looked curiously from one to the other, slow, shrewd, clairvoyant. “were you on your way home?” asked robert, huffy. the stranger lifted his head and looked at him. “home!” he repeated. “no. the other road--” he indicated the direction with his head, and smiled faintly. “beldover?” inquired robert. “yes.” he had dropped his head again, as if he did not want to look at them. to josephine, the pale, impassive, blank-seeming face, the blue eyes with the smile which wasn't a smile, and the continual dropping of the well-shaped head was curiously affecting. she wanted to cry. “are you a miner?” robert asked, _de haute en bas_. “no,” cried josephine. she had looked at his hands. “men's checkweighman,” replied aaron. he had emptied his glass. he put it on the table. “have another?” said jim, who was attending fixedly, with curious absorption, to the stranger. “no,” cried josephine, “no more.” aaron looked at jim, then at her, and smiled slowly, with remote bitterness. then he lowered his head again. his hands were loosely clasped between his knees. “what about the wife?” said robert--the young lieutenant. “what about the wife and kiddies? you're a married man, aren't you?” the sardonic look of the stranger rested on the subaltern. “yes,” he said. “won't they be expecting you?” said robert, trying to keep his temper and his tone of authority. “i expect they will--” “then you'd better be getting along, hadn't you?” the eyes of the intruder rested all the time on the flushed subaltern. the look on aaron's face became slowly satirical. “oh, dry up the army touch,” said jim contemptuously, to robert. “we're all civvies here. we're all right, aren't we?” he said loudly, turning to the stranger with a grin that showed his pointed teeth. aaron gave a brief laugh of acknowledgement. “how many children have you?” sang julia from her distance. “three.” “girls or boys?” “girls.” “all girls? dear little things! how old?” “oldest eight--youngest nine months--” “so small!” sang julia, with real tenderness now--aaron dropped his head. “but you're going home to them, aren't you?” said josephine, in whose eyes the tears had already risen. he looked up at her, at her tears. his face had the same pale perverse smile. “not tonight,” he said. “but why? you're wrong!” cried josephine. he dropped his head and became oblivious. “well!” said cyril scott, rising at last with a bored exclamation. “i think i'll retire.” “will you?” said julia, also rising. “you'll find your candle outside.” she went out. scott bade good night, and followed her. the four people remained in the room, quite silent. then robert rose and began to walk about, agitated. “don't you go back to 'em. have a night out. you stop here tonight,” jim said suddenly, in a quiet intimate tone. the stranger turned his head and looked at him, considering. “yes?” he said. he seemed to be smiling coldly. “oh, but!” cried josephine. “your wife and your children! won't they be awfully bothered? isn't it awfully unkind to them?” she rose in her eagerness. he sat turning up his face to her. she could not understand his expression. “won't you go home to them?” she said, hysterical. “not tonight,” he replied quietly, again smiling. “you're wrong!” she cried. “you're wrong!” and so she hurried out of the room in tears. “er--what bed do you propose to put him in?” asked robert rather officer-like. “don't propose at all, my lad,” replied jim, ironically--he did not like robert. then to the stranger he said: “you'll be all right on the couch in my room?--it's a good couch, big enough, plenty of rugs--” his voice was easy and intimate. aaron looked at him, and nodded. they had another drink each, and at last the two set off, rather stumbling, upstairs. aaron carried his bowler hat with him. robert remained pacing in the drawing-room for some time. then he went out, to return in a little while. he extinguished the lamps and saw that the fire was safe. then he went to fasten the window-doors securely. outside he saw the uncanny glimmer of candles across the lawn. he had half a mind to go out and extinguish them--but he did not. so he went upstairs and the house was quiet. faint crumbs of snow were falling outside. when jim woke in the morning aaron had gone. only on the floor were two packets of christmas-tree candles, fallen from the stranger's pockets. he had gone through the drawing-room door, as he had come. the housemaid said that while she was cleaning the grate in the dining-room she heard someone go into the drawing-room: a parlour-maid had even seen someone come out of jim's bedroom. but they had both thought it was jim himself, for he was an unsettled house mate. there was a thin film of snow, a lovely christmas morning. chapter iv. “the pillar of salt” our story will not yet see daylight. a few days after christmas, aaron sat in the open shed at the bottom of his own garden, looking out on the rainy darkness. no one knew he was there. it was some time after six in the evening. from where he sat, he looked straight up the garden to the house. the blind was not drawn in the middle kitchen, he could see the figures of his wife and one child. there was a light also in the upstairs window. his wife was gone upstairs again. he wondered if she had the baby ill. he could see her figure vaguely behind the lace curtains of the bedroom. it was like looking at his home through the wrong end of a telescope. now the little girls had gone from the middle room: only to return in a moment. his attention strayed. he watched the light falling from the window of the next-door house. uneasily, he looked along the whole range of houses. the street sloped down-hill, and the backs were open to the fields. so he saw a curious succession of lighted windows, between which jutted the intermediary back premises, scullery and outhouse, in dark little blocks. it was something like the keyboard of a piano: more still, like a succession of musical notes. for the rectangular planes of light were of different intensities, some bright and keen, some soft, warm, like candle-light, and there was one surface of pure red light, one or two were almost invisible, dark green. so the long scale of lights seemed to trill across the darkness, now bright, now dim, swelling and sinking. the effect was strange. and thus the whole private life of the street was threaded in lights. there was a sense of indecent exposure, from so many backs. he felt himself almost in physical contact with this contiguous stretch of back premises. he heard the familiar sound of water gushing from the sink in to the grate, the dropping of a pail outside the door, the clink of a coal shovel, the banging of a door, the sound of voices. so many houses cheek by jowl, so many squirming lives, so many back yards, back doors giving on to the night. it was revolting. away in the street itself, a boy was calling the newspaper: “--'ning post! --'ning po-o-st!” it was a long, melancholy howl, and seemed to epitomise the whole of the dark, wet, secretive, thickly-inhabited night. a figure passed the window of aaron's own house, entered, and stood inside the room talking to mrs. sisson. it was a young woman in a brown mackintosh and a black hat. she stood under the incandescent light, and her hat nearly knocked the globe. next door a man had run out in his shirt sleeves: this time a young, dark-headed collier running to the gate for a newspaper, running bare-headed, coatless, slippered in the rain. he had got his news-sheet, and was returning. and just at that moment the young man's wife came out, shading her candle with a lading tin. she was going to the coal-house for some coal. her husband passed her on the threshold. she could be heard breaking the bits of coal and placing them on the dustpan. the light from her candle fell faintly behind her. then she went back, blown by a swirl of wind. but again she was at the door, hastily standing her iron shovel against the wall. then she shut the back door with a bang. these noises seemed to scrape and strike the night. in aaron's own house, the young person was still talking to mrs. sisson. millicent came out, sheltering a candle with her hand. the candle blew out. she ran indoors, and emerged again, her white pinafore fluttering. this time she performed her little journey safely. he could see the faint glimmer of her candle emerging secretly from the closet. the young person was taking her leave. he could hear her sympathetic--“well--good night! i hope she'll be no worse. good night mrs. sisson!” she was gone--he heard the windy bang of the street-gate. presently millicent emerged again, flitting indoors. so he rose to his feet, balancing, swaying a little before he started into motion, as so many colliers do. then he moved along the path towards the house, in the rain and darkness, very slowly edging forwards. suddenly the door opened. his wife emerged with a pail. he stepped quietly aside, on to his side garden, among the sweet herbs. he could smell rosemary and sage and hyssop. a low wall divided his garden from his neighbour's. he put his hand on it, on its wetness, ready to drop over should his wife come forward. but she only threw the contents of her pail on the garden and retired again. she might have seen him had she looked. he remained standing where he was, listening to the trickle of rain in the water-butt. the hollow countryside lay beyond him. sometimes in the windy darkness he could see the red burn of new brunswick bank, or the brilliant jewels of light clustered at bestwood colliery. away in the dark hollow, nearer, the glare of the electric power-station disturbed the night. so again the wind swirled the rain across all these hieroglyphs of the countryside, familiar to him as his own breast. a motor-car was labouring up the hill. his trained ear attended to it unconsciously. it stopped with a jar. there was a bang of the yard-gate. a shortish dark figure in a bowler hat passed the window. millicent was drawing down the blind. it was the doctor. the blind was drawn, he could see no more. stealthily he began to approach the house. he stood by the climbing rose of the porch, listening. he heard voices upstairs. perhaps the children would be downstairs. he listened intently. voices were upstairs only. he quietly opened the door. the room was empty, save for the baby, who was cooing in her cradle. he crossed to the hall. at the foot of the stairs he could hear the voice of the indian doctor: “now little girl, you must just keep still and warm in bed, and not cry for the moon.” he said “_de_ moon,” just as ever.--marjory must be ill. so aaron quietly entered the parlour. it was a cold, clammy room, dark. he could hear footsteps passing outside on the asphalt pavement below the window, and the wind howling with familiar cadence. he began feeling for something in the darkness of the music-rack beside the piano. he touched and felt--he could not find what he wanted. perplexed, he turned and looked out of the window. through the iron railing of the front wall he could see the little motorcar sending its straight beams of light in front of it, up the street. he sat down on the sofa by the window. the energy had suddenly left all his limbs. he sat with his head sunk, listening. the familiar room, the familiar voice of his wife and his children--he felt weak as if he were dying. he felt weak like a drowning man who acquiesces in the waters. his strength was gone, he was sinking back. he would sink back to it all, float henceforth like a drowned man. so he heard voices coming nearer from upstairs, feet moving. they were coming down. “no, mrs. sisson, you needn't worry,” he heard the voice of the doctor on the stairs. “if she goes on as she is, she'll be all right. only she must be kept warm and quiet--warm and quiet--that's the chief thing.” “oh, when she has those bouts i can't bear it,” aaron heard his wife's voice. they were downstairs. their feet click-clicked on the tiled passage. they had gone into the middle room. aaron sat and listened. “she won't have any more bouts. if she does, give her a few drops from the little bottle, and raise her up. but she won't have any more,” the doctor said. “if she does, i s'll go off my head, i know i shall.” “no, you won't. no, you won't do anything of the sort. you won't go off your head. you'll keep your head on your shoulders, where it ought to be,” protested the doctor. “but it nearly drives me mad.” “then don't let it. the child won't die, i tell you. she will be all right, with care. who have you got sitting up with her? you're not to sit up with her tonight, i tell you. do you hear me?” “miss smitham's coming in. but it's no good--i shall have to sit up. i shall have to.” “i tell you you won't. you obey me. i know what's good for you as well as for her. i am thinking of you as much as of her.” “but i can't bear it--all alone.” this was the beginning of tears. there was a dead silence--then a sound of millicent weeping with her mother. as a matter of fact, the doctor was weeping too, for he was an emotional sympathetic soul, over forty. “never mind--never mind--you aren't alone,” came the doctor's matter-of-fact voice, after a loud nose-blowing. “i am here to help you. i will do whatever i can--whatever i can.” “i can't bear it. i can't bear it,” wept the woman. another silence, another nose-blowing, and again the doctor: “you'll have to bear it--i tell you there's nothing else for it. you'll have to bear it--but we'll do our best for you. i will do my best for you--always--always--in sickness or out of sickness--there!” he pronounced _there_ oddly, not quite _dhere_. “you haven't heard from your husband?” he added. “i had a letter--“--sobs--“from the bank this morning.” “from de bank?” “telling me they were sending me so much per month, from him, as an allowance, and that he was quite well, but he was travelling.” “well then, why not let him travel? you can live.” “but to leave me alone,” there was burning indignation in her voice. “to go off and leave me with every responsibility, to leave me with all the burden.” “well i wouldn't trouble about him. aren't you better off without him?” “i am. i am,” she cried fiercely. “when i got that letter this morning, i said may evil befall you, you selfish demon. and i hope it may.” “well-well, well-well, don't fret. don't be angry, it won't make it any better, i tell you.” “angry! i am angry. i'm worse than angry. a week ago i hadn't a grey hair in my head. now look here--” there was a pause. “well-well, well-well, never mind. you will be all right, don't you bother. your hair is beautiful anyhow.” “what makes me so mad is that he should go off like that--never a word--coolly takes his hook. i could kill him for it.” “were you ever happy together?” “we were all right at first. i know i was fond of him. but he'd kill anything.--he kept himself back, always kept himself back, couldn't give himself--” there was a pause. “ah well,” sighed the doctor. “marriage is a mystery. i'm glad i'm not entangled in it.” “yes, to make some woman's life a misery.--i'm sure it was death to live with him, he seemed to kill everything off inside you. he was a man you couldn't quarrel with, and get it over. quiet--quiet in his tempers, and selfish through and through. i've lived with him twelve years--i know what it is. killing! you don't know what he was--” “i think i knew him. a fair man? yes?” said the doctor. “fair to look at.--there's a photograph of him in the parlour--taken when he was married--and one of me.--yes, he's fairhaired.” aaron guessed that she was getting a candle to come into the parlour. he was tempted to wait and meet them--and accept it all again. devilishly tempted, he was. then he thought of her voice, and his heart went cold. quick as thought, he obeyed his first impulse. he felt behind the couch, on the floor where the curtains fell. yes--the bag was there. he took it at once. in the next breath he stepped out of the room and tip-toed into the passage. he retreated to the far end, near the street door, and stood behind the coats that hung on the hall-stand. at that moment his wife came into the passage, holding a candle. she was red-eyed with weeping, and looked frail. “did you leave the parlour door open?” she asked of millicent, suspiciously. “no,” said millicent from the kitchen. the doctor, with his soft, oriental tread followed mrs. sisson into the parlour. aaron saw his wife hold up the candle before his portrait and begin to weep. but he knew her. the doctor laid his hand softly on her arm, and left it there, sympathetically. nor did he remove it when millicent stole into the room, looking very woe-begone and important. the wife wept silently, and the child joined in. “yes, i know him,” said the doctor. “if he thinks he will be happier when he's gone away, you must be happier too, mrs. sisson. that's all. don't let him triumph over you by making you miserable. you enjoy yourself as well. you're only a girl---” but a tear came from his eye, and he blew his nose vigorously on a large white silk handkerchief, and began to polish his _pince nez_. then he turned, and they all bundled out of the room. the doctor took his departure. mrs. sisson went almost immediately upstairs, and millicent shortly crept after her. then aaron, who had stood motionless as if turned to a pillar of salt, went quietly down the passage and into the living room. his face was very pale, ghastly-looking. he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror over the mantel, as he passed, and felt weak, as if he were really a criminal. but his heart did not relax, nevertheless. so he hurried into the night, down the garden, climbed the fence into the field, and went away across the field in the rain, towards the highroad. he felt sick in every fibre. he almost hated the little handbag he carried, which held his flute and piccolo. it seemed a burden just then--a millstone round his neck. he hated the scene he had left--and he hated the hard, inviolable heart that stuck unchanging in his own breast. coming to the high-road, he saw a tall, luminous tram-car roving along through the rain. the trams ran across country from town to town. he dared not board, because people knew him. so he took a side road, and walked in a detour for two miles. then he came out on the high-road again and waited for a tram-car. the rain blew on his face. he waited a long time for the last car. chapter v. at the opera a friend had given josephine ford a box at the opera for one evening; our story continues by night. the box was large and important, near the stage. josephine and julia were there, with robert and jim--also two more men. the women sat in the front of the box, conspicuously. they were both poor, they were rather excited. but they belonged to a set which looked on social triumphs as a downfall that one allows oneself. the two men, lilly and struthers, were artists, the former literary, the latter a painter. lilly sat by josephine in the front of the box: he was her little lion of the evening. few women can sit in the front of a big box, on a crowded and full-swing opera night, without thrilling and dilating. there is an intoxication in being thus thrust forward, conspicuous and enhanced, right in the eye of the vast crowd that lines the hollow shell of the auditorium. thus even josephine and julia leaned their elbows and poised their heads regally, looking condescendingly down upon the watchful world. they were two poor women, having nothing to do with society. half bohemians. josephine was an artist. in paris she was a friend of a very fashionable dressmaker and decorator, master of modern elegance. sometimes she designed dresses for him, and sometimes she accepted from him a commission to decorate a room. usually at her last sou, it gave her pleasure to dispose of costly and exquisite things for other people, and then be rid of them. this evening her dress was a simple, but a marvellously poised thing of black and silver: in the words of the correct journal. with her tight, black, bright hair, her arched brows, her dusky-ruddy face and her bare shoulders; her strange equanimity, her long, slow, slanting looks; she looked foreign and frightening, clear as a cameo, but dark, far off. julia was the english beauty, in a lovely blue dress. her hair was becomingly untidy on her low brow, her dark blue eyes wandered and got excited, her nervous mouth twitched. her high-pitched, sing-song voice and her hurried laugh could be heard in the theatre. she twisted a beautiful little fan that a dead artist had given her. not being fashionable, they were in the box when the overture began. the opera was verdi--_aida_. if it is impossible to be in an important box at the opera without experiencing the strange intoxication of social pre-eminence, it is just as impossible to be there without some feeling of horror at the sight the stage presents. josephine leaned her elbow and looked down: she knew how arresting that proud, rather stiff bend of her head was. she had some aboriginal american in her blood. but as she looked, she pursed her mouth. the artist in her forgot everything, she was filled with disgust. the sham egypt of _aida_ hid from her nothing of its shame. the singers were all colour-washed, deliberately colour-washed to a bright orange tint. the men had oblong dabs of black wool under their lower lip; the beard of the mighty pharaohs. this oblong dab shook and wagged to the singing. the vulgar bodies of the fleshy women were unendurable. they all looked such good meat. why were their haunches so prominent? it was a question josephine could not solve. she scanned their really expensive, brilliant clothing. it was _nearly_ right--nearly splendid. it only lacked that last subtlety which the world always lacks, the last final clinching which puts calm into a sea of fabric, and yet is the opposite pole to machine fixity. but the leading tenor was the chief pain. he was large, stout, swathed in a cummerbund, and looked like a eunuch. this fattish, emasculated look seems common in stage heroes--even the extremely popular. the tenor sang bravely, his mouth made a large, coffin-shaped, yawning gap in his orange face, his little beard fluttered oddly, like a tail. he turned up his eyes to josephine's box as he sang--that being the regulation direction. meanwhile his abdomen shook as he caught his breath, the flesh of his fat, naked arms swayed. josephine looked down with the fixed gravity of a red indian, immovable, inscrutable. it was not till the scene was ended that she lifted her head as if breaking a spell, sent the point of her tongue rapidly over her dried lips, and looked round into the box. her brown eyes expressed shame, fear, and disgust. a curious grimace went over her face--a grimace only to be expressed by the exclamation _merde!_ but she was mortally afraid of society, and its fixed institutions. rapidly she scanned the eyes of her friends in the box. she rested on the eyes of lilly, a dark, ugly man. “isn't it nasty?” she said. “you shouldn't look so closely,” he said. but he took it calmly, easily, whilst she felt floods of burning disgust, a longing to destroy it all. “oh-ho-ho!” laughed julia. “it's so fu-nny--so funny!” “of course we are too near,” said robert. “say you admire that pink fondant over there,” said struthers, indicating with his eyebrows a blond large woman in white satin with pink edging, who sat in a box opposite, on the upper tier. “oh, the fondant--exactly--the fondant! yes, i admire her immensely! isn't she exactly it!” sang julia. josephine was scanning the auditorium. so many myriads of faces--like beads on a bead-work pattern--all bead-work, in different layers. she bowed to various acquaintances--mostly americans in uniform, whom she had known in paris. she smiled to lady cochrane, two boxes off--lady cochrane had given her the box. but she felt rather coldly towards her. the curtain rose, the opera wound its slow length along. the audience loved it. they cheered with mad enthusiasm. josephine looked down on the choppy sea of applause, white gloves clapping, heads shaking. the noise was strange and rattling. what a curious multiple object a theatre-audience was! it seemed to have a million heads, a million hands, and one monstrous, unnatural consciousness. the singers appeared before the curtain--the applause rose up like clouds of dust. “oh, isn't it too wonderful!” cried julia. “i am wild with excitement. are you all of you?” “absolutely wild,” said lilly laconically. “where is scott to-night?” asked struthers. julia turned to him and gave him a long, queer look from her dark blue eyes. “he's in the country,” she said, rather enigmatic. “don't you know, he's got a house down in dorset,” said robert, verbally rushing in. “he wants julia to go down and stay.” “is she going?” said lilly. “she hasn't decided,” replied robert. “oh! what's the objection?” asked struthers. “well, none whatsoever, as far as can be seen, except that she can't make up her mind,” replied robert. “julia's got no mind,” said jim rudely. “oh! hear the brotherly verdict!” laughed julia hurriedly. “you mean to go down to dorset alone!” said struthers. “why not?” replied robert, answering for her. “and stay how long?” “oh--as long as it lasts,” said robert again. “starting with eternity,” said lilly, “and working back to a fortnight.” “and what's the matter?--looks bad in the eyes of the world?” “yes--about that. afraid of compromising herself--” lilly looked at them. “depends what you take the world to mean. do you mean us in this box, or the crew outside there?” he jerked his head towards the auditorium. “do you think, lilly, that we're the world?” said robert ironically. “oh, yes, i guess we're shipwrecked in this box, like robinson crusoes. and what we do on our own little island matters to us alone. as for the infinite crowds of howling savages outside there in the unspeakable, all you've got to do is mind they don't scrap you.” “but won't they?” said struthers. “not unless you put your head in their hands,” said lilly. “i don't know--” said jim. but the curtain had risen, they hushed him into silence. all through the next scene, julia puzzled herself, as to whether she should go down to the country and live with scott. she had carried on a nervous kind of _amour_ with him, based on soul sympathy and emotional excitement. but whether to go and live with him? she didn't know if she wanted to or not: and she couldn't for her life find out. she was in that nervous state when desire seems to evaporate the moment fulfilment is offered. when the curtain dropped she turned. “you see,” she said, screwing up her eyes, “i have to think of robert.” she cut the word in two, with an odd little hitch in her voice--“rob-ert.” “my dear julia, can't you believe that i'm tired of being thought of,” cried robert, flushing. julia screwed up her eyes in a slow smile, oddly cogitating. “well, who am i to think of?” she asked. “yourself,” said lilly. “oh, yes! why, yes! i never thought of that!” she gave a hurried little laugh. “but then it's no fun to think about oneself,” she cried flatly. “i think about rob-ert, and scott.” she screwed up her eyes and peered oddly at the company. “which of them will find you the greatest treat,” said lilly sarcastically. “anyhow,” interjected robert nervously, “it will be something new for scott.” “stale buns for you, old boy,” said jim drily. “i don't say so. but--” exclaimed the flushed, full-blooded robert, who was nothing if not courteous to women. “how long ha' you been married? eh?” asked jim. “six years!” sang julia sweetly. “good god!” “you see,” said robert, “julia can't decide anything for herself. she waits for someone else to decide, then she puts her spoke in.” “put it plainly--” began struthers. “but don't you know, it's no use putting it plainly,” cried julia. “but do you want to be with scott, out and out, or don't you?” said lilly. “exactly!” chimed robert. “that's the question for you to answer julia.” “i won't answer it,” she cried. “why should i?” and she looked away into the restless hive of the theatre. she spoke so wildly that she attracted attention. but it half pleased her. she stared abstractedly down at the pit. the men looked at one another in some comic consternation. “oh, damn it all!” said the long jim, rising and stretching himself. “she's dead nuts on scott. she's all over him. she'd have eloped with him weeks ago if it hadn't been so easy. she can't stand it that robert offers to hand her into the taxi.” he gave his malevolent grin round the company, then went out. he did not reappear for the next scene. “of course, if she loves scott--” began struthers. julia suddenly turned with wild desperation, and cried: “i like him tremendously--tre-men-dous-ly! he does understand.” “which we don't,” said robert. julia smiled her long, odd smile in their faces: one might almost say she smiled in their teeth. “what do you think, josephine?” asked lilly. josephine was leaning froward. she started. her tongue went rapidly over her lips. “who--? i--?” she exclaimed. “yes.” “i think julia should go with scott,” said josephine. “she'll bother with the idea till she's done it. she loves him, really.” “of course she does,” cried robert. julia, with her chin resting on her arms, in a position which irritated the neighbouring lady cochrane sincerely, was gazing with unseeing eyes down upon the stalls. “well then--” began struthers. but the music struck up softly. they were all rather bored. struthers kept on making small, half audible remarks--which was bad form, and displeased josephine, the hostess of the evening. when the curtain came down for the end of the act, the men got up. lilly's wife, tanny, suddenly appeared. she had come on after a dinner engagement. “would you like tea or anything?” lilly asked. the women refused. the men filtered out on to the crimson and white, curving corridor. julia, josephine and tanny remained in the box. tanny was soon hitched on to the conversation in hand. “of course,” she replied, “one can't decide such a thing like drinking a cup of tea.” “of course, one can't, dear tanny,” said julia. “after all, one doesn't leave one's husband every day, to go and live with another man. even if one looks on it as an experiment--.” “it's difficult!” cried julia. “it's difficult! i feel they all want to force me to decide. it's cruel.” “oh, men with their beastly logic, their either-this-or-that stunt, they are an awful bore.--but of course, robert can't love you really, or he'd want to keep you. i can see lilly discussing such a thing for me. but then you don't love robert either,” said tanny. “i do! oh, i do, tanny! i do love him, i love him dearly. i think he's beautiful. robert's beautiful. and he needs me. and i need him too. i need his support. yes, i do love him.” “but you like scott better,” said tanny. “only because he--he's different,” sang julia, in long tones. “you see scott has his art. his art matters. and rob-ert--robert is a dilettante, don't you think--he's dilettante--” she screwed up her eyes at tanny. tanny cogitated. “of course i don't think that matters,” she replied. “but it does, it matters tremendously, dear tanny, tremendously.” “of course,” tanny sheered off. “i can see scott has great attractions--a great warmth somewhere--” “exactly!” cried julia. “he understands!” “and i believe he's a real artist. you might even work together. you might write his librettos.” “yes!--yes!--” julia spoke with a long, pondering hiss. “it might be awfully nice,” said tanny rapturously. “yes!--it might!--it might--!” pondered julia. suddenly she gave herself a shake. then she laughed hurriedly, as if breaking from her line of thought. “and wouldn't robert be an awfully nice lover for josephine! oh, wouldn't that be splendid!” she cried, with her high laugh. josephine, who had been gazing down into the orchestra, turned now, flushing darkly. “but i don't want a lover, julia,” she said, hurt. “josephine dear! dear old josephine! don't you really! oh, yes, you do.--i want one so badly,” cried julia, with her shaking laugh. “robert's awfully good to me. but we've been married six years. and it does make a difference, doesn't it, tanny dear?” “a great difference,” said tanny. “yes, it makes a difference, it makes a difference,” mused julia. “dear old rob-ert--i wouldn't hurt him for worlds. i wouldn't. do you think it would hurt robert?” she screwed up her eyes, looking at tanny. “perhaps it would do robert good to be hurt a little,” said tanny. “he's so well-nourished.” “yes!--yes!--i see what you mean, tanny!--poor old rob-ert! oh, poor old rob-ert, he's so young!” “he does seem young,” said tanny. “one doesn't forgive it.” “he is young,” said julia. “i'm five years older than he. he's only twenty-seven. poor old robert.” “robert is young, and inexperienced,” said josephine, suddenly turning with anger. “but i don't know why you talk about him.” “is he inexperienced, josephine dear? is he?” sang julia. josephine flushed darkly, and turned away. “ah, he's not so innocent as all that,” said tanny roughly. “those young young men, who seem so fresh, they're deep enough, really. they're far less innocent really than men who are experienced.” “they are, aren't they, tanny,” repeated julia softly. “they're old--older than the old man of the seas, sometimes, aren't they? incredibly old, like little boys who know too much--aren't they? yes!” she spoke quietly, seriously, as if it had struck her. below, the orchestra was coming in. josephine was watching closely. julia became aware of this. “do you see anybody we know, josephine?” she asked. josephine started. “no,” she said, looking at her friends quickly and furtively. “dear old josephine, she knows all sorts of people,” sang julia. at that moment the men returned. “have you actually come back!” exclaimed tanny to them. they sat down without answering. jim spread himself as far as he could, in the narrow space. he stared upwards, wrinkling his ugly, queer face. it was evident he was in one of his moods. “if only somebody loved me!” he complained. “if only somebody loved me i should be all right. i'm going to pieces.” he sat up and peered into the faces of the women. “but we all love you,” said josephine, laughing uneasily. “why aren't you satisfied?” “i'm not satisfied. i'm not satisfied,” murmured jim. “would you like to be wrapped in swaddling bands and laid at the breast?” asked lilly, disagreeably. jim opened his mouth in a grin, and gazed long and malevolently at his questioner. “yes,” he said. then he sprawled his long six foot of limb and body across the box again. “you should try loving somebody, for a change,” said tanny. “you've been loved too often. why not try and love somebody?” jim eyed her narrowly. “i couldn't love you,” he said, in vicious tones. “_a la bonne heure_!” said tanny. but jim sank his chin on his chest, and repeated obstinately: “i want to be loved.” “how many times have you been loved?” robert asked him. “it would be rather interesting to know.” jim looked at robert long and slow, but did not answer. “did you ever keep count?” tanny persisted. jim looked up at her, malevolent. “i believe i did,” he replied. “forty is the age when a man should begin to reckon up,” said lilly. jim suddenly sprang to his feet, and brandished his fists. “i'll pitch the lot of you over the bloody rail,” he said. he glared at them, from under his bald, wrinkled forehead. josephine glanced round. she had become a dusky white colour. she was afraid of him, and she disliked him intensely nowadays. “do you recognise anyone in the orchestra?” she asked. the party in the box had become dead silent. they looked down. the conductor was at his stand. the music began. they all remained silent and motionless during the next scene, each thinking his own thoughts. jim was uncomfortable. he wanted to make good. he sat with his elbows on his knees, grinning slightly, looking down. at the next interval he stood up suddenly. “it is the chap--what?” he exclaimed excitedly, looking round at his friends. “who?” said tanny. “it is he?” said josephine quietly, meeting jim's eye. “sure!” he barked. he was leaning forward over the ledge, rattling a programme in his hand, as if trying to attract attention. then he made signals. “there you are!” he exclaimed triumphantly. “that's the chap.” “who? who?” they cried. but neither jim nor josephine would vouchsafe an answer. the next was the long interval. jim and josephine gazed down at the orchestra. the musicians were laying aside their instruments and rising. the ugly fire-curtain began slowly to descend. jim suddenly bolted out. “is it that man aaron sisson?” asked robert. “where? where?” cried julia. “it can't be.” but josephine's face was closed and silent. she did not answer. the whole party moved out on to the crimson-carpeted gangway. groups of people stood about chatting, men and women were passing along, to pay visits or to find drinks. josephine's party stared around, talking desultorily. and at length they perceived jim stalking along, leading aaron sisson by the arm. jim was grinning, the flautist looked unwilling. he had a comely appearance, in his white shirt--a certain comely blondness and repose. and as much a gentleman as anybody. “well!” cried josephine to him. “how do you come here?” “i play the flute,” he answered, as he shook hands. the little crowd stood in the gangway and talked. “how wonderful of you to be here!” cried julia. he laughed. “do you think so?” he answered. “yes, i do.--it seems so far from shottle house and christmas eve.--oh, wasn't it exciting!” cried julia. aaron looked at her, but did not answer. “we've heard all about you,” said tanny playfully. “oh, yes,” he replied. “come!” said josephine, rather irritated. “we crowd up the gangway.” and she led the way inside the box. aaron stood and looked down at the dishevelled theatre. “you get all the view,” he said. “we do, don't we!” cried julia. “more than's good for us,” said lilly. “tell us what you are doing. you've got a permanent job?” asked josephine. “yes--at present.” “ah! it's more interesting for you than at beldover.” she had taken her seat. he looked down at her dusky young face. her voice was always clear and measured. “it's a change,” he said, smiling. “oh, it must be more than that,” she said. “why, you must feel a whole difference. it's a whole new life.” he smiled, as if he were laughing at her silently. she flushed. “but isn't it?” she persisted. “yes. it can be,” he replied. he looked as if he were quietly amused, but dissociated. none of the people in the box were quite real to him. he was not really amused. julia found him dull, stupid. tanny also was offended that he could not _perceive her_. the men remained practically silent. “you're a chap i always hoped would turn up again,” said jim. “oh, yes!” replied aaron, smiling as if amused. “but perhaps he doesn't like us! perhaps he's not glad that we turned up,” said julia, leaving her sting. the flautist turned and looked at her. “you can't remember us, can you?” she asked. “yes,” he said. “i can remember you.” “oh,” she laughed. “you are unflattering.” he was annoyed. he did not know what she was getting at. “how are your wife and children?” she asked spitefully. “all right, i think.” “but you've been back to them?” cried josephine in dismay. he looked at her, a slow, half smiling look, but did not speak. “come and have a drink. damn the women,” said jim uncouthly, seizing aaron by the arm and dragging him off. chapter vi. talk the party stayed to the end of the interminable opera. they had agreed to wait for aaron. he was to come around to the vestibule for them, after the show. they trooped slowly down-stairs into the crush of the entrance hall. chattering, swirling people, red carpet, palms green against cream-and-gilt walls, small whirlpools of life at the open, dark doorways, men in opera hats steering decisively about-it was the old scene. but there were no taxis--absolutely no taxis. and it was raining. fortunately the women had brought shoes. they slipped these on. jim rocked through the crowd, in his tall hat, looking for the flautist. at last aaron was found--wearing a bowler hat. julia groaned in spirit. josephine's brow knitted. not that anybody cared, really. but as one must frown at something, why not at the bowler hat? acquaintances and elegant young men in uniforms insisted on rushing up and bowing and exchanging a few words, either with josephine, or jim, or julia, or lilly. they were coldly received. the party veered out into the night. the women hugged their wraps about them, and set off sharply, feeling some repugnance for the wet pavements and the crowd. they had not far to go--only to jim's rooms in adelphi. jim was leading aaron, holding him by the arm and slightly pinching his muscles. it gave him great satisfaction to have between his fingers the arm-muscles of a working-man, one of the common people, the _fons et origo_ of modern life. jim was talking rather vaguely about labour and robert smillie, and bolshevism. he was all for revolution and the triumph of labour. so they arrived, mounted a dark stair, and entered a large, handsome room, one of the adams rooms. jim had furnished it from heale's with striped hangings, green and white and yellow and dark purple, and with a green-and-black checked carpet, and great stripe-covered chairs and chesterfield. a big gas-fire was soon glowing in the handsome old fire-place, the panelled room seemed cosy. while jim was handing round drinks and sandwiches, and josephine was making tea, robert played bach on the piano--the pianola, rather. the chairs and lounge were in a half-circle round the fire. the party threw off their wraps and sank deep into this expensive comfort of modern bohemia. they needed the bach to take away the bad taste that _aida_ had left in their mouths. they needed the whiskey and curacao to rouse their spirits. they needed the profound comfort in which to sink away from the world. all the men, except aaron, had been through the war in some way or other. but here they were, in the old setting exactly, the old bohemian routine. the bell rang, jim went downstairs. he returned shortly with a frail, elegant woman--fashionable rather than bohemian. she was cream and auburn, irish, with a slightly-lifted upper lip that gave her a pathetic look. she dropped her wrap and sat down by julia, taking her hand delicately. “how are you, darling?” she asked. “yes--i'm happy,” said julia, giving her odd, screwed-up smile. the pianola stopped, they all chatted indiscriminately. jim was watching the new-comer--mrs. browning--with a concentrated wolfish grin. “i like her,” he said at last. “i've seen her before, haven't i?--i like her awfully.” “yes,” said josephine, with a slight grunt of a laugh. “he wants to be loved.” “oh,” cried clariss. “so do i!” “then there you are!” cried tanny. “alas, no, there we aren't,” cried clariss. she was beautiful too, with her lifted upper-lip. “we both want to be loved, and so we miss each other entirely. we run on in two parallel lines, that can never meet.” she laughed low and half sad. “doesn't she love you?” said aaron to jim amused, indicating josephine. “i thought you were engaged.” “her!” leered jim vindictively, glancing at josephine. “she doesn't love me.” “is that true?” asked robert hastily, of josephine. “why,” she said, “yes. why should he make me say out here that i don't love him!” “got you my girl,” said jim. “then it's no engagement?” said robert. “listen to the row fools make, rushing in,” said jim maliciously. “no, the engagement is broken,” said josephine. “world coming to pieces bit by bit,” said lilly. jim was twisting in his chair, and looking like a chinese dragon, diabolical. the room was uneasy. “what gives you such a belly-ache for love, jim?” said lilly, “or for being loved? why do you want so badly to be loved?” “because i like it, damn you,” barked jim. “because i'm in need of it.” none of them quite knew whether they ought to take it as a joke. it was just a bit too real to be quite pleasant. “why are you such a baby?” said lilly. “there you are, six foot in length, have been a cavalry officer and fought in two wars, and you spend your time crying for somebody to love you. you're a comic.” “am i though?” said jim. “i'm losing life. i'm getting thin.” “you don't look as if you were losing life,” said lilly. “don't i? i am, though. i'm dying.” “what of? lack of life?” “that's about it, my young cock. life's leaving me.” “better sing tosti's farewell to it.” jim who had been sprawling full length in his arm-chair, the centre of interest of all the company, suddenly sprang forward and pushed his face, grinning, in the face of lilly. “you're a funny customer, you are,” he said. then he turned round in his chair, and saw clariss sitting at the feet of julia, with one white arm over her friend's knee. jim immediately stuck forward his muzzle and gazed at her. clariss had loosened her masses of thick, auburn hair, so that it hung half free. her face was creamy pale, her upper lip lifted with odd pathos! she had rose-rubies in her ears. “i like her,” said jim. “what's her name?” “mrs. browning. don't be so rude,” said josephine. “browning for gravies. any relation of robert?” “oh, yes! you ask my husband,” came the slow, plangent voice of clariss. “you've got a husband, have you?” “rather! haven't i, juley?” “yes,” said julia, vaguely and wispily. “yes, dear, you have.” “and two fine children,” put in robert. “no! you don't mean it!” said jim. “who's your husband? anybody?” “rather!” came the deep voice of clariss. “he sees to that.” jim stared, grinning, showing his pointed teeth, reaching nearer and nearer to clariss who, in her frail scrap of an evening dress, amethyst and silver, was sitting still in the deep black hearth-rug, her arm over julia's knee, taking very little notice of jim, although he amused her. “i like you awfully, i say,” he repeated. “thanks, i'm sure,” she said. the others were laughing, sprawling in their chairs, and sipping curacao and taking a sandwich or a cigarette. aaron sisson alone sat upright, smiling flickeringly. josephine watched him, and her pointed tongue went from time to time over her lips. “but i'm sure,” she broke in, “this isn't very interesting for the others. awfully boring! don't be silly all the time, jim, or we must go home.” jim looked at her with narrowed eyes. he hated her voice. she let her eye rest on his for a moment. then she put her cigarette to her lips. robert was watching them both. josephine took her cigarette from her lips again. “tell us about yourself, mr. sisson,” she said. “how do you like being in london?” “i like london,” said aaron. where did he live? bloomsbury. did he know many people? no--nobody except a man in the orchestra. how had he got his job? through an agent. etc. etc. “what do you make of the miners?” said jim, suddenly taking a new line. “me?” said sisson. “i don't make anything of them.” “do you think they'll make a stand against the government?” “what for?” “nationalisation.” “they might, one day.” “think they'd fight?” “fight?” “yes.” aaron sat laughing. “what have they to fight for?” “why, everything! what haven't they to fight for?” cried josephine fiercely. “freedom, liberty, and escape from this vile system. won't they fight for that?” aaron sat smiling, slowly shaking his head. “nay,” he said, “you mustn't ask me what they'll do--i've only just left them, for good. they'll do a lot of cavilling.” “but won't they act?” cried josephine. “act?” said aaron. “how, act?” “why, defy the government, and take things in their own hands,” said josephine. “they might, some time,” said aaron, rather indifferent. “i wish they would!” cried josephine. “my, wouldn't i love it if they'd make a bloody revolution!” they were all looking now at her. her black brows were twitching, in her black and silver dress she looked like a symbol of young disaster. “must it be bloody, josephine?” said robert. “why, yes. i don't believe in revolutions that aren't bloody,” said josephine. “wouldn't i love it! i'd go in front with a red flag.” “it would be rather fun,” said tanny. “wouldn't it!” cried josephine. “oh, josey, dear!” cried julia hysterically. “isn't she a red-hot bolsher! _i_ should be frightened.” “no!” cried josephine. “i should love it.” “so should i,” said jim, in a luscious sort of voice. “what price machine-guns at the end of the strand! that's a day to live for, what?” “ha! ha!” laughed clariss, with her deep laugh. “we'd all bolsh together. i'd give the cheers.” “i wouldn't mind getting killed. i'd love it, in a real fight,” said josephine. “but, josephine,” said robert, “don't you think we've had enough of that sort of thing in the war? don't you think it all works out rather stupid and unsatisfying?” “ah, but a civil war would be different. i've no interest in fighting germans. but a civil war would be different.” “that's a fact, it would,” said jim. “only rather worse,” said robert. “no, i don't agree,” cried josephine. “you'd feel you were doing something, in a civil war.” “pulling the house down,” said lilly. “yes,” she cried. “don't you hate it, the house we live in--london--england--america! don't you hate them?” “i don't like them. but i can't get much fire in my hatred. they pall on me rather,” said lilly. “ay!” said aaron, suddenly stirring in his chair. lilly and he glanced at one another with a look of recognition. “still,” said tanny, “there's got to be a clearance some day or other.” “oh,” drawled clariss. “i'm all for a clearance. i'm all for pulling the house down. only while it stands i do want central heating and a good cook.” “may i come to dinner?” said jim. “oh, yes. you'd find it rather domestic.” “where do you live?” “rather far out now--amersham.” “amersham? where's that--?” “oh, it's on the map.” there was a little lull. jim gulped down a drink, standing at the sideboard. he was a tall, fine, soldierly figure, and his face, with its little sandy moustache and bald forehead, was odd. aaron sisson sat watching him, unconsciously. “hello you!” said jim. “have one?” aaron shook his head, and jim did not press him. it saved the drinks. “you believe in love, don't you?” said jim, sitting down near aaron, and grinning at him. “love!” said aaron. “love! he says,” mocked jim, grinning at the company. “what about it, then?” asked aaron. “it's life! love is life,” said jim fiercely. “it's a vice, like drink,” said lilly. “eh? a vice!” said jim. “may be for you, old bird.” “more so still for you,” said lilly. “it's life. it's life!” reiterated jim. “don't you agree?” he turned wolfishly to clariss. “oh, yes--every time--” she drawled, nonchalant. “here, let's write it down,” said lilly. he found a blue pencil and printed in large letters on the old creamy marble of the mantel-piece panel:--love is life. julia suddenly rose and flung her arms asunder wildly. “oh, i hate love. i hate it,” she protested. jim watched her sardonically. “look at her!” he said. “look at lesbia who hates love.” “no, but perhaps it is a disease. perhaps we are all wrong, and we can't love properly,” put in josephine. “have another try,” said jim,--“i know what love is. i've thought about it. love is the soul's respiration.” “let's have that down,” said lilly. love is the soul's respiration. he printed it on the old mantel-piece. jim eyed the letters. “it's right,” he said. “quite right. when you love, your soul breathes in. if you don't breathe in, you suffocate.” “what about breathing out?” said robert. “if you don't breathe out, you asphyxiate.” “right you are, mock turtle--” said jim maliciously. “breathing out is a bloody revolution,” said lilly. “you've hit the nail on the head,” said jim solemnly. “let's record it then,” said lilly. and with the blue pencil he printed: when you love, your soul breathes in-when your soul breathes out, it's a bloody revolution. “i say jim,” he said. “you must be busting yourself, trying to breathe in.” “don't you be too clever. i've thought about it,” said jim. “when i'm in love, i get a great inrush of energy. i actually feel it rush in--here!” he poked his finger on the pit of his stomach. “it's the soul's expansion. and if i can't get these rushes of energy, i'm dying, and i know i am.” he spoke the last words with sudden ferocity and desperation. “all _i_ know is,” said tanny, “you don't look it.” “i am. i am.” jim protested. “i'm dying. life's leaving me.” “maybe you're choking with love,” said robert. “perhaps you have breathed in so much, you don't know how to let it go again. perhaps your soul's got a crick in it, with expanding so much.” “you're a bloody young sucking pig, you are,” said jim. “even at that age, i've learned my manners,” replied robert. jim looked round the party. then he turned to aaron sisson. “what do you make of 'em, eh?” he said. aaron shook his head, and laughed. “me?” he said. but jim did not wait for an answer. “i've had enough,” said tanny suddenly rising. “i think you're all silly. besides, it's getting late.” “she!” said jim, rising and pointing luridly to clariss. “she's love. and he's the working people. the hope is these two--” he jerked a thumb at aaron sisson, after having indicated mrs. browning. “oh, how awfully interesting. it's quite a long time since i've been a personification.--i suppose you've never been one before?” said clariss, turning to aaron in conclusion. “no, i don't think i have,” he answered. “i hope personification is right.--ought to be _allegory_ or something else?” this from clariss to robert. “or a parable, clariss,” laughed the young lieutenant. “goodbye,” said tanny. “i've been awfully bored.” “have you?” grinned jim. “goodbye! better luck next time.” “we'd better look sharp,” said robert, “if we want to get the tube.” the party hurried through the rainy narrow streets down to the embankment station. robert and julia and clariss were going west, lilly and his wife were going to hampstead, josephine and aaron sisson were going both to bloomsbury. “i suppose,” said robert, on the stairs--“mr. sisson will see you to your door, josephine. he lives your way.” “there's no need at all,” said josephine. the four who were going north went down to the low tube level. it was nearly the last train. the station was half deserted, half rowdy, several fellows were drunk, shouting and crowing. down there in the bowels of london, after midnight, everything seemed horrible and unnatural. “how i hate this london,” said tanny. she was half norwegian, and had spent a large part of her life in norway, before she married lilly. “yes, so do i,” said josephine. “but if one must earn one's living one must stay here. i wish i could get back to paris. but there's nothing doing for me in france.--when do you go back into the country, both of you?” “friday,” said lilly. “how lovely for you!--and when will you go to norway, tanny?” “in about a month,” said tanny. “you must be awfully pleased.” “oh--thankful--thankful to get out of england--” “i know. that's how i feel. everything is so awful--so dismal and dreary, i find it--” they crowded into the train. men were still yelling like wild beasts--others were asleep--soldiers were singing. “have you really broken your engagement with jim?” shrilled tanny in a high voice, as the train roared. “yes, he's impossible,” said josephine. “perfectly hysterical and impossible.” “and selfish--” cried tanny. “oh terribly--” cried josephine. “come up to hampstead to lunch with us,” said lilly to aaron. “ay--thank you,” said aaron. lilly scribbled directions on a card. the hot, jaded midnight underground rattled on. aaron and josephine got down to change trains. chapter vii. the dark square garden josephine had invited aaron sisson to dinner at a restaurant in soho, one sunday evening. they had a corner to themselves, and with a bottle of burgundy she was getting his history from him. his father had been a shaft-sinker, earning good money, but had been killed by a fall down the shaft when aaron was only four years old. the widow had opened a shop: aaron was her only child. she had done well in her shop. she had wanted aaron to be a schoolteacher. he had served three years apprenticeship, then suddenly thrown it up and gone to the pit. “but why?” said josephine. “i couldn't tell you. i felt more like it.” he had a curious quality of an intelligent, almost sophisticated mind, which had repudiated education. on purpose he kept the midland accent in his speech. he understood perfectly what a personification was--and an allegory. but he preferred to be illiterate. josephine found out what a miner's checkweighman was. she tried to find out what sort of wife aaron had--but, except that she was the daughter of a publican and was delicate in health, she could learn nothing. “and do you send her money?” she asked. “ay,” said aaron. “the house is mine. and i allow her so much a week out of the money in the bank. my mother left me a bit over a thousand when she died.” “you don't mind what i say, do you?” said josephine. “no i don't mind,” he laughed. he had this pleasant-seeming courteous manner. but he really kept her at a distance. in some things he reminded her of robert: blond, erect, nicely built, fresh and english-seeming. but there was a curious cold distance to him, which she could not get across. an inward indifference to her--perhaps to everything. yet his laugh was so handsome. “will you tell me why you left your wife and children?--didn't you love them?” aaron looked at the odd, round, dark muzzle of the girl. she had had her hair bobbed, and it hung in odd dark folds, very black, over her ears. “why i left her?” he said. “for no particular reason. they're all right without me.” josephine watched his face. she saw a pallor of suffering under its freshness, and a strange tension in his eyes. “but you couldn't leave your little girls for no reason at all--” “yes, i did. for no reason--except i wanted to have some free room round me--to loose myself--” “you mean you wanted love?” flashed josephine, thinking he said _lose_. “no, i wanted fresh air. i don't know what i wanted. why should i know?” “but we must know: especially when other people will be hurt,” said she. “ah, well! a breath of fresh air, by myself. i felt forced to feel--i feel if i go back home now, i shall be forced--forced to love--or care--or something.” “perhaps you wanted more than your wife could give you,” she said. “perhaps less. she's made up her mind she loves me, and she's not going to let me off.” “did you never love her?” said josephine. “oh, yes. i shall never love anybody else. but i'm damned if i want to be a lover any more. to her or to anybody. that's the top and bottom of it. i don't want to care, when care isn't in me. and i'm not going to be forced to it.” the fat, aproned french waiter was hovering near. josephine let him remove the plates and the empty bottle. “have more wine,” she said to aaron. but he refused. she liked him because of his dead-level indifference to his surroundings. french waiters and foreign food--he noticed them in his quick, amiable-looking fashion--but he was indifferent. josephine was piqued. she wanted to pierce this amiable aloofness of his. she ordered coffee and brandies. “but you don't want to get away from everything, do you? i myself feel so lost sometimes--so dreadfully alone: not in a silly sentimental fashion, because men keep telling me they love me, don't you know. but my life seems alone, for some reason--” “haven't you got relations?” he said. “no one, now mother is dead. nothing nearer than aunts and cousins in america. i suppose i shall see them all again one day. but they hardly count over here.” “why don't you get married?” he said. “how old are you?” “i'm twenty-five. how old are you?” “thirty-three.” “you might almost be any age.--i don't know why i don't get married. in a way, i hate earning my own living--yet i go on--and i like my work--” “what are you doing now?” “i'm painting scenery for a new play--rather fun--i enjoy it. but i often wonder what will become of me.” “in what way?” she was almost affronted. “what becomes of me? oh, i don't know. and it doesn't matter, not to anybody but myself.” “what becomes of anybody, anyhow? we live till we die. what do you want?” “why, i keep saying i want to get married and feel sure of something. but i don't know--i feel dreadful sometimes--as if every minute would be the last. i keep going on and on--i don't know what for--and it keeps going on and on--goodness knows what it's all for.” “you shouldn't bother yourself,” he said. “you should just let it go on and on--” “but i must bother,” she said. “i must think and feel--” “you've no occasion,” he said. “how--?” she said, with a sudden grunting, unhappy laugh. then she lit a cigarette. “no,” she said. “what i should really like more than anything would be an end of the world. i wish the world would come to an end.” he laughed, and poured his drops of brandy down his throat. “it won't, for wishing,” he said. “no, that's the awful part of it. it'll just go on and on-doesn't it make you feel you'd go mad?” he looked at her and shook his head. “you see it doesn't concern me,” he said. “so long as i can float by myself.” “but are you satisfied!” she cried. “i like being by myself--i hate feeling and caring, and being forced into it. i want to be left alone--” “you aren't very polite to your hostess of the evening,” she said, laughing a bit miserably. “oh, we're all right,” he said. “you know what i mean--” “you like your own company? do you?--sometimes i think i'm nothing when i'm alone. sometimes i think i surely must be nothing--nothingness.” he shook his head. “no,” he said. “no. i only want to be left alone.” “not to have anything to do with anybody?” she queried ironically. “not to any extent.” she watched him--and then she bubbled with a laugh. “i think you're funny,” she said. “you don't mind?” “no--why--it's just as you see it.--jim bricknell's a rare comic, to my eye.” “oh, him!--no, not actually. he's self-conscious and selfish and hysterical. it isn't a bit funny after a while.” “i only know what i've seen,” said aaron. “you'd both of you like a bloody revolution, though.” “yes. only when it came he wouldn't be there.” “would you?” “yes, indeed i would. i would give everything to be in it. i'd give heaven and earth for a great big upheaval--and then darkness.” “perhaps you'll get it, when you die,” said aaron. “oh, but i don't want to die and leave all this standing. i hate it so.” “why do you?” “but don't you?” “no, it doesn't really bother me.” “it makes me feel i can't live.” “i can't see that.” “but you always disagree with one!” said josephine. “how do you like lilly? what do you think of him?” “he seems sharp,” said aaron. “but he's more than sharp.” “oh, yes! he's got his finger in most pies.” “and doesn't like the plums in any of them,” said josephine tartly. “what does he do?” “writes--stories and plays.” “and makes it pay?” “hardly at all.--they want us to go. shall we?” she rose from the table. the waiter handed her her cloak, and they went out into the blowy dark night. she folded her wrap round her, and hurried forward with short, sharp steps. there was a certain parisian _chic_ and mincingness about her, even in her walk: but underneath, a striding, savage suggestion as if she could leg it in great strides, like some savage squaw. aaron pressed his bowler hat down on his brow. “would you rather take a bus?” she said in a high voice, because of the wind. “i'd rather walk.” “so would i.” they hurried across the charing cross road, where great buses rolled and rocked, crammed with people. her heels clicked sharply on the pavement, as they walked east. they crossed holborn, and passed the museum. and neither of them said anything. when they came to the corner, she held out her hand. “look!” she said. “don't come any further: don't trouble.” “i'll walk round with you: unless you'd rather not.” “no--but do you want to bother?” “it's no bother.” so they pursued their way through the high wind, and turned at last into the old, beautiful square. it seemed dark and deserted, dark like a savage wilderness in the heart of london. the wind was roaring in the great bare trees of the centre, as if it were some wild dark grove deep in a forgotten land. josephine opened the gate of the square garden with her key, and let it slam to behind him. “how wonderful the wind is!” she shrilled. “shall we listen to it for a minute?” she led him across the grass past the shrubs to the big tree in the centre. there she climbed up to a seat. he sat beside her. they sat in silence, looking at the darkness. rain was blowing in the wind. they huddled against the big tree-trunk, for shelter, and watched the scene. beyond the tall shrubs and the high, heavy railings the wet street gleamed silently. the houses of the square rose like a cliff on this inner dark sea, dimly lighted at occasional windows. boughs swayed and sang. a taxi-cab swirled round a corner like a cat, and purred to a standstill. there was a light of an open hall door. but all far away, it seemed, unthinkably far away. aaron sat still and watched. he was frightened, it all seemed so sinister, this dark, bristling heart of london. wind boomed and tore like waves ripping a shingle beach. the two white lights of the taxi stared round and departed, leaving the coast at the foot of the cliffs deserted, faintly spilled with light from the high lamp. beyond there, on the outer rim, a policeman passed solidly. josephine was weeping steadily all the time, but inaudibly. occasionally she blew her nose and wiped her face. but he had not realized. she hardly realized herself. she sat near the strange man. he seemed so still and remote--so fascinating. “give me your hand,” she said to him, subduedly. he took her cold hand in his warm, living grasp. she wept more bitterly. he noticed at last. “why are you crying?” he said. “i don't know,” she replied, rather matter-of-fact, through her tears. so he let her cry, and said no more, but sat with her cold hand in his warm, easy clasp. “you'll think me a fool,” she said. “i don't know why i cry.” “you can cry for nothing, can't you?” he said. “why, yes, but it's not very sensible.” he laughed shortly. “sensible!” he said. “you are a strange man,” she said. but he took no notice. “did you ever intend to marry jim bricknell?” he asked. “yes, of course.” “i can't imagine it,” he said. “why not?” both were watching blankly the roaring night of mid-london, the phantasmagoric old bloomsbury square. they were still hand in hand. “such as you shouldn't marry,” he said. “but why not? i want to.” “you think you do.” “yes indeed i do.” he did not say any more. “why shouldn't i?” she persisted. “i don't know--” and again he was silent. “you've known some life, haven't you?” he asked. “me? why?” “you seem to.” “do i? i'm sorry. do i seem vicious?--no, i'm not vicious.--i've seen some life, perhaps--in paris mostly. but not much. why do you ask?” “i wasn't thinking.” “but what do you mean? what are you thinking?” “nothing. nothing.” “don't be so irritating,” said she. but he did not answer, and she became silent also. they sat hand in hand. “won't you kiss me?” came her voice out of the darkness. he waited some moments, then his voice sounded gently, half mocking, half reproachful. “nay!” he said. “why not?” “i don't want to.” “why not?” she asked. he laughed, but did not reply. she sat perfectly still for some time. she had ceased to cry. in the darkness her face was set and sullen. sometimes a spray of rain blew across it. she drew her hand from his, and rose to her feet. “ill go in now,” she said. “you're not offended, are you?” he asked. “no. why?” they stepped down in the darkness from their perch. “i wondered.” she strode off for some little way. then she turned and said: “yes, i think it is rather insulting.” “nay,” he said. “not it! not it!” and he followed her to the gate. she opened with her key, and they crossed the road to her door. “good-night,” she said, turning and giving him her hand. “you'll come and have dinner with me--or lunch--will you? when shall we make it?” he asked. “well, i can't say for certain--i'm very busy just now. i'll let you know.” a policeman shed his light on the pair of them as they stood on the step. “all right,” said aaron, dropping back, and she hastily opened the big door, and entered. chapter viii. a punch in the wind the lillys had a labourer's cottage in hampshire--pleasant enough. they were poor. lilly was a little, dark, thin, quick fellow, his wife was strong and fair. they had known robert and julia for some years, but josephine and jim were new acquaintances,--fairly new. one day in early spring lilly had a telegram, “coming to see you arrive 4:30--bricknell.” he was surprised, but he and his wife got the spare room ready. and at four o'clock lilly went off to the station. he was a few minutes late, and saw jim's tall, rather elegant figure stalking down the station path. jim had been an officer in the regular army, and still spent hours with his tailor. but instead of being a soldier he was a sort of socialist, and a red-hot revolutionary of a very ineffectual sort. “good lad!” he exclaimed, as lilly came up. “thought you wouldn't mind.” “not at all. let me carry your bag.” jim had a bag and a knapsack. “i had an inspiration this morning,” said jim. “i suddenly saw that if there was a man in england who could save me, it was you.” “save you from what?” asked lilly, rather abashed. “eh--?” and jim stooped, grinning at the smaller man. lilly was somewhat puzzled, but he had a certain belief in himself as a saviour. the two men tramped rather incongruously through the lanes to the cottage. tanny was in the doorway as they came up the garden path. “so nice to see you! are you all right?” she said. “a-one!” said jim, grinning. “nice of you to have me.” “oh, we're awfully pleased.” jim dropped his knapsack on the broad sofa. “i've brought some food,” he said. “have you! that's sensible of you. we can't get a great deal here, except just at week-ends,” said tanny. jim fished out a pound of sausages and a pot of fish paste. “how lovely the sausages,” said tanny. “we'll have them for dinner tonight--and we'll have the other for tea now. you'd like a wash?” but jim had already opened his bag, taken off his coat, and put on an old one. “thanks,” he said. lilly made the tea, and at length all sat down. “well how unexpected this is--and how nice,” said tanny. “jolly--eh?” said jim. he ate rapidly, stuffing his mouth too full. “how is everybody?” asked tanny. “all right. julia's gone with cyril scott. can't stand that fellow, can you? what?” “yes, i think he's rather nice,” said tanny. “what will robert do?” “have a shot at josephine, apparently.” “really? is he in love with her? i thought so. and she likes him too, doesn't she?” said tanny. “very likely,” said jim. “i suppose you're jealous,” laughed tanny. “me!” jim shook his head. “not a bit. like to see the ball kept rolling.” “what have you been doing lately?” “been staying a few days with my wife.” “no, really! i can't believe it.” jim had a french wife, who had divorced him, and two children. now he was paying visits to this wife again: purely friendly. tanny did most of the talking. jim excited her, with his way of looking in her face and grinning wolfishly, and at the same time asking to be saved. after tea, he wanted to send telegrams, so lilly took him round to the village post-office. telegrams were a necessary part of his life. he had to be suddenly starting off to keep sudden appointments, or he felt he was a void in the atmosphere. he talked to lilly about social reform, and so on. jim's work in town was merely nominal. he spent his time wavering about and going to various meetings, philandering and weeping. lilly kept in the back of his mind the saving which james had come to look for. he intended to do his best. after dinner the three sat cosily round the kitchen fire. “but what do you really think will happen to the world?” lilly asked jim, amid much talk. “what? there's something big coming,” said jim. “where from?” “watch ireland, and watch japan--they're the two poles of the world,” said jim. “i thought russia and america,” said lilly. “eh? what? russia and america! they'll depend on ireland and japan. i know it. i've had a vision of it. ireland on this side and japan on the other--they'll settle it.” “i don't see how,” said lilly. “i don't see how--but i had a vision of it.” “what sort of vision?” “couldn't describe it.” “but you don't think much of the japanese, do you?” asked lilly. “don't i! don't i!” said jim. “what, don't you think they're wonderful?” “no. i think they're rather unpleasant.” “i think the salvation of the world lies with them.” “funny salvation,” said lilly. “i think they're anything but angels.” “do you though? now that's funny. why?” “looking at them even. i knew a russian doctor who'd been through the russo-japanese war, and who had gone a bit cracked. he said he saw the japs rush a trench. they threw everything away and flung themselves through the russian fire and simply dropped in masses. but those that reached the trenches jumped in with bare hands on the russians and tore their faces apart and bit their throats out--fairly ripped the faces off the bone.--it had sent the doctor a bit cracked. he said the wounded were awful,--their faces torn off and their throats mangled--and dead japs with flesh between the teeth--god knows if it's true. but that's the impression the japanese had made on this man. it had affected his mind really.” jim watched lilly, and smiled as if he were pleased. “no--really--!” he said. “anyhow they're more demon than angel, i believe,” said lilly. “oh, no, rawdon, but you always exaggerate,” said tanny. “maybe,” said lilly. “i think japanese are fascinating--fascinating--so quick, and such force in them--” “rather!--eh?” said jim, looking with a quick smile at tanny. “i think a japanese lover would be marvellous,” she laughed riskily. “i s'd think he would,” said jim, screwing up his eyes. “do you hate the normal british as much as i do?” she asked him. “hate them! hate them!” he said, with an intimate grin. “their beastly virtue,” said she. “and i believe there's nobody more vicious underneath.” “nobody!” said jim. “but you're british yourself,” said lilly to jim. “no, i'm irish. family's irish--my mother was a fitz-patrick.” “anyhow you live in england.” “because they won't let me go to ireland.” the talk drifted. jim finished up all the beer, and they prepared to go to bed. jim was a bit tipsy, grinning. he asked for bread and cheese to take upstairs. “will you have supper?” said lilly. he was surprised, because jim had eaten strangely much at dinner. “no--where's the loaf?” and he cut himself about half of it. there was no cheese. “bread'll do,” said jim. “sit down and eat it. have cocoa with it,” said tanny. “no, i like to have it in my bedroom.” “you don't eat bread in the night?” said lilly. “i do.” “what a funny thing to do.” the cottage was in darkness. the lillys slept soundly. jim woke up and chewed bread and slept again. in the morning at dawn he rose and went downstairs. lilly heard him roaming about--heard the woman come in to clean--heard them talking. so he got up to look after his visitor, though it was not seven o'clock, and the woman was busy.--but before he went down, he heard jim come upstairs again. mrs. short was busy in the kitchen when lilly went down. “the other gentleman have been down, sir,” said mrs. short. “he asked me where the bread and butter were, so i said should i cut him a piece. but he wouldn't let me do it. i gave him a knife and he took it for himself, in the pantry.” “i say, bricknell,” said lilly at breakfast time, “why do you eat so much bread?” “i've got to feed up. i've been starved during this damned war.” “but hunks of bread won't feed you up.” “gives the stomach something to work at, and prevents it grinding on the nerves,” said jim. “but surely you don't want to keep your stomach always full and heavy.” “i do, my boy. i do. it needs keeping solid. i'm losing life, if i don't. i tell you i'm losing life. let me put something inside me.” “i don't believe bread's any use.” during breakfast jim talked about the future of the world. “i reckon christ's the finest thing time has ever produced,” said he; “and will remain it.” “but you don't want crucifixions _ad infinitum_,” said lilly. “what? why not?” “once is enough--and have done.” “don't you think love and sacrifice are the finest things in life?” said jim, over his bacon. “depends what love, and what sacrifice,” said lilly. “if i really believe in an almighty god, i am willing to sacrifice for him. that is, i'm willing to yield my own personal interest to the bigger creative interest.--but it's obvious almighty god isn't mere love.” “i think it is. love and only love,” said jim. “i think the greatest joy is sacrificing oneself to love.” “to someone you love, you mean,” said tanny. “no i don't. i don't mean someone at all. i mean love--love--love. i sacrifice myself to love. i reckon that's the highest man is capable of.” “but you can't sacrifice yourself to an abstract principle,” said tanny. “that's just what you can do. and that's the beauty of it. who represents the principle doesn't matter. christ is the principle of love,” said jim. “but no!” said tanny. “it must be more individual. it must be somebody you love, not abstract love in itself. how can you sacrifice yourself to an abstraction.” “ha, i think love and your christ detestable,” said lilly--“a sheer ignominy.” “finest thing the world has produced,” said jim. “no. a thing which sets itself up to be betrayed! no, it's foul. don't you see it's the judas principle you really worship. judas is the real hero. but for judas the whole show would have been _manque_.” “oh yes,” said jim. “judas was inevitable. i'm not sure that judas wasn't the greatest of the disciples--and jesus knew it. i'm not sure judas wasn't the disciple jesus loved.” “jesus certainly encouraged him in his judas tricks,” said tanny. jim grinned knowingly at lilly. “then it was a nasty combination. and anything which turns on a judas climax is a dirty show, to my thinking. i think your judas is a rotten, dirty worm, just a dirty little self-conscious sentimental twister. and out of all christianity he is the hero today. when people say christ they mean judas. they find him luscious on the palate. and jesus fostered him--” said lilly. “he's a profound figure, is judas. it's taken two thousand years to begin to understand him,” said jim, pushing the bread and marmalade into his mouth. “a traitor is a traitor--no need to understand any further. and a system which rests all its weight on a piece of treachery makes that treachery not only inevitable but sacred. that's why i'm sick of christianity.--at any rate this modern christ-mongery.” “the finest thing the world has produced, or ever will produce--christ and judas--” said jim. “not to me,” said lilly. “foul combination.” it was a lovely morning in early march. violets were out, and the first wild anemones. the sun was quite warm. the three were about to take out a picnic lunch. lilly however was suffering from jim's presence. “jolly nice here,” said jim. “mind if i stay till saturday?” there was a pause. lilly felt he was being bullied, almost obscenely bullied. was he going to agree? suddenly he looked up at jim. “i'd rather you went tomorrow,” he said. tanny, who was sitting opposite jim, dropped her head in confusion. “what's tomorrow?” said jim. “thursday,” said lilly. “thursday,” repeated jim. and he looked up and got lilly's eye. he wanted to say “friday then?” “yes, i'd rather you went thursday,” repeated lilly. “but rawdon--!” broke in tanny, who was suffering. she stopped, however. “we can walk across country with you some way if you like,” said lilly to jim. it was a sort of compromise. “fine!” said jim. “we'll do that, then.” it was lovely sunshine, and they wandered through the woods. between jim and tanny was a sort of growing _rapprochement_, which got on lilly's nerves. “what the hell do you take that beastly personal tone for?” cried lilly at tanny, as the three sat under a leafless great beech-tree. “but i'm not personal at all, am i, mr. bricknell?” said tanny. jim watched lilly, and grinned pleasedly. “why shouldn't you be, anyhow?” he said. “yes!” she retorted. “why not!” “not while i'm here. i loathe the slimy creepy personal intimacy.--'don't you think, mr. bricknell, that it's lovely to be able to talk quite simply to somebody? oh, it's such a relief, after most people---'” lilly mimicked his wife's last speech savagely. “but i mean it,” cried tanny. “it is lovely.” “dirty messing,” said lilly angrily. jim watched the dark, irascible little man with amusement. they rose, and went to look for an inn, and beer. tanny still clung rather stickily to jim's side. but it was a lovely day, the first of all the days of spring, with crocuses and wall-flowers in the cottage gardens, and white cocks crowing in the quiet hamlet. when they got back in the afternoon to the cottage, they found a telegram for jim. he let the lillys see it--“meet you for a walk on your return journey lois.” at once tanny wanted to know all about lois. lois was a nice girl, well-to-do middle-class, but also an actress, and she would do anything jim wanted. “i must get a wire to her to meet me tomorrow,” he said. “where shall i say?” lilly produced the map, and they decided on time and station at which lois coming out of london, should meet jim. then the happy pair could walk along the thames valley, spending a night perhaps at marlowe, or some such place. off went jim and lilly once more to the postoffice. they were quite good friends. having so inhospitably fixed the hour of departure, lilly wanted to be nice. arrived at the postoffice, they found it shut: half-day closing for the little shop. “well,” said lilly. “we'll go to the station.” they proceeded to the station--found the station-master--were conducted down to the signal-box. lilly naturally hung back from people, but jim was hob-nob with the station-master and the signal man, quite officer-and-my-men kind of thing. lilly sat out on the steps of the signal-box, rather ashamed, while the long telegram was shouted over the telephone to the junction town--first the young lady and her address, then the message “meet me x. station 3:40 tomorrow walk back great pleasure jim.” anyhow that was done. they went home to tea. after tea, as the evening fell, lilly suggested a little stroll in the woods, while tanny prepared the dinner. jim agreed, and they set out. the two men wandered through the trees in the dusk, till they came to a bank on the farther edge of the wood. there they sat down. and there lilly said what he had to say. “as a matter of fact,” he said, “it's nothing but love and self-sacrifice which makes you feel yourself losing life.” “you're wrong. only love brings it back--and wine. if i drink a bottle of burgundy i feel myself restored at the middle--right here! i feel the energy back again. and if i can fall in love--but it's becoming so damned hard--” “what, to fall in love?” asked lilly. “yes.” “then why not leave off trying! what do you want to poke yourself and prod yourself into love, for?” “because i'm dead without it. i'm dead. i'm dying.” “only because you force yourself. if you drop working yourself up--” “i shall die. i only live when i can fall in love. otherwise i'm dying by inches. why, man, you don't know what it was like. i used to get the most grand feelings--like a great rush of force, or light--a great rush--right here, as i've said, at the solar plexus. and it would come any time--anywhere--no matter where i was. and then i was all right. “all right for what?--for making love?” “yes, man, i was.” “and now you aren't?--oh, well, leave love alone, as any twopenny doctor would tell you.” “no, you're off it there. it's nothing technical. technically i can make love as much as you like. it's nothing a doctor has any say in. it's what i feel inside me. i feel the life going. i know it's going. i never get those inrushes now, unless i drink a jolly lot, or if i possibly could fall in love. technically, i'm potent all right--oh, yes!” “you should leave yourself and your inrushes alone.” “but you can't. it's a sort of ache.” “then you should stiffen your backbone. it's your backbone that matters. you shouldn't want to abandon yourself. you shouldn't want to fling yourself all loose into a woman's lap. you should stand by yourself and learn to be by yourself. why don't you be more like the japanese you talk about? quiet, aloof little devils. they don't bother about being loved. they keep themselves taut in their own selves--there, at the bottom of the spine--the devil's own power they've got there.” jim mused a bit. “think they have?” he laughed. it seemed comic to him. “sure! look at them. why can't you gather yourself there?” “at the tail?” “yes. hold yourself firm there.” jim broke into a cackle of a laugh, and rose. the two went through the dark woods back to the cottage. jim staggered and stumbled like a drunken man: or worse, like a man with locomotor ataxia: as if he had no power in his lower limbs. “walk there--!” said lilly, finding him the smoothest bit of the dark path. but jim stumbled and shambled, in a state of nauseous weak relaxation. however, they reached the cottage: and food and beer--and tanny, piqued with curiosity to know what the men had been saying privately to each other. after dinner they sat once more talking round the fire. lilly sat in a small chair facing the fire, the other two in the armchairs on either side the hearth. “how nice it will be for you, walking with lois towards london tomorrow,” gushed tanny sentimentally. “good god!” said lilly. “why the dickens doesn't he walk by himself, without wanting a woman always there, to hold his hand.” “don't be so spiteful,” said tanny. “you see that you have a woman always there, to hold your hand.” “my hand doesn't need holding,” snapped lilly. “doesn't it! more than most men's! but you're so beastly ungrateful and mannish. because i hold you safe enough all the time you like to pretend you're doing it all yourself.” “all right. don't drag yourself in,” said lilly, detesting his wife at that moment. “anyhow,” and he turned to jim, “it's time you'd done slobbering yourself over a lot of little women, one after the other.” “why shouldn't i, if i like it?” said jim. “yes, why not?” said tanny. “because it makes a fool of you. look at you, stumbling and staggering with no use in your legs. i'd be ashamed if i were you.” “would you?” said jim. “i would. and it's nothing but your wanting to be loved which does it. a maudlin crying to be loved, which makes your knees all go rickety.” “think that's it?” said jim. “what else is it. you haven't been here a day, but you must telegraph for some female to be ready to hold your hand the moment you go away. and before she lets go, you'll be wiring for another. you want to be loved, you want to be loved--a man of your years. it's disgusting--” “i don't see it. i believe in love--” said jim, watching and grinning oddly. “bah, love! messing, that's what it is. it wouldn't matter if it did you no harm. but when you stagger and stumble down a road, out of sheer sloppy relaxation of your will---” at this point jim suddenly sprang from his chair at lilly, and gave him two or three hard blows with his fists, upon the front of the body. then he sat down in his own chair again, saying sheepishly: “i knew i should have to do it, if he said any more.” lilly sat motionless as a statue, his face like paper. one of the blows had caught him rather low, so that he was almost winded and could not breathe. he sat rigid, paralysed as a winded man is. but he wouldn't let it be seen. with all his will he prevented himself from gasping. only through his parted lips he drew tiny gasps, controlled, nothing revealed to the other two. he hated them both far too much. for some minutes there was dead silence, whilst lilly silently and viciously fought for his breath. tanny opened her eyes wide in a sort of pleased bewilderment, and jim turned his face aside, and hung his clasped hands between his knees. “there's a great silence, suddenly!” said tanny. “what is there to say?” ejaculated lilly rapidly, with a spoonful of breath which he managed to compress and control into speech. then he sat motionless again, concerned with the business of getting back his wind, and not letting the other two see. jim jerked in his chair, and looked round. “it isn't that i don't like the man,” he said, in a rather small voice. “but i knew if he went on i should have to do it.” to lilly, rigid and physically preoccupied, there sounded a sort of self-consciousness in jim's voice, as if the whole thing had been semi-deliberate. he detected the sort of maudlin deliberateness which goes with hysterics, and he was colder, more icy than ever. tanny looked at lilly, puzzled, bewildered, but still rather pleased, as if she demanded an answer. none being forthcoming, she said: “of course, you mustn't expect to say all those things without rousing a man.” still lilly did not answer. jim glanced at him, then looked at tanny. “it isn't that i don't like him,” he said, slowly. “i like him better than any man i've ever known, i believe.” he clasped his hands and turned aside his face. “judas!” flashed through lilly's mind. again tanny looked for her husband's answer. “yes, rawdon,” she said. “you can't say the things you do without their having an effect. you really ask for it, you know.” “it's no matter.” lilly squeezed the words out coldly. “he wanted to do it, and he did it.” a dead silence ensued now. tanny looked from man to man. “i could feel it coming on me,” said jim. “of course!” said tanny. “rawdon doesn't know the things he says.” she was pleased that he had had to pay for them, for once. it takes a man a long time to get his breath back, after a sharp blow in the wind. lilly was managing by degrees. the others no doubt attributed his silence to deep or fierce thoughts. it was nothing of the kind, merely a cold struggle to get his wind back, without letting them know he was struggling: and a sheer, stock-stiff hatred of the pair of them. “i like the man,” said jim. “never liked a man more than i like him.” he spoke as if with difficulty. “the man” stuck safely in lilly's ears. “oh, well,” he managed to say. “it's nothing. i've done my talking and had an answer, for once.” “yes, rawdy, you've had an answer, for once. usually you don't get an answer, you know--and that's why you go so far--in the things you say. now you'll know how you make people feel.” “quite!” said lilly. “_i_ don't feel anything. i don't mind what he says,” said jim. “yes, but he ought to know the things he does say,” said tanny. “he goes on, without considering the person he's talking to. this time it's come back on him. he mustn't say such personal things, if he's not going to risk an answer.” “i don't mind what he says. i don't mind a bit,” said jim. “nor do i mind,” said lilly indifferently. “i say what i feel--you do as you feel--there's an end of it.” a sheepish sort of silence followed this speech. it was broken by a sudden laugh from tanny. “the things that happen to us!” she said, laughing rather shrilly. “suddenly, like a thunderbolt, we're all struck into silence!” “rum game, eh!” said jim, grinning. “isn't it funny! isn't life too funny!” she looked again at her husband. “but, rawdy, you must admit it was your own fault.” lilly's stiff face did not change. “why fault!” he said, looking at her coldly. “what is there to talk about?” “usually there's so much,” she said sarcastically. a few phrases dribbled out of the silence. in vain jim, tried to get lilly to thaw, and in vain tanny gave her digs at her husband. lilly's stiff, inscrutable face did not change, he was polite and aloof. so they all went to bed. in the morning, the walk was to take place, as arranged, lilly and tanny accompanying jim to the third station across country. the morning was lovely, the country beautiful. lilly liked the countryside and enjoyed the walk. but a hardness inside himself never relaxed. jim talked a little again about the future of the world, and a higher state of christlikeness in man. but lilly only laughed. then tanny managed to get ahead with jim, sticking to his side and talking sympathetic personalities. but lilly, feeling it from afar, ran after them and caught them up. they were silent. “what was the interesting topic?” he said cuttingly. “nothing at all!” said tanny, nettled. “why must you interfere?” “because i intend to,” said lilly. and the two others fell apart, as if severed with a knife. jim walked rather sheepishly, as if cut out. so they came at last past the canals to the wayside station: and at last jim's train came. they all said goodbye. jim and tanny were both waiting for lilly to show some sign of real reconciliation. but none came. he was cheerful and aloof. “goodbye,” he said to jim. “hope lois will be there all right. third station on. goodbye! goodbye!” “you'll come to rackham?” said jim, leaning out of the train. “we should love to,” called tanny, after the receding train. “all right,” said lilly, non-committal. but he and his wife never saw jim again. lilly never intended to see him: a devil sat in the little man's breast. “you shouldn't play at little jesus, coming so near to people, wanting to help them,” was tanny's last word. chapter ix. low-water mark tanny went away to norway to visit her people, for the first time for three years. lilly did not go: he did not want to. he came to london and settled in a room over covent garden market. the room was high up, a fair size, and stood at the corner of one of the streets and the market itself, looking down on the stalls and the carts and the arcade. lilly would climb out of the window and sit for hours watching the behaviour of the great draught-horses which brought the mountains of boxes and vegetables. funny half-human creatures they seemed, so massive and fleshy, yet so cockney. there was one which could not bear donkeys, and which used to stretch out its great teeth like some massive serpent after every poor diminutive ass that came with a coster's barrow. another great horse could not endure standing. it would shake itself and give little starts, and back into the heaps of carrots and broccoli, whilst the driver went into a frenzy of rage. there was always something to watch. one minute it was two great loads of empty crates, which in passing had got entangled, and reeled, leaning to fall disastrously. then the drivers cursed and swore and dismounted and stared at their jeopardised loads: till a thin fellow was persuaded to scramble up the airy mountains of cages, like a monkey. and he actually managed to put them to rights. great sigh of relief when the vans rocked out of the market. again there was a particular page-boy in buttons, with a round and perky behind, who nimbly carried a tea-tray from somewhere to somewhere, under the arches beside the market. the great brawny porters would tease him, and he would stop to give them cheek. one afternoon a giant lunged after him: the boy darted gracefully among the heaps of vegetables, still bearing aloft his tea-tray, like some young blue-buttoned acolyte fleeing before a false god. the giant rolled after him--when alas, the acolyte of the tea-tray slipped among the vegetables, and down came the tray. then tears, and a roar of unfeeling mirth from the giants. lilly felt they were going to make it up to him. another afternoon a young swell sauntered persistently among the vegetables, and lilly, seated in his high little balcony, wondered why. but at last, a taxi, and a very expensive female, in a sort of silver brocade gown and a great fur shawl and ospreys in her bonnet. evidently an assignation. yet what could be more conspicuous than this elegant pair, picking their way through the cabbage-leaves? and then, one cold grey afternoon in early april, a man in a black overcoat and a bowler hat, walking uncertainly. lilly had risen and was just retiring out of the chill, damp air. for some reason he lingered to watch the figure. the man was walking east. he stepped rather insecurely off the pavement, and wavered across the setts between the wheels of the standing vans. and suddenly he went down. lilly could not see him on the ground, but he saw some van-men go forward, and he saw one of them pick up the man's hat. “i'd better go down,” said lilly to himself. so he began running down the four long flights of stone stairs, past the many doors of the multifarious business premises, and out into the market. a little crowd had gathered, and a large policeman was just rowing into the centre of the interest. lilly, always a hoverer on the edge of public commotions, hung now hesitating on the outskirts of the crowd. “what is it?” he said, to a rather sniffy messenger boy. “drunk,” said the messenger boy: except that, in unblushing cockney, he pronounced it “drank.” lilly hung further back on the edge of the little crowd. “come on here. where d' you want to go?” he heard the hearty tones of the policeman. “i'm all right. i'm all right,” came the testy drunken answer. “all right, are yer! all right, and then some,--come on, get on your pins.” “i'm all right! i'm all right.” the voice made lilly peer between the people. and sitting on the granite setts, being hauled up by a burly policeman, he saw our acquaintance aaron, very pale in the face and a little dishevelled. “like me to tuck the sheets round you, shouldn't you? fancy yourself snug in bed, don't you? you won't believe you're right in the way of traffic, will you now, in covent garden market? come on, we'll see to you.” and the policeman hoisted the bitter and unwilling aaron. lilly was quickly at the centre of the affair, unobtrusive like a shadow, different from the other people. “help him up to my room, will you?” he said to the constable. “friend of mine.” the large constable looked down on the bare-headed wispy, unobtrusive lilly with good-humoured suspicion and incredulity. lilly could not have borne it if the policeman had uttered any of this cockney suspicion, so he watched him. there was a great gulf between the public official and the odd, quiet little individual--yet lilly had his way. “which room?” said the policeman, dubious. lilly pointed quickly round. then he said to aaron: “were you coming to see me, sisson? you'll come in, won't you?” aaron nodded rather stupidly and testily. his eyes looked angry. somebody stuck his hat on his head for him, and made him look a fool. lilly took it off again, and carried it for him. he turned and the crowd eased. he watched aaron sharply, and saw that it was with difficulty he could walk. so he caught him by the arm on the other side from the policeman, and they crossed the road to the pavement. “not so much of this sort of thing these days,” said the policeman. “not so much opportunity,” said lilly. “more than there was, though. coming back to the old days, like. working round, bit by bit.” they had arrived at the stairs. aaron stumbled up. “steady now! steady does it!” said the policeman, steering his charge. there was a curious breach of distance between lilly and the constable. at last lilly opened his own door. the room was pleasant. the fire burned warm, the piano stood open, the sofa was untidy with cushions and papers. books and papers covered the big writing desk. beyond the screen made by the bookshelves and the piano were two beds, with washstand by one of the large windows, the one through which lilly had climbed. the policeman looked round curiously. “more cosy here than in the lock-up, sir!” he said. lilly laughed. he was hastily clearing the sofa. “sit on the sofa, sisson,” he said. the policeman lowered his charge, with a-“right we are, then!” lilly felt in his pocket, and gave the policeman half a crown. but he was watching aaron, who sat stupidly on the sofa, very pale and semi-conscious. “do you feel ill, sisson?” he said sharply. aaron looked back at him with heavy eyes, and shook his head slightly. “i believe you are,” said lilly, taking his hand. “might be a bit o' this flu, you know,” said the policeman. “yes,” said lilly. “where is there a doctor?” he added, on reflection. “the nearest?” said the policeman. and he told him. “leave a message for you, sir?” lilly wrote his address on a card, then changed his mind. “no, i'll run round myself if necessary,” he said. and the policeman departed. “you'll go to bed, won't you?” said lilly to aaron, when the door was shut. aaron shook his head sulkily. “i would if i were you. you can stay here till you're all right. i'm alone, so it doesn't matter.” but aaron had relapsed into semi-consciousness. lilly put the big kettle on the gas stove, the little kettle on the fire. then he hovered in front of the stupefied man. he felt uneasy. again he took aaron's hand and felt the pulse. “i'm sure you aren't well. you must go to bed,” he said. and he kneeled and unfastened his visitor's boots. meanwhile the kettle began to boil, he put a hot-water bottle into the bed. “let us get your overcoat off,” he said to the stupefied man. “come along.” and with coaxing and pulling and pushing he got off the overcoat and coat and waistcoat. at last aaron was undressed and in bed. lilly brought him tea. with a dim kind of obedience he took the cup and would drink. he looked at lilly with heavy eyes. “i gave in, i gave in to her, else i should ha' been all right,” he said. “to whom?” said lilly. “i gave in to her--and afterwards i cried, thinking of lottie and the children. i felt my heart break, you know. and that's what did it. i should have been all right if i hadn't given in to her--” “to whom?” said lilly. “josephine. i felt, the minute i was loving her, i'd done myself. and i had. everything came back on me. if i hadn't given in to her, i should ha' kept all right.” “don't bother now. get warm and still--” “i felt it--i felt it go, inside me, the minute i gave in to her. it's perhaps killed me.” “no, not it. never mind, be still. be still, and you'll be all right in the morning.” “it's my own fault, for giving in to her. if i'd kept myself back, my liver wouldn't have broken inside me, and i shouldn't have been sick. and i knew--” “never mind now. have you drunk your tea? lie down. lie down, and go to sleep.” lilly pushed aaron down in the bed, and covered him over. then he thrust his hands under the bedclothes and felt his feet--still cold. he arranged the water bottle. then he put another cover on the bed. aaron lay still, rather grey and peaked-looking, in a stillness that was not healthy. for some time lilly went about stealthily, glancing at his patient from time to time. then he sat down to read. he was roused after a time by a moaning of troubled breathing and a fretful stirring in the bed. he went across. aaron's eyes were open, and dark looking. “have a little hot milk,” said lilly. aaron shook his head faintly, not noticing. “a little bovril?” the same faint shake. then lilly wrote a note for the doctor, went into the office on the same landing, and got a clerk, who would be leaving in a few minutes, to call with the note. when he came back he found aaron still watching. “are you here by yourself?” asked the sick man. “yes. my wife's gone to norway.” “for good?” “no,” laughed lilly. “for a couple of months or so. she'll come back here: unless she joins me in switzerland or somewhere.” aaron was still for a while. “you've not gone with her,” he said at length. “to see her people? no, i don't think they want me very badly--and i didn't want very badly to go. why should i? it's better for married people to be separated sometimes.” “ay!” said aaron, watching the other man with fever-darkened eyes. “i hate married people who are two in one--stuck together like two jujube lozenges,” said lilly. “me an' all. i hate 'em myself,” said aaron. “everybody ought to stand by themselves, in the first place--men and women as well. they can come together, in the second place, if they like. but nothing is any good unless each one stands alone, intrinsically.” “i'm with you there,” said aaron. “if i'd kep' myself to myself i shouldn't be bad now--though i'm not very bad. i s'll be all right in the morning. but i did myself in when i went with another woman. i felt myself go--as if the bile broke inside me, and i was sick.” “josephine seduced you?” laughed lilly. “ay, right enough,” replied aaron grimly. “she won't be coming here, will she?” “not unless i ask her.” “you won't ask her, though?” “no, not if you don't want her.” “i don't.” the fever made aaron naive and communicative, unlike himself. and he knew he was being unlike himself, he knew that he was not in proper control of himself, so he was unhappy, uneasy. “i'll stop here the night then, if you don't mind,” he said. “you'll have to,” said lilly. “i've sent for the doctor. i believe you've got the flu.” “think i have?” said aaron frightened. “don't be scared,” laughed lilly. there was a long pause. lilly stood at the window looking at the darkening market, beneath the street-lamps. “i s'll have to go to the hospital, if i have,” came aaron's voice. “no, if it's only going to be a week or a fortnight's business, you can stop here. i've nothing to do,” said lilly. “there's no occasion for you to saddle yourself with me,” said aaron dejectedly. “you can go to your hospital if you like--or back to your lodging--if you wish to,” said lilly. “you can make up your mind when you see how you are in the morning.” “no use going back to my lodgings,” said aaron. “i'll send a telegram to your wife if you like,” said lilly. aaron was silent, dead silent, for some time. “nay,” he said at length, in a decided voice. “not if i die for it.” lilly remained still, and the other man lapsed into a sort of semi-sleep, motionless and abandoned. the darkness had fallen over london, and away below the lamps were white. lilly lit the green-shaded reading lamp over the desk. then he stood and looked at aaron, who lay still, looking sick. rather beautiful the bones of the countenance: but the skull too small for such a heavy jaw and rather coarse mouth. aaron half-opened his eyes, and writhed feverishly, as if his limbs could not be in the right place. lilly mended the fire, and sat down to write. then he got up and went downstairs to unfasten the street door, so that the doctor could walk up. the business people had gone from their various holes, all the lower part of the tall house was in darkness. lilly waited and waited. he boiled an egg and made himself toast. aaron said he might eat the same. lilly cooked another egg and took it to the sick man. aaron looked at it and pushed it away with nausea. he would have some tea. so lilly gave him tea. “not much fun for you, doing this for somebody who is nothing to you,” said aaron. “i shouldn't if you were unsympathetic to me,” said lilly. “as it is, it's happened so, and so we'll let be.” “what time is it?” “nearly eight o'clock.” “oh, my lord, the opera.” and aaron got half out of bed. but as he sat on the bedside he knew he could not safely get to his feet. he remained a picture of dejection. “perhaps we ought to let them know,” said lilly. but aaron, blank with stupid misery, sat huddled there on the bedside without answering. “ill run round with a note,” said lilly. “i suppose others have had flu, besides you. lie down!” but aaron stupidly and dejectedly sat huddled on the side of the bed, wearing old flannel pyjamas of lilly's, rather small for him. he felt too sick to move. “lie down! lie down!” said lilly. “and keep still while i'm gone. i shan't be more than ten minutes.” “i don't care if i die,” said aaron. lilly laughed. “you're a long way from dying,” said he, “or you wouldn't say it.” but aaron only looked up at him with queer, far-off, haggard eyes, something like a criminal who is just being executed. “lie down!” said lilly, pushing him gently into the bed. “you won't improve yourself sitting there, anyhow.” aaron lay down, turned away, and was quite still. lilly quietly left the room on his errand. the doctor did not come until ten o'clock: and worn out with work when he did come. “isn't there a lift in this establishment?” he said, as he groped his way up the stone stairs. lilly had heard him, and run down to meet him. the doctor poked the thermometer under aaron's tongue and felt the pulse. then he asked a few questions: listened to the heart and breathing. “yes, it's the flu,” he said curtly. “nothing to do but to keep warm in bed and not move, and take plenty of milk and liquid nourishment. i'll come round in the morning and give you an injection. lungs are all right so far.” “how long shall i have to be in bed?” said aaron. “oh--depends. a week at least.” aaron watched him sullenly--and hated him. lilly laughed to himself. the sick man was like a dog that is ill but which growls from a deep corner, and will bite if you put your hand in. he was in a state of black depression. lilly settled him down for the night, and himself went to bed. aaron squirmed with heavy, pained limbs, the night through, and slept and had bad dreams. lilly got up to give him drinks. the din in the market was terrific before dawn, and aaron suffered bitterly. in the morning he was worse. the doctor gave him injections against pneumonia. “you wouldn't like me to wire to your wife?” said lilly. “no,” said aaron abruptly. “you can send me to the hospital. i'm nothing but a piece of carrion.” “carrion!” said lilly. “why?” “i know it. i feel like it.” “oh, that's only the sort of nauseated feeling you get with flu.” “i'm only fit to be thrown underground, and made an end of. i can't stand myself--” he had a ghastly, grey look of self-repulsion. “it's the germ that makes you feel like that,” said lilly. “it poisons the system for a time. but you'll work it off.” at evening he was no better, the fever was still high. yet there were no complications--except that the heart was irregular. “the one thing i wonder,” said lilly, “is whether you hadn't better be moved out of the noise of the market. it's fearful for you in the early morning.” “it makes no difference to me,” said aaron. the next day he was a little worse, if anything. the doctor knew there was nothing to be done. at evening he gave the patient a calomel pill. it was rather strong, and aaron had a bad time. his burning, parched, poisoned inside was twisted and torn. meanwhile carts banged, porters shouted, all the hell of the market went on outside, away down on the cobble setts. but this time the two men did not hear. “you'll feel better now,” said lilly, “after the operation.” “it's done me harm,” cried aaron fretfully. “send me to the hospital, or you'll repent it. get rid of me in time.” “nay,” said lilly. “you get better. damn it, you're only one among a million.” again over aaron's face went the ghastly grimace of self-repulsion. “my soul's gone rotten,” he said. “no,” said lilly. “only toxin in the blood.” next day the patient seemed worse, and the heart more irregular. he rested badly. so far, lilly had got a fair night's rest. now aaron was not sleeping, and he seemed to struggle in the bed. “keep your courage up, man,” said the doctor sharply. “you give way.” aaron looked at him blackly, and did not answer. in the night lilly was up time after time. aaron would slip down on his back, and go semi-conscious. and then he would awake, as if drowning, struggling to move, mentally shouting aloud, yet making no sound for some moments, mentally shouting in frenzy, but unable to stir or make a sound. when at last he got some sort of physical control he cried: “lift me up! lift me up!” lilly hurried and lifted him up, and he sat panting with a sobbing motion, his eyes gloomy and terrified, more than ever like a criminal who is just being executed. he drank brandy, and was laid down on his side. “don't let me lie on my back,” he said, terrified. “no, i won't,” said lilly. aaron frowned curiously on his nurse. “mind you don't let me,” he said, exacting and really terrified. “no, i won't let you.” and now lilly was continually crossing over and pulling aaron on to his side, whenever he found him slipped down on his back. in the morning the doctor was puzzled. probably it was the toxin in the blood which poisoned the heart. there was no pneumonia. and yet aaron was clearly growing worse. the doctor agreed to send in a nurse for the coming night. “what's the matter with you, man!” he said sharply to his patient. “you give way! you give way! can't you pull yourself together?” but aaron only became more gloomily withheld, retracting from life. and lilly began to be really troubled. he got a friend to sit with the patient in the afternoon, whilst he himself went out and arranged to sleep in aaron's room, at his lodging. the next morning, when he came in, he found the patient lying as ever, in a sort of heap in the bed. nurse had had to lift him up and hold him up again. and now aaron lay in a sort of semi-stupor of fear, frustrated anger, misery and self-repulsion: a sort of interlocked depression. the doctor frowned when he came. he talked with the nurse, and wrote another prescription. then he drew lilly away to the door. “what's the matter with the fellow?” he said. “can't you rouse his spirit? he seems to be sulking himself out of life. he'll drop out quite suddenly, you know, if he goes on like this. can't you rouse him up?” “i think it depresses him partly that his bowels won't work. it frightens him. he's never been ill in his life before,” said lilly. “his bowels won't work if he lets all his spirit go, like an animal dying of the sulks,” said the doctor impatiently. “he might go off quite suddenly--dead before you can turn round--” lilly was properly troubled. yet he did not quite know what to do. it was early afternoon, and the sun was shining into the room. there were daffodils and anemones in a jar, and freezias and violets. down below in the market were two stalls of golden and blue flowers, gay. “the flowers are lovely in the spring sunshine,” said lilly. “i wish i were in the country, don't you? as soon as you are better we'll go. it's been a terrible cold, wet spring. but now it's going to be nice. do you like being in the country?” “yes,” said aaron. he was thinking of his garden. he loved it. never in his life had he been away from a garden before. “make haste and get better, and we'll go.” “where?” said aaron. “hampshire. or berkshire. or perhaps you'd like to go home? would you?” aaron lay still, and did not answer. “perhaps you want to, and you don't want to,” said lilly. “you can please yourself, anyhow.” there was no getting anything definite out of the sick man--his soul seemed stuck, as if it would not move. suddenly lilly rose and went to the dressing-table. “i'm going to rub you with oil,” he said. “i'm going to rub you as mothers do their babies whose bowels don't work.” aaron frowned slightly as he glanced at the dark, self-possessed face of the little man. “what's the good of that?” he said irritably. “i'd rather be left alone.” “then you won't be.” quickly he uncovered the blond lower body of his patient, and began to rub the abdomen with oil, using a slow, rhythmic, circulating motion, a sort of massage. for a long time he rubbed finely and steadily, then went over the whole of the lower body, mindless, as if in a sort of incantation. he rubbed every speck of the man's lower body--the abdomen, the buttocks, the thighs and knees, down to the feet, rubbed it all warm and glowing with camphorated oil, every bit of it, chafing the toes swiftly, till he was almost exhausted. then aaron was covered up again, and lilly sat down in fatigue to look at his patient. he saw a change. the spark had come back into the sick eyes, and the faint trace of a smile, faintly luminous, into the face. aaron was regaining himself. but lilly said nothing. he watched his patient fall into a proper sleep. and he sat and watched him sleep. and he thought to himself: “i wonder why i do it. i wonder why i bother with him.... jim ought to have taught me my lesson. as soon as this man's really better he'll punch me in the wind, metaphorically if not actually, for having interfered with him. and tanny would say, he was quite right to do it. she says i want power over them. what if i do? they don't care how much power the mob has over them, the nation, lloyd george and northcliffe and the police and money. they'll yield themselves up to that sort of power quickly enough, and immolate themselves _pro bono publico_ by the million. and what's the bonum publicum but a mob power? why can't they submit to a bit of healthy individual authority? the fool would die, without me: just as that fool jim will die in hysterics one day. why does he last so long! “tanny's the same. she does nothing really but resist me: my authority, or my influence, or just me. at the bottom of her heart she just blindly and persistently opposes me. god knows what it is she opposes: just me myself. she thinks i want her to submit to me. so i do, in a measure natural to our two selves. somewhere, she ought to submit to me. but they all prefer to kick against the pricks. not that they get many pricks. i get them. damn them all, why don't i leave them alone? they only grin and feel triumphant when they've insulted one and punched one in the wind. “this aaron will do just the same. i like him, and he ought to like me. and he'll be another jim: he will like me, if he can knock the wind out of me. a lot of little stavrogins coming up to whisper affectionately, and biting one's ear. “but anyhow i can soon see the last of this chap: and him the last of all the rest. i'll be damned for ever if i see their jims and roberts and julias and scotts any more. let them dance round their insipid hell-broth. thin tack it is. “there's a whole world besides this little gang of europeans. except, dear god, that they've exterminated all the peoples worth knowing. i can't do with folk who teem by the billion, like the chinese and japs and orientals altogether. only vermin teem by the billion. higher types breed slower. i would have loved the aztecs and the red indians. i know they hold the element in life which i am looking for--they had living pride. not like the flea-bitten asiatics--even niggers are better than asiatics, though they are wallowers--the american races--and the south sea islanders--the marquesans, the maori blood. that was the true blood. it wasn't frightened. all the rest are craven--europeans, asiatics, africans--everyone at his own individual quick craven and cringing: only conceited in the mass, the mob. how i hate them: the mass-bullies, the individual judases. “well, if one will be a jesus he must expect his judas. that's why abraham lincoln gets shot. a jesus makes a judas inevitable. a man should remain himself, not try to spread himself over humanity. he should pivot himself on his own pride. “i suppose really i ought to have packed this aaron off to the hospital. instead of which here am i rubbing him with oil to rub the life into him. and i know he'll bite me, like a warmed snake, the moment he recovers. and tanny will say 'quite right, too,' i shouldn't have been so intimate. no, i should have left it to mechanical doctors and nurses. “so i should. everything to its own. and aaron belongs to this little system, and jim is waiting to be psychoanalysed, and tanny is waiting for her own glorification. “all right, aaron. last time i break my bread for anybody, this is. so get better, my flautist, so that i can go away. “it was easy for the red indians and the others to take their hook into death. they might have stayed a bit longer to help one to defy the white masses. “i'll make some tea--” lilly rose softly and went across to the fire. he had to cross a landing to a sort of little lavatory, with a sink and a tap, for water. the clerks peeped out at him from an adjoining office and nodded. he nodded, and disappeared from their sight as quickly as possible, with his kettle. his dark eyes were quick, his dark hair was untidy, there was something silent and withheld about him. people could never approach him quite ordinarily. he put on the kettle, and quietly set cups and plates on a tray. the room was clean and cosy and pleasant. he did the cleaning himself, and was as efficient and inobtrusive a housewife as any woman. while the kettle boiled, he sat darning the socks which he had taken off aaron's feet when the flautist arrived, and which he had washed. he preferred that no outsider should see him doing these things. yet he preferred also to do them himself, so that he should be independent of outside aid. his face was dark and hollow, he seemed frail, sitting there in the london afternoon darning the black woollen socks. his full brow was knitted slightly, there was a tension. at the same time, there was an indomitable stillness about him, as it were in the atmosphere about him. his hands, though small, were not very thin. he bit off the wool as he finished his darn. as he was making the tea he saw aaron rouse up in bed. “i've been to sleep. i feel better,” said the patient, turning round to look what the other man was doing. and the sight of the water steaming in a jet from the teapot seemed attractive. “yes,” said lilly. “you've slept for a good two hours.” “i believe i have,” said aaron. “would you like a little tea?” “ay--and a bit of toast.” “you're not supposed to have solid food. let me take your temperature.” the temperature was down to a hundred, and lilly, in spite of the doctor, gave aaron a piece of toast with his tea, enjoining him not to mention it to the nurse. in the evening the two men talked. “you do everything for yourself, then?” said aaron. “yes, i prefer it.” “you like living all alone?” “i don't know about that. i never have lived alone. tanny and i have been very much alone in various countries: but that's two, not one.” “you miss her then?” “yes, of course. i missed her horribly in the cottage, when she'd first gone. i felt my heart was broken. but here, where we've never been together, i don't notice it so much.” “she'll come back,” said aaron. “yes, she'll come back. but i'd rather meet her abroad than here--and get on a different footing.” “why?” “oh, i don't know. there's something with marriage altogether, i think. _egoisme a deux_--” “what's that mean?” “_egoisme a deux_? two people, one egoism. marriage is a self-conscious egoistic state, it seems to me.” “you've got no children?” said aaron. “no. tanny wants children badly. i don't. i'm thankful we have none.” “why?” “i can't quite say. i think of them as a burden. besides, there are such millions and billions of children in the world. and we know well enough what sort of millions and billions of people they'll grow up into. i don't want to add my quota to the mass--it's against my instinct--” “ay!” laughed aaron, with a curt acquiescence. “tanny's furious. but then, when a woman has got children, she thinks the world wags only for them and her. nothing else. the whole world wags for the sake of the children--and their sacred mother.” “ay, that's damned true,” said aaron. “and myself, i'm sick of the children stunt. children are all right, so long as you just take them for what they are: young immature things like kittens and half-grown dogs, nuisances, sometimes very charming. but i'll be hanged if i can see anything high and holy about children. i should be sorry, too, it would be so bad for the children. young brats, tiresome and amusing in turns.” “when they don't give themselves airs,” said aaron. “yes, indeed. which they do half the time. sacred children, and sacred motherhood, i'm absolutely fed stiff by it. that's why i'm thankful i have no children. tanny can't come it over me there.” “it's a fact. when a woman's got her children, by god, she's a bitch in the manger. you can starve while she sits on the hay. it's useful to keep her pups warm.” “yes.” “why, you know,” aaron turned excitedly in the bed, “they look on a man as if he was nothing but an instrument to get and rear children. if you have anything to do with a woman, she thinks it's because you want to get children by her. and i'm damned if it is. i want my own pleasure, or nothing: and children be damned.” “ah, women--they must be loved, at any price!” said lilly. “and if you just don't want to love them--and tell them so--what a crime.” “a crime!” said aaron. “they make a criminal of you. them and their children be cursed. is my life given me for nothing but to get children, and work to bring them up? see them all in hell first. they'd better die while they're children, if childhood's all that important.” “i quite agree,” said lilly. “if childhood is more important than manhood, then why live to be a man at all? why not remain an infant?” “be damned and blasted to women and all their importances,” cried aaron. “they want to get you under, and children is their chief weapon.” “men have got to stand up to the fact that manhood is more than childhood--and then force women to admit it,” said lilly. “but the rotten whiners, they're all grovelling before a baby's napkin and a woman's petticoat.” “it's a fact,” said aaron. but he glanced at lilly oddly, as if suspiciously. and lilly caught the look. but he continued: “and if they think you try to stand on your legs and walk with the feet of manhood, why, there isn't a blooming father and lover among them but will do his best to get you down and suffocate you--either with a baby's napkin or a woman's petticoat.” lilly's lips were curling; he was dark and bitter. “ay, it is like that,” said aaron, rather subduedly. “the man's spirit has gone out of the world. men can't move an inch unless they can grovel humbly at the end of the journey.” “no,” said aaron, watching with keen, half-amused eyes. “that's why marriage wants readjusting--or extending--to get men on to their own legs once more, and to give them the adventure again. but men won't stick together and fight for it. because once a woman has climbed up with her children, she'll find plenty of grovellers ready to support her and suffocate any defiant spirit. and women will sacrifice eleven men, fathers, husbands, brothers and lovers, for one baby--or for her own female self-conceit--” “she will that,” said aaron. “and can you find two men to stick together, without feeling criminal, and without cringing, and without betraying one another? you can't. one is sure to go fawning round some female, then they both enjoy giving each other away, and doing a new grovel before a woman again.” “ay,” said aaron. after which lilly was silent. chapter x. the war again “one is a fool,” said lilly, “to be lachrymose. the thing to do is to get a move on.” aaron looked up with a glimpse of a smile. the two men were sitting before the fire at the end of a cold, wet april day: aaron convalescent, somewhat chastened in appearance. “ay,” he said rather sourly. “a move back to guilford street.” “oh, i meant to tell you,” said lilly. “i was reading an old baden history. they made a law in 1528--not a law, but a regulation--that: if a man forsakes his wife and children, as now so often happens, the said wife and children are at once to be dispatched after him. i thought that would please you. does it?” “yes,” said aaron briefly. “they would have arrived the next day, like a forwarded letter.” “i should have had to get a considerable move on, at that rate,” grinned aaron. “oh, no. you might quite like them here.” but lilly saw the white frown of determined revulsion on the convalescent's face. “wouldn't you?” he asked. aaron shook his head. “no,” he said. and it was obvious he objected to the topic. “what are you going to do about your move on?” “me!” said lilly. “i'm going to sail away next week--or steam dirtily away on a tramp called the _maud allen wing_.” “where to?” “malta.” “where from?” “london dock. i fixed up my passage this morning for ten pounds. i am cook's assistant, signed on.” aaron looked at him with a little admiration. “you can take a sudden jump, can't you?” he said. “the difficulty is to refrain from jumping: overboard or anywhere.” aaron smoked his pipe slowly. “and what good will malta do you?” he asked, envious. “heaven knows. i shall cross to syracuse, and move up italy.” “sounds as if you were a millionaire.” “i've got thirty-five pounds in all the world. but something will come along.” “i've got more than that,” said aaron. “good for you,” replied lilly. he rose and went to the cupboard, taking out a bowl and a basket of potatoes. he sat down again, paring the potatoes. his busy activity annoyed aaron. “but what's the good of going to malta? shall you be any different in yourself, in another place? you'll be the same there as you are here.” “how am i here?” “why, you're all the time grinding yourself against something inside you. you're never free. you're never content. you never stop chafing.” lilly dipped his potato into the water, and cut out the eyes carefully. then he cut it in two, and dropped it in the clean water of the second bowl. he had not expected this criticism. “perhaps i don't,” said he. “then what's the use of going somewhere else? you won't change yourself.” “i may in the end,” said lilly. “you'll be yourself, whether it's malta or london,” said aaron. “there's a doom for me,” laughed lilly. the water on the fire was boiling. he rose and threw in salt, then dropped in the potatoes with little plops. “there there are lots of mes. i'm not only just one proposition. a new place brings out a new thing in a man. otherwise you'd have stayed in your old place with your family.” “the man in the middle of you doesn't change,” said aaron. “do you find it so?” said lilly. “ay. every time.” “then what's to be done?” “nothing, as far as i can see. you get as much amusement out of life as possible, and there's the end of it.” “all right then, i'll get the amusement.” “ay, all right then,” said aaron. “but there isn't anything wonderful about it. you talk as if you were doing something special. you aren't. you're no more than a man who drops into a pub for a drink, to liven himself up a bit. only you give it a lot of names, and make out as if you were looking for the philosopher's stone, or something like that. when you're only killing time like the rest of folks, before time kills you.” lilly did not answer. it was not yet seven o'clock, but the sky was dark. aaron sat in the firelight. even the saucepan on the fire was silent. darkness, silence, the firelight in the upper room, and the two men together. “it isn't quite true,” said lilly, leaning on the mantelpiece and staring down into the fire. “where isn't it? you talk, and you make a man believe you've got something he hasn't got? but where is it, when it comes to? what have you got, more than me or jim bricknell! only a bigger choice of words, it seems to me.” lilly was motionless and inscrutable like a shadow. “does it, aaron!” he said, in a colorless voice. “yes. what else is there to it?” aaron sounded testy. “why,” said lilly at last, “there's something. i agree, it's true what you say about me. but there's a bit of something else. there's just a bit of something in me, i think, which isn't a man running into a pub for a drink--” “and what--?” the question fell into the twilight like a drop of water falling down a deep shaft into a well. “i think a man may come into possession of his own soul at last--as the buddhists teach--but without ceasing to love, or even to hate. one loves, one hates--but somewhere beyond it all, one understands, and possesses one's soul in patience and in peace--” “yes,” said aaron slowly, “while you only stand and talk about it. but when you've got no chance to talk about it--and when you've got to live--you don't possess your soul, neither in patience nor in peace, but any devil that likes possesses you and does what it likes with you, while you fridge yourself and fray yourself out like a worn rag.” “i don't care,” said lilly, “i'm learning to possess my soul in patience and in peace, and i know it. and it isn't a negative nirvana either. and if tanny possesses her own soul in patience and peace as well--and if in this we understand each other at last--then there we are, together and apart at the same time, and free of each other, and eternally inseparable. i have my nirvana--and i have it all to myself. but more than that. it coincides with her nirvana.” “ah, yes,” said aaron. “but i don't understand all that word-splitting.” “i do, though. you learn to be quite alone, and possess your own soul in isolation--and at the same time, to be perfectly with someone else--that's all i ask.” “sort of sit on a mountain top, back to back with somebody else, like a couple of idols.” “no--because it isn't a case of sitting--or a case of back to back. it's what you get to after a lot of fighting and a lot of sensual fulfilment. and it never does away with the fighting and with the sensual passion. it flowers on top of them, and it would never flower save on top of them.” “what wouldn't?” “the possessing one's own soul--and the being together with someone else in silence, beyond speech.” “and you've got them?” “i've got a bit of the real quietness inside me.” “so has a dog on a mat.” “so i believe, too.” “or a man in a pub.” “which i don't believe.” “you prefer the dog?” “maybe.” there was silence for a few moments. “and i'm the man in the pub,” said aaron. “you aren't the dog on the mat, anyhow.” “and you're the idol on the mountain top, worshipping yourself.” “you talk to me like a woman, aaron.” “how do you talk to me, do you think?” “how do i?” “are the potatoes done?” lilly turned quickly aside, and switched on the electric light. everything changed. aaron sat still before the fire, irritated. lilly went about preparing the supper. the room was pleasant at night. two tall, dark screens hid the two beds. in front, the piano was littered with music, the desk littered with papers. lilly went out on to the landing, and set the chops to grill on the gas stove. hastily he put a small table on the hearth-rug, spread it with a blue-and-white cloth, set plates and glasses. aaron did not move. it was not his nature to concern himself with domestic matters--and lilly did it best alone. the two men had an almost uncanny understanding of one another--like brothers. they came from the same district, from the same class. each might have been born into the other's circumstance. like brothers, there was a profound hostility between them. but hostility is not antipathy. lilly's skilful housewifery always irritated aaron: it was so self-sufficient. but most irritating of all was the little man's unconscious assumption of priority. lilly was actually unaware that he assumed this quiet predominance over others. he mashed the potatoes, he heated the plates, he warmed the red wine, he whisked eggs into the milk pudding, and served his visitor like a housemaid. but none of this detracted from the silent assurance with which he bore himself, and with which he seemed to domineer over his acquaintance. at last the meal was ready. lilly drew the curtains, switched off the central light, put the green-shaded electric lamp on the table, and the two men drew up to the meal. it was good food, well cooked and hot. certainly lilly's hands were no longer clean: but it was clean dirt, as he said. aaron sat in the low arm-chair at table. so his face was below, in the full light. lilly sat high on a small chair, so that his face was in the green shadow. aaron was handsome, and always had that peculiar well-dressed look of his type. lilly was indifferent to his own appearance, and his collar was a rag. so the two men ate in silence. they had been together alone for a fortnight only: but it was like a small eternity. aaron was well now--only he suffered from the depression and the sort of fear that follows influenza. “when are you going?” he asked irritably, looking up at lilly, whose face hovered in that green shadow above, and worried him. “one day next week. they'll send me a telegram. not later than thursday.” “you're looking forward to going?” the question was half bitter. “yes. i want to get a new tune out of myself.” “had enough of this?” “yes.” a flush of anger came on aaron's face. “you're easily on, and easily off,” he said, rather insulting. “am i?” said lilly. “what makes you think so?” “circumstances,” replied aaron sourly. to which there was no answer. the host cleared away the plates, and put the pudding on the table. he pushed the bowl to aaron. “i suppose i shall never see you again, once you've gone,” said aaron. “it's your choice. i will leave you an address.” after this, the pudding was eaten in silence. “besides, aaron,” said lilly, drinking his last sip of wine, “what do you care whether you see me again or not? what do you care whether you see anybody again or not? you want to be amused. and now you're irritated because you think i am not going to amuse you any more: and you don't know who is going to amuse you. i admit it's a dilemma. but it's a hedonistic dilemma of the commonest sort.” “i don't know hedonistic. and supposing i am as you say--are you any different?” “no, i'm not very different. but i always persuade myself there's a bit of difference. do you know what josephine ford confessed to me? she's had her lovers enough. 'there isn't any such thing as love, lilly,' she said. 'men are simply afraid to be alone. that is absolutely all there is in it: fear of being alone.'” “what by that?” said aaron. “you agree?” “yes, on the whole.” “so do i--on the whole. and then i asked her what about woman. and then she said with a woman it wasn't fear, it was just boredom. a woman is like a violinist: any fiddle, any instrument rather than empty hands and no tune going.” “yes--what i said before: getting as much amusement out of life as possible,” said aaron. “you amuse me--and i'll amuse you.” “yes--just about that.” “all right, aaron,” said lilly. “i'm not going to amuse you, or try to amuse you any more.” “going to try somebody else; and malta.” “malta, anyhow.” “oh, and somebody else--in the next five minutes.” “yes--that also.” “goodbye and good luck to you.” “goodbye and good luck to you, aaron.” with which lilly went aside to wash the dishes. aaron sat alone under the zone of light, turning over a score of _pelleas_. though the noise of london was around them, it was far below, and in the room was a deep silence. each of the men seemed invested in his own silence. aaron suddenly took his flute, and began trying little passages from the opera on his knee. he had not played since his illness. the noise came out a little tremulous, but low and sweet. lilly came forward with a plate and a cloth in his hand. “aaron's rod is putting forth again,” he said, smiling. “what?” said aaron, looking up. “i said aaron's rod is putting forth again.” “what rod?” “your flute, for the moment.” “it's got to put forth my bread and butter.” “is that all the buds it's going to have?” “what else!” “nay--that's for you to show. what flowers do you imagine came out of the rod of moses's brother?” “scarlet runners, i should think if he'd got to live on them.” “scarlet enough, i'll bet.” aaron turned unnoticing back to his music. lilly finished the wiping of the dishes, then took a book and sat on the other side of the table. “it's all one to you, then,” said aaron suddenly, “whether we ever see one another again?” “not a bit,” said lilly, looking up over his spectacles. “i very much wish there might be something that held us together.” “then if you wish it, why isn't there?” “you might wish your flute to put out scarlet-runner flowers at the joints.” “ay--i might. and it would be all the same.” the moment of silence that followed was extraordinary in its hostility. “oh, we shall run across one another again some time,” said aaron. “sure,” said lilly. “more than that: i'll write you an address that will always find me. and when you write i will answer you.” he took a bit of paper and scribbled an address. aaron folded it and put it into his waistcoat pocket. it was an italian address. “but how can i live in italy?” he said. “you can shift about. i'm tied to a job.” “you--with your budding rod, your flute--and your charm--you can always do as you like.” “my what?” “your flute and your charm.” “what charm?” “just your own. don't pretend you don't know you've got it. i don't really like charm myself; too much of a trick about it. but whether or not, you've got it.” “it's news to me.” “not it.” “fact, it is.” “ha! somebody will always take a fancy to you. and you can live on that, as well as on anything else.” “why do you always speak so despisingly?” “why shouldn't i?” “have you any right to despise another man?” “when did it go by rights?” “no, not with you.” “you answer me like a woman, aaron.” again there was a space of silence. and again it was aaron who at last broke it. “we're in different positions, you and me,” he said. “how?” “you can live by your writing--but i've got to have a job.” “is that all?” said lilly. “ay. and plenty. you've got the advantage of me.” “quite,” said lilly. “but why? i was a dirty-nosed little boy when you were a clean-nosed little boy. and i always had more patches on my breeches than you: neat patches, too, my poor mother! so what's the good of talking about advantages? you had the start. and at this very moment you could buy me up, lock, stock, and barrel. so don't feel hard done by. it's a lie.” “you've got your freedom.” “i make it and i take it.” “circumstances make it for you.” “as you like.” “you don't do a man justice,” said aaron. “does a man care?” “he might.” “then he's no man.” “thanks again, old fellow.” “welcome,” said lilly, grimacing. again aaron looked at him, baffled, almost with hatred. lilly grimaced at the blank wall opposite, and seemed to ruminate. then he went back to his book. and no sooner had he forgotten aaron, reading the fantasies of a certain leo frobenius, than aaron must stride in again. “you can't say there isn't a difference between your position and mine,” he said pertinently. lilly looked darkly over his spectacles. “no, by god,” he said. “i should be in a poor way otherwise.” “you can't say you haven't the advantage--your job gives you the advantage.” “all right. then leave it out with my job, and leave me alone.” “that's your way of dodging it.” “my dear aaron, i agree with you perfectly. there is no difference between us, save the fictitious advantage given to me by my job. save for my job--which is to write lies--aaron and i are two identical little men in one and the same little boat. shall we leave it at that, now?” “yes,” said aaron. “that's about it.” “let us shake hands on it--and go to bed, my dear chap. you are just recovering from influenza, and look paler than i like.” “you mean you want to be rid of me,” said aaron. “yes, i do mean that,” said lilly. “ay,” said aaron. and after a few minutes more staring at the score of _pelleas_, he rose, put the score away on the piano, laid his flute beside it, and retired behind the screen. in silence, the strange dim noise of london sounding from below, lilly read on about the kabyles. his soul had the faculty of divesting itself of the moment, and seeking further, deeper interests. these old africans! and atlantis! strange, strange wisdom of the kabyles! old, old dark africa, and the world before the flood! how jealous aaron seemed! the child of a jealous god. a jealous god! could any race be anything but despicable, with such an antecedent? but no, persistent as a jealous god himself, aaron reappeared in his pyjamas, and seated himself in his chair. “what is the difference then between you and me, lilly?” he said. “haven't we shaken hands on it--a difference of jobs.” “you don't believe that, though, do you?” “nay, now i reckon you're trespassing.” “why am i? i know you don't believe it.” “what do i believe then?” said lilly. “you believe you know something better than me--and that you are something better than me. don't you?” “do you believe it?” “what?” “that i am something better than you, and that i know something better?” “no, because i don't see it,” said aaron. “then if you don't see it, it isn't there. so go to bed and sleep the sleep of the just and the convalescent. i am not to be badgered any more.” “am i badgering you?” said aaron. “indeed you are.” “so i'm in the wrong again?” “once more, my dear.” “you're a god-almighty in your way, you know.” “so long as i'm not in anybody else's way--anyhow, you'd be much better sleeping the sleep of the just. and i'm going out for a minute or two. don't catch cold there with nothing on-“i want to catch the post,” he added, rising. aaron looked up at him quickly. but almost before there was time to speak, lilly had slipped into his hat and coat, seized his letters, and gone. it was a rainy night. lilly turned down king street to walk to charing cross. he liked being out of doors. he liked to post his letters at charing cross post office. he did not want to talk to aaron any more. he was glad to be alone. he walked quickly down villiers street to the river, to see it flowing blackly towards the sea. it had an endless fascination for him: never failed to soothe him and give him a sense of liberty. he liked the night, the dark rain, the river, and even the traffic. he enjoyed the sense of friction he got from the streaming of people who meant nothing to him. it was like a fox slipping alert among unsuspecting cattle. when he got back, he saw in the distance the lights of a taxi standing outside the building where he lived, and heard a thumping and hallooing. he hurried forward. it was a man called herbertson. “oh, why, there you are!” exclaimed herbertson, as lilly drew near. “can i come up and have a chat?” “i've got that man who's had flu. i should think he is gone to bed.” “oh!” the disappointment was plain. “well, look here i'll just come up for a couple of minutes.” he laid his hand on lilly's arm. “i heard you were going away. where are you going?” “malta.” “malta! oh, i know malta very well. well now, it'll be all right if i come up for a minute? i'm not going to see much more of you, apparently.” he turned quickly to the taxi. “what is it on the clock?” the taxi was paid, the two men went upstairs. aaron was in bed, but he called as lilly entered the room. “hullo!” said lilly. “not asleep? captain herbertson has come in for a minute.” “hope i shan't disturb you,” said captain herbertson, laying down his stick and gloves, and his cap. he was in uniform. he was one of the few surviving officers of the guards, a man of about forty-five, good-looking, getting rather stout. he settled himself in the chair where aaron had sat, hitching up his trousers. the gold identity plate, with its gold chain, fell conspicuously over his wrist. “been to 'rosemary,'” he said. “rotten play, you know--but passes the time awfully well. oh, i quite enjoyed it.” lilly offered him sauterne--the only thing in the house. “oh, yes! how awfully nice! yes, thanks, i shall love it. can i have it with soda? thanks! do you know, i think that's the very best drink in the tropics: sweet white wine, with soda? yes--well!-well--now, why are you going away?” “for a change,” said lilly. “you're quite right, one needs a change now the damned thing is all over. as soon as i get out of khaki i shall be off. malta! yes! i've been in malta several times. i think valletta is quite enjoyable, particularly in winter, with the opera. oh--er--how's your wife? all right? yes!--glad to see her people again. bound to be-oh, by the way, i met jim bricknell. sends you a message hoping you'll go down and stay--down at captain bingham's place in surrey, you know. awfully queer lot down there. not my sort, no. you won't go down? no, i shouldn't. not the right sort of people.” herbertson rattled away, rather spasmodic. he had been through the very front hell of the war--and like every man who had, he had the war at the back of his mind, like an obsession. but in the meantime, he skirmished. “yes. i was on guard one day when the queen gave one of her tea-parties to the blind. awful affair. but the children are awfully nice children. prince of wales awfully nice, almost too nice. prince henry smart boy, too--oh, a smart boy. queen mary poured the tea, and i handed round bread and butter. she told me i made a very good waiter. i said, thank you, madam. but i like the children. very different from the battenbergs. oh!--” he wrinkled his nose. “i can't stand the battenbergs.” “mount battens,” said lilly. “yes! awful mistake, changing the royal name. they were guelfs, why not remain it? why, i'll tell you what battenberg did. he was in the guards, too--” the talk flowed on: about royalty and the guards, buckingham palace and st. james. “rather a nice story about queen victoria. man named joyce, something or other, often used to dine at the palace. and he was an awfully good imitator--really clever, you know. used to imitate the queen. 'mr. joyce,' she said, 'i hear your imitation is very amusing. will you do it for us now, and let us see what it is like?' 'oh, no, madam! i'm afraid i couldn't do it now. i'm afraid i'm not in the humour.' but she would have him do it. and it was really awfully funny. he had to do it. you know what he did. he used to take a table-napkin, and put it on with one corner over his forehead, and the rest hanging down behind, like her veil thing. and then he sent for the kettle-lid. he always had the kettle-lid, for that little crown of hers. and then he impersonated her. but he was awfully good--so clever. 'mr. joyce,' she said. 'we are not amused. please leave the room.' yes, that is exactly what she said: 'we are not amused--please leave the room.' i like the we, don't you? and he a man of sixty or so. however, he left the room and for a fortnight or so he wasn't invited--wasn't she wonderful--queen victoria?” and so, by light transitions, to the prince of wales at the front, and thus into the trenches. and then herbertson was on the subject he was obsessed by. he had come, unconsciously, for this and this only, to talk war to lilly: or at lilly. for the latter listened and watched, and said nothing. as a man at night helplessly takes a taxi to find some woman, some prostitute, herbertson had almost unthinkingly got into a taxi and come battering at the door in covent garden, only to talk war to lilly, whom he knew very little. but it was a driving instinct--to come and get it off his chest. and on and on he talked, over his wine and soda. he was not conceited--he was not showing off--far from it. it was the same thing here in this officer as it was with the privates, and the same with this englishman as with a frenchman or a german or an italian. lilly had sat in a cowshed listening to a youth in the north country: he had sat on the corn-straw that the oxen had been treading out, in calabria, under the moon: he had sat in a farm-kitchen with a german prisoner: and every time it was the same thing, the same hot, blind, anguished voice of a man who has seen too much, experienced too much, and doesn't know where to turn. none of the glamour of returned heroes, none of the romance of war: only a hot, blind, mesmerised voice, going on and on, mesmerised by a vision that the soul cannot bear. in this officer, of course, there was a lightness and an appearance of bright diffidence and humour. but underneath it all was the same as in the common men of all the combatant nations: the hot, seared burn of unbearable experience, which did not heal nor cool, and whose irritation was not to be relieved. the experience gradually cooled on top: but only with a surface crust. the soul did not heal, did not recover. “i used to be awfully frightened,” laughed herbertson. “now you say, lilly, you'd never have stood it. but you would. you're nervous--and it was just the nervous ones that did stand it. when nearly all our officers were gone, we had a man come out--a man called margeritson, from india--big merchant people out there. they all said he was no good--not a bit of good--nervous chap. no good at all. but when you had to get out of the trench and go for the germans he was perfect--perfect--it all came to him then, at the crisis, and he was perfect. “some things frighten one man, and some another. now shells would never frighten me. but i couldn't stand bombs. you could tell the difference between our machines and the germans. ours was a steady noise--drrrrrrrr!--but their's was heavy, drrrrrururrrrruru!-my word, that got on my nerves.... “no i was never hit. the nearest thing was when i was knocked down by an exploding shell--several times that--you know. when you shout like mad for the men to come and dig you out, under all the earth. and my word, you do feel frightened then.” herbertson laughed with a twinkling motion to lilly. but between his brows there was a tension like madness. “and a funny thing you know--how you don't notice things. in--let me see--1916, the german guns were a lot better than ours. ours were old, and when they're old you can't tell where they'll hit: whether they'll go beyond the mark, or whether they'll fall short. well, this day our guns were firing short, and killing our own men. we'd had the order to charge, and were running forward, and i suddenly felt hot water spurting on my neck--” he put his hand to the back of his neck and glanced round apprehensively. “it was a chap called innes--oh, an awfully decent sort--people were in the argentine. he'd been calling out to me as we were running, and i was just answering. when i felt this hot water on my neck and saw him running past me with no head--he'd got no head, and he went running past me. i don't know how far, but a long way.... blood, you know--yes--well-“oh, i hated chelsea--i loathed chelsea--chelsea was purgatory to me. i had a corporal called wallace--he was a fine chap--oh, he was a fine chap--six foot two--and about twenty-four years old. he was my stand-back. oh, i hated chelsea, and parades, and drills. you know, when it's drill, and you're giving orders, you forget what order you've just given--in front of the palace there the crowd don't notice--but it's awful for you. and you know you daren't look round to see what the men are doing. but wallace was splendid. he was just behind me, and i'd hear him, quite quiet you know, 'it's right wheel, sir.' always perfect, always perfect--yes--well.... “you know you don't get killed if you don't think you will. now i never thought i should get killed. and i never knew a man get killed if he hadn't been thinking he would. i said to wallace i'd rather be out here, at the front, than at chelsea. i hated chelsea--i can't tell you how much. 'oh no, sir!' he said. 'i'd rather be at chelsea than here. i'd rather be at chelsea. there isn't hell like this at chelsea.' we'd had orders that we were to go back to the real camp the next day. 'never mind, wallace,' i said. 'we shall be out of this hell-on-earth tomorrow.' and he took my hand. we weren't much for showing feeling or anything in the guards. but he took my hand. and we climbed out to charge--poor fellow, he was killed--” herbertson dropped his head, and for some moments seemed to go unconscious, as if struck. then he lifted his face, and went on in the same animated chatty fashion: “you see, he had a presentiment. i'm sure he had a presentiment. none of the men got killed unless they had a presentiment--like that, you know....” herbertson nodded keenly at lilly, with his sharp, twinkling, yet obsessed eyes. lilly wondered why he made the presentiment responsible for the death--which he obviously did--and not vice versa. herbertson implied every time, that you'd never get killed if you could keep yourself from having a presentiment. perhaps there was something in it. perhaps the soul issues its own ticket of death, when it can stand no more. surely life controls life: and not accident. “it's a funny thing what shock will do. we had a sergeant and he shouted to me. both his feet were off--both his feet, clean at the ankle. i gave him morphia. you know officers aren't allowed to use the needle--might give the man blood poisoning. you give those tabloids. they say they act in a few minutes, but they don't. it's a quarter of an hour. and nothing is more demoralising than when you have a man, wounded, you know, and crying out. well, this man i gave him the morphia before he got over the stunning, you know. so he didn't feel the pain. well, they carried him in. i always used to like to look after my men. so i went next morning and i found he hadn't been removed to the clearing station. i got hold of the doctor and i said, 'look here! why hasn't this man been taken to the clearing station?' i used to get excited. but after some years they'd got used to me. 'don't get excited, herbertson, the man's dying.' 'but,' i said, 'he's just been talking to me as strong as you are.' and he had--he'd talk as strong and well as you or me, then go quiet for a bit. i said i gave him the morphia before he came round from the stunning. so he'd felt nothing. but in two hours he was dead. the doctor says that the shock does it like that sometimes. you can do nothing for them. nothing vital is injured--and yet the life is broken in them. nothing can be done--funny thing--must be something in the brain--” “it's obviously not the brain,” said lilly. “it's deeper than the brain.” “deeper,” said herbertson, nodding. “funny thing where life is. we had a lieutenant. you know we all buried our own dead. well, he looked as if he was asleep. most of the chaps looked like that.” herbertson closed his eyes and laid his face aside, like a man asleep and dead peacefully. “you very rarely see a man dead with any other look on his face--you know the other look.--” and he clenched his teeth with a sudden, momentaneous, ghastly distortion.--“well, you'd never have known this chap was dead. he had a wound here--in the back of the head--and a bit of blood on his hand--and nothing else, nothing. well, i said we'd give him a decent burial. he lay there waiting--and they'd wrapped him in a filthy blanket--you know. well, i said he should have a proper blanket. he'd been dead lying there a day and a half you know. so i went and got a blanket, a beautiful blanket, out of his private kit--his people were scotch, well-known family--and i got the pins, you know, ready to pin him up properly, for the scots guards to bury him. and i thought he'd be stiff, you see. but when i took him by the arms, to lift him on, he sat up. it gave me an awful shock. 'why he's alive!' i said. but they said he was dead. i couldn't believe it. it gave me an awful shock. he was as flexible as you or me, and looked as if he was asleep. you couldn't believe he was dead. but we pinned him up in his blanket. it was an awful shock to me. i couldn't believe a man could be like that after he'd been dead two days.... “the germans were wonderful with the machine guns--it's a wicked thing, a machine gun. but they couldn't touch us with the bayonet. every time the men came back they had bayonet practice, and they got awfully good. you know when you thrust at the germans--so--if you miss him, you bring your rifle back sharp, with a round swing, so that the butt comes up and hits up under the jaw. it's one movement, following on with the stab, you see, if you miss him. it was too quick for them--but bayonet charge was worst, you know. because your man cries out when you catch him, when you get him, you know. that's what does you.... “no, oh no, this was no war like other wars. all the machinery of it. no, you couldn't stand it, but for the men. the men are wonderful, you know. they'll be wiped out.... no, it's your men who keep you going, if you're an officer.... but there'll never be another war like this. because the germans are the only people who could make a war like this--and i don't think they'll ever do it again, do you? “oh, they were wonderful, the germans. they were amazing. it was incredible, what they invented and did. we had to learn from them, in the first two years. but they were too methodical. that's why they lost the war. they were too methodical. they'd fire their guns every ten minutes--regular. think of it. of course we knew when to run, and when to lie down. you got so that you knew almost exactly what they'd do--if you'd been out long enough. and then you could time what you wanted to do yourselves. “they were a lot more nervous than we were, at the last. they sent up enough light at night from their trenches--you know, those things that burst in the air like electric light--we had none of that to do--they did it all for us--lit up everything. they were more nervous than we were....” it was nearly two o'clock when herbertson left. lilly, depressed, remained before the fire. aaron got out of bed and came uneasily to the fire. “it gives me the bellyache, that damned war,” he said. “so it does me,” said lilly. “all unreal.” “real enough for those that had to go through it.” “no, least of all for them,” said lilly sullenly. “not as real as a bad dream. why the hell don't they wake up and realise it!” “that's a fact,” said aaron. “they're hypnotised by it.” “and they want to hypnotise me. and i won't be hypnotised. the war was a lie and is a lie and will go on being a lie till somebody busts it.” “it was a fact--you can't bust that. you can't bust the fact that it happened.” “yes you can. it never happened. it never happened to me. no more than my dreams happen. my dreams don't happen: they only seem.” “but the war did happen, right enough,” smiled aaron palely. “no, it didn't. not to me or to any man, in his own self. it took place in the automatic sphere, like dreams do. but the actual man in every man was just absent--asleep--or drugged--inert--dream-logged. that's it.” “you tell 'em so,” said aaron. “i do. but it's no good. because they won't wake up now even--perhaps never. they'll all kill themselves in their sleep.” “they wouldn't be any better if they did wake up and be themselves--that is, supposing they are asleep, which i can't see. they are what they are--and they're all alike--and never very different from what they are now.” lilly stared at aaron with black eyes. “do you believe in them less than i do, aaron?” he asked slowly. “i don't even want to believe in them.” “but in yourself?” lilly was almost wistful--and aaron uneasy. “i don't know that i've any more right to believe in myself than in them,” he replied. lilly watched and pondered. “no,” he said. “that's not true--i knew the war was false: humanly quite false. i always knew it was false. the germans were false, we were false, everybody was false.” “and not you?” asked aaron shrewishly. “there was a wakeful, self-possessed bit of me which knew that the war and all that horrible movement was false for me. and so i wasn't going to be dragged in. the germans could have shot my mother or me or what they liked: i wouldn't have joined the war. i would like to kill my enemy. but become a bit of that huge obscene machine they called the war, that i never would, no, not if i died ten deaths and had eleven mothers violated. but i would like to kill my enemy: oh, yes, more than one enemy. but not as a unit in a vast obscene mechanism. that never: no, never.” poor lilly was too earnest and vehement. aaron made a fine nose. it seemed to him like a lot of words and a bit of wriggling out of a hole. “well,” he said, “you've got men and nations, and you've got the machines of war--so how are you going to get out of it? league of nations?” “damn all leagues. damn all masses and groups, anyhow. all i want is to get myself out of their horrible heap: to get out of the swarm. the swarm to me is nightmare and nullity--horrible helpless writhing in a dream. i want to get myself awake, out of it all--all that mass-consciousness, all that mass-activity--it's the most horrible nightmare to me. no man is awake and himself. no man who was awake and in possession of himself would use poison gases: no man. his own awake self would scorn such a thing. it's only when the ghastly mob-sleep, the dream helplessness of the mass-psyche overcomes him, that he becomes completely base and obscene.” “ha--well,” said aaron. “it's the wide-awake ones that invent the poison gas, and use it. where should we be without it?” lilly started, went stiff and hostile. “do you mean that, aaron?” he said, looking into aaron's face with a hard, inflexible look. aaron turned aside half sheepishly. “that's how it looks on the face of it, isn't it?” he said. “look here, my friend, it's too late for you to be talking to me about the face of things. if that's how you feel, put your things on and follow herbertson. yes--go out of my room. i don't put up with the face of things here.” aaron looked at him in cold amazement. “it'll do tomorrow morning, won't it?” he asked rather mocking. “yes,” said lilly coldly. “but please go tomorrow morning.” “oh, i'll go all right,” said aaron. “everybody's got to agree with you--that's your price.” but lilly did not answer. aaron turned into bed, his satirical smile under his nose. somewhat surprised, however, at this sudden turn of affairs. as he was just going to sleep, dismissing the matter, lilly came once more to his bedside, and said, in a hard voice: “i'm not going to pretend to have friends on the face of things. no, and i don't have friends who don't fundamentally agree with me. a friend means one who is at one with me in matters of life and death. and if you're at one with all the rest, then you're their friend, not mine. so be their friend. and please leave me in the morning. you owe me nothing, you have nothing more to do with me. i have had enough of these friendships where i pay the piper and the mob calls the tune. “let me tell you, moreover, your heroic herbertsons lost us more than ever they won. a brave ant is a damned cowardly individual. your heroic officers are a sad sight afterwards, when they come home. bah, your herbertson! the only justification for war is what we learn from it. and what have they learnt?--why did so many of them have presentiments, as he called it? because they could feel inside them, there was nothing to come after. there was no life-courage: only death-courage. nothing beyond this hell--only death or love--languishing--” “what could they have seen, anyhow?” said aaron. “it's not what you see, actually. it's the kind of spirit you keep inside you: the life spirit. when wallace had presentiments, herbertson, being officer, should have said: 'none of that, wallace. you and i, we've got to live and make life smoke.'--instead of which he let wallace be killed and his own heart be broken. always the death-choice-and we won't, we simply will not face the world as we've made it, and our own souls as we find them, and take the responsibility. we'll never get anywhere till we stand up man to man and face everything out, and break the old forms, but never let our own pride and courage of life be broken.” lilly broke off, and went silently to bed. aaron turned over to sleep, rather resenting the sound of so many words. what difference did it make, anyhow? in the morning, however, when he saw the other man's pale, closed, rather haughty face, he realised that something _had_ happened. lilly was courteous and even affable: but with a curious cold space between him and aaron. breakfast passed, and aaron knew that he must leave. there was something in lilly's bearing which just showed him the door. in some surprise and confusion, and in some anger, not unmingled with humorous irony, he put his things in his bag. he put on his hat and coat. lilly was seated rather stiffly writing. “well,” said aaron. “i suppose we shall meet again.” “oh, sure to,” said lilly, rising from his chair. “we are sure to run across one another.” “when are you going?” asked aaron. “in a few days' time.” “oh, well, i'll run in and see you before you go, shall i?” “yes, do.” lilly escorted his guest to the top of the stairs, shook hands, and then returned into his own room, closing the door on himself. aaron did not find his friend at home when he called. he took it rather as a slap in the face. but then he knew quite well that lilly had made a certain call on his, aaron's soul: a call which he, aaron, did not at all intend to obey. if in return the soul-caller chose to shut his street-door in the face of the world-friend--well, let it be quits. he was not sure whether he felt superior to his unworldly enemy or not. he rather thought he did. chapter xi. more pillar of salt the opera season ended, aaron was invited by cyril scott to join a group of musical people in a village by the sea. he accepted, and spent a pleasant month. it pleased the young men musically-inclined and bohemian by profession to patronise the flautist, whom they declared marvellous. bohemians with well-to-do parents, they could already afford to squander a little spasmodic and self-gratifying patronage. and aaron did not mind being patronised. he had nothing else to do. but the party broke up early in september. the flautist was detained a few days at a country house, for the amusement of the guests. then he left for london. in london he found himself at a loose end. a certain fretful dislike of the patronage of indifferent young men, younger than himself, and a certain distaste for regular work in the orchestra made him look round. he wanted something else. he wanted to disappear again. qualms and emotions concerning his abandoned family overcame him. the early, delicate autumn affected him. he took a train to the midlands. and again, just after dark, he strolled with his little bag across the field which lay at the end of his garden. it had been mown, and the grass was already growing long. he stood and looked at the line of back windows, lighted once more. he smelled the scents of autumn, phlox and moist old vegetation and corn in sheaf. a nostalgia which was half at least revulsion affected him. the place, the home, at once fascinated and revolted him. sitting in his shed, he scrutinised his garden carefully, in the starlight. there were two rows of beans, rather disshevelled. near at hand the marrow plants sprawled from their old bed. he could detect the perfume of a few carnations. he wondered who it was had planted the garden, during his long absence. anyhow, there it was, planted and fruited and waning into autumn. the blind was not drawn. it was eight o'clock. the children were going to bed. aaron waited in his shed, his bowels stirred with violent but only half-admitted emotions. there was his wife, slim and graceful, holding a little mug to the baby's mouth. and the baby was drinking. she looked lonely. wild emotions attacked his heart. there was going to be a wild and emotional reconciliation. was there? it seemed like something fearful and imminent. a passion arose in him, a craving for the violent emotional reconciliation. he waited impatiently for the children to be gone to bed, gnawed with restless desire. he heard the clock strike nine, then half-past, from the village behind. the children would be asleep. his wife was sitting sewing some little frock. he went lingering down the garden path, stooping to lift the fallen carnations, to see how they were. there were many flowers, but small. he broke one off, then threw it away. the golden rod was out. even in the little lawn there were asters, as of old. his wife started to listen, hearing his step. he was filled with a violent conflict of tenderness, like a sickness. he hesitated, tapping at the door, and entered. his wife started to her feet, at bay. “what have you come for!” was her involuntary ejaculation. but he, with the familiar odd jerk of his head towards the garden, asked with a faint smile: “who planted the garden?” and he felt himself dropping into the twang of the vernacular, which he had discarded. lottie only stood and stared at him, objectively. she did not think to answer. he took his hat off, and put it on the dresser. again the familiar act maddened her. “what have you come for?” she cried again, with a voice full of hate. or perhaps it was fear and doubt and even hope as well. he heard only hate. this time he turned to look at her. the old dagger was drawn in her. “i wonder,” he said, “myself.” then she recovered herself, and with trembling hand picked up her sewing again. but she still stood at bay, beyond the table. she said nothing. he, feeling tired, sat down on the chair nearest the door. but he reached for his hat, and kept it on his knee. she, as she stood there unnaturally, went on with her sewing. there was silence for some time. curious sensations and emotions went through the man's frame seeming to destroy him. they were like electric shocks, which he felt she emitted against him. and an old sickness came in him again. he had forgotten it. it was the sickness of the unrecognised and incomprehensible strain between him and her. after a time she put down her sewing, and sat again in her chair. “do you know how vilely you've treated me?” she said, staring across the space at him. he averted his face. yet he answered, not without irony. “i suppose so.” “and why?” she cried. “i should like to know why.” he did not answer. the way she rushed in made him go vague. “justify yourself. say why you've been so vile to me. say what you had against me,” she demanded. “what i had against her,” he mused to himself: and he wondered that she used the past tense. he made no answer. “accuse me,” she insisted. “say what i've done to make you treat me like this. say it. you must think it hard enough.” “nay,” he said. “i don't think it.” this speech, by which he merely meant that he did not trouble to formulate any injuries he had against her, puzzled her. “don't come pretending you love me, now. it's too late,” she said with contempt. yet perhaps also hope. “you might wait till i start pretending,” he said. this enraged her. “you vile creature!” she exclaimed. “go! what have you come for?” “to look at you,” he said sarcastically. after a few minutes she began to cry, sobbing violently into her apron. and again his bowels stirred and boiled. “what have i done! what have i done! i don't know what i've done that he should be like this to me,” she sobbed, into her apron. it was childish, and perhaps true. at least it was true from the childish part of her nature. he sat gloomy and uneasy. she took the apron from her tear-stained face, and looked at him. it was true, in her moments of roused exposure she was a beautiful woman--a beautiful woman. at this moment, with her flushed, tear-stained, wilful distress, she was beautiful. “tell me,” she challenged. “tell me! tell me what i've done. tell me what you have against me. tell me.” watching like a lynx, she saw the puzzled, hurt look in his face. telling isn't so easy--especially when the trouble goes too deep for conscious comprehension. he couldn't _tell_ what he had against her. and he had not the slightest intention of doing what she would have liked him to do, starting to pile up detailed grievances. he knew the detailed grievances were nothing in themselves. “you can't,” she cried vindictively. “you can't. you can't find anything real to bring against me, though you'd like to. you'd like to be able to accuse me of something, but you can't, because you know there isn't anything.” she watched him, watched. and he sat in the chair near the door, without moving. “you're unnatural, that's what you are,” she cried. “you're unnatural. you're not a man. you haven't got a man's feelings. you're nasty, and cold, and unnatural. and you're a coward. you're a coward. you run away from me, without telling me what you've got against me.” “when you've had enough, you go away and you don't care what you do,” he said, epigrammatic. she paused a moment. “enough of what?” she said. “what have you had enough of? of me and your children? it's a nice manly thing to say. haven't i loved you? haven't i loved you for twelve years, and worked and slaved for you and tried to keep you right? heaven knows where you'd have been but for me, evil as you are at the bottom. you're evil, that's what it is--and weak. you're too weak to love a woman and give her what she wants: too weak. unmanly and cowardly, he runs away.” “no wonder,” he said. “no,” she cried. “it is no wonder, with a nature like yours: weak and unnatural and evil. it is no wonder.” she became quiet--and then started to cry again, into her apron. aaron waited. he felt physically weak. “and who knows what you've been doing all these months?” she wept. “who knows all the vile things you've been doing? and you're the father of my children--the father of my little girls--and who knows what vile things he's guilty of, all these months?” “i shouldn't let my imagination run away with me,” he answered. “i've been playing the flute in the orchestra of one of the theatres in london.” “ha!” she cried. “it's more than that. don't think i'm going to believe you. i know you, with your smooth-sounding lies. you're a liar, as you know. and i know you've been doing other things besides play a flute in an orchestra. you!--as if i don't know you. and then coming crawling back to me with your lies and your pretense. don't think i'm taken in.” “i should be sorry,” he said. “coming crawling back to me, and expecting to be forgiven,” she went on. “but no--i don't forgive--and i can't forgive--never--not as long as i live shall i forgive what you've done to me.” “you can wait till you're asked, anyhow,” he said. “and you can wait,” she said. “and you shall wait.” she took up her sewing, and stitched steadily, as if calmly. anyone glancing in would have imagined a quiet domestic hearth at that moment. he, too, feeling physically weak, remained silent, feeling his soul absent from the scene. again she suddenly burst into tears, weeping bitterly. “and the children,” she sobbed, rocking herself with grief and chagrin. “what have i been able to say to the children--what have i been able to tell them?” “what have you told them?” he asked coldly. “i told them you'd gone away to work,” she sobbed, laying her head on her arms on the table. “what else could i tell them? i couldn't tell them the vile truth about their father. i couldn't tell them how evil you are.” she sobbed and moaned. he wondered what exactly the vile truth would have been, had she _started_ to tell it. and he began to feel, coldly and cynically, that among all her distress there was a luxuriating in the violent emotions of the scene in hand, and the situation altogether. then again she became quiet, and picked up her sewing. she stitched quietly, wistfully, for some time. then she looked up at him--a long look of reproach, and sombre accusation, and wifely tenderness. he turned his face aside. “you know you've been wrong to me, don't you?” she said, half wistfully, half menacing. he felt her wistfulness and her menace tearing him in his bowels and loins. “you do know, don't you?” she insisted, still with the wistful appeal, and the veiled threat. “you do, or you would answer,” she said. “you've still got enough that's right in you, for you to know.” she waited. he sat still, as if drawn by hot wires. then she slipped across to him, put her arms round him, sank on her knees at his side, and sank her face against his thigh. “say you know how wrong you are. say you know how cruel you've been to me,” she pleaded. but under her female pleading and appeal he felt the iron of her threat. “you do know it,” she murmured, looking up into his face as she crouched by his knee. “you do know it. i can see in your eyes that you know it. and why have you come back to me, if you don't know it! why have you come back to me? tell me!” her arms gave him a sharp, compulsory little clutch round the waist. “tell me! tell me!” she murmured, with all her appeal liquid in her throat. but him, it half overcame, and at the same time, horrified. he had a certain horror of her. the strange liquid sound of her appeal seemed to him like the swaying of a serpent which mesmerises the fated, fluttering, helpless bird. she clasped her arms round him, she drew him to her, she half roused his passion. at the same time she coldly horrified and repelled him. he had not the faintest feeling, at the moment, of his own wrong. but she wanted to win his own self-betrayal out of him. he could see himself as the fascinated victim, falling to this cajoling, awful woman, the wife of his bosom. but as well, he had a soul outside himself, which looked on the whole scene with cold revulsion, and which was as unchangeable as time. “no,” he said. “i don't feel wrong.” “you do!” she said, giving him a sharp, admonitory clutch. “you do. only you're silly, and obstinate, babyish and silly and obstinate. an obstinate little boy--you do feel wrong. and you are wrong. and you've got to say it.” but quietly he disengaged himself and got to his feet, his face pale and set, obstinate as she said. he put his hat on, and took his little bag. she watched him curiously, still crouching by his chair. “i'll go,” he said, putting his hand on the latch. suddenly she sprang to her feet and clutched him by the shirt-neck, her hand inside his soft collar, half strangling him. “you villain,” she said, and her face was transfigured with passion as he had never seen it before, horrible. “you villain!” she said thickly. “what have you come here for?” his soul went black as he looked at her. he broke her hand away from his shirt collar, bursting the stud-holes. she recoiled in silence. and in one black, unconscious movement he was gone, down the garden and over the fence and across the country, swallowed in a black unconsciousness. she, realising, sank upon the hearth-rug and lay there curled upon herself. she was defeated. but she, too, would never yield. she lay quite motionless for some time. then she got up, feeling the draught on the floor. she closed the door, and drew down the blind. then she looked at her wrist, which he had gripped, and which pained her. then she went to the mirror and looked for a long time at her white, strained, determined face. come life, come death, she, too would never yield. and she realised now that he would never yield. she was faint with weariness, and would be glad to get to bed and sleep. aaron meanwhile had walked across the country and was looking for a place to rest. he found a cornfield with a half-built stack, and sheaves in stook. ten to one some tramp would have found the stack. he threw a dozen sheaves together and lay down, looking at the stars in the september sky. he, too, would never yield. the illusion of love was gone for ever. love was a battle in which each party strove for the mastery of the other's soul. so far, man had yielded the mastery to woman. now he was fighting for it back again. and too late, for the woman would never yield. but whether woman yielded or not, he would keep the mastery of his own soul and conscience and actions. he would never yield himself up to her judgment again. he would hold himself forever beyond her jurisdiction. henceforth, life single, not life double. he looked at the sky, and thanked the universe for the blessedness of being alone in the universe. to be alone, to be oneself, not to be driven or violated into something which is not oneself, surely it is better than anything. he thought of lottie, and knew how much more truly herself she was when she was alone, with no man to distort her. and he was thankful for the division between them. such scenes as the last were too horrible and unreal. as for future unions, too soon to think about it. let there be clean and pure division first, perfected singleness. that is the only way to final, living unison: through sheer, finished singleness. chapter xii. novara having no job for the autumn, aaron fidgetted in london. he played at some concerts and some private shows. he was one of an odd quartette, for example, which went to play to lady artemis hooper, when she lay in bed after her famous escapade of falling through the window of her taxi-cab. aaron had that curious knack, which belongs to some people, of getting into the swim without knowing he was doing it. lady artemis thought his flute lovely, and had him again to play for her. aaron looked at her and she at him. she, as she reclined there in bed in a sort of half-light, well made-up, smoking her cigarettes and talking in a rather raucous voice, making her slightly rasping witty comments to the other men in the room--of course there were other men, the audience--was a shock to the flautist. this was the bride of the moment! curious how raucous her voice sounded out of the cigarette smoke. yet he liked her--the reckless note of the modern, social freebooter. in himself was a touch of the same quality. “do you love playing?” she asked him. “yes,” he said, with that shadow of irony which seemed like a smile on his face. “live for it, so to speak,” she said. “i make my living by it,” he said. “but that's not really how you take it?” she said. he eyed her. she watched him over her cigarette. it was a personal moment. “i don't think about it,” he said. “i'm sure you don't. you wouldn't be so good if you did. you're awfully lucky, you know, to be able to pour yourself down your flute.” “you think i go down easy?” he laughed. “ah!” she replied, flicking her cigarette broadcast. “that's the point. what should you say, jimmy?” she turned to one of the men. he screwed his eyeglass nervously and stiffened himself to look at her. “i--i shouldn't like to say, off-hand,” came the small-voiced, self-conscious answer. and jimmy bridled himself and glanced at aaron. “do you find it a tight squeeze, then?” she said, turning to aaron once more. “no, i can't say that,” he answered. “what of me goes down goes down easy enough. it's what doesn't go down.” “and how much is that?” she asked, eying him. “a good bit, maybe,” he said. “slops over, so to speak,” she retorted sarcastically. “and which do you enjoy more, trickling down your flute or slopping over on to the lap of mother earth--of miss, more probably!” “depends,” he said. having got him a few steps too far upon the personal ground, she left him to get off by himself. so he found london got on his nerves. he felt it rubbed him the wrong way. he was flattered, of course, by his own success--and felt at the same time irritated by it. this state of mind was by no means acceptable. wherever he was he liked to be given, tacitly, the first place--or a place among the first. among the musical people he frequented, he found himself on a callow kind of equality with everybody, even the stars and aristocrats, at one moment, and a backstairs outsider the next. it was all just as the moment demanded. there was a certain excitement in slithering up and down the social scale, one minute chatting in a personal tete-a-tete with the most famous, or notorious, of the society beauties: and the next walking in the rain, with his flute in a bag, to his grubby lodging in bloomsbury. only the excitement roused all the savage sarcasm that lay at the bottom of his soul, and which burned there like an unhealthy bile. therefore he determined to clear out--to disappear. he had a letter from lilly, from novara. lilly was drifting about. aaron wrote to novara, and asked if he should come to italy, having no money to speak of. “come if you want to. bring your flute. and if you've no money, put on a good suit of clothes and a big black hat, and play outside the best cafe in any italian town, and you'll collect enough to get on with.” it was a sporting chance. aaron packed his bag and got a passport, and wrote to lilly to say he would join him, as invited, at sir william franks'. he hoped lilly's answer would arrive before he left london. but it didn't. therefore behold our hero alighting at novara, two hours late, on a wet, dark evening. he hoped lilly would be there: but nobody. with some slight dismay he faced the big, crowded station. the stream of people carried him automatically through the barrier, a porter having seized his bag, and volleyed various unintelligible questions at him. aaron understood not one word. so he just wandered after the blue blouse of the porter. the porter deposited the bag on the steps of the station front, fired off more questions and gesticulated into the half-illuminated space of darkness outside the station. aaron decided it meant a cab, so he nodded and said “yes.” but there were no cabs. so once more the blue-bloused porter slung the big bag and the little bag on the strap over his shoulder, and they plunged into the night, towards some lights and a sort of theatre place. one carriage stood there in the rain--yes, and it was free. “keb? yes--orright--sir. whe'to? where you go? sir william franks? yes, i know. long way go--go long way. sir william franks.” the cabman spattered his few words of english. aaron gave the porter an english shilling. the porter let the coin lie in the middle of his palm, as if it were a live beetle, and darted to the light of the carriage to examine the beast, exclaiming volubly. the cabman, wild with interest, peered down from the box into the palm of the porter, and carried on an impassioned dialogue. aaron stood with one foot on the step. “what you give--he? one franc?” asked the driver. “a shilling,” said aaron. “one sheeling. yes. i know that. one sheeling english”--and the driver went off into impassioned exclamations in torinese. the porter, still muttering and holding his hand as if the coin might sting him, filtered away. “orright. he know--sheeling--orright. english moneys, eh? yes, he know. you get up, sir.” and away went aaron, under the hood of the carriage, clattering down the wide darkness of novara, over a bridge apparently, past huge rain-wet statues, and through more rainy, half-lit streets. they stopped at last outside a sort of park wall with trees above. the big gates were just beyond. “sir william franks--there.” in a mixture of italian and english the driver told aaron to get down and ring the bell on the right. aaron got down and in the darkness was able to read the name on the plate. “how much?” said aaron to the driver. “ten franc,” said the fat driver. but it was his turn now to screw down and scrutinise the pink ten-shilling note. he waved it in his hand. “not good, eh? not good moneys?” “yes,” said aaron, rather indignantly. “good english money. ten shillings. better than ten francs, a good deal. better--better--” “good--you say? ten sheeling--” the driver muttered and muttered, as if dissatisfied. but as a matter of fact he stowed the note in his waistcoat pocket with considerable satisfaction, looked at aaron curiously, and drove away. aaron stood there in the dark outside the big gates, and wished himself somewhere else. however, he rang the bell. there was a huge barking of dogs on the other side. presently a light switched on, and a woman, followed by a man, appeared cautiously, in the half-opened doorway. “sir william franks?” said aaron. “si, signore.” and aaron stepped with his two bags inside the gate. huge dogs jumped round. he stood in the darkness under the trees at the foot of the park. the woman fastened the gate--aaron saw a door--and through an uncurtained window a man writing at a desk--rather like the clerk in an hotel office. he was going with his two bags to the open door, when the woman stopped him, and began talking to him in italian. it was evident he must not go on. so he put down the bags. the man stood a few yards away, watchfully. aaron looked down at the woman and tried to make out something of what she was saying, but could not. the dogs still barked spasmodically, drops fell from the tall, dark trees that rose overhead. “is mr. lilly here? mr. lilly?” he asked. “signor lillee. no, signore--” and off the woman went in italian. but it was evident lilly was not at the house. aaron wished more than ever he had not come, but had gone to an hotel. he made out that the woman was asking him for his name--“meester--? meester--?” she kept saying, with a note of interrogation. “sisson. mr. sisson,” said aaron, who was becoming impatient. and he found a visiting card to give her. she seemed appeased--said something about telephone--and left him standing. the rain had ceased, but big drops were shaken from the dark, high trees. through the uncurtained window he saw the man at the desk reach the telephone. there was a long pause. at length the woman came back and motioned to him to go up--up the drive which curved and disappeared under the dark trees. “go up there?” said aaron, pointing. that was evidently the intention. so he picked up his bags and strode forward, from out of the circle of electric light, up the curved drive in the darkness. it was a steep incline. he saw trees and the grass slopes. there was a tang of snow in the air. suddenly, up ahead, a brilliant light switched on. he continued uphill through the trees along the path, towards it, and at length, emerged at the foot of a great flight of steps, above which was a wide glass entrance, and an italian manservant in white gloves hovering as if on the brink. aaron emerged from the drive and climbed the steps. the manservant came down two steps and took the little bag. then he ushered aaron and the big bag into a large, pillared hall, with thick turkish carpet on the floor, and handsome appointments. it was spacious, comfortable and warm; but somewhat pretentious; rather like the imposing hall into which the heroine suddenly enters on the film. aaron dropped his heavy bag, with relief, and stood there, hat in hand, in his damp overcoat in the circle of light, looking vaguely at the yellow marble pillars, the gilded arches above, the shadowy distances and the great stairs. the butler disappeared--reappeared in another moment--and through an open doorway came the host. sir william was a small, clean old man with a thin, white beard and a courtly deportment, wearing a black velvet dinner jacket faced with purple silk. “how do you do, mr. sisson. you come straight from england?” sir william held out his hand courteously and benevolently, smiling an old man's smile of hospitality. “mr. lilly has gone away?” said aaron. “yes. he left us several days ago.” aaron hesitated. “you didn't expect me, then?” “yes, oh, yes. yes, oh, yes. very glad to see you--well, now, come in and have some dinner--” at this moment lady franks appeared--short, rather plump, but erect and definite, in a black silk dress and pearls round her throat. “how do you do? we are just at dinner,” she said. “you haven't eaten? no--well, then--would you like a bath now, or--?” it was evident the franks had dispensed much hospitality: much of it charitable. aaron felt it. “no,” he said. “i'll wash my hands and come straight in, shall i?” “yes, perhaps that would be better--” “i'm afraid i am a nuisance.” “not at all--beppe--” and she gave instructions in italian. another footman appeared, and took the big bag. aaron took the little one this time. they climbed the broad, turning stairs, crossed another handsome lounge, gilt and ormolu and yellow silk chairs and scattered copies of _the graphic_ or of _country life_, then they disappeared through a doorway into a much narrower flight of stairs. man can so rarely keep it up all the way, the grandeur. two black and white chamber-maids appeared. aaron found himself in a blue silk bedroom, and a footman unstrapping his bag, which he did not want unstrapped. next minute he was beckoned and allured by the italian servants down the corridor, and presented to the handsome, spacious bathroom, which was warm and creamy-coloured and glittering with massive silver and mysterious with up-to-date conveniences. there he was left to his own devices, and felt like a small boy finding out how it works. for even the mere turning on of the taps was a problem in silver mechanics. in spite of all the splendours and the elaborated convenience, he washed himself in good hot water, and wished he were having a bath, chiefly because of the wardrobe of marvellous turkish towels. then he clicked his way back to his bedroom, changed his shirt and combed his hair in the blue silk bedroom with the greuze picture, and felt a little dim and superficial surprise. he had fallen into country house parties before, but never into quite such a plushy sense of riches. he felt he ought to have his breath taken away. but alas, the cinema has taken our breath away so often, investing us in all the splendours of the splendidest american millionaire, or all the heroics and marvels of the somme or the north pole, that life has now no magnate richer than we, no hero nobler than we have been, on the film. _connu_! _connu_! everything life has to offer is known to us, couldn't be known better, from the film. so aaron tied his tie in front of a big venice mirror, and nothing was a surprise to him. he found a footman hovering to escort him to the dining-room--a real italian footman, uneasy because milady's dinner was unsettled. he entered the rather small dining-room, and saw the people at table. he was told various names: bowed to a young, slim woman with big blue eyes and dark hair like a photograph, then to a smaller rather colourless young woman with a large nose: then to a stout, rubicund, bald colonel, and to a tall, thin, oxford-looking major with a black patch over his eye--both these men in khaki: finally to a good-looking, well-nourished young man in a dinner-jacket, and he sat down to his soup, on his hostess' left hand. the colonel sat on her right, and was confidential. little sir william, with his hair and his beard white like spun glass, his manner very courteous and animated, the purple facings of his velvet jacket very impressive, sat at the far end of the table jesting with the ladies and showing his teeth in an old man's smile, a little bit affected, but pleasant, wishing everybody to be happy. aaron ate his soup, trying to catch up. milady's own confidential italian butler, fidelity itself, hovered quivering near, spiritually helping the newcomer to catch up. two nice little entree dishes, specially prepared for aaron to take the place of the bygone fish and vol au-vents of the proper dinner, testified to the courtesy and charity of his hostess. well, eating rapidly, he had more or less caught up by the time the sweets came. so he swallowed a glass of wine and looked round. his hostess with her pearls, and her diamond star in her grey hair, was speaking of lilly and then of music to him. “i hear you are a musician. that's what i should have been if i had had my way.” “what instrument?” asked aaron. “oh, the piano. yours is the flute, mr. lilly says. i think the flute can be so attractive. but i feel, of course you have more range with the piano. i love the piano--and orchestra.” at that moment, the colonel and hostess-duties distracted her. but she came back in snatches. she was a woman who reminded him a little of queen victoria; so assured in her own room, a large part of her attention always given to the successful issue of her duties, the remainder at the disposal of her guests. it was an old-fashioned, not unpleasant feeling: like retrospect. but she had beautiful, big, smooth emeralds and sapphires on her fingers. money! what a curious thing it is! aaron noticed the deference of all the guests at table: a touch of obsequiousness: before the money! and the host and hostess accepted the deference, nay, expected it, as their due. yet both sir william and lady franks knew that it was only money and success. they had both a certain afterthought, knowing dimly that the game was but a game, and that they were the helpless leaders in the game. they had a certain basic ordinariness which prevented their making any great hits, and which kept them disillusioned all the while. they remembered their poor and insignificant days. “and i hear you were playing in the orchestra at covent garden. we came back from london last week. i enjoyed beecham's operas so much.” “which do you like best?” said aaron. “oh, the russian. i think _ivan_. it is such fine music.” “i find _ivan_ artificial.” “do you? oh, i don't think so. no, i don't think you can say that.” aaron wondered at her assurance. she seemed to put him just a tiny bit in his place, even in an opinion on music. money gave her that right, too. curious--the only authority left. and he deferred to her opinion: that is, to her money. he did it almost deliberately. yes--what did he believe in, besides money? what does any man? he looked at the black patch over the major's eye. what had he given his eye for?--the nation's money. well, and very necessary, too; otherwise we might be where the wretched austrians are. instead of which--how smooth his hostess' sapphires! “of course i myself prefer moussorgsky,” said aaron. “i think he is a greater artist. but perhaps it is just personal preference.” “yes. _boris_ is wonderful. oh, some of the scenes in _boris_!” “and even more _kovantchina_,” said aaron. “i wish we could go back to melody pure and simple. yet i find _kovantchina_, which is all mass music practically, gives me more satisfaction than any other opera.” “do you really? i shouldn't say so: oh, no--but you can't mean that you would like all music to go back to melody pure and simple! just a flute--just a pipe! oh, mr. sisson, you are bigoted for your instrument. i just live in harmony--chords, chords!” she struck imaginary chords on the white damask, and her sapphires swam blue. but at the same time she was watching to see if sir william had still got beside his plate the white medicine _cachet_ which he must swallow at every meal. because if so, she must remind him to swallow it. however, at that very moment, he put it on his tongue. so that she could turn her attention again to aaron and the imaginary chord on the white damask; the thing she just lived in. but the rubicund bald colonel, more rubicund after wine, most rubicund now the marsala was going, snatched her attention with a burly homage to her femininity, and shared his fear with her with a boyish gallantry. when the women had gone up, sir william came near and put his hand on aaron's shoulder. it was evident the charm was beginning to work. sir william was a self-made man, and not in the least a snob. he liked the fundamental ordinariness in aaron, the commonness of the common man. “well now, mr. sisson, we are very glad to see you! very glad, indeed. i count mr. lilly one of the most interesting men it has ever been my good fortune to know. and so for your own sake, and for mr. lilly's sake, we are very glad to see you. arthur, my boy, give mr. sisson some marsala--and take some yourself.” “thank you, sir,” said the well-nourished young man in nice evening clothes. “you'll take another glass yourself, sir?” “yes, i will, i will. i will drink a glass with mr. sisson. major, where are you wandering off to? come and take a glass with us, my boy.” “thanks, sir william,” drawled the young major with the black patch. “now, colonel--i hope you are in good health and spirits.” “never better, sir william, never better.” “i'm very glad to hear it; very glad indeed. try my marsala--i think it is quite good. port is beyond us for the moment--for the moment--” and the old man sipped his brown wine, and smiled again. he made quite a handsome picture: but he was frail. “and where are you bound, mr. sisson? towards rome?” “i came to meet lilly,” said aaron. “ah! but lilly has fled over the borders by this time. never was such a man for crossing frontiers. wonderful person, to be able to do it.” “where has he gone?” said aaron. “i think to geneva for the moment. but he certainly talked of venice. you yourself have no definite goal?” “no.” “ah! you have not come to italy to practice your art?” “i shall have to practice it: or else--no, i haven't come for that.” “ah, you will have to practice it. ah, yes! we are all under the necessity to eat. and you have a family in england? am i not right?” “quite. i've got a family depending on me.” “yes, then you must practice your art: you must practice your art. well--shall we join the ladies? coffee will no doubt be served.” “will you take my arm, sir?” said the well-nourished arthur. “thank you, thank you,” the old man motioned him away. so they went upstairs to where the three women were sitting in the library round the fire, chattering not very interested. the entry of sir william at once made a stir. the girl in white, with the biggish nose, fluttered round him. she was arthur's wife. the girl in soft blue spread herself on the couch: she was the young major's wife, and she had a blue band round her hair. the colonel hovered stout and fidgetty round lady franks and the liqueur stand. he and the major were both in khaki--belonging to the service on duty in italy still. coffee appeared--and sir william doled out _creme de menthe_. there was no conversation--only tedious words. the little party was just commonplace and dull--boring. yet sir william, the self-made man, was a study. and the young, oxford-like major, with his english diffidence and his one dark, pensive, baffled eye was only waiting to be earnest, poor devil. the girl in white had been a sort of companion to lady franks, so that arthur was more or less a son-in-law. in this capacity, he acted. aaron strayed round uneasily looking at the books, bought but not read, and at the big pictures above. it was arthur who fetched out the little boxes containing the orders conferred on sir william for his war-work: and perhaps more, for the many thousands of pounds he had spent on his war-work. there were three orders: one british, and quite important, a large silver star for the breast: one italian, smaller, and silver and gold; and one from the state of ruritania, in silver and red-and-green enamel, smaller than the others. “come now, william,” said lady franks, “you must try them all on. you must try them all on together, and let us see how you look.” the little, frail old man, with his strange old man's blue eyes and his old man's perpetual laugh, swelled out his chest and said: “what, am i to appear in all my vanities?” and he laughed shortly. “of course you are. we want to see you,” said the white girl. “indeed we do! we shouldn't mind all appearing in such vanities--what, lady franks!” boomed the colonel. “i should think not,” replied his hostess. “when a man has honours conferred on him, it shows a poor spirit if he isn't proud of them.” “of course i am proud of them!” said sir william. “well then, come and have them pinned on. i think it's wonderful to have got so much in one life-time--wonderful,” said lady franks. “oh, sir william is a wonderful man,” said the colonel. “well--we won't say so before him. but let us look at him in his orders.” arthur, always ready on these occasions, had taken the large and shining british star from its box, and drew near to sir william, who stood swelling his chest, pleased, proud, and a little wistful. “this one first, sir,” said arthur. sir william stood very still, half tremulous, like a man undergoing an operation. “and it goes just here--the level of the heart. this is where it goes.” and carefully he pinned the large, radiating ornament on the black velvet dinner-jacket of the old man. “that is the first--and very becoming,” said lady franks. “oh, very becoming! very becoming!” said the tall wife of the major--she was a handsome young woman of the tall, frail type. “do you think so, my dear?” said the old man, with his eternal smile: the curious smile of old people when they are dead. “not only becoming, sir,” said the major, bending his tall, slim figure forwards. “but a reassuring sign that a nation knows how to distinguish her valuable men.” “quite!” said lady franks. “i think it is a very great honour to have got it. the king was most gracious, too-now the other. that goes beside it--the italian--” sir william stood there undergoing the operation of the pinning-on. the italian star being somewhat smaller than the british, there was a slight question as to where exactly it should be placed. however, arthur decided it: and the old man stood before the company with his two stars on his breast. “and now the ruritanian,” said lady franks eagerly. “that doesn't go on the same level with the others, lady franks,” said arthur. “that goes much lower down--about here.” “are you sure?” said lady franks. “doesn't it go more here?” “no no, no no, not at all. here! isn't it so, sybil?” “yes, i think so,” said sybil. old sir william stood quite silent, his breast prepared, peering over the facings of his coat to see where the star was going. the colonel was called in, and though he knew nothing about it, he agreed with arthur, who apparently did know something. so the star was pinned quite low down. sir william, peeping down, exclaimed: “well, that is most curious now! i wear an order over the pit of my stomach! i think that is very curious: a curious place to wear an order.” “stand up! stand up and let us look!” said lady franks. “there now, isn't it handsome? and isn't it a great deal of honour for one man? could he have expected so much, in one life-time? i call it wonderful. come and look at yourself, dear”--and she led him to a mirror. “what's more, all thoroughly deserved,” said arthur. “i should think so,” said the colonel, fidgetting. “ah, yes, nobody has deserved them better,” cooed sybil. “nor on more humane and generous grounds,” said the major, _sotto voce._ “the effort to save life, indeed,” returned the major's young wife: “splendid!” sir william stood naively before the mirror and looked at his three stars on his black velvet dinner-jacket. “almost directly over the pit of my stomach,” he said. “i hope that is not a decoration for my greedy appetite.” and he laughed at the young women. “i assure you it is in position, sir,” said arthur. “absolutely correct. i will read it out to you later.” “aren't you satisfied? aren't you a proud man! isn't it wonderful?” said lady franks. “why, what more could a man want from life? he could never expect so much.” “yes, my dear. i am a proud man. three countries have honoured me--” there was a little, breathless pause. “and not more than they ought to have done,” said sybil. “well! well! i shall have my head turned. let me return to my own humble self. i am too much in the stars at the moment.” sir william turned to arthur to have his decorations removed. aaron, standing in the background, felt the whole scene strange, childish, a little touching. and lady franks was so obviously trying to _console_ her husband: to console the frail, excitable old man with his honours. but why console him? did he need consolation? and did she? it was evident that only the hard-money woman in her put any price on the decorations. aaron came forward and examined the orders, one after the other. just metal playthings of curious shiny silver and gilt and enamel. heavy the british one--but only like some heavy buckle, a piece of metal merely when one turned it over. somebody dropped the italian cross, and there was a moment of horror. but the lump of metal took no hurt. queer to see the things stowed in their boxes again. aaron had always imagined these mysterious decorations as shining by nature on the breasts of heroes. pinned-on pieces of metal were a considerable come-down. the orders were put away, the party sat round the fire in the comfortable library, the men sipping more _creme de menthe_, since nothing else offered, and the couple of hours in front promising the tedium of small-talk of tedious people who had really nothing to say and no particular originality in saying it. aaron, however, had reckoned without his host. sir william sat upright in his chair, with all the determination of a frail old man who insists on being level with the young. the new guest sat in a lower chair, smoking, that curious glimmer on his face which made him so attractive, and which only meant that he was looking on the whole scene from the outside, as it were, from beyond a fence. sir william came almost directly to the attack. “and so, mr. sisson, you have no definite purpose in coming to italy?” “no, none,” said aaron. “i wanted to join lilly.” “but when you had joined him--?” “oh, nothing--stay here a time, in this country, if i could earn my keep.” “ah!--earn your keep? so you hope to earn your keep here? may i ask how?” “by my flute.” “italy is a poor country.” “i don't want much.” “you have a family to provide for.” “they are provided for--for a couple of years.” “oh, indeed! is that so?” the old man got out of aaron the detailed account of his circumstances--how he had left so much money to be paid over to his wife, and had received only a small amount for himself. “i see you are like lilly--you trust to providence,” said sir william. “providence or fate,” said aaron. “lilly calls it providence,” said sir william. “for my own part, i always advise providence plus a banking account. i have every belief in providence, plus a banking account. providence and no banking account i have observed to be almost invariably fatal. lilly and i have argued it. he believes in casting his bread upon the waters. i sincerely hope he won't have to cast himself after his bread, one of these days. providence with a banking account. believe in providence once you have secured enough to live on. i should consider it disastrous to believe in providence before. one can never be sure of providence.” “what can you be sure of, then?” said aaron. “well, in moderation, i can believe in a little hard cash, and in my own ability to earn a little hard cash.” “perhaps lilly believes in his own ability, too.” “no. not so. because he will never directly work to earn money. he works--and works quite well, i am told: but only as the spirit moves him, and never with any eye to the market. now i call that tempting providence, myself. the spirit may move him in quite an opposite direction to the market--then where is lilly? i have put it to him more than once.” “the spirit generally does move him dead against the market,” said aaron. “but he manages to scrape along.” “in a state of jeopardy: all the time in a state of jeopardy,” said the old man. “his whole existence, and that of his wife, is completely precarious. i found, in my youth, the spirit moved me to various things which would have left me and my wife starving. so i realised in time, this was no good. i took my spirit in hand, therefore, and made him pull the cart which mankind is riding in. i harnessed him to the work of productive labour. and so he brought me my reward.” “yes,” said aaron. “but every man according to his belief.” “i don't see,” said sir william, “how a man can believe in a providence unless he sets himself definitely to the work of earning his daily bread, and making provision for future needs. that's what providence means to me--making provision for oneself and one's family. now, mr. lilly--and you yourself--you say you believe in a providence that does not compel you to earn your daily bread, and make provision. i confess myself i cannot see it: and lilly has never been able to convince me.” “i don't believe in a kind-hearted providence,” said aaron, “and i don't believe lilly does. but i believe in chance. i believe, if i go my own way, without tying my nose to a job, chance will always throw something in my way: enough to get along with.” “but on what do you base such a very unwarrantable belief?” “i just feel like that.” “and if you are ever quite without success--and nothing to fall back on?” “i can work at something.” “in case of illness, for example?” “i can go to a hospital--or die.” “dear me! however, you are more logical than lilly. he seems to believe that he has the invisible--call it providence if you will--on his side, and that this invisible will never leave him in the lurch, or let him down, so long as he sticks to his own side of the bargain, and never works for his own ends. i don't quite see how he works. certainly he seems to me a man who squanders a great deal of talent unworthily. yet for some reason or other he calls this true, genuine activity, and has a contempt for actual work by which a man makes provision for his years and for his family. in the end, he will have to fall back on charity. but when i say so, he denies it, and says that in the end we, the men who work and make provision, will have to fall back on him. well, all i can say is, that so far he is in far greater danger of having to fall back on me, than i on him.” the old man sat back in his chair with a little laugh of triumph. but it smote almost devilishly on aaron's ears, and for the first time in his life he felt that there existed a necessity for taking sides. “i don't suppose he will do much falling back,” he said. “well, he is young yet. you are both young. you are squandering your youth. i am an old man, and i see the end.” “what end, sir william?” “charity--and poverty--and some not very congenial 'job,' as you call it, to put bread in your mouth. no, no, i would not like to trust myself to your providence, or to your chance. though i admit your chance is a sounder proposition than lilly's providence. you speculate with your life and your talent. i admit the nature which is a born speculator. after all, with your flute, you will speculate in other people's taste for luxury, as a man may speculate in theatres or _trains de luxe_. you are the speculator. that may be your way of wisdom. but lilly does not even speculate. i cannot see his point. i cannot see his point. i cannot see his point. yet i have the greatest admiration for his mentality.” the old man had fired up during this conversation--and all the others in the room had gone silent. lady franks was palpably uneasy. she alone knew how frail the old man was--frailer by far than his years. she alone knew what fear of his own age, what fear of death haunted him now: fear of his own non-existence. his own old age was an agony to him; worse than an agony, a horror. he wanted to be young--to live, to live. and he was old, he was breaking up. the glistening youth of aaron, the impetuousness of lilly fascinated him. and both these men seemed calmly to contradict his own wealth and honours. lady franks tried to turn off the conversation to the trickles of normal chit-chat. the colonel was horribly bored--so were all the women--arthur was indifferent. only the young major was implicated, troubled in his earnest and philosophic spirit. “what i can't see,” he said, “is the place that others have in your scheme.” “is isn't a scheme,” said aaron. “well then, your way of life. isn't it pretty selfish, to marry a woman and then expect her to live on very little indeed, and that always precarious, just because you happen to believe in providence or in chance: which i think worse? what i don't see is where others come in. what would the world be like if everybody lived that way?” “other people can please themselves,” said aaron. “no, they can't--because you take first choice, it seems to me. supposing your wife--or lilly's wife--asks for security and for provision, as sir william says. surely she has a right to it.” “if i've no right to it myself--and i have no right to it, if i don't want it--then what right has she?” “every right, i should say. all the more since you are improvident.” “then she must manage her rights for herself. it's no good her foisting her rights on to me.” “isn't that pure selfishness?” “it may be. i shall send my wife money as long as i've money to send.” “and supposing you have none?” “then i can't send it--and she must look out for herself.” “i call that almost criminal selfishness.” “i can't help it.” the conversation with the young major broke off. “it is certainly a good thing for society that men like you and mr. lilly are not common,” said sir william, laughing. “becoming commoner every day, you'll find,” interjaculated the colonel. “indeed! indeed! well. may we ask you another question, mr. sisson? i hope you don't object to our catechism?” “no. nor your judgment afterwards,” said aaron, grinning. “then upon what grounds did you abandon your family? i know it is a tender subject. but lilly spoke of it to us, and as far i could see....” “there were no grounds,” said aaron. “no, there weren't i just left them.” “mere caprice?” “if it's a caprice to be begotten--and a caprice to be born--and a caprice to die--then that was a caprice, for it was the same.” “like birth or death? i don't follow.” “it happened to me: as birth happened to me once--and death will happen. it was a sort of death, too: or a sort of birth. but as undeniable as either. and without any more grounds.” the old, tremulous man, and the young man were watching one another. “a natural event,” said sir william. “a natural event,” said aaron. “not that you loved any other woman?” “god save me from it.” “you just left off loving?” “not even that. i went away.” “what from?” “from it all.” “from the woman in particular?” “oh, yes. yes. yes, that.” “and you couldn't go back?” aaron shook his head. “yet you can give no reasons?” “not any reasons that would be any good. it wasn't a question of reasons. it was a question of her and me and what must be. what makes a child be born out of its mother to the pain and trouble of both of them? i don't know.” “but that is a natural process.” “so is this--or nothing.” “no,” interposed the major. “because birth is a universal process--and yours is a specific, almost unique event.” “well, unique or not, it so came about. i didn't ever leave off loving her--not as far as i know. i left her as i shall leave the earth when i die--because it has to be.” “do you know what i think it is, mr. sisson?” put in lady franks. “i think you are just in a wicked state of mind: just that. mr. lilly, too. and you must be very careful, or some great misfortune will happen to you.” “it may,” said aaron. “and it will, mark my word, it will.” “you almost wish it might, as a judgment on me,” smiled aaron. “oh, no, indeed. i should only be too sorry. but i feel it will, unless you are careful.” “i'll be careful, then.” “yes, and you can't be too careful.” “you make me frightened.” “i would like to make you very frightened indeed, so that you went back humbly to your wife and family.” “it would have to be a big fright then, i assure you.” “ah, you are really heartless. it makes me angry.” she turned angrily aside. “well, well! well, well! life! life! young men are a new thing to me!” said sir william, shaking his head. “well, well! what do you say to whiskey and soda, colonel?” “why, delighted, sir william,” said the colonel, bouncing up. “a night-cap, and then we retire,” said lady franks. aaron sat thinking. he knew sir william liked him: and that lady franks didn't. one day he might have to seek help from sir william. so he had better placate milady. wrinkling the fine, half mischievous smile on his face, and trading on his charm, he turned to his hostess. “you wouldn't mind, lady franks, if i said nasty things about my wife and found a lot of fault with her. what makes you angry is that i know it is not a bit more her fault than mine, that we come apart. it can't be helped.” “oh, yes, indeed. i disapprove of your way of looking at things altogether. it seems to me altogether cold and unmanly and inhuman. thank goodness my experience of a man has been different.” “we can't all be alike, can we? and if i don't choose to let you see me crying, that doesn't prove i've never had a bad half hour, does it? i've had many--ay, and a many.” “then why are you so wrong, so wrong in your behaviour?” “i suppose i've got to have my bout out: and when it's out, i can alter.” “then i hope you've almost had your bout out,” she said. “so do i,” said he, with a half-repentant, half-depressed look on his attractive face. the corners of his mouth grimaced slightly under his moustache. “the best thing you can do is to go straight back to england, and to her.” “perhaps i'd better ask her if she wants me, first,” he said drily. “yes, you might do that, too.” and lady franks felt she was quite getting on with her work of reform, and the restoring of woman to her natural throne. best not go too fast, either. “say when,” shouted the colonel, who was manipulating the syphon. “when,” said aaron. the men stood up to their drinks. “will you be leaving in the morning, mr. sisson?” asked lady franks. “may i stay till monday morning?” said aaron. they were at saturday evening. “certainly. and you will take breakfast in your room: we all do. at what time? half past eight?” “thank you very much.” “then at half past eight the man will bring it in. goodnight.” once more in his blue silk bedroom, aaron grimaced to himself and stood in the middle of the room grimacing. his hostess' admonitions were like vitriol in his ears. he looked out of the window. through the darkness of trees, the lights of a city below. italy! the air was cold with snow. he came back into his soft, warm room. luxurious it was. and luxurious the deep, warm bed. he was still asleep when the man came noiselessly in with the tray: and it was morning. aaron woke and sat up. he felt that the deep, warm bed, and the soft, warm room had made him sleep too well: robbed him of his night, like a narcotic. he preferred to be more uncomfortable and more aware of the flight of the dark hours. it seemed numbing. the footman in his grey house-jacket was neat and italian and sympathising. he gave good-morning in italian--then softly arranged the little table by the bedside, and put out the toast and coffee and butter and boiled egg and honey, with silver and delicate china. aaron watched the soft, catlike motions of the man. the dark eyes glanced once at the blond man, leaning on his elbow on the pillow. aaron's face had that watchful, half-amused expression. the man said something in italian. aaron shook his head, laughed, and said: “tell me in english.” the man went softly to the window curtains, and motioned them with his hand. “yes, do,” said aaron. so the man drew the buff-coloured silk curtains: and aaron, sitting in bed, could see away beyond red roofs of a town, and in the further heaven great snowy mountains. “the alps,” he said in surprise. “gli alpi--si, signore.” the man bowed, gathered up aaron's clothes, and silently retired. aaron watched through the window. it was a frosty morning at the end of september, with a clear blue morning-sky, alpine, and the watchful, snow-streaked mountain tops bunched in the distance, as if waiting. there they were, hovering round, circling, waiting. they reminded him of marvellous striped sky-panthers circling round a great camp: the red-roofed city. aaron looked, and looked again. in the near distance, under the house elm-tree tops were yellowing. he felt himself changing inside his skin. so he turned away to his coffee and eggs. a little silver egg-cup with a curious little frill round it: honey in a frail, iridescent glass bowl, gold-iridescent: the charm of delicate and fine things. he smiled half mockingly to himself. two instincts played in him: the one, an instinct for fine, delicate things: he had attractive hands; the other, an inclination to throw the dainty little table with all its niceties out of the window. it evoked a sort of devil in him. he took his bath: the man had brought back his things: he dressed and went downstairs. no one in the lounge: he went down to the ground floor: no one in the big hall with its pillars of yellow marble and its gold arches, its enormous, dark, bluey-red carpet. he stood before the great glass doors. some red flowers still were blooming in the tubs, on the steps, handsome: and beautiful chrysanthemums in the wide portico. beyond, yellow leaves were already falling on the green grass and the neat drive. everywhere was silent and empty. he climbed the wide stairs, sat in the long, upper lounge where the papers were. he wanted his hat and coat, and did not know where to find them. the windows looked on to a terraced garden, the hill rising steeply behind the house. he wanted to go out. so he opened more doors, and in a long drawing-room came upon five or six manservants, all in the grey house-jackets, all clean-shaven, neat, with neat black hair, all with dusters or brushes or feather brooms, and all frolicking, chattering, playing like so many monkeys. they were all of the same neat, smallish size. they were all laughing. they rolled back a great rug as if it were some football game, one flew at the curtains. and they merely looked at aaron and went on chattering, and laughing and dusting. surprised, and feeling that he trespassed, he stood at the window a moment looking out. the noise went on behind him. so he turned, smiling, and asked for his hat, pointing to his head. they knew at once what he wanted. one of the fellows beckoned him away, down to the hall and to the long cupboard place where hats and coats and sticks were hung. there was his hat; he put it on, while the man chattered to him pleasantly and unintelligibly, and opened for him the back door, into the garden. chapter xiii. wie es ihnen gefaellt the fresh morning air comes startling after a central heated house. so aaron found it. he felt himself dashing up the steps into the garden like a bird dashing out of a trap where it has been caught: that warm and luxurious house. heaven bless us, we who want to save civilisation. we had better make up our minds what of it we want to save. the kernel may be all well and good. but there is precious little kernel, to a lot of woolly stuffing and poisonous rind. the gardens to sir william's place were not imposing, and still rather war-neglected. but the pools of water lay smooth in the bright air, the flowers showed their colour beside the walks. many birds dashed about, rather bewildered, having crossed the alps in their migration southwards. aaron noted with gratification a certain big magnificence, a certain reckless powerfulness in the still-blossoming, harsh-coloured, autumn flowers. distinct satisfaction he derived from it. he wandered upwards, up the succeeding flights of step; till he came to the upper rough hedge, and saw the wild copse on the hill-crest just above. passing through a space in the hedge, he climbed the steep last bit of sir william's lane. it was a little vineyard, with small vines and yellowing leaves. everywhere the place looked neglected--but as if man had just begun to tackle it once more. at the very top, by the wild hedge where spindle-berries hung pink, seats were placed, and from here the view was very beautiful. the hill dropped steep beneath him. a river wound on the near side of the city, crossed by a white bridge. the city lay close clustered, ruddy on the plains, glittering in the clear air with its flat roofs and domes and square towers, strangely naked-seeming in the clear, clean air. and massive in the further nearness, snow-streaked mountains, the tiger-like alps. tigers prowling between the north and the south. and this beautiful city lying nearest exposed. the snow-wind brushed her this morning like the icy whiskers of a tiger. and clear in the light lay novara, wide, fearless, violent novara. beautiful the perfect air, the perfect and unblemished alp-sky. and like the first southern flower, novara. aaron sat watching in silence. only the uneasy birds rustled. he watched the city and the winding river, the bridges, and the imminent alps. he was on the south side. on the other side of the time barrier. his old, sleepy english nature was startled in its sleep. he felt like a man who knows it is time to wake up, and who doesn't want to wake up, to face the responsibility of another sort of day. to open his darkest eyes and wake up to a new responsibility. wake up and enter on the responsibility of a new self in himself. ach, the horror of responsibility! he had all his life slept and shelved the burden. and he wanted to go on sleeping. it was so hateful to have to get a new grip on his own bowels, a new hard recklessness into his heart, a new and responsible consciousness into his mind and soul. he felt some finger prodding, prodding, prodding him awake out of the sleep of pathos and tragedy and spasmodic passion, and he wriggled, unwilling, oh, most unwilling to undertake the new business. in fact he ran away again. he gave a last look at the town and its white-fanged mountains, and descended through the garden, round the way of the kitchen garden and garage and stables and pecking chickens, back to the house again. in the hall still no one. he went upstairs to the long lounge. there sat the rubicund, bald, boy-like colonel reading the _graphic_. aaron sat down opposite him, and made a feeble attempt at conversation. but the colonel wasn't having any. it was evident he didn't care for the fellow--mr. aaron, that is. aaron therefore dried up, and began to sit him out, with the aid of _the queen_. came a servant, however, and said that the signor colonello was called up from the hospital, on the telephone. the colonel once departed, aaron fled again, this time out of the front doors, and down the steep little park to the gates. huge dogs and little dogs came bounding forward. out of the lodge came the woman with the keys, smiling very pleasantly this morning. so, he was in the street. the wide road led him inevitably to the big bridge, with the violent, physical stone statue-groups. men and women were moving about, and he noticed for the first time the littleness and the momentaneousness of the italians in the street. perhaps it was the wideness of the bridge and the subsequent big, open boulevard. but there it was: the people seemed little, upright brisk figures moving in a certain isolation, like tiny figures on a big stage. and he felt himself moving in the space between. all the northern cosiness gone. he was set down with a space round him. little trams flitted down the boulevard in the bright, sweet light. the barbers' shops were all busy, half the novarese at that moment ambushed in lather, full in the public gaze. a shave is nothing if not a public act, in the south. at the little outdoor tables of the cafes a very few drinkers sat before empty coffee-cups. most of the shops were shut. it was too soon after the war for life to be flowing very fast. the feeling of emptiness, of neglect, of lack of supplies was evident everywhere. aaron strolled on, surprised himself at his gallant feeling of liberty: a feeling of bravado and almost swaggering carelessness which is italy's best gift to an englishman. he had crossed the dividing line, and the values of life, though ostensibly and verbally the same, were dynamically different. alas, however, the verbal and the ostensible, the accursed mechanical ideal gains day by day over the spontaneous life-dynamic, so that italy becomes as idea-bound and as automatic as england: just a business proposition. coming to the station, he went inside. there he saw a money-changing window which was open, so he planked down a five-pound note and got two-hundred-and-ten lire. here was a start. at a bookstall he saw a man buy a big timetable with a large railway map in it. he immediately bought the same. then he retired to a corner to get his whereabouts. in the morning he must move: where? he looked on the map. the map seemed to offer two alternatives, milan and genoa. he chose milan, because of its musical associations and its cathedral. milano then. strolling and still strolling, he found the boards announcing arrivals and departures. as far as he could make out, the train for milan left at 9:00 in the morning. so much achieved, he left the big desolating caravanserai of the station. soldiers were camped in every corner, lying in heaps asleep. in their grey-green uniform, he was surprised at their sturdy limbs and uniformly short stature. for the first time, he saw the cock-feathers of the bersaglieri. there seemed a new life-quality everywhere. many worlds, not one world. but alas, the one world triumphing more and more over the many worlds, the big oneness swallowing up the many small diversities in its insatiable gnawing appetite, leaving a dreary sameness throughout the world, that means at last complete sterility. aaron, however, was too new to the strangeness, he had no eye for the horrible sameness that was spreading like a disease over italy from england and the north. he plunged into the space in front of the station, and took a new, wide boulevard. to his surprise he ran towards a big and over-animated statue that stood resolutely with its back to the magnificent snow-domes of the wild alps. wolves in the street could not have startled him more than those magnificent fierce-gleaming mountains of snow at the street-end, beyond the statue. he stood and wondered, and never thought to look who the gentleman was. then he turned right round, and began to walk home. luncheon was at one o'clock. it was half-past twelve when he rang at the lodge gates. he climbed through the leaves of the little park, on a side-path, rather reluctantly towards the house. in the hall lady franks was discussing with arthur a fat pekinese who did not seem very well. she was sure the servants did not obey her orders concerning the pekinese bitch. arthur, who was more than indifferent, assured her they did. but she seemed to think that the whole of the male human race was in league against the miserable specimen of a she-dog. she almost cried, thinking her queenie _might_ by some chance meet with, perhaps, a harsh word or look. queenie apparently fattened on the secret detestation of the male human species. “i can't bear to think that a dumb creature might be ill-treated,” she said to aaron. “thank goodness the italians are better than they used to be.” “are they better than they used to be?” “oh, much. they have learnt it from us.” she then enquired if her guest had slept, and if he were rested from his journey. aaron, into whose face the faint snow-wind and the sun had brought a glow, replied that he had slept well and enjoyed the morning, thank you. whereupon lady franks knitted her brows and said sir william had had such a bad night. he had not been able to sleep, and had got up and walked about the room. the least excitement, and she dreaded a break-down. he must have absolute calm and restfulness. “there's one for you and your jawing last night, aaron, my boy!” said our hero to himself. “i thought sir william seemed so full of life and energy,” he said, aloud. “ah, did you! no, he wants to be. but he can't do it. he's very much upset this morning. i have been very anxious about him.” “i am sorry to hear that.” lady franks departed to some duty. aaron sat alone before the fire. it was a huge fireplace, like a dark chamber shut in by tall, finely-wrought iron gates. behind these iron gates of curly iron the logs burned and flickered like leopards slumbering and lifting their heads within their cage. aaron wondered who was the keeper of the savage element, who it was that would open the iron grille and throw on another log, like meat to the lions. to be sure the fire was only to be looked at: like wild beasts in the zoo. for the house was warm from roof to floor. it was strange to see the blue air of sunlight outside, the yellow-edged leaves falling in the wind, the red flowers shaking. the gong sounded softly through the house. the colonel came in heartily from the garden, but did not speak to aaron. the major and his wife came pallid down the stairs. lady franks appeared, talking domestic-secretarial business with the wife of arthur. arthur, well-nourished and half at home, called down the stairs. and then sir william descended, old and frail now in the morning, shaken: still he approached aaron heartily, and asked him how he did, and how he had spent his morning. the old man who had made a fortune: how he expected homage: and how he got it! homage, like most things, is just a convention and a social trick. aaron found himself paying homage, too, to the old man who had made a fortune. but also, exacting a certain deference in return, from the old man who had made a fortune. getting it, too. on what grounds? youth, maybe. but mostly, scorn for fortunes and fortune-making. did he scorn fortunes and fortune-making? not he, otherwise whence this homage for the old man with much money? aaron, like everybody else, was rather paralysed by a million sterling, personified in one old man. paralysed, fascinated, overcome. all those three. only having no final control over his own make-up, he could not drive himself into the money-making or even into the money-having habit. and he had just wit enough to threaten sir william's golden king with his own ivory queen and knights of wilful life. and sir william quaked. “well, and how have you spent your morning?” asked the host. “i went first to look at the garden.” “ah, not much to see now. they have been beautiful with flowers, once. but for two and a half years the house has been a hospital for officers--and even tents in the park and garden--as many as two hundred wounded and sick at a time. we are only just returning to civil life. and flowers need time. yes--yes--british officers--for two and a half years. but did you go up, now, to the belvedere?” “to the top--where the vines are? i never expected the mountains.” “you never expected the mountains? pray, why not? they are always there!” “but i was never there before. i never knew they were there, round the town. i didn't expect it like that.” “ah! so you found our city impressive?” “very! ah, very! a new world to me. i feel i've come out of myself.” “yes, it is a wonderful sight--a wonderful sight-but you have not been into the town?” “yes. i saw the men being shaved, and all the soldiers at the station: and a statue, and mountains behind it. oh, i've had a full morning.” “a full morning! that is good, that is good!” the old man looked again at the younger man, and seemed to get life from him, to live in him vicariously. “come,” said the hostess. “luncheon.” aaron sat again on his hostess' left hand. the colonel was more affable now it was meal-time. sir william was again in a good humour, chaffing the young ladies with an old man's gallantry. but now he insisted on drawing aaron into the play. and aaron did not want to be drawn. he did not one bit want to chaffer gallantries with the young women. between him and sir william there was a curious rivalry--unconscious on both sides. the old knight had devoted an energetic, adventurous, almost an artistic nature to the making of his fortune and the developing of later philanthropies. he had no children. aaron was devoting a similar nature to anything but fortune-making and philanthropy. the one held life to be a storing-up of produce and a conservation of energy: the other held life to be a sheer spending of energy and a storing-up of nothing but experience. there they were, in opposition, the old man and the young. sir william kept calling aaron into the chaffer at the other end of the table: and aaron kept on refusing to join. he hated long distance answers, anyhow. and in his mood of the moment he hated the young women. he had a conversation with arthur about statues: concerning which aaron knew nothing, and arthur less than nothing. then lady franks turned the conversation to the soldiers at the station, and said how sir william had equipped rest-huts for the italian privates, near the station: but that such was the jealousy and spite of the italian red cross--or some such body, locally--that sir william's huts had been left empty--standing unused--while the men had slept on the stone floor of the station, night after night, in icy winter. there was evidently much bitter feeling as a result of sir william's philanthropy. apparently even the honey of lavish charity had turned to gall in the italian mouth: at least the official mouth. which gall had been spat back at the charitable, much to his pain. it is in truth a difficult world, particularly when you have another race to deal with. after which came the beef-olives. “oh,” said lady franks, “i had such a dreadful dream last night, such a dreadful dream. it upset me so much. i have not been able to get over it all day.” “what was it?” said aaron. “tell it, and break it.” “why,” said his hostess, “i dreamed i was asleep in my room--just as i actually was--and that it was night, yet with a terrible sort of light, like the dead light before dawn, so that one could see. and my maid giuseppina came running into my room, saying: 'signora! signora! si alza! subito! signora! vengono su!'--and i said, 'chi? chi sono chi vengono? chi?'--'i novaresi! i novaresi vengono su. vengono qui!'--i got out of bed and went to the window. and there they were, in the dead light, rushing up to the house, through the trees. it was so awful, i haven't been able to forget it all day.” “tell me what the words are in english,” said aaron. “why,” she said, “get up, get up--the novaresi, the people of novara are coming up--vengono su--they are coming up--the novara people--work-people. i can't forget it. it was so real, i can't believe it didn't actually happen.” “ah,” said aaron. “it will never happen. i know, that whatever one foresees, and feels has happened, never happens in real life. it sort of works itself off through the imagining of it.” “well, it was almost more real to me than real life,” said his hostess. “then it will never happen in real life,” he said. luncheon passed, and coffee. the party began to disperse--lady franks to answer more letters, with the aid of arthur's wife--some to sleep, some to walk. aaron escaped once more through the big gates. this time he turned his back on the town and the mountains, and climbed up the hill into the country. so he went between the banks and the bushes, watching for unknown plants and shrubs, hearing the birds, feeling the influence of a new soil. at the top of the hill he saw over into vineyards, and a new strange valley with a winding river, and jumbled, entangled hills. strange wild country so near the town. it seemed to keep an almost virgin wildness--yet he saw the white houses dotted here and there. just below him was a peasant house: and on a little loggia in the sun two peasants in white shirtsleeves and black sunday suits were sitting drinking wine, and talking, talking. peasant youths in black hats, their sweethearts in dark stuff dresses, wearing no hat, but a black silk or a white silk scarf, passed slowly along the little road just below the ridge. none looked up to see aaron sitting there alone. from some hidden place somebody was playing an accordion, a jerky sound in the still afternoon. and away beyond lay the unchanging, mysterious valley, and the infolding, mysterious hills of italy. returning back again another way, he lost himself at the foot of the hill in new and deserted suburb streets--unfinished streets of seemingly unfinished houses. then a sort of boulevard where bourgeois families were taking the sunday afternoon walk: stout papas, stout, pallid mamas in rather cheap black fur, little girls very much dressed, and long lads in short socks and round sailor caps, ribbons fluttering. alien they felt, alien, alien, as a bourgeois crowd always does, but particularly a foreign, sunday-best bourgeois crowd. aaron wandered and wandered, finding the tram terminus and trying blank, unfinished street after street. he had a great disinclination to ask his way. at last he recognised the bank and the little stream of water that ran along the street side. so he was back in time for tea. a hospital nurse was there, and two other strange women. arthur played the part of host. sir william came in from a walk with the dogs, but retired to his room without taking tea. and so the evening fell. aaron sat in the hall at some distance from the fire, which burned behind its wrought iron gates. he was tired now with all his impressions, and dispirited. he thought of his wife and children at home: of the church-bells ringing so loudly across the field beyond his garden end: of the dark-clad people trailing unevenly across the two paths, one to the left, one to the right, forking their way towards the houses of the town, to church or to chapel: mostly to chapel. at this hour he himself would be dressed in his best clothes, tying his bow, ready to go out to the public house. and his wife would be resenting his holiday departure, whilst she was left fastened to the children. rather tired and dispirited in this alien place, he wondered if he wished himself back. but the moment he actually _realised_ himself at home, and felt the tension of barrenness which it meant, felt the curious and deadly opposition of his wife's will against his own nature, the almost nauseating ache which it amounted to, he pulled himself together and rejoiced again in his new surroundings. her will, her will, her terrible, implacable, cunning will! what was there in the female will so diabolical, he asked himself, that it could press like a flat sheet of iron against a man all the time? the female will! he realised now that he had a horror of it. it was flat and inflexible as a sheet of iron. but also it was cunning as a snake that could sing treacherous songs. of two people at a deadlock, he always reminded himself, there is not one only wholly at fault. both must be at fault. having a detached and logical soul, he never let himself forget this truth. take lottie! he had loved her. he had never loved any other woman. if he had had his other affairs--it was out of spite or defiance or curiosity. they meant nothing. he and lottie had loved one another. and the love had developed almost at once into a kind of combat. lottie had been the only child of headstrong, well-to-do parents. he also had been the only child of his widowed mother. well then, both he and lottie had been brought up to consider themselves the first in whatsoever company they found themselves. during the early months of the marriage he had, of course, continued the spoiling of the young wife. but this never altered the fact that, by his very nature, he considered himself as first and almost as single in any relationship. first and single he felt, and as such he bore himself. it had taken him years to realise that lottie also felt herself first and single: under all her whimsicalness and fretfulness was a conviction as firm as steel: that she, as woman, was the centre of creation, the man was but an adjunct. she, as woman, and particularly as mother, was the first great source of life and being, and also of culture. the man was but the instrument and the finisher. she was the source and the substance. sure enough, lottie had never formulated this belief inside herself. but it was formulated for her in the whole world. it is the substantial and professed belief of the whole white world. she did but inevitably represent what the whole world around her asserted: the life-centrality of woman. woman, the life-bearer, the life-source. nearly all men agree to the assertion. practically all men, even while demanding their selfish rights as superior males, tacitly agree to the fact of the sacred life-bearing priority of woman. tacitly, they yield the worship to that which is female. tacitly, they conspire to agree that all that is productive, all that is fine and sensitive and most essentially noble, is woman. this, in their productive and religious souls, they believe. and however much they may react against the belief, loathing their women, running to prostitutes, or beer or _anything_, out of reaction against this great and ignominious dogma of the sacred priority of women, still they do but profane the god they worship. profaning woman, they still inversely worship her. but in aaron was planted another seed. he did not know it. he started off on the good old tack of worshipping his woman while his heart was honest, and profaning her in his fits of temper and revolt. but he made a bad show. born in him was a spirit which could not worship woman: no, and would not. could not and would not. it was not in him. in early days, he tried to pretend it was in him. but through his plaintive and homage-rendering love of a young husband was always, for the woman, discernible the arrogance of self-unyielding male. he never yielded himself: never. all his mad loving was only an effort. afterwards, he was as devilishly unyielded as ever. and it was an instinct in her, that her man must yield to her, so that she should envelop him yielding, in her all-beneficent love. she was quite sure that her love was all-beneficent. of this no shadow of doubt. she was quite sure that the highest her man could ever know or ever reach, was to be perfectly enveloped in her all-beneficent love. this was her idea of marriage. she held it not as an idea, but as a profound impulse and instinct: an instinct developed in her by the age in which she lived. all that was deepest and most sacred in he feeling centred in this belief. and he outraged her! oh, from the first day and the first night, she felt he outraged her. true, for some time she had been taken in by his manifest love. but though you can deceive the conscious mind, you can never deceive the deep, unconscious instinct. she could never understand whence arose in her, almost from the first days of marriage with him, her terrible paroxysms of hatred for him. she was in love with him: ah, heaven, how maddeningly she was in love with him: a certain unseizable beauty that was his, and which fascinated her as a snake a bird. but in revulsion, how she hated him! how she abhorred him! how she despised and shuddered at him! he seemed a horrible thing to her. and then again, oh, god, the agony of her desire for him. the agony of her long, long desire for him. he was a passionate lover. he gave her, ostensibly, all she asked for. he withheld from her nothing, no experience, no degree of intimacy. she was his initiate, or he hers. and yet, oh, horror for a woman, he withheld everything from her. he withheld the very centre of himself. for a long time, she never realised. she was dazed and maddened only. but as months of married experience passed into years of married torment, she began to understand. it was that, after their most tremendous, and, it seemed to her, heaven-rending passion--yea, when for her every veil seemed rent and a terrible and sacred creative darkness covered the earth--then--after all this wonder and miracle--in crept a poisonous grey snake of disillusionment, a poisonous grey snake of disillusion that bit her to madness, so that she really was a mad woman, demented. why? why? he never gave himself. he never came to her, _really_. he withheld himself. yes, in those supreme and sacred times which for her were the whole culmination of life and being, the ecstasy of unspeakable passional conjunction, he was not really hers. he was withheld. he withheld the central core of himself, like the devil and hell-fiend he was. he cheated and made play with her tremendous passional soul, her sacred sex passion, most sacred of all things for a woman. all the time, some central part of him stood apart from her, aside, looking on. oh, agony and horror for a passionate, fierce-hearted woman! she who loved him. she who loved him to madness. she who would have died for him. she who did die with him, many terrible and magnificent connubial deaths, in his arms, her husband. her husband! how bitter the word grew to her! her husband! and him never once given, given wholly to her! her husband--and in all the frenzied finality of desire, she never _fully_ possessed him, not once. no, not once. as time went on, she learned it for inevitable. not once! and then, how she hated him! cheated, foiled, betrayed, forced to love him or to hate him: never able to be at peace near him nor away from him: poor lottie, no wonder she was as a mad woman. she was strictly as a woman demented, after the birth of her second child. for all her instinct, all her impulse, all her desire, and above all, all her _will_, was to possess her man in very fulness once: just once: and once and for all. once, just once: and it would be once and for all. but never! never! not once! never! not for one single solitary second! was it not enough to send a woman mad! was it not enough to make her demented! yes, and mad she was. she made his life a hell for him. she bit him to the bone with her frenzy of rage, chagrin, and agony. she drove him mad, too: mad, so that he beat her: mad so that he longed to kill her. but even in his greatest rages it was the same: he never finally lost himself: he remained, somewhere in the centre, in possession of himself. she sometimes wished he would kill her: or that she would kill him. neither event happened. and neither of them understood what was happening. how should they? they were both dazed, horrified, and mortified. he took to leaving her alone as much as was possible. but when he _had_ to come home, there was her terrible will, like a flat, cold snake coiled round his soul and squeezing him to death. yes, she did not relent. she was a good wife and mother. all her duties she fulfilled. but she was not one to yield. _he_ must yield. that was written in eternal letters, on the iron tablet of her will. _he_ must yield. she the woman, the mother of his children, how should she ever even think to yield? it was unthinkable. he, the man, the weak, the false, the treacherous, the half-hearted, it was he who must yield. was not hers the divine will and the divine right? ha, she would be less than woman if she ever capitulated, abandoned her divine responsibility as woman! no, _he_ must yield. so, he was unfaithful to her. piling reproach after reproach upon himself, he added adultery to his brutality. and this was the beginning of the end. she was more than maddened: but he began to grow silent, unresponsive, as if he did not hear her. he was unfaithful to her: and oh, in such a low way. such shame, such shame! but he only smiled carelessly now, and asked her what she wanted. she had asked for all she got. that he reiterated. and that was all he would do. terrible was, that she found even his smile of insolent indifference half-beautiful. oh, bitter chain to bear! but she summoned up all her strange woman's will. she fought against his fascination, the fascination he exerted over her. with fearful efforts of will she fought against it, and mastered it. and then, suddenly, horror and agony of it, up it would rush in her again, her unbearable desire for him, the longing for his contact, his quality of beauty. that was a cross hard to bear. yet even that she bore. and schooled herself into a fretful, petulant manner of indifference. her odd, whimsical petulance hid a will which he, and he alone, knew to be stronger than steel, strong as a diabolical, cold, grey snake that presses and presses and cannot-relax: nay, cannot relax. she became the same as he. even in her moments of most passionate desire for him, the cold and snake-like tension of her will never relaxed, and the cold, snake-like eye of her intention never closed. so, till it reached a deadlock. each will was wound tense, and so fixed. fixed! there was neither any relaxing or any increase of pressure. fixed. hard like a numbness, a grip that was solidifying and turning to stone. he realised, somehow, that at this terrible passive game of fixed tension she would beat him. her fixed female soul, her wound-up female will would solidify into stone--whereas his must break. in him something must break. it was a cold and fatal deadlock, profitless. a life-automatism of fixed tension that suddenly, in him, did break. his will flew loose in a recoil: a recoil away from her. he left her, as inevitably as a broken spring flies out from its hold. not that he was broken. he would not do her even that credit. he had only flown loose from the old centre-fixture. his will was still entire and unabated. only he did not know: he did not understand. he swung wildly about from place to place, as if he were broken. then suddenly, on this sunday evening in the strange country, he realised something about himself. he realised that he had never intended to yield himself fully to her or to anything: that he did not intend ever to yield himself up entirely to her or to anything: that his very being pivoted on the fact of his isolate self-responsibility, aloneness. his intrinsic and central aloneness was the very centre of his being. break it, and he broke his being. break this central aloneness, and he broke everything. it was the great temptation, to yield himself: and it was the final sacrilege. anyhow, it was something which, from his profoundest soul, he did not intend to do. by the innermost isolation and singleness of his own soul he would abide though the skies fell on top of one another, and seven heavens collapsed. vaguely he realised this. and vaguely he realised that this had been the root cause of his strife with lottie: lottie, the only person who had mattered at all to him in all the world: save perhaps his mother. and his mother had not mattered, no, not one-half nor one-fifth what lottie had mattered. so it was: there was, for him, only her significant in the universe. and between him and her matters were as they were. he coldly and terribly hated her, for a moment. then no more. there was no solution. it was a situation without a solution. but at any rate, it was now a defined situation. he could rest in peace. thoughts something in this manner ran through aaron's subconscious mind as he sat still in the strange house. he could not have fired it all off at any listener, as these pages are fired off at any chance reader. nevertheless there it was, risen to half consciousness in him. all his life he had _hated_ knowing what he felt. he had wilfully, if not consciously, kept a gulf between his passional soul and his open mind. in his mind was pinned up a nice description of himself, and a description of lottie, sort of authentic passports to be used in the conscious world. these authentic passports, self-describing: nose short, mouth normal, etc.; he had insisted that they should do all the duty of the man himself. this ready-made and very banal idea of himself as a really quite nice individual: eyes blue, nose short, mouth normal, chin normal; this he had insisted was really himself. it was his conscious mask. now at last, after years of struggle, he seemed suddenly to have dropped his mask on the floor, and broken it. his authentic self-describing passport, his complete and satisfactory idea of himself suddenly became a rag of paper, ridiculous. what on earth did it matter if he was nice or not, if his chin was normal or abnormal. his mask, his idea of himself dropped and was broken to bits. there he sat now maskless and invisible. that was how he strictly felt: invisible and undefined, rather like wells' _invisible man_. he had no longer a mask to present to people: he was present and invisible: they _could_ not really think anything about him, because they could not really see him. what did they see when they looked at him? lady franks, for example. he neither knew nor cared. he only knew he was invisible to himself and everybody, and that all thinking about what he was like was only a silly game of mrs. mackenzie's dead. so there. the old aaron sisson was as if painfully transmuted, as the invisible man when he underwent his transmutations. now he was gone, and no longer to be seen. his visibility lost for ever. and then what? sitting there as an invisible presence, the preconceived world melted also and was gone. lady franks, sir william, all the guests, they talked and maneuvered with their visible personalities, manipulating the masks of themselves. and underneath there was something invisible and dying--something fading, wilting: the essential plasm of themselves: their invisible being. well now, and what next? having in some curious manner tumbled from the tree of modern knowledge, and cracked and rolled out from the shell of the preconceived idea of himself like some dark, night-lustrous chestnut from the green ostensibility of the burr, he lay as it were exposed but invisible on the floor, knowing, but making no conceptions: knowing, but having no idea. now that he was finally unmasked and exposed, the accepted idea of himself cracked and rolled aside like a broken chestnut-burr, the mask split and shattered, he was at last quiet and free. he had dreaded exposure: and behold, we cannot be exposed, for we are invisible. we cannot be exposed to the looks of others, for our very being is night-lustrous and unseeable. like the invisible man, we are only revealed through our clothes and our masks. in his own powerful but subconscious fashion aaron realized this. he was a musician. and hence even his deepest _ideas_: were not word-ideas, his very thoughts were not composed of words and ideal concepts. they too, his thoughts and his ideas, were dark and invisible, as electric vibrations are invisible no matter how many words they may purport. if i, as a word-user, must translate his deep conscious vibrations into finite words, that is my own business. i do but make a translation of the man. he would speak in music. i speak with words. the inaudible music of his conscious soul conveyed his meaning in him quite as clearly as i convey it in words: probably much more clearly. but in his own mode only: and it was in his own mode only he realised what i must put into words. these words are my own affair. his mind was music. don't grumble at me then, gentle reader, and swear at me that this damned fellow wasn't half clever enough to think all these smart things, and realise all these fine-drawn-out subtleties. you are quite right, he wasn't, yet it all resolved itself in him as i say, and it is for you to prove that it didn't. in his now silent, maskless state of wordless comprehension, he knew that he had never wanted to surrender himself utterly to lottie: nor to his mother: nor to anybody. the last extreme of self-abandon in love was for him an act of false behaviour. his own nature inside him fated him not to take this last false step, over the edge of the abyss of selflessness. even if he wanted to, he could not. he might struggle on the edge of the precipice like an assassin struggling with his own soul, but he could not conquer. for, according to all the current prejudice and impulse in one direction, he too had believed that the final achievement, the consummation of human life, was this flinging oneself over the precipice, down the bottomless pit of love. now he realised that love, even in its intensest, was only an attribute of the human soul: one of its incomprehensible gestures. and to fling down the whole soul in one gesture of finality in love was as much a criminal suicide as to jump off a church-tower or a mountain-peak. let a man give himself as much as he liked in love, to seven thousand extremities, he must never give himself _away_. the more generous and the more passionate a soul, the more it _gives_ itself. but the more absolute remains the law, that it shall never give itself away. give thyself, but give thyself not away. that is the lesson written at the end of the long strange lane of love. the _idee fixe_ of today is that every individual shall not only give himself, but shall achieve the last glory of giving himself away. and since this takes two--you can't even make a present of yourself unless you've got somebody to receive the present; since this last extra-divine act takes two people to perform it, you've got to take into count not only your giver but your receiver. who is going to be the giver and who the receiver. why, of course, in our long-drawn-out christian day, man is given and woman is recipient. man is the gift, woman the receiver. this is the sacrament we live by; the holy communion we live for. that man gives himself to woman in an utter and sacred abandon, all, all, all himself given, and taken. woman, eternal woman, she is the communicant. she receives the sacramental body and spirit of the man. and when she's got it, according to her passionate and all-too-sacred desire, completely, when she possesses her man at last finally and ultimately, without blemish or reservation in the perfection of the sacrament: then, also, poor woman, the blood and the body of which she has partaken become insipid or nauseous to her, she is driven mad by the endless meal of the marriage sacrament, poisoned by the sacred communion which was her goal and her soul's ambition. we have pushed a process into a goal. the aim of any process is not the perpetuation of that process, but the completion thereof. love is a process of the incomprehensible human soul: love also incomprehensible, but still only a process. the process should work to a completion, not to some horror of intensification and extremity wherein the soul and body ultimately perish. the completion of the process of love is the arrival at a state of simple, pure self-possession, for man and woman. only that. which isn't exciting enough for us sensationalists. we prefer abysses and maudlin self-abandon and self-sacrifice, the degeneration into a sort of slime and merge. perhaps, truly, the process of love is never accomplished. but it moves in great stages, and at the end of each stage a true goal, where the soul possesses itself in simple and generous singleness. without this, love is a disease. so aaron, crossing a certain border-line and finding himself alone completely, accepted his loneliness or singleness as a fulfilment, a state of fulfilment. the long fight with lottie had driven him at last to himself, so that he was quiet as a thing which has its root deep in life, and has lost its anxiety. as for considering the lily, it is not a matter of consideration. the lily toils and spins hard enough, in her own way. but without that strain and that anxiety with which we try to weave ourselves a life. the lily is life-rooted, life-central. she _cannot_ worry. she is life itself, a little, delicate fountain playing creatively, for as long or as short a time as may be, and unable to be anxious. she may be sad or sorry, if the north wind blows. but even then, anxious she cannot be. whether her fountain play or cease to play, from out the cold, damp earth, she cannot be anxious. she may only be glad or sorry, and continue her way. she is perfectly herself, whatever befall! even if frosts cut her off. happy lily, never to be saddled with an _idee fixe_, never to be in the grip of a monomania for happiness or love or fulfilment. it is not _laisser aller_. it is life-rootedness. it is being by oneself, life-living, like the much-mooted lily. one toils, one spins, one strives: just as the lily does. but like her, taking one's own life-way amidst everything, and taking one's own life-way alone. love too. but there also, taking one's way alone, happily alone in all the wonders of communion, swept up on the winds, but never swept away from one's very self. two eagles in mid-air, maybe, like whitman's dalliance of eagles. two eagles in mid-air, grappling, whirling, coming to their intensification of love-oneness there in mid-air. in mid-air the love consummation. but all the time each lifted on its own wings: each bearing itself up on its own wings at every moment of the mid-air love consummation. that is the splendid love-way. ............... the party was festive at dinner-time, the women in their finest dresses, new flowers on the table, the best wine going. it was sunday evening. aaron too was dressed--and lady franks, in black lace and pearls, was almost gay. there were quails for dinner. the colonel was quite happy. an air of conviviality gathered round the table during the course of the meal. “i hope,” said aaron, “that we shall have some music tonight.” “i want so much to hear your flute,” said his hostess. “and i your piano,” he said. “i am very weak--very out of practise. i tremble at the thought of playing before a musician. but you must not be too critical.” “oh,” said aaron, “i am not a man to be afraid of.” “well, we will see,” said lady franks. “but i am afraid of music itself.” “yes,” said aaron. “i think it is risky.” “risky! i don't see that! music risky? bach? beethoven! no, i don't agree. on the contrary, i think it is most elevating--most morally inspiring. no, i tremble before it because it is so wonderful and elevating.” “i often find it makes me feel diabolical,” said he. “that is your misfortune, i am sure,” said lady franks. “please do take another--but perhaps you don't like mushrooms?” aaron quite liked mushrooms, and helped himself to the _entree_. “but perhaps,” said she, “you are too modern. you don't care for bach or beethoven or chopin--dear chopin.” “i find them all quite as modern as i am.” “is that so! yes. for myself i am quite old-fashioned--though i can appreciate strauss and stravinsky as well, some things. but my old things--ah, i don't think the moderns are so fine. they are not so deep. they haven't fathomed life so deeply.” lady franks sighed faintly. “they don't care for depths,” said aaron. “no, they haven't the capacity. but i like big, deep music. oh, i love orchestra. but my instrument is the piano. i like the great masters, bach, beethoven. they have such faith. you were talking of faith--believing that things would work out well for you in the end. beethoven inspires that in me, too.” “he makes you feel that all will be well with you at last?” “yes, he does. he makes me feel faith in my personal destiny. and i do feel that there is something in one's special fate. i feel that i myself have a special kind of fate, that will always look after me.” “and you can trust to it?” “yes, i can. it always turns out right. i think something has gone wrong--and then, it always turns out right. why when we were in london--when we were at lunch one morning it suddenly struck me, haven't i left my fur cloak somewhere? it was rather cold, so i had taken it with me, and then never put it on. and i hadn't brought it home. i had left it somewhere. but whether in a taxi, or in a shop, or in a little show of pictures i had been to, i couldn't remember. i could not remember. and i thought to myself: have i lost my cloak? i went round to everywhere i could think of: no-trace of it. but i didn't give it up. something prompted me not to give it up: quite distinctly, i felt something telling me that i should get it back. so i called at scotland yard and gave the information. well, two days later i had a notice from scotland yard, so i went. and there was my cloak. i had it back. and that has happened to me almost every time. i almost always get my things back. and i always feel that something looks after me, do you know: almost takes care of me.” “but do you mean when you lose things--or in your life?” “i mean when i lose things--or when i want to get something i want--i am very nearly always successful. and i always feel there is some sort of higher power which does it for me.” “finds your cloak for you.” “yes. wasn't it extraordinary? i felt when i saw my cloak in scotland yard: there, i knew i should recover you. and i always feel, as i say, that there is some higher power which helps me. do you feel the same?” “no, not that way, worse luck. i lost a batch of music a month ago which didn't belong to me--and which i couldn't replace. but i never could recover it: though i'm sure nobody wanted it.” “how very unfortunate! whereas my fur cloak was just the thing that gets stolen most.” “i wished some power would trace my music: but apparently we aren't all gifted alike with guardian angels.” “apparently not. and that is how i regard it: almost as a gift, you know, that my fairy godmother gave me in my cradle.” “for always recovering your property?” “yes--and succeeding in my undertakings.” “i'm afraid i had no fairy godmother.” “well--i think i had. and very glad i am of it.” “why, yes,” said aaron, looking at his hostess. so the dinner sailed merrily on. “but does beethoven make you feel,” said aaron as an afterthought, “in the same way--that you will always find the things you have lost?” “yes--he makes me feel the same faith: that what i lose will be returned to me. just as i found my cloak. and that if i enter into an undertaking, it will be successful.” “and your life has been always successful?” “yes--almost always. we have succeeded with almost everything.” “why, yes,” said aaron, looking at her again. but even so, he could see a good deal of hard wornness under her satisfaction. she had had her suffering, sure enough. but none the less, she was in the main satisfied. she sat there, a good hostess, and expected the homage due to her success. and of course she got it. aaron himself did his little share of shoe-licking, and swallowed the taste of boot-polish with a grimace, knowing what he was about. the dinner wound gaily to an end. the ladies retired. sir william left his seat of honour at the end of the table and came and sat next to aaron, summoning the other three men to cluster near. “now, colonel,” said the host, “send round the bottle.” with a flourish of the elbow and shoulder, the colonel sent on the port, actually port, in those bleak, post-war days! “well, mr. sisson,” said sir william, “we will drink to your kind providence: providing, of course, that we shall give no offence by so doing.” “no, sir; no, sir! the providence belonged to mr. lilly. mr. sisson put his money on kindly fortune, i believe,” said arthur, who rosy and fresh with wine, looked as if he would make a marvelous _bonne bouchee_ for a finely-discriminating cannibal. “ah, yes, indeed! a much more ingratiating lady to lift our glasses to. mr. sisson's kindly fortune. _fortuna gentil-issima_! well, mr. sisson, and may your lady fortune ever smile on you.” sir william lifted his glass with an odd little smirk, some touch of a strange, prim old satyr lurking in his oddly inclined head. nay, more than satyr: that curious, rather terrible iron demon that has fought with the world and wrung wealth from it, and which knows all about it. the devilish spirit of iron itself, and iron machines. so, with his strange, old smile showing his teeth rather terribly, the old knight glowered sightlessly over his glass at aaron. then he drank: the strange, careful, old-man's gesture in drinking. “but,” said aaron, “if fortune is a female---” “fortune! fortune! why, fortune is a lady. what do you say, major?” “she has all the airs of one, sir william,” said the major, with the wistful grimness of his age and culture. and the young fellow stared like a crucified cyclops from his one eye: the black shutter being over the other. “and all the graces,” capped sir william, delighted with himself. “oh, quite!” said the major. “for some, all the airs, and for others, all the graces.” “faint heart ne'er won fair lady, my boy,” said sir william. “not that your heart is faint. on the contrary--as we know, and your country knows. but with lady fortune you need another kind of stout heart--oh, quite another kind.” “i believe it, sir: and the kind of stout heart which i am afraid i haven't got,” said the major. “what!” said the old man. “show the white feather before you've tackled the lady! fill the major's glass, colonel. i am quite sure we will none of us ever say die.” “not likely. not if we know it,” said the colonel, stretching himself heartily inside his tunic. he was becoming ruddier than the cherry. all he cared about at the moment was his gay little port glass. but the major's young cheek was hollow and sallow, his one eye terribly pathetic. “and you, mr. sisson,” said sir william, “mean to carry all before you by taking no thought for the morrow. well, now, we can only wish you success.” “i don't want to carry all before me,” said aaron. “i should be sorry. i want to walk past most of it.” “can you tell us where to? i am intrigued, as sybil says, to know where you will walk to. come now. enlighten us.” “nowhere, i suppose.” “but is that satisfactory? can you find it satisfactory?” “is it even true?” said the major. “isn't it quite as positive an act to walk away from a situation as to walk towards it?” “my dear boy, you can't merely walk away from a situation. believe that. if you walk away from rome, you walk into the maremma, or into the alban hills, or into the sea--but you walk into something. now if i am going to walk away from rome, i prefer to choose my direction, and therefore my destination.” “but you can't,” said the major. “what can't you?” “choose. either your direction or your destination.” the major was obstinate. “really!” said sir william. “i have not found it so. i have not found it so. i have had to keep myself hard at work, all my life, choosing between this or that.” “and we,” said the major, “have no choice, except between this or nothing.” “really! i am afraid,” said sir william, “i am afraid i am too old--or too young--which shall i say?--to understand.” “too young, sir,” said arthur sweetly. “the child was always father to the man, i believe.” “i confess the major makes me feel childish,” said the old man. “the choice between this or nothing is a puzzler to me. can you help me out, mr. sisson? what do you make of this this-or-nothing business? i can understand neck-or-nothing---” “i prefer the nothing part of it to the this part of it,” said aaron, grinning. “colonel,” said the old man, “throw a little light on this nothingness.” “no, sir william,” said the colonel. “i am all right as i am.” “as a matter of fact, so are we all, perfectly a-one,” said arthur. aaron broke into a laugh. “that's the top and bottom of it,” he laughed, flushed with wine, and handsome. we're all as right as ninepence. only it's rather nice to talk.” “there!” said sir william. “we're all as right as ninepence! we're all as right ninepence. so there well leave it, before the major has time to say he is twopence short.” laughing his strange old soundless laugh, sir william rose and made a little bow. “come up and join the ladies in a minute or two,” he said. arthur opened the door for him and he left the room. the four men were silent for a moment--then the colonel whipped up the decanter and filled his glass. then he stood up and clinked glasses with aaron, like a real old sport. “luck to you,” he said. “thanks,” said aaron. “you're going in the morning?” said arthur. “yes,” said aaron. “what train?” said arthur. “eight-forty.” “oh--then we shan't see you again. well--best of luck.” “best of luck--” echoed the colonel. “same to you,” said aaron, and they all peered over their glasses and quite loved one another for a rosy minute. “i should like to know, though,” said the hollow-cheeked young major with the black flap over his eye, “whether you do really mean you are all right--that it is all right with you--or whether you only say so to get away from the responsibility.” “i mean i don't really care--i don't a damn--let the devil take it all.” “the devil doesn't want it, either,” said the major. “then let him leave it. i don't care one single little curse about it all.” “be damned. what is there to care about?” said the colonel. “ay, what?” said aaron. “it's all the same, whether you care or don't care. so i say it's much easier not to care,” said arthur. “of course it is,” said the colonel gaily. “and i think so, too,” said aaron. “right you are! we're all as right as ninepence--what? good old sport! here's yours!” cried the colonel. “we shall have to be going up,” said arthur, wise in his generation. as they went into the hall, arthur suddenly put one arm round aaron's waist, and one arm round the colonel's, and the three did a sudden little barn-dance towards the stairs. arthur was feeling himself quite let loose again, back in his old regimental mess. approaching the foot of the stairs, he let go again. he was in that rosy condition when united-we-stand. but unfortunately it is a complicated job to climb the stairs in unison. the whole lot tends to fall backwards. arthur, therefore, rosy, plump, looking so good to eat, stood still a moment in order to find his own neatly-slippered feet. having found them, he proceeded to put them carefully one before the other, and to his enchantment found that this procedure was carrying him magically up the stairs. the colonel, like a drowning man, clutched feebly for the straw of the great stair-rail--and missed it. he would have gone under, but that aaron's hand gripped his arm. so, orientating once more like a fragile tendril, he reached again for the banister rail, and got it. after which, lifting his feet as if they were little packets of sand tied to his trouser buttons, he manipulated his way upwards. aaron was in that pleasant state when he saw what everybody else was doing and was unconscious of what he did himself. whilst tall, gaunt, erect, like a murdered hamlet resurrected in khaki, with the terrible black shutter over his eye, the young major came last. arthur was making a stern fight for his composure. his whole future depended on it. but do what he would, he could not get the flushed, pleased, mess-happy look off his face. the colonel, oh, awful man, did a sort of plump roly-poly-cake-walk, like a fat boy, right to the very door of that santum-sanctorum, the library. aaron was inwardly convulsed. even the major laughed. but arthur stiffened himself militarily and cleared his throat. all four started to compose themselves, like actors going on the stage, outside that library door. and then arthur softly, almost wistfully, opened and held the door for the others to pass. the colonel slunk meekly in, and sat in a chair in the background. the major stalked in expressionless, and hovered towards the sofa where his wife sat. there was a rather cold-water-down-your-back feeling in the library. the ladies had been waiting for coffee. sir william was waiting, too. therefore in a little tension, half silent, the coffee was handed round. lady franks was discussing something with arthur's wife. arthur's wife was in a cream lace dress, and looking what is called lovely. the major's wife was in amethyst chiffon with dark-red roses, and was looking blindingly beautiful. the colonel was looking into his coffee-cup as wistfully as if it contained the illusion of tawny port. the major was looking into space, as if there and there alone, etc. arthur was looking for something which lady franks had asked for, and which he was much too flushed to find. sir william was looking at aaron, and preparing for another _coeur a coeur_. “well,” he said, “i doubt if you will care for milan. it is one of the least italian of all the towns, in my opinion. venice, of course, is a thing apart. i cannot stand, myself, that miserable specimen the modern roman. he has most of the vices of the old romans and none of the virtues. the most congenial town, perhaps, for a stranger, is florence. but it has a very bad climate.” lady franks rose significantly and left the room, accompanied by arthur's wife. aaron knew, silently, that he was summoned to follow. his hostess had her eye on him this evening. but always postponing his obedience to the cool commands of women, he remained talking with his host in the library, and sipping _creme de menthe_! came the ripple of the pianoforte from the open doorway down at the further end of the room. lady franks was playing, in the large drawing-room. and the ripple of the music contained in it the hard insistence of the little woman's will. coldly, and decidedly, she intended there should be no more unsettling conversations for the old sir william. aaron was to come forthwith into the drawing room. which aaron plainly understood--and so he didn't go. no, he didn't go, though the pianoforte rippled and swelled in volume. no, and he didn't go even when lady franks left off playing and came into the library again. there he sat, talking with sir william. let us do credit to lady franks' will-power, and admit that the talk was quite empty and distracted--none of the depths and skirmishes of the previous occasions. none the less, the talk continued. lady franks retired, discomfited, to her piano again. she would never break in upon her lord. so now aaron relented. he became more and more distracted. sir william wandered away like some restless, hunted soul. the colonel still sat in his chair, nursing his last drop of _creme de menthe_ resentfully. he did not care for the green toffee-stuff. arthur was busy. the major lay sprawled in the last stages of everything on the sofa, holding his wife's hand. and the music came pathetically through the open folding-doors. of course, she played with feeling--it went without saying. aaron's soul felt rather tired. but she had a touch of discrimination also. he rose and went to the drawing-room. it was a large, vacant-seeming, empire sort of drawing-room, with yellow silk chairs along the walls and yellow silk panels upon the walls, and a huge, vasty crystal chandelier hanging from a faraway-above ceiling. lady franks sat at a large black bechstein piano at one end of this vacant yellow state-room. she sat, a little plump elderly lady in black lace, for all the world like queen victoria in max beerbohm's drawing of alfred tennyson reading to her victorian majesty, with space before her. arthur's wife was bending over some music in a remote corner of the big room. aaron seated himself on one of the chairs by the wall, to listen. certainly it was a beautiful instrument. and certainly, in her way, she loved it. but aaron remembered an anthem in which he had taken part as a boy. his eye is on the sparrow so i know he watches me. for a long time he had failed to catch the word _sparrow_, and had heard: his eye is on the spy-hole so i know he watches me. which was just how it had all seemed to him, as a boy. now, as ever, he felt the eye was on the spy-hole. there sat the woman playing music. but her inward eye was on the spy-hole of her vital affairs--her domestic arrangements, her control of her household, guests and husband included. the other eye was left for the music, don't you know. sir william appeared hovering in the doorway, not at all liking the defection of mr. aaron. then he retreated. he seemed not to care for music. the major's wife hovered--felt it her duty to _aude_, or play audience--and entered, seating herself in a breath of lilac and amethyst again at the near distance. the major, after a certain beating about the bush, followed and sat wrapt in dim contemplation near his wife. arthur luckily was still busy with something. aaron of course made proper musical remarks in the intervals--arthur's wife sorted out more pieces. arthur appeared--and then the colonel. the colonel tip-toed beautifully across the wide blank space of the empire room, and seated himself on a chair, rather in the distance, with his back to the wall, facing aaron. when lady franks finished her piece, to everybody's amazement the colonel clapped gaily to himself and said bravo! as if at a cafe chantant, looking round for his glass. but there was no glass. so he crossed his neatly-khakied legs, and looked rapt again. lady franks started with a _vivace_ schumann piece. everybody listened in sanctified silence, trying to seem to like it. when suddenly our colonel began to spring and bounce in his chair, slinging his loose leg with a kind of rapture up and down in the air, and capering upon his posterior, doing a sitting-down jig to the schumann _vivace_. arthur, who had seated himself at the farthest extremity of the room, winked with wild bliss at aaron. the major tried to look as if he noticed nothing, and only succeeded in looking agonised. his wife studied the point of her silver shoe minutely, and peeped through her hair at the performance. aaron grimly chuckled, and loved the colonel with real tenderness. and the game went on while the _vivace_ lasted. up and down bounced the plump colonel on his chair, kicking with his bright, black-patent toe higher and higher, getting quite enthusiastic over his jig. rosy and unabashed, he was worthy of the great nation he belonged to. the broad-seated empire chair showed no signs of giving way. let him enjoy himself, away there across the yellow sahara of this silk-panelled salon. aaron felt quite cheered up. “well, now,” he thought to himself, “this man is in entire command of a very important branch of the british service in italy. we are a great race still.” but lady franks must have twigged. her playing went rather stiff. she came to the end of the _vivace_ movement, and abandoned her piece. “i always prefer schumann in his _vivace_ moods,” said aaron. “do you?” said lady franks. “oh, i don't know.” it was now the turn of arthur's wife to sing. arthur seemed to get further away: if it was possible, for he was at the remotest remote end of the room, near the gallery doors. the colonel became quiet, pensive. the major's wife eyed the young woman in white lace, and seemed not to care for lace. arthur seemed to be trying to push himself backwards through the wall. lady franks switched on more lights into the vast and voluminous crystal chandelier which hung like some glory-cloud above the room's centre. and arthur's wife sang sweet little french songs, and _ye banks and braes_, and _caro mio ben_, which goes without saying: and so on. she had quite a nice voice and was quite adequately trained. which is enough said. aaron had all his nerves on edge. then he had to play the flute. arthur strolled upstairs with him, arm-in-arm, where he went to fetch his instrument. “i find music in the home rather a strain, you know,” said arthur. “cruel strain. i quite agree,” said aaron. “i don't mind it so much in the theatre--or even a concert--where there are a lot of other people to take the edge off-but after a good dinner--” “it's medicine,” said aaron. “well, you know, it really is, to me. it affects my inside.” aaron laughed. and then, in the yellow drawing-room, blew into his pipe and played. he knew so well that arthur, the major, the major's wife, the colonel, and sir william thought it merely an intolerable bore. however, he played. his hostess even accompanied him in a mozart bit. chapter xiv. xx settembre aaron was awakened in the morning by the soft entrance of the butler with the tray: it was just seven o'clock. lady franks' household was punctual as the sun itself. but our hero roused himself with a wrench. the very act of lifting himself from the pillow was like a fight this morning. why? he recognized his own wrench, the pain with which he struggled under the necessity to move. why shouldn't he want to move? why not? because he didn't want the day in front--the plunge into a strange country, towards nowhere, with no aim in view. true, he said that ultimately he wanted to join lilly. but this was hardly more than a sop, an excuse for his own irrational behaviour. he was breaking loose from one connection after another; and what for? why break every tie? snap, snap, snap went the bonds and ligatures which bound him to the life that had formed him, the people he had loved or liked. he found all his affections snapping off, all the ties which united him with his own people coming asunder. and why? in god's name, why? what was there instead? there was nothingness. there was just himself, and blank nothingness. he had perhaps a faint sense of lilly ahead of him; an impulse in that direction, or else merely an illusion. he could not persuade himself that he was seeking for love, for any kind of unison or communion. he knew well enough that the thought of any loving, any sort of real coming together between himself and anybody or anything, was just objectionable to him. no--he was not moving _towards_ anything: he was moving almost violently away from everything. and that was what he wanted. only that. only let him _not_ run into any sort of embrace with anything or anybody--this was what he asked. let no new connection be made between himself and anything on earth. let all old connections break. this was his craving. yet he struggled under it this morning as under the lid of a tomb. the terrible sudden weight of inertia! he knew the tray stood ready by the bed: he knew the automobile would be at the door at eight o'clock, for lady franks had said so, and he half divined that the servant had also said so: yet there he lay, in a kind of paralysis in this bed. he seemed for the moment to have lost his will. why go forward into more nothingness, away from all that he knew, all he was accustomed to and all he belonged to? however, with a click he sat up. and the very instant he had poured his coffee from the little silver coffee-pot into his delicate cup, he was ready for anything and everything. the sense of silent adventure took him, the exhilarated feeling that he was fulfilling his own inward destiny. pleasant to taste was the coffee, the bread, the honey--delicious. the man brought his clothes, and again informed him that the automobile would be at the door at eight o'clock: or at least so he made out. “i can walk,” said aaron. “milady ha comandato l'automobile,” said the man softly. it was evident that if milady had ordered it, so it must be. so aaron left the still-sleeping house, and got into the soft and luxurious car. as he dropped through the park he wondered that sir william and lady franks should be so kind to him: a complete stranger. but so it was. there he sat in their car. he wondered, also, as he ran over the bridge and into the city, whether this soft-running automobile would ever rouse the socialistic bile of the work-people. for the first time in his life, as he sat among the snug cushions, he realised what it might be to be rich and uneasy: uneasy, even if not afraid, lurking there inside an expensive car.--well, it wasn't much of a sensation anyhow: and riches were stuffy, like wadded upholstery on everything. he was glad to get out into the fresh air of the common crowd. he was glad to be in the bleak, not-very-busy station. he was glad to be part of common life. for the very atmosphere of riches seems to be stuffed and wadded, never any real reaction. it was terrible, as if one's very body, shoulders and arms, were upholstered and made cushiony. ugh, but he was glad to shake off himself the atmosphere of wealth and motor-cars, to get out of it all. it was like getting out of quilted clothes. “well,” thought aaron, “if this is all it amounts to, to be rich, you can have riches. they talk about money being power. but the only sort of power it has over me is to bring on a kind of numbness, which i fairly hate. no wonder rich people don't seem to be really alive.” the relief of escaping quite took away his self-conscious embarrassment at the station. he carried his own bags, bought a third-class ticket, and got into the train for milan without caring one straw for the comments or the looks of the porters. it began to rain. the rain ran across the great plain of north italy. aaron sat in his wood-seated carriage and smoked his pipe in silence, looking at the thick, short lombards opposite him without heeding them. he paid hardly any outward attention to his surroundings, but sat involved in himself. in milan he had been advised to go to the hotel britannia, because it was not expensive, and english people went there. so he took a carriage, drove round the green space in front of milan station, and away into the town. the streets were busy, but only half-heartedly so. it must be confessed that every new move he made was rather an effort. even he himself wondered why he was struggling with foreign porters and foreign cabmen, being talked at and not understanding a word. but there he was. so he went on with it. the hotel was small and congenial. the hotel porter answered in english. aaron was given a little room with a tiny balcony, looking on to a quiet street. so, he had a home of his own once more. he washed, and then counted his money. thirty-seven pounds he had: and no more. he stood on the balcony and looked at the people going by below. life seems to be moving so quick, when one looks down on it from above. across the road was a large stone house with its green shutters all closed. but from the flagpole under the eaves, over the central window of the uppermost floor--the house was four storeys high--waved the italian flag in the melancholy damp air. aaron looked at it--the red, white and green tricolour, with the white cross of savoy in the centre. it hung damp and still. and there seemed a curious vacancy in the city--something empty and depressing in the great human centre. not that there was really a lack of people. but the spirit of the town seemed depressed and empty. it was a national holiday. the italian flag was hanging from almost every housefront. it was about three o'clock in the afternoon. aaron sat in the restaurant of the hotel drinking tea, for he was rather tired, and looking through the thin curtains at the little square outside, where people passed: little groups of dark, aimless-seeming men, a little bit poorer looking--perhaps rather shorter in stature--but very much like the people in any other town. yet the feeling of the city was so different from that of london. there seemed a curious emptiness. the rain had ceased, but the pavements were still wet. there was a tension. suddenly there was a noise of two shots, fired in rapid succession. aaron turned startled to look into the quiet piazza. and to his amazement, the pavements were empty, not a soul was in sight. two minutes before the place was busy with passers-by, and a newspaper man selling the corriere, and little carriages rattling through. now, as if by magic, nobody, nothing. it was as if they had all melted into thin air. the waiter, too, was peeping behind the curtain. a carriage came trotting into the square--an odd man took his way alone--the traffic began to stir once more, and people reappeared as suddenly as they had disappeared. then the waiter ran hastily and furtively out and craned his neck, peering round the square. he spoke with two youths--rather loutish youths. then he returned to his duty in the hotel restaurant. “what was it? what were the shots?” aaron asked him. “oh--somebody shooting at a dog,” said the man negligently. “at a dog!” said aaron, with round eyes. he finished his tea, and went out into the town. his hotel was not far from the cathedral square. passing through the arcade, he came in sight of the famous cathedral with its numerous spines pricking into the afternoon air. he was not as impressed as he should have been. and yet there was something in the northern city--this big square with all the trams threading through, the little yellow continental trams: and the spiny bulk of the great cathedral, like a grey-purple sea-urchin with many spines, on the one side, the ornamental grass-plots and flower beds on the other: the big shops going all along the further strands, all round: and the endless restless nervous drift of a north italian crowd, so nervous, so twitchy; nervous and twitchy as the slipping past of the little yellow tram-cars; it all affected him with a sense of strangeness, nervousness, and approaching winter. it struck him the people were afraid of themselves: afraid of their own souls, and that which was in their own souls. turning up the broad steps of the cathedral, he entered the famous building. the sky had cleared, and the freshened light shone coloured in living tablets round the wonderful, towering, rose-hearted dusk of the great church. at some altars lights flickered uneasily. at some unseen side altar mass was going on, and a strange ragged music fluttered out on the incense-dusk of the great and lofty interior, which was all shadow, all shadow, hung round with jewel tablets of light. particularly beautiful the great east bay, above the great altar. and all the time, over the big-patterned marble floor, the faint click and rustle of feet coming and going, coming and going, like shallow uneasy water rustled back and forth in a trough. a white dog trotted pale through the under-dusk, over the pale, big-patterned floor. aaron came to the side altar where mass was going on, candles ruddily wavering. there was a small cluster of kneeling women--a ragged handful of on-looking men--and people wandering up and wandering away, young women with neatly dressed black hair, and shawls, but without hats; fine young women in very high heels; young men with nothing to do; ragged men with nothing to do. all strayed faintly clicking over the slabbed floor, and glanced at the flickering altar where the white-surpliced boys were curtseying and the white-and-gold priest bowing, his hands over his breast, in the candle-light. all strayed, glanced, lingered, and strayed away again, as if the spectacle were not sufficiently holding. the bell chimed for the elevation of the host. but the thin trickle of people trickled the same, uneasily, over the slabbed floor of the vastly-upreaching shadow-foliaged cathedral. the smell of incense in his nostrils, aaron went out again by a side door, and began to walk along the pavements of the cathedral square, looking at the shops. some were closed, and had little notices pinned on them. some were open, and seemed half-stocked with half-elegant things. men were carrying newspapers. in the cafes a few men were seated drinking vermouth. in the doorway of the restaurants waiters stood inert, looking out on the streets. the curious heart-eating _ennui_ of the big town on a holiday came over our hero. he felt he must get out, whatever happened. he could not bear it. so he went back to his hotel and up to his room. it was still only five o'clock. and he did not know what to do with himself. he lay down on the bed, and looked at the painting on his bedroom ceiling. it was a terrible business in reckitt's blue and browny gold, with awful heraldic beasts, rather worm-wriggly, displayed in a blue field. as he lay thinking of nothing and feeling nothing except a certain weariness, or dreariness, or tension, or god-knows-what, he heard a loud hoarse noise of humanity in the distance, something frightening. rising, he went on to his little balcony. it was a sort of procession, or march of men, here and there a red flag fluttering from a man's fist. there had been a big meeting, and this was the issue. the procession was irregular, but powerful, men four abreast. they emerged irregularly from the small piazza to the street, calling and vociferating. they stopped before a shop and clotted into a crowd, shouting, becoming vicious. over the shop-door hung a tricolour, a national flag. the shop was closed, but the men began to knock at the door. they were all workmen, some in railway men's caps, mostly in black felt hats. some wore red cotton neck-ties. they lifted their faces to the national flag, and as they shouted and gesticulated aaron could see their strong teeth in their jaws. there was something frightening in their lean, strong italian jaws, something inhuman and possessed-looking in their foreign, southern-shaped faces, so much more formed and demon-looking than northern faces. they had a demon-like set purpose, and the noise of their voices was like a jarring of steel weapons. aaron wondered what they wanted. there were no women--all men--a strange male, slashing sound. vicious it was--the head of the procession swirling like a little pool, the thick wedge of the procession beyond, flecked with red flags. a window opened above the shop, and a frowsty-looking man, yellow-pale, was quickly and nervously hauling in the national flag. there were shouts of derision and mockery--a great overtone of acrid derision--the flag and its owner ignominiously disappeared. and the procession moved on. almost every shop had a flag flying. and every one of these flags now disappeared, quickly or slowly, sooner or later, in obedience to the command of the vicious, derisive crowd, that marched and clotted slowly down the street, having its own way. only one flag remained flying--the big tricolour that floated from the top storey of the house opposite aaron's hotel. the ground floor of this house consisted of shop-premises--now closed. there was no sign of any occupant. the flag floated inert aloft. the whole crowd had come to a stop immediately below the hotel, and all were now looking up at the green and white and red tricolour which stirred damply in the early evening light, from under the broad eaves of the house opposite. aaron looked at the long flag, which drooped almost unmoved from the eaves-shadow, and he half expected it to furl itself up of its own accord, in obedience to the will of the masses. then he looked down at the packed black shoulders of the mob below, and at the curious clustering pattern of a sea of black hats. he could hardly see anything but hats and shoulders, uneasily moving like boiling pitch away beneath him. but the shouts began to come up hotter and hotter. there had been a great ringing of a door-bell and battering on the shop-door. the crowd--the swollen head of the procession--talked and shouted, occupying the centre of the street, but leaving the pavement clear. a woman in a white blouse appeared in the shop-door. she came out and looked up at the flag and shook her head and gesticulated with her hands. it was evidently not her flag--she had nothing to do with it. the leaders again turned to the large house-door, and began to ring all the bells and to knock with their knuckles. but no good--there was no answer. they looked up again at the flag. voices rose ragged and ironical. the woman explained something again. apparently there was nobody at home in the upper floors--all entrance was locked--there was no caretaker. nobody owned the flag. there it hung under the broad eaves of the strong stone house, and didn't even know that it was guilty. the woman went back into her shop and drew down the iron shutter from inside. the crowd, nonplussed, now began to argue and shout and whistle. the voices rose in pitch and derision. steam was getting up. there hung the flag. the procession crowded forward and filled the street in a mass below. all the rest of the street was empty and shut up. and still hung the showy rag, red and white and green, up aloft. suddenly there was a lull--then shouts, half-encouraging, half-derisive. and aaron saw a smallish-black figure of a youth, fair-haired, not more than seventeen years old, clinging like a monkey to the front of the house, and by the help of the heavy drain-pipe and the stone-work ornamentation climbing up to the stone ledge that ran under ground-floor windows, up like a sudden cat on to the projecting footing. he did not stop there, but continued his race like some frantic lizard running up the great wall-front, working away from the noise below, as if in sheer fright. it was one unending wriggling movement, sheer up the front of the impassive, heavy stone house. the flag hung from a pole under one of the windows of the top storey--the third floor. up went the wriggling figure of the possessed youth. the cries of the crowd below were now wild, ragged ejaculations of excitement and encouragement. the youth seemed to be lifted up, almost magically on the intense upreaching excitement of the massed men below. he passed the ledge of the first floor, like a lizard he wriggled up and passed the ledge or coping of the second floor, and there he was, like an upward-climbing shadow, scrambling on to the coping of the third floor. the crowd was for a second electrically still as the boy rose there erect, cleaving to the wall with the tips of his fingers. but he did not hesitate for one breath. he was on his feet and running along the narrow coping that went across the house under the third floor windows, running there on that narrow footing away above the street, straight to the flag. he had got it--he had clutched it in his hand, a handful of it. exactly like a great flame rose the simultaneous yell of the crowd as the boy jerked and got the flag loose. he had torn it down. a tremendous prolonged yell, touched with a snarl of triumph, and searing like a puff of flame, sounded as the boy remained for one moment with the flag in his hand looking down at the crowd below. his face was odd and elated and still. then with the slightest gesture he threw the flag from him, and aaron watched the gaudy remnant falling towards the many faces, whilst the noise of yelling rose up unheard. there was a great clutch and hiss in the crowd. the boy still stood unmoved, holding by one hand behind him, looking down from above, from his dangerous elevation, in a sort of abstraction. and the next thing aaron was conscious of was the sound of trumpets. a sudden startling challenge of trumpets, and out of nowhere a sudden rush of grey-green carabinieri battering the crowd wildly with truncheons. it was so sudden that aaron _heard_ nothing any more. he only saw. in utmost amazement he saw the greeny-grey uniformed carabinieri rushing thick and wild and indiscriminate on the crowd: a sudden new excited crowd in uniforms attacking the black crowd, beating them wildly with truncheons. there was a seething moment in the street below. and almost instantaneously the original crowd burst into a terror of frenzy. the mob broke as if something had exploded inside it. a few black-hatted men fought furiously to get themselves free of the hated soldiers; in the confusion bunches of men staggered, reeled, fell, and were struggling among the legs of their comrades and of the carabinieri. but the bulk of the crowd just burst and fled--in every direction. like drops of water they seemed to fly up at the very walls themselves. they darted into any entry, any doorway. they sprang up the walls and clambered into the ground-floor windows. they sprang up the walls on to window-ledges, and then jumped down again, and ran--clambering, wriggling, darting, running in every direction; some cut, blood on their faces, terror or frenzy of flight in their hearts. not so much terror as the frenzy of running away. in a breath the street was empty. and all the time, there above on the stone coping stood the long-faced, fair-haired boy, while four stout carabinieri in the street below stood with uplifted revolvers and covered him, shouting that if he moved they would shoot. so there he stood, still looking down, still holding with his left hand behind him, covered by the four revolvers. he was not so much afraid as twitchily self-conscious because of his false position. meanwhile down below the crowd had dispersed--melted momentaneously. the carabinieri were busy arresting the men who had fallen and been trodden underfoot, or who had foolishly let themselves be taken; perhaps half a dozen men, half a dozen prisoners; less rather than more. the sergeant ordered these to be secured between soldiers. and last of all the youth up above, still covered by the revolvers, was ordered to come down. he turned quite quietly, and quite humbly, cautiously picked his way along the coping towards the drain-pipe. he reached this pipe and began, in humiliation, to climb down. it was a real climb down. once in the street he was surrounded by the grey uniforms. the soldiers formed up. the sergeant gave the order. and away they marched, the dejected youth a prisoner between them. then were heard a few scattered yells of derision and protest, a few shouts of anger and derision against the carabinieri. there were once more gangs of men and groups of youths along the street. they sent up an occasional shout. but always over their shoulders, and pretending it was not they who shouted. they were all cowed and hang-dog once more, and made not the slightest effort to save the youth. nevertheless, they prowled and watched, ready for the next time. so, away went the prisoner and the grey-green soldiers, and the street was left to the little gangs and groups of hangdog, discontented men, all thoroughly out of countenance. the scene was ended. aaron looked round, dazed. and then for the first time he noticed, on the next balcony to his own, two young men: young gentlemen, he would have said. the one was tall and handsome and well-coloured, might be italian. but the other with his pale thin face and his rimless monocle in his eye, he was surely an englishman. he was surely one of the young officers shattered by the war. a look of strange, arch, bird-like pleasure was on his face at this moment: if one could imagine the gleaming smile of a white owl over the events that had just passed, this was the impression produced on aaron by the face of the young man with the monocle. the other youth, the ruddy, handsome one, had knitted his brows in mock distress, and was glancing with a look of shrewd curiosity at aaron, and with a look of almost self-satisfied excitement first to one end of the street, then to the other. “but imagine, angus, it's all over!” he said, laying his hand on the arm of the monocled young man, and making great eyes--not without a shrewd glance in aaron's direction. “did you see him fall!” replied angus, with another strange gleam. “yes. but was he hurt--?” “i don't know. i should think so. he fell right back out of that on to those stones!” “but how perfectly awful! did you ever see anything like it?” “no. it's one of the funniest things i ever did see. i saw nothing quite like it, even in the war--” here aaron withdrew into his room. his mind and soul were in a whirl. he sat down in his chair, and did not move again for a great while. when he did move, he took his flute and played he knew not what. but strange, strange his soul passed into his instrument. or passed half into his instrument. there was a big residue left, to go bitter, or to ferment into gold old wine of wisdom. he did not notice the dinner gong, and only the arrival of the chamber-maid, to put the wash-table in order, sent him down to the restaurant. the first thing he saw, as he entered, was the two young englishmen seated at a table in a corner just behind him. their hair was brushed straight back from their foreheads, making the sweep of the head bright and impeccable, and leaving both the young faces clear as if in cameo. angus had laid his monocle on the table, and was looking round the room with wide, light-blue eyes, looking hard, like some bird-creature, and seeming to see nothing. he had evidently been very ill: was still very ill. his cheeks and even his jaw seemed shrunken, almost withered. he forgot his dinner: or he did not care for it. probably the latter. “what do you think, francis,” he said, “of making a plan to see florence and sienna and orvieto on the way down, instead of going straight to rome?” he spoke in precise, particularly-enunciated words, in a public-school manner, but with a strong twang of south wales. “why, angus,” came the graceful voice of francis, “i thought we had settled to go straight through via pisa.” francis was graceful in everything--in his tall, elegant figure, in the poses of his handsome head, in the modulation of his voice. “yes, but i see we can go either way--either pisa or florence. and i thought it might be nice to look at florence and sienna and orvieto. i believe they're very lovely,” came the soft, precise voice of angus, ending in a touch of odd emotion on the words “very lovely,” as if it were a new experience to him to be using them. “i'm sure they're marvellous. i'm quite sure they're marvellously beautiful,” said francis, in his assured, elegant way. “well, then, angus--suppose we do that, then?--when shall we start?” angus was the nervous insister. francis was quite occupied with his own thoughts and calculations and curiosity. for he was very curious, not to say inquisitive. and at the present moment he had a new subject to ponder. this new subject was aaron, who sat with his back to our new couple, and who, with his fine sharp ears, caught every word that they said. aaron's back was broad enough, and his shoulders square, and his head rather small and fairish and well-shaped--and francis was intrigued. he wanted to know, was the man english. he _looked_ so english--yet he might be--he might perhaps be danish, scandinavian, or dutch. therefore, the elegant young man watched and listened with all his ears. the waiter who had brought aaron his soup now came very free and easy, to ask for further orders. “what would you like to drink? wine? chianti? or white wine? or beer?”--the old-fashioned “sir” was dropped. it is too old-fashioned now, since the war. “what should i drink?” said aaron, whose acquaintance with wines was not very large. “half-litre of chianti: that is very good,” said the waiter, with the air of a man who knew only too well how to bring up his betters, and train them in the way they should go. “all right,” said aaron. the welcome sound of these two magic words, all right! was what the waiter most desired. “all right! yes! all right!” this is the pith, the marrow, the sum and essence of the english language to a southerner. of course it is not _all right_. it is _or-rye_--and one word at that. the blow that would be given to most foreign waiters, if they were forced to realize that the famous _orye_ was really composed of two words, and spelt _all right_, would be too cruel, perhaps. “half litre chianti. orye,” said the waiter. and we'll let him say it. “english!” whispered francis melodramatically in the ear of angus. “i thought so. the flautist.” angus put in his monocle, and stared at the oblivious shoulders of aaron, without apparently seeing anything. “yes. obviously english,” said angus, pursing like a bird. “oh, but i heard him,” whispered francis emphatically. “quite,” said angus. “but quite inoffensive.” “oh, but angus, my dear--he's the flautist. don't you remember? the divine bit of scriabin. at least i believe it was scriabin.--but perfectly divine!!! i adore the flute above all things--” and francis placed his hand on angus' arm, and rolled his eyes--lay this to the credit of a bottle of lacrimae cristi, if you like. “yes. so do i,” said angus, again looking archly through the monocle, and seeing nothing. “i wonder what he's doing here.” “don't you think we might ask him?” said francis, in a vehement whisper. “after all, we are the only three english people in the place.” “for the moment, apparently we are,” said angus. “but the english are all over the place wherever you go, like bits of orange peel in the street. don't forget that, francesco.” “no, angus, i don't. the point is, his flute is perfectly divine--and he seems quite attractive in himself. don't you think so?” “oh, quite,” said angus, whose observations had got no further than the black cloth of the back of aaron's jacket. that there was a man inside he had not yet paused to consider. “quite a musician,” said francis. “the hired sort,” said angus, “most probably.” “but he plays--he plays most marvellously. that you can't get away from, angus.” “i quite agree,” said angus. “well, then? don't you think we might hear him again? don't you think we might get him to play for us?--but i should love it more than anything.” “yes, i should, too,” said angus. “you might ask him to coffee and a liqueur.” “i should like to--most awfully. but do you think i might?” “oh, yes. he won't mind being offered a coffee and liqueur. we can give him something decent--where's the waiter?” angus lifted his pinched, ugly bare face and looked round with weird command for the waiter. the waiter, having not much to do, and feeling ready to draw these two weird young birds, allowed himself to be summoned. “where's the wine list? what liqueurs have you got?” demanded angus abruptly. the waiter rattled off a list, beginning with strega and ending with cherry brandy. “grand marnier,” said angus. “and leave the bottle.” then he looked with arch triumph at francis, like a wicked bird. francis bit his finger moodily, and glowered with handsome, dark-blue uncertain eyes at mr. aaron, who was just surveying the _frutte_, which consisted of two rather old pomegranates and various pale yellow apples, with a sprinkling of withered dried figs. at the moment, they all looked like a _natura morta_ arrangement. “but do you think i might--?” said francis moodily. angus pursed his lips with a reckless brightness. “why not? i see no reason why you shouldn't,” he said. whereupon francis cleared his throat, disposed of his serviette, and rose to his feet, slowly but gracefully. then he composed himself, and took on the air he wished to assume at the moment. it was a nice degage air, half naive and half enthusiastic. then he crossed to aaron's table, and stood on one lounging hip, gracefully, and bent forward in a confidential manner, and said: “do excuse me. but i must ask you if it was you we heard playing the flute so perfectly wonderfully, just before dinner.” the voice was confidential and ingratiating. aaron, relieved from the world's stress and seeing life anew in the rosy glow of half a litre of good old chianti--the war was so near but gone by--looked up at the dark blue, ingenuous, well-adapted eyes of our friend francis, and smiling, said: “yes, i saw you on the balcony as well.” “oh, did you notice us?” plunged francis. “but wasn't it an extraordinary affair?” “very,” said aaron. “i couldn't make it out, could you?” “oh,” cried francis. “i never try. it's all much too new and complicated for me.--but perhaps you know italy?” “no, i don't,” said aaron. “neither do we. and we feel rather stunned. we had only just arrived--and then--oh!” francis put up his hand to his comely brow and rolled his eyes. “i feel perfectly overwhelmed with it still.” he here allowed himself to sink friendlily into the vacant chair opposite aaron's. “yes, i thought it was a bit exciting,” said aaron. “i wonder what will become of him--” “--of the one who climbed for the flag, you mean? no!--but wasn't it perfectly marvellous! oh, incredible, quite incredible!--and then your flute to finish it all! oh! i felt it only wanted that.--i haven't got over it yet. but your playing was marvellous, really marvellous. do you know, i can't forget it. you are a professional musician, of course.” “if you mean i play for a living,” said aaron. “i have played in orchestras in london.” “of course! of course! i knew you must be a professional. but don't you give private recitals, too?” “no, i never have.” “oh!” cried francis, catching his breath. “i can't believe it. but you play marvellously! oh, i just loved it, it simply swept me away, after that scene in the street. it seemed to sum it all up, you know.” “did it,” said aaron, rather grimly. “but won't you come and have coffee with us at our table?” said francis. “we should like it most awfully if you would.” “yes, thank you,” said aaron, half-rising. “but you haven't had your dessert,” said francis, laying a fatherly detaining hand on the arm of the other man. aaron looked at the detaining hand. “the dessert isn't much to stop for,” he said. “i can take with me what i want.” and he picked out a handful of dried figs. the two went across to angus' table. “we're going to take coffee together,” said francis complacently, playing the host with a suave assurance that was rather amusing and charming in him. “yes. i'm very glad,” said angus. let us give the show away: he was being wilfully nice. but he _was_ quite glad; to be able to be so nice. anything to have a bit of life going: especially a bit of pleased life. he looked at aaron's comely, wine-warmed face with gratification. “have a grand marnier,” he said. “i don't know how bad it is. everything is bad now. they lay it down to the war as well. it used to be quite a decent drink. what the war had got to do with bad liqueurs, i don't know.” aaron sat down in a chair at their table. “but let us introduce ourselves,” said francis. “i am francis--or really franz dekker--and this is angus guest, my friend.” “and my name is aaron sisson.” “what! what did you say?” said francis, leaning forward. he, too, had sharp ears. “aaron sisson.” “aaron sisson! oh, but how amusing! what a nice name!” “no better than yours, is it?” “mine! franz dekker! oh, much more amusing, _i_ think,” said francis archly. “oh, well, it's a matter of opinion. you're the double decker, not me.” “the double decker!” said francis archly. “why, what do you mean!--” he rolled his eyes significantly. “but may i introduce my friend angus guest.” “you've introduced me already, francesco,” said angus. “so sorry,” said francis. “guest!” said aaron. francis suddenly began to laugh. “may he not be guest?” he asked, fatherly. “very likely,” said aaron. “not that i was ever good at guessing.” francis tilted his eyebrows. fortunately the waiter arrived with the coffee. “tell me,” said francis, “will you have your coffee black, or with milk?” he was determined to restore a tone of sobriety. the coffee was sipped in sober solemnity. “is music your line as well, then?” asked aaron. “no, we're painters. we're going to work in rome.” “to earn your living?” “not yet.” the amount of discretion, modesty, and reserve which francis put into these two syllables gave aaron to think that he had two real young swells to deal with. “no,” continued francis. “i was only just down from oxford when the war came--and angus had been about ten months at the slade--but i have always painted.--so now we are going to work, really hard, in rome, to make up for lost time.--oh, one has lost so much time, in the war. and such precious time! i don't know if ever one will even be able to make it up again.” francis tilted his handsome eyebrows and put his head on one side with a wise-distressed look. “no,” said angus. “one will never be able to make it up. what is more, one will never be able to start again where one left off. we're shattered old men, now, in one sense. and in another sense, we're just pre-war babies.” the speech was uttered with an odd abruptness and didacticism which made aaron open his eyes. angus had that peculiar manner: he seemed to be haranguing himself in the circle of his own thoughts, not addressing himself to his listener. so his listener listened on the outside edge of the young fellow's crowded thoughts. francis put on a distressed air, and let his attention wander. angus pursed his lips and his eyes were stretched wide with a kind of pleasure, like a wicked owl which has just joyfully hooted an ill omen. “tell me,” said francis to aaron. “where were you all the time during the war?” “i was doing my job,” said aaron. which led to his explaining his origins. “really! so your music is quite new! but how interesting!” cried francis. aaron explained further. “and so the war hardly affected you? but what did you feel about it, privately?” “i didn't feel much. i didn't know what to feel. other folks did such a lot of feeling, i thought i'd better keep my mouth shut.” “yes, quite!” said angus. “everybody had such a lot of feelings on somebody else's behalf, that nobody ever had time to realise what they felt themselves. i know i was like that. the feelings all came on to me from the outside: like flies settling on meat. before i knew where i was i was eaten up with a swarm of feelings, and i found myself in the trenches. god knows what for. and ever since then i've been trying to get out of my swarm of feelings, which buzz in and out of me and have nothing to do with me. i realised it in hospital. it's exactly like trying to get out of a swarm of nasty dirty flies. and every one you kill makes you sick, but doesn't make the swarm any less.” again angus pursed and bridled and looked like a pleased, wicked white owl. then he polished his monocle on a very choice silk handkerchief, and fixed it unseeing in his left eye. but francis was not interested in his friend's experiences. for francis had had a job in the war office--whereas angus was a war-hero with shattered nerves. and let him depreciate his own experiences as much as he liked, the young man with the monocle kept tight hold on his prestige as a war hero. only for himself, though. he by no means insisted that anyone else should be war-bitten. francis was one of those men who, like women, can set up the sympathetic flow and make a fellow give himself away without realising what he is doing. so there sat our friend aaron, amusingly unbosoming himself of all his history and experiences, drawn out by the arch, subtle attentiveness of the handsome francis. angus listened, too, with pleased amusedness on his pale, emaciated face, pursing his shrunken jaw. and aaron sipped various glasses of the liqueur, and told all his tale as if it was a comedy. a comedy it seemed, too, at that hour. and a comedy no doubt it was. but mixed, like most things in this life. mixed. it was quite late before this seance broke up: and the waiter itching to get rid of the fellows. “well, now,” said francis, as he rose from the table and settled his elegant waist, resting on one hip, as usual. “we shall see you in the morning, i hope. you say you are going to venice. why? have you some engagement in venice?” “no,” said aaron. “i only was going to look for a friend--rawdon lilly.” “rawdon lilly! why, is he in venice? oh, i've heard such a lot about him. i should like so much to meet him. but i heard he was in germany--” “i don't know where he is.” “angus! didn't we hear that lilly was in germany?” “yes, in munich, being psychoanalysed, i believe it was.” aaron looked rather blank. “but have you anything to take you to venice? it's such a bad climate in the winter. why not come with us to florence?” said francis. aaron wavered. he really did not know what to do. “think about it,” said francis, laying his hand on aaron's arm. “think about it tonight. and we'll meet in the morning. at what time?” “any time,” said aaron. “well, say eleven. we'll meet in the lounge here at eleven. will that suit you? all right, then. it's so awfully nice meeting you. that marvellous flute.--and think about florence. but do come. don't disappoint us.” the two young men went elegantly upstairs. chapter xv. a railway journey the next day but one, the three set off for florence. aaron had made an excursion from milan with the two young heroes, and dined with them subsequently at the most expensive restaurant in the town. then they had all gone home--and had sat in the young men's bedroom drinking tea, whilst aaron played the flute. francis was really musical, and enchanted. angus enjoyed the novelty, and the moderate patronage he was able to confer. and aaron felt amused and pleased, and hoped he was paying for his treat. so behold them setting off for florence in the early morning. angus and francis had first-class tickets: aaron took a third-class. “come and have lunch with us on the train,” said angus. “i'll order three places, and we can lunch together.” “oh, i can buy a bit of food at the station,” said aaron. “no, come and lunch with us. it will be much nicer. and we shall enjoy it as well,” said angus. “of course! ever so much nicer! of course!” cried francis. “yes, why not, indeed! why should you hesitate?” “all right, then,” said aaron, not without some feeling of constraint. so they separated. the young men settled themselves amidst the red plush and crochet-work, looking, with their hair plastered smoothly back, quite as first class as you could wish, creating quite the right impression on the porters and the travelling italians. aaron went to his third-class, further up the train. “well, then, _au revoir_, till luncheon,” cried francis. the train was fairly full in the third and second classes. however, aaron got his seat, and the porter brought on his bags, after disposing of the young men's luggage. aaron gave the tip uneasily. he always hated tipping--it seemed humiliating both ways. and the airy aplomb of the two young cavaliers, as they settled down among the red plush and the obsequiousness, and said “well, then, _au revoir_ till luncheon,” was peculiarly unsettling: though they did not intend it so. “the porter thinks i'm their servant--their valet,” said aaron to himself, and a curious half-amused, half-contemptuous look flickered on his face. it annoyed him. the falsity occasioned by the difference in the price of the tickets was really humiliating. aaron had lived long enough to know that as far as manhood and intellect went--nay, even education--he was not the inferior of the two young “gentlemen.” he knew quite well that, as far as intrinsic nature went, they did not imagine him an inferior: rather the contrary. they had rather an exaggerated respect for him and his life-power, and even his origin. and yet--they had the inestimable cash advantage--and they were going to keep it. they knew it was nothing more than an artificial cash superiority. but they gripped it all the more intensely. they were the upper middle classes. they were eton and oxford. and they were going to hang on to their privileges. in these days, it is a fool who abdicates before he's forced to. and therefore: “well, then--_au revoir_ till luncheon.” they were being so awfully nice. and inwardly they were not condescending. but socially, they just had to be. the world is made like that. it wasn't their own private fault. it was no fault at all. it was just the mode in which they were educated, the style of their living. and as we know, _le style, c'est l'homme_. angus came of very wealthy iron people near merthyr. already he had a very fair income of his own. as soon as the law-business concerning his father's and his grandfather's will was settled, he would be well off. and he knew it, and valued himself accordingly. francis was the son of a highly-esteemed barrister and politician of sydney, and in his day would inherit his father's lately-won baronetcy. but francis had not very much money: and was much more class-flexible than angus. angus had been born in a house with a park, and of awful, hard-willed, money-bound people. francis came of a much more adventurous, loose, excitable family, he had the colonial newness and adaptability. he knew, for his own part, that class superiority was just a trick, nowadays. still, it was a trick that paid. and a trick he was going to play as long as it did pay. while aaron sat, a little pale at the gills, immobile, ruminating these matters, a not very pleasant look about his nose-end, he heard a voice: “oh, there you are! i thought i'd better come and see, so that we can fetch you at lunch time.--you've got a seat? are you quite comfortable? is there anything i could get you? why, you're in a non-smoker!--but that doesn't matter, everybody will smoke. are you sure you have everything? oh, but wait just one moment--” it was francis, long and elegant, with his straight shoulders and his coat buttoned to show his waist, and his face so well-formed and so modern. so modern, altogether. his voice was pleasantly modulated, and never hurried. he now looked as if a thought had struck him. he put a finger to his brow, and hastened back to his own carriage. in a minute, he returned with a new london literary magazine. “something to read--i shall have to fly--see you at lunch,” and he had turned and elegantly hastened, but not too fast, back to his carriage. the porter was holding the door for him. so francis looked pleasantly hurried, but by no means rushed. oh, dear, no. he took his time. it was not for him to bolt and scramble like a mere italian. the people in aaron's carriage had watched the apparition of the elegant youth intently. for them, he was a being from another sphere--no doubt a young milordo with power wealth, and glamorous life behind him. which was just what francis intended to convey. so handsome--so very, very impressive in all his elegant calm showiness. he made such a _bella figura_. it was just what the italians loved. those in the first class regions thought he might even be an italian, he was so attractive. the train in motion, the many italian eyes in the carriage studied aaron. he, too, was good-looking. but by no means as fascinating as the young milordo. not half as sympathetic. no good at all at playing a role. probably a servant of the young signori. aaron stared out of the window, and played the one single british role left to him, that of ignoring his neighbours, isolating himself in their midst, and minding his own business. upon this insular trick our greatness and our predominance depends--such as it is. yes, they might look at him. they might think him a servant or what they liked. but he was inaccessible to them. he isolated himself upon himself, and there remained. it was a lovely day, a lovely, lovely day of early autumn. over the great plain of lombardy a magnificent blue sky glowed like mid-summer, the sun shone strong. the great plain, with its great stripes of cultivation--without hedges or boundaries---how beautiful it was! sometimes he saw oxen ploughing. sometimes. oh, so beautiful, teams of eight, or ten, even of twelve pale, great soft oxen in procession, ploughing the dark velvety earth, a driver with a great whip at their head, a man far behind holding the plough-shafts. beautiful the soft, soft plunging motion of oxen moving forwards. beautiful the strange, snaky lifting of the muzzles, the swaying of the sharp horns. and the soft, soft crawling motion of a team of oxen, so invisible, almost, yet so inevitable. now and again straight canals of water flashed blue. now and again the great lines of grey-silvery poplars rose and made avenues or lovely grey airy quadrangles across the plain. their top boughs were spangled with gold and green leaf. sometimes the vine-leaves were gold and red, a patterning. and the great square farm-homesteads, white, red-roofed, with their out-buildings, stood naked amid the lands, without screen or softening. there was something big and exposed about it all. no more the cosy english ambushed life, no longer the cosy littleness of the landscape. a bigness--and nothing to shelter the unshrinking spirit. it was all exposed, exposed to the sweep of plain, to the high, strong sky, and to human gaze. a kind of boldness, an indifference. aaron was impressed and fascinated. he looked with new interest at the italians in the carriage with him--for this same boldness and indifference and exposed gesture. and he found it in them, too. and again it fascinated him. it seemed so much bigger, as if the walls of life had fallen. nay, the walls of english life will have to fall. sitting there in the third-class carriage, he became happy again. the _presence_ of his fellow-passengers was not so hampering as in england. in england, everybody seems held tight and gripped, nothing is left free. every passenger seems like a parcel holding his string as fast as he can about him, lest one corner of the wrapper should come undone and reveal what is inside. and every other passenger is forced, by the public will, to hold himself as tight-bound also. which in the end becomes a sort of self-conscious madness. but here, in the third class carriage, there was no tight string round every man. they were not all trussed with self-conscious string as tight as capons. they had a sufficient amount of callousness and indifference and natural equanimity. true, one of them spat continually on the floor, in large spits. and another sat with his boots all unlaced and his collar off, and various important buttons undone. they did not seem to care if bits of themselves did show, through the gaps in the wrapping. aaron winced--but he preferred it to english tightness. he was pleased, he was happy with the italians. he thought how generous and natural they were. so the towns passed by, and the hours, and he seemed at last to have got outside himself and his old conditions. it seemed like a great escape. there was magic again in life--real magic. was it illusion, or was it genuine? he thought it was genuine, and opened his soul a if there was no danger. lunch-time came. francis summoned aaron down the rocking tram. the three men had a table to themselves, and all felt they were enjoying themselves very much indeed. of course francis and angus made a great impression again. but in the dining car were mostly middle-class, well-to-do italians. and these did not look upon our two young heroes as two young wonders. no, rather with some criticism, and some class-envy. but they were impressed. oh, they were impressed! how should they not be, when our young gentlemen had such an air! aaron was conscious all the time that the fellow-diners were being properly impressed by the flower of civilisation and the salt of the earth, namely, young, well-to-do englishmen. and he had a faint premonition, based on experience perhaps, that fellow-passengers in the end never forgive the man who has “impressed” them. mankind loves being impressed. it asks to be impressed. it almost forces those whom it can force to play a role and to make an impression. and afterwards, never forgives. when the train ran into bologna station, they were still in the restaurant car. nor did they go at once to their seats. angus had paid the bill. there was three-quarters-of-an-hour's wait in bologna. “you may as well come down and sit with us,” said francis. “we've got nobody in our carriage, so why shouldn't we all stay together during the wait. you kept your own seat, i suppose.” no, he had forgotten. so when he went to look for it, it was occupied by a stout man who was just taking off his collar and wrapping a white kerchief round his neck. the third class carriages were packed. for those were early days after the war, while men still had pre-war notions and were poor. ten months would steal imperceptibly by, and the mysterious revolution would be effected. then, the second class and the first class would be packed, indescribably packed, crowded, on all great trains: and the third class carriages, lo and behold, would be comparatively empty. oh, marvellous days of bankruptcy, when nobody will condescend to travel third! however, these were still modest, sombre months immediately after the peace. so a large man with a fat neck and a white kerchief, and his collar over his knee, sat in aaron's seat. aaron looked at the man, and at his own luggage overhead. the fat man saw him looking and stared back: then stared also at the luggage overhead: and with his almost invisible north-italian gesture said much plainer than words would have said it: “go to hell. i'm here and i'm going to stop here.” there was something insolent and unbearable about the look--and about the rocky fixity of the large man. he sat as if he had insolently taken root in his seat. aaron flushed slightly. francis and angus strolled along the train, outside, for the corridor was already blocked with the mad bologna rush, and the baggage belonging. they joined aaron as he stood on the platform. “but where is your seat?” cried francis, peering into the packed and jammed compartments of the third class. “that man's sitting in it.” “which?” cried francis, indignant. “the fat one there--with the collar on his knee.” “but it was your seat--!” francis' gorge rose in indignation. he mounted into the corridor. and in the doorway of the compartment he bridled like an angry horse rearing, bridling his head. poising himself on one hip, he stared fixedly at the man with the collar on his knee, then at the baggage aloft. he looked down at the fat man as a bird looks down from the eaves of a house. but the man looked back with a solid, rock-like impudence, before which an englishman quails: a jeering, immovable insolence, with a sneer round the nose and a solid-seated posterior. “but,” said francis in english--none of them had any italian yet. “but,” said francis, turning round to aaron, “that was your seat?” and he flung his long fore-finger in the direction of the fat man's thighs. “yes!” said aaron. “and he's taken it--!” cried francis in indignation. “and knows it, too,” said aaron. “but--!” and francis looked round imperiously, as if to summon his bodyguard. but bodyguards are no longer forthcoming, and train-guards are far from satisfactory. the fat man sat on, with a sneer-grin, very faint but very effective, round his nose, and a solidly-planted posterior. he quite enjoyed the pantomime of the young foreigners. the other passengers said something to him, and he answered laconic. then they all had the faint sneer-grin round their noses. a woman in the corner grinned jeeringly straight in francis' face. his charm failed entirely this time: and as for his commandingness, that was ineffectual indeed. rage came up in him. “oh well--something must be done,” said he decisively. “but didn't you put something in the seat to reserve it?” “only that _new statesman_--but he's moved it.” the man still sat with the invisible sneer-grin on his face, and that peculiar and immovable plant of his italian posterior. “mais--cette place etait reservee--” said francis, moving to the direct attack. the man turned aside and ignored him utterly--then said something to the men opposite, and they all began to show their teeth in a grin. francis was not so easily foiled. he touched the man on the arm. the man looked round threateningly, as if he had been struck. “cette place est reservee--par ce monsieur--” said francis with hauteur, though still in an explanatory tone, and pointing to aaron. the italian looked him, not in the eyes, but between the eyes, and sneered full in his face. then he looked with contempt at aaron. and then he said, in italian, that there was room for such snobs in the first class, and that they had not any right to come occupying the place of honest men in the third. “gia! gia!” barked the other passengers in the carriage. “loro possono andare prima classa--prima classa!” said the woman in the corner, in a very high voice, as if talking to deaf people, and pointing to aaron's luggage, then along the train to the first class carriages. “c'e posto la,” said one of the men, shrugging his shoulders. there was a jeering quality in the hard insolence which made francis go very red and augus very white. angus stared like a death's-head behind his monocle, with death-blue eyes. “oh, never mind. come along to the first class. i'll pay the difference. we shall be much better all together. get the luggage down, francis. it wouldn't be possible to travel with this lot, even if he gave up the seat. there's plenty of room in our carriage--and i'll pay the extra,” said angus. he knew there was one solution--and only one--money. but francis bit his finger. he felt almost beside himself--and quite powerless. for he knew the guard of the train would jeer too. it is not so easy to interfere with honest third-class bolognesi in bologna station, even if they _have_ taken another man's seat. powerless, his brow knitted, and looking just like mephistopheles with his high forehead and slightly arched nose, mephistopheles in a rage, he hauled down aaron's bag and handed it to angus. so they transferred themselves to the first-class carriage, while the fat man and his party in the third-class watched in jeering, triumphant silence. solid, planted, immovable, in static triumph. so aaron sat with the others amid the red plush, whilst the train began its long slow climb of the apennines, stinking sulphurous through tunnels innumerable. wonderful the steep slopes, the great chestnut woods, and then the great distances glimpsed between the heights, firenzuola away and beneath, turneresque hills far off, built of heaven-bloom, not of earth. it was cold at the summit-station, ice and snow in the air, fierce. our travellers shrank into the carriage again, and wrapped themselves round. then the train began its long slither downhill, still through a whole necklace of tunnels, which fortunately no longer stank. so down and down, till the plain appears in sight once more, the arno valley. but then began the inevitable hitch that always happens in italian travel. the train began to hesitate--to falter to a halt, whistling shrilly as if in protest: whistling pip-pip-pip in expostulation as it stood forlorn among the fields: then stealing forward again and stealthily making pace, gathering speed, till it had got up a regular spurt: then suddenly the brakes came on with a jerk, more faltering to a halt, more whistling and pip-pip-pipping, as the engine stood jingling with impatience: after which another creak and splash, and another choking off. so on till they landed in prato station: and there they sat. a fellow passenger told them, there was an hour to wait here: an hour. something had happened up the line. “then i propose we make tea,” said angus, beaming. “why not! of course. let us make tea. and i will look for water.” so aaron and francis went to the restaurant bar and filled the little pan at the tap. angus got down the red picnic case, of which he was so fond, and spread out the various arrangements on the floor of the coupe. he soon had the spirit-lamp burning, the water heating. francis proposed that he and aaron should dash into prato and see what could be bought, whilst the tea was in preparation. so off they went, leaving angus like a busy old wizard manipulating his arrangements on the floor of the carriage, his monocle beaming with bliss. the one fat fellow--passenger with a lurid striped rug over his knees watched with acute interest. everybody who passed the doorway stood to contemplate the scene with pleasure. officials came and studied the situation with appreciation. then francis and aaron returned with a large supply of roast chestnuts, piping hot, and hard dried plums, and good dried figs, and rather stale rusks. they found the water just boiling, angus just throwing in the tea-egg, and the fellow-passenger just poking his nose right in, he was so thrilled. nothing pleased angus so much as thus pitching camp in the midst of civilisation. the scrubby newspaper packets of chestnuts, plums, figs and rusks were spread out: francis flew for salt to the man at the bar, and came back with a little paper of rock-salt: the brown tea was dispensed in the silver-fitted glasses from the immortal luncheon-case: and the picnic was in full swing. angus, being in the height of his happiness, now sat on the seat cross-legged, with his feet under him, in the authentic buddha fashion, and on his face the queer rapt alert look, half a smile, also somewhat buddhistic, holding his glass of brown tea in his hand. he was as rapt and immobile as if he really were in a mystic state. yet it was only his delight in the tea-party. the fellow-passenger peered at the tea, and said in broken french, was it good. in equally fragmentary french francis said very good, and offered the fat passenger some. he, however, held up his hand in protest, as if to say not for any money would he swallow the hot-watery stuff. and he pulled out a flask of wine. but a handful of chestnuts he accepted. the train-conductor, ticket-collector, and the heavy green soldier who protected them, swung open the door and stared attentively. the fellow passenger addressed himself to these new-comers, and they all began to smile good-naturedly. then the fellow-passenger--he was stout and fifty and had a brilliant striped rug always over his knees--pointed out the buddha-like position of angus, and the three in-starers smiled again. and so the fellow-passenger thought he must try too. so he put aside his rug, and lifted his feet from the floor, and took his toes in his hands, and tried to bring his legs up and his feet under him. but his knees were fat, his trousers in the direst extreme of peril, and he could no more manage it than if he had tried to swallow himself. so he desisted suddenly, rather scared, whilst the three bunched and official heads in the doorway laughed and jested at him, showing their teeth and teasing him. but on our gypsy party they turned their eyes with admiration. they loved the novelty and the fun. and on the thin, elegant angus in his new london clothes, they looked really puzzled, as he sat there immobile, gleaming through his monocle like some buddha going wicked, perched cross-legged and ecstatic on the red velvet seat. they marvelled that the lower half of him could so double up, like a foot-rule. so they stared till they had seen enough. when they suddenly said “buon 'appetito,” withdrew their heads and shoulders, slammed the door, and departed. then the train set off also--and shortly after six arrived in florence. it was debated what should aaron do in florence. the young men had engaged a room at bertolini's hotel, on the lungarno. bertolini's was not expensive--but aaron knew that his friends would not long endure hotel life. however, he went along with the other two, trusting to find a cheaper place on the morrow. it was growing quite dark as they drove to the hotel, but still was light enough to show the river rustling, the ponte vecchio spanning its little storeys across the flood, on its low, heavy piers: and some sort of magic of the darkening, varied houses facing, on the other side of the stream. of course they were all enchanted. “i knew,” said francis, “we should love it.” aaron was told he could have a little back room and pension terms for fifteen lire a day, if he stayed at least fifteen days. the exchange was then at forty-five. so fifteen lire meant just six-shillings-and-six pence a day, without extras. extras meant wine, tea, butter, and light. it was decided he should look for something cheaper next day. by the tone of the young men, he now gathered that they would prefer it if he took himself off to a cheaper place. they wished to be on their own. “well, then,” said francis, “you will be in to lunch here, won't you? then we'll see you at lunch.” it was as if both the young men had drawn in their feelers now. they were afraid of finding the new man an incubus. they wanted to wash their hands of him. aaron's brow darkened. “perhaps it was right your love to dissemble but why did you kick me down stairs?...” then morning found him out early, before his friends had arisen. it was sunny again. the magic of florence at once overcame him, and he forgot the bore of limited means and hotel costs. he went straight out of the hotel door, across the road, and leaned on the river parapet. there ran the arno: not such a flood after all, but a green stream with shoals of pebbles in its course. across, and in the delicate shadow of the early sun, stood the opposite lungarno, the old flat houses, pink, or white, or grey stone, with their green shutters, some closed, some opened. it had a flowery effect, the skyline irregular against the morning light. to the right the delicate trinita bridge, to the left, the old bridge with its little shops over the river. beyond, towards the sun, glimpses of green, sky-bloomed country: tuscany. there was a noise and clatter of traffic: boys pushing hand-barrows over the cobble-stones, slow bullocks stepping side by side, and shouldering one another affectionately, drawing a load of country produce, then horses in great brilliant scarlet cloths, like vivid palls, slowly pulling the long narrow carts of the district: and men hu-huing!--and people calling: all the sharp, clattering morning noise of florence. “oh, angus! do come and look! oh, so lovely!” glancing up, he saw the elegant figure of francis, in fine coloured-silk pyjamas, perched on a small upper balcony, turning away from the river towards the bedroom again, his hand lifted to his lips, as if to catch there his cry of delight. the whole pose was classic and effective: and very amusing. how the italians would love it! aaron slipped back across the road, and walked away under the houses towards the ponte vecchio. he passed the bridge--and passed the uffizi--watching the green hills opposite, and san miniato. then he noticed the over-dramatic group of statuary in the piazza mentana--male and physical and melodramatic--and then the corner house. it was a big old florentine house, with many green shutters and wide eaves. there was a notice plate by the door--“pension nardini.” he came to a full stop. he stared at the notice-plate, stared at the glass door, and turning round, stared at the over-pathetic dead soldier on the arm of his over-heroic pistol-firing comrade; _mentana_--and the date! aaron wondered what and where mentana was. then at last he summoned his energy, opened the glass door, and mounted the first stairs. he waited some time before anybody appeared. then a maid-servant. “can i have a room?” said aaron. the bewildered, wild-eyed servant maid opened a door and showed him into a heavily-gilt, heavily-plush drawing-room with a great deal of frantic grandeur about it. there he sat and cooled his heels for half an hour. arrived at length a stout young lady--handsome, with big dark-blue italian eyes--but anaemic and too stout. “oh!” she said as she entered, not knowing what else to say. “good-morning,” said aaron awkwardly. “oh, good-morning! english! yes! oh, i am so sorry to keep you, you know, to make you wait so long. i was upstairs, you know, with a lady. will you sit?” “can i have a room?” said aaron. “a room! yes, you can.” “what terms?” “terms! oh! why, ten francs a day, you know, pension--if you stay--how long will you stay?” “at least a month, i expect.” “a month! oh yes. yes, ten francs a day.” “for everything?” “everything. yes, everything. coffee, bread, honey or jam in the morning: lunch at half-past twelve; tea in the drawing-room, half-past four: dinner at half-past seven: all very nice. and a warm room with the sun--would you like to see?” so aaron was led up the big, rambling old house to the top floor--then along a long old corridor--and at last into a big bedroom with two beds and a red tiled floor--a little dreary, as ever--but the sun just beginning to come in, and a lovely view on to the river, towards the ponte vecchio, and at the hills with their pines and villas and verdure opposite. here he would settle. the signorina would send a man for his bags, at half past two in the afternoon. at luncheon aaron found the two friends, and told them of his move. “how very nice for you! ten francs a day--but that is nothing. i am so pleased you've found something. and when will you be moving in?” said francis. “at half-past two.” “oh, so soon. yes, just as well.--but we shall see you from time to time, of course. what did you say the address was? oh, yes--just near the awful statue. very well. we can look you up any time--and you will find us here. leave a message if we should happen not to be in--we've got lots of engagements--” chapter xvi. florence the very afternoon after aaron's arrival in florence the sky became dark, the wind cold, and rain began steadily to fall. he sat in his big, bleak room above the river, and watched the pale green water fused with yellow, the many-threaded streams fuse into one, as swiftly the surface flood came down from the hills. across, the dark green hills looked darker in the wet, the umbrella pines held up in vain above the villas. but away below, on the lungarno, traffic rattled as ever. aaron went down at five o'clock to tea, and found himself alone next a group of women, mostly swedes or danish or dutch, drinking a peculiar brown herb-brew which tasted like nothing else on earth, and eating two thick bits of darkish bread smeared with a brown smear which hoped it was jam, but hoped in vain. unhappily he sat in the gilt and red, massively ornate room, while the foreign women eyed him. oh, bitter to be a male under such circumstances. he escaped as soon as possible back to his far-off regions, lonely and cheerless, away above. but he rather liked the far-off remoteness in the big old florentine house: he did not mind the peculiar dark, uncosy dreariness. it was not really dreary: only indifferent. indifferent to comfort, indifferent to all homeliness and cosiness. the over-big furniture trying to be impressive, but never to be pretty or bright or cheerful. there it stood, ugly and apart. and there let it stand.--neither did he mind the lack of fire, the cold sombreness of his big bedroom. at home, in england, the bright grate and the ruddy fire, the thick hearth-rug and the man's arm-chair, these had been inevitable. and now he was glad to get away from it all. he was glad not to have a cosy hearth, and his own arm-chair. he was glad to feel the cold, and to breathe the unwarmed air. he preferred the italian way of no fires, no heating. if the day was cold, he was willing to be cold too. if it was dark, he was willing to be dark. the cosy brightness of a real home--it had stifled him till he felt his lungs would burst. the horrors of real domesticity. no, the italian brutal way was better. so he put his overcoat over his knee, and studied some music he had bought in milan: some pergolesi and the scarlatti he liked, and some corelli. he preferred frail, sensitive, abstract music, with not much feeling in it, but a certain limpidity and purity. night fell as he sat reading the scores. he would have liked to try certain pieces on his flute. but his flute was too sensitive, it winced from the new strange surroundings, and would not blossom. dinner sounded at last--at eight o'clock, or something after. he had to learn to expect the meals always forty minutes late. down he went, down the long, dark, lonely corridors and staircases. the dining room was right downstairs. but he had a little table to himself near the door, the elderly women were at some little distance. the only other men were agostmo, the unshapely waiter, and an italian duke, with wife and child and nurse, the family sitting all together at a table halfway down the room, and utterly pre-occupied with a little yellow dog. however, the food was good enough, and sufficient, and the waiter and the maid-servant cheerful and bustling. everything felt happy-go-lucky and informal, there was no particular atmosphere. nobody put on any airs, because nobody in the nardini took any notice if they did. the little ducal dog yapped, the ducal son shouted, the waiter dropped half a dozen spoons, the old women knitted during the waits, and all went off so badly that it was quite pleasant. yes, aaron preferred it to bertolini's, which was trying to be efficient and correct: though not making any strenuous effort. still, bertolini's was much more up to the scratch, there was the tension of proper standards. whereas here at nardini's, nothing mattered very much. it was november. when he got up to his far-off room again, aaron felt almost as if he were in a castle with the drawbridge drawn up. through the open window came the sound of the swelling arno, as it rushed and rustled along over its gravel-shoals. lights spangled the opposite side. traffic sounded deep below. the room was not really cold, for the summer sun so soaks into these thick old buildings, that it takes a month or two of winter to soak it out.--the rain still fell. in the morning it was still november, and the dawn came slowly. and through the open window was the sound of the river's rushing. but the traffic started before dawn, with a bang and a rattle of carts, and a bang and jingle of tram-cars over the not-distant bridge. oh, noisy florence! at half-past seven aaron rang for his coffee: and got it at a few minutes past eight. the signorina had told him to take his coffee in bed. rain was still falling. but towards nine o'clock it lifted, and he decided to go out. a wet, wet world. carriages going by, with huge wet shiny umbrellas, black and with many points, erected to cover the driver and the tail of the horse and the box-seat. the hood of the carriage covered the fare. clatter-clatter through the rain. peasants with long wagons and slow oxen, and pale-green huge umbrellas erected for the driver to walk beneath. men tripping along in cloaks, shawls, umbrellas, anything, quite unconcerned. a man loading gravel in the river-bed, in spite of the wet. and innumerable bells ringing: but innumerable bells. the great soft trembling of the cathedral bell felt in all the air. anyhow it was a new world. aaron went along close to the tall thick houses, following his nose. and suddenly he caught sight of the long slim neck of the palazzo vecchio up above, in the air. and in another minute he was passing between massive buildings, out into the piazza della signoria. there he stood still and looked round him in real surprise, and real joy. the flat empty square with its stone paving was all wet. the great buildings rose dark. the dark, sheer front of the palazzo vecchio went up like a cliff, to the battlements, and the slim tower soared dark and hawk-like, crested, high above. and at the foot of the cliff stood the great naked david, white and stripped in the wet, white against the dark, warm-dark cliff of the building--and near, the heavy naked men of bandinelli. the first thing he had seen, as he turned into the square, was the back of one of these bandinelli statues: a great naked man of marble, with a heavy back and strong naked flanks over which the water was trickling. and then to come immediately upon the david, so much whiter, glistening skin-white in the wet, standing a little forward, and shrinking. he may be ugly, too naturalistic, too big, and anything else you like. but the david in the piazza della signoria, there under the dark great palace, in the position michelangelo chose for him, there, standing forward stripped and exposed and eternally half-shrinking, half--wishing to expose himself, he is the genius of florence. the adolescent, the white, self-conscious, physical adolescent: enormous, in keeping with the stark, grim, enormous palace, which is dark and bare as he is white and bare. and behind, the big, lumpy bandinelli men are in keeping too. they may be ugly--but they are there in their place, and they have their own lumpy reality. and this morning in the rain, standing unbroken, with the water trickling down their flanks and along the inner side of their great thighs, they were real enough, representing the undaunted physical nature of the heavier florentines. aaron looked and looked at the three great naked men. david so much white, and standing forward, self-conscious: then at the great splendid front of the palazzo vecchio: and at the fountain splashing water upon its wet, wet figures; and the distant equestrian statue; and the stone-flagged space of the grim square. and he felt that here he was in one of the world's living centres, here, in the piazza della signoria. the sense of having arrived--of having reached a perfect centre of the human world: this he had. and so, satisfied, he turned round to look at the bronze perseus which rose just above him. benvenuto cellini's dark hero looked female, with his plump hips and his waist, female and rather insignificant: graceful, and rather vulgar. the clownish bandinellis were somehow more to the point.--then all the statuary in the loggia! but that is a mistake. it looks too much like the yard of a monumental mason. the great, naked men in the rain, under the dark-grey november sky, in the dark, strong inviolable square! the wonderful hawk-head of the old palace. the physical, self-conscious adolescent, michelangelo's david, shrinking and exposing himself, with his white, slack limbs! florence, passionate, fearless florence had spoken herself out.--aaron was fascinated by the piazza della signoria. he never went into the town, nor returned from it to his lodging, without contriving to pass through the square. and he never passed through it without satisfaction. here men had been at their intensest, most naked pitch, here, at the end of the old world and the beginning of the new. since then, always rather puling and apologetic. aaron felt a new self, a new life-urge rising inside himself. florence seemed to start a new man in him. it was a town of men. on friday morning, so early, he heard the traffic. early, he watched the rather low, two-wheeled traps of the peasants spanking recklessly over the bridge, coming in to town. and then, when he went out, he found the piazza della signoria packed with men: but all, all men. and all farmers, land-owners and land-workers. the curious, fine-nosed tuscan farmers, with their half-sardonic, amber-coloured eyes. their curious individuality, their clothes worn so easy and reckless, their hats with the personal twist. their curious full oval cheeks, their tendency to be too fat, to have a belly and heavy limbs. their close-sitting dark hair. and above all, their sharp, almost acrid, mocking expression, the silent curl of the nose, the eternal challenge, the rock-bottom unbelief, and the subtle fearlessness. the dangerous, subtle, never-dying fearlessness, and the acrid unbelief. but men! men! a town of men, in spite of everything. the one manly quality, undying, acrid fearlessness. the eternal challenge of the un-quenched human soul. perhaps too acrid and challenging today, when there is nothing left to challenge. but men--who existed without apology and without justification. men who would neither justify themselves nor apologize for themselves. just men. the rarest thing left in our sweet christendom. altogether aaron was pleased with himself, for being in florence. those were early days after the war, when as yet very few foreigners had returned, and the place had the native sombreness and intensity. so that our friend did not mind being alone. the third day, however, francis called on him. there was a tap at the bedroom door, and the young man entered, all eyes of curiosity. “oh, there you are!” he cried, flinging his hand and twisting his waist and then laying his hand on his breast. “such a long way up to you! but miles--! well, how are you? are you quite all right here? you are? i'm so glad--we've been so rushed, seeing people that we haven't had a minute. but not a minute! people! people! people! isn't it amazing how many there are, and how many one knows, and gets to know! but amazing! endless acquaintances!--oh, and such quaint people here! so odd! so more than odd! oh, extraordinary--!” francis chuckled to himself over the extraordinariness. then he seated himself gracefully at aaron's table. “oh, music! what? corelli! so interesting! so very clever, these people, weren't they!--corelli and the younger scarlatti and all that crowd.” here he closed the score again. “but now--look! do you want to know anybody here, or don't you? i've told them about you, and of course they're dying to meet you and hear you play. but i thought it best not to mention anything about--about your being hard-up, and all that. i said you were just here on a visit. you see with this kind of people i'm sure it's much the best not to let them start off by thinking you will need them at all--or that you might need them. why give yourself away, anyhow? just meet them and take them for what they're worth--and then you can see. if they like to give you an engagement to play at some show or other--well, you can decide when the time comes whether you will accept. much better that these kind of people shouldn't get it into their heads at once that they can hire your services. it doesn't do. they haven't enough discrimination for that. much best make rather a favour of it, than sort of ask them to hire you.--don't you agree? perhaps i'm wrong.” aaron sat and listened and wondered at the wisdom and the genuine kindness of the young _beau_. and more still, he wondered at the profound social disillusionment. this handsome collie dog was something of a social wolf, half showing his fangs at the moment. but with genuine kindheartedness for another wolf. aaron was touched. “yes, i think that's the best way,” he said. “you do! yes, so do i. oh, they are such queer people! why is it, do you think, that english people abroad go so very queer--so ultra-english--incredible!--and at the same time so perfectly impossible? but impossible! pathological, i assure you.--and as for their sexual behaviour--oh, dear, don't mention it. i assure you it doesn't bear mention.--and all quite flagrant, quite unabashed--under the cover of this fanatical englishness. but i couldn't begin to tell you all the things. it's just incredible.” aaron wondered how on earth francis had been able to discover and bear witness to so much that was incredible, in a bare two days. but a little gossip, and an addition of lurid imagination will carry you anywhere. “well now,” said francis. “what are you doing today?” aaron was not doing anything in particular. “then will you come and have dinner with us--?” francis fixed up the time and the place--a small restaurant at the other end of the town. then he leaned out of the window. “fascinating place! oh, fascinating place!” he said, soliloquy. “and you've got a superb view. almost better than ours, i think.--well then, half-past seven. we're meeting a few other people, mostly residents or people staying some time. we're not inviting them. just dropping in, you know--a little restaurant. we shall see you then! well then, _a rivederci_ till this evening.--so glad you like florence! i'm simply loving it--revelling. and the pictures!--oh--” the party that evening consisted all of men: francis and angus, and a writer, james argyle, and little algy constable, and tiny louis mee, and deaf walter rosen. they all snapped and rattled at one another, and were rather spiteful but rather amusing. francis and angus had to leave early. they had another appointment. and james argyle got quite tipsy, and said to aaron: “but, my boy, don't let yourself be led astray by the talk of such people as algy. beware of them, my boy, if you've a soul to save. if you've a soul to save!” and he swallowed the remains of his litre. algy's nose trembled a little, and his eyes blinked. “and if you've a soul to lose,” he said, “i would warn you very earnestly against argyle.” whereupon algy shut one eye and opened the other so wide, that aaron was almost scared. “quite right, my boy. ha! ha! never a truer thing said! ha-ha-ha.” argyle laughed his mephistophelian tipsy laugh. “they'll teach you to save. never was such a lot of ripe old savers! save their old trouser-buttons! go to them if you want to learn to save. oh, yes, i advise it seriously. you'll lose nothing--not even a reputation.--you may lose a soul, of course. but that's a detail, among such a hoard of banknotes and trouser-buttons. ha-ha! what's a soul, to them--?” “what is it to you, is perhaps the more pertinent question,” said algy, flapping his eyelids like some crazy owl. “it is you who specialise in the matter of soul, and we who are in need of enlightenment--” “yes, very true, you are! you are in need of enlightenment. a set of benighted wise virgins. ha-ha-ha! that's good, that--benighted wise virgins! what--” argyle put his red face near to aaron's, and made a _moue_, narrowing his eyes quizzically as he peered up from under his level grey eyebrows. “sit in the dark to save the lamp-oil--and all no good to them.--when the bridegroom cometh--! ha-ha! good that! good, my boy!--the bridegroom--” he giggled to himself. “what about the bridegroom, algy, my boy? eh? what about him? better trim your wick, old man, if it's not too late--” “we were talking of souls, not wicks, argyle,” said algy. “same thing. upon my soul it all amounts to the same thing. where's the soul in a man that hasn't got a bedfellow--eh?--answer me that! can't be done you know. might as well ask a virgin chicken to lay you an egg.” “then there ought to be a good deal of it about,” said algy. “of what? of soul? there ought to be a good deal of soul about?--ah, because there's a good deal of--, you mean.--ah, i wish it were so. i wish it were so. but, believe me, there's far more damned chastity in the world, than anything else. even in this town.--call it chastity, if you like. i see nothing in it but sterility. it takes a rat to praise long tails. impotence set up the praise of chastity--believe me or not--but that's the bottom of it. the virtue is made out of the necessity.--ha-ha-ha!--like them! like them! ha-ha! saving their souls! why they'd save the waste matter of their bodies if they could. grieves them to part with it.--ha! ha!--ha!” there was a pause. argyle was in his cups, which left no more to be said. algy, quivering and angry, looked disconcertingly round the room as if he were quite calm and collected. the deaf jewish rosen was smiling down his nose and saying: “what was that last? i didn't catch that last,” cupping his ear with his hand in the frantic hope that someone would answer. no one paid any heed. “i shall be going,” said algy, looking round. then to aaron he said, “you play the flute, i hear. may we hear you some time?” “yes,” said aaron, non-committal. “well, look here--come to tea tomorrow. i shall have some friends, and del torre will play the piano. come to tea tomorrow, will you?” “thank you, i will.” “and perhaps you'll bring your flute along.” “don't you do any such thing, my boy. make them entertain you, for once.--they're always squeezing an entertainment out of somebody--” and argyle desperately emptied the remains of algy's wine into his own glass: whilst algy stood as if listening to something far off, and blinking terribly. “anyhow,” he said at length, “you'll come, won't you? and bring the flute if you feel like it.” “don't you take that flute, my boy,” persisted argyle. “don't think of such a thing. if they want a concert, let them buy their tickets and go to the teatro diana. or to marchesa del torre's saturday morning. she can afford to treat them.” algy looked at argyle, and blinked. “well,” he said. “i hope you'll get home all right, argyle.” “thank you for your courtesy, algy. won't you lend me your arm?” as algy was small and frail, somewhat shaky, and as argyle was a finely built, heavy man of fifty or more, the slap was unkind. “afraid i can't tonight. good-night--” algy departed, so did little mee, who had sat with a little delighted disapproval on his tiny, bird-like face, without saying anything. and even the jew rosen put away his deaf-machine and began awkwardly to take his leave. his long nose was smiling to itself complacently at all the things argyle had been saying. when he, too, had gone, argyle arched his brows at aaron, saying: “oh, my dear fellow, what a lot they are!--little mee--looking like an innocent little boy. he's over seventy if he's a day. well over seventy. well, you don't believe me. ask his mother--ask his mother. she's ninety-five. old lady of ninety-five--” argyle even laughed himself at his own preposterousness. “and then algy--algy's not a fool, you know. oh, he can be most entertaining, most witty, and amusing. but he's out of place here. he should be in kensington, dandling round the ladies' drawing rooms and making his _mots_. they're rich, you know, the pair of them. little mee used to boast that he lived on eleven-and-three-pence a week. had to, poor chap. but then what does a white mouse like that need? makes a heavy meal on a cheese-paring. luck, you know--but of course he's come into money as well. rich as croesus, and still lives on nineteen-and-two-pence a week. though it's nearly double, of course, what it used to be. no wonder he looks anxious. they disapprove of me--oh, quite right, quite right from their own point of view. where would their money be otherwise? it wouldn't last long if i laid hands on it--” he made a devilish quizzing face. “but you know, they get on my nerves. little old maids, you know, little old maids. i'm sure i'm surprised at their patience with me.--but when people are patient with you, you want to spit gall at them. don't you? ha-ha-ha! poor old algy.--did i lay it on him tonight, or did i miss him?” “i think you got him,” said aaron. “he'll never forgive me. depend on it, he'll never forgive me. ha-ha! i like to be unforgiven. it adds zest to one's intercourse with people, to know that they'll never forgive one. ha-ha-ha! little old maids, who do their knitting with their tongues. poor old algy--he drops his stitches now. ha-ha-ha!--must be eighty, i should say.” aaron laughed. he had never met a man like argyle before--and he could not help being charmed. the other man had a certain wicked whimsicality that was very attractive, when levelled against someone else, and not against oneself. he must have been very handsome in his day, with his natural dignity, and his clean-shaven strong square face. but now his face was all red and softened and inflamed, his eyes had gone small and wicked under his bushy grey brows. still he had a presence. and his grey hair, almost gone white, was still handsome. “and what are you going to do in florence?” asked argyle. aaron explained. “well,” said argyle. “make what you can out of them, and then go. go before they have time to do the dirty on you. if they think you want anything from them, they'll treat you like a dog, like a dog. oh, they're very frightened of anybody who wants anything of them: frightened to death. i see nothing of them.--live by myself--see nobody. can't stand it, you know: their silly little teaparties--simply can't stand it. no, i live alone--and shall die alone.--at least, i sincerely hope so. i should be sorry to have any of them hanging round.” the restaurant was empty, the pale, malarial waiter--he had of course contracted malaria during the war--was looking purple round the eyes. but argyle callously sat on. aaron therefore rose to his feet. “oh, i'm coming, i'm coming,” said argyle. he got unsteadily to his feet. the waiter helped him on with his coat: and he put a disreputable-looking little curly hat on his head. then he took his stick. “don't look at my appearance, my dear fellow,” said argyle. “i am frayed at the wrists--look here!” he showed the cuffs of his overcoat, just frayed through. “i've got a trunkful of clothes in london, if only somebody would bring it out to me.--ready then! _avanti!_” and so they passed out into the still rainy street. argyle lived in the very centre of the town: in the cathedral square. aaron left him at his hotel door. “but come and see me,” said argyle. “call for me at twelve o'clock--or just before twelve--and let us have luncheon together. what! is that all right?--yes, come just before twelve.--when?--tomorrow? tomorrow morning? will you come tomorrow?” aaron said he would on monday. “monday, eh! you say monday! very well then. don't you forget now. don't you forget. for i've a memory like a vice. _i_ shan't forget.--just before twelve then. and come right up. i'm right under the roof. in paradise, as the porter always says. _siamo nel paradiso_. but he's a _cretin_. as near paradise as i care for, for it's devilish hot in summer, and damned cold in winter. don't you forget now--monday, twelve o'clock.” and argyle pinched aaron's arm fast, then went unsteadily up the steps to his hotel door. the next day at algy's there was a crowd algy had a very pleasant flat indeed, kept more scrupulously neat and finicking than ever any woman's flat was kept. so today, with its bowls of flowers and its pictures and books and old furniture, and algy, very nicely dressed, fluttering and blinking and making really a charming host, it was all very delightful to the little mob of visitors. they were a curious lot, it is true: everybody rather exceptional. which though it may be startling, is so very much better fun than everybody all alike. aaron talked to an old, old italian elegant in side-curls, who peeled off his grey gloves and studied his formalities with a delightful mid-victorian dash, and told stories about a _plaint_ which lady surry had against lord marsh, and was quite incomprehensible. out rolled the english words, like plums out of a burst bag, and all completely unintelligible. but the old _beau_ was supremely satisfied. he loved talking english, and holding his listeners spell-bound. next to aaron on the sofa sat the marchesa del torre, an american woman from the southern states, who had lived most of her life in europe. she was about forty years of age, handsome, well-dressed, and quiet in the buzz of the tea-party. it was evident she was one of algy's lionesses. now she sat by aaron, eating nothing, but taking a cup of tea and keeping still. she seemed sad--or not well perhaps. her eyes were heavy. but she was very carefully made up, and very well dressed, though simply: and sitting there, full-bosomed, rather sad, remote-seeming, she suggested to aaron a modern cleopatra brooding, anthony-less. her husband, the marchese, was a little intense italian in a colonel's grey uniform, cavalry, leather gaiters. he had blue eyes, his hair was cut very short, his head looked hard and rather military: he would have been taken for an austrian officer, or even a german, had it not been for the peculiar italian sprightliness and touch of grimace in his mobile countenance. he was rather like a gnome--not ugly, but odd. now he came and stood opposite to signor di lanti, and quizzed him in italian. but it was evident, in quizzing the old buck, the little marchese was hovering near his wife, in ear-shot. algy came up with cigarettes, and she at once began to smoke, with that peculiar heavy intensity of a nervous woman. aaron did not say anything--did not know what to say. he was peculiarly conscious of the woman sitting next to him, her arm near his. she smoked heavily, in silence, as if abstracted, a sort of cloud on her level, dark brows. her hair was dark, but a softish brown, not black, and her skin was fair. her bosom would be white.--why aaron should have had this thought, he could not for the life of him say. manfredi, her husband, rolled his blue eyes and grimaced as he laughed at old lanti. but it was obvious that his attention was diverted sideways, towards his wife. aaron, who was tired of nursing a tea-cup, placed in on a table and resumed his seat in silence. but suddenly the little marchese whipped out his cigarette-case, and making a little bow, presented it to aaron, saying: “won't you smoke?” “thank you,” said aaron. “turkish that side--virginia there--you see.” “thank you, turkish,” said aaron. the little officer in his dove-grey and yellow uniform snapped his box shut again, and presented a light. “you are new in florence?” he said, as he presented the match. “four days,” said aaron. “and i hear you are musical.” “i play the flute--no more.” “ah, yes--but then you play it as an artist, not as an accomplishment.” “but how do you know?” laughed aaron. “i was told so--and i believe it.” “that's nice of you, anyhow--but you are a musician too.” “yes--we are both musicians--my wife and i.” manfredi looked at his wife. she flicked the ash off her cigarette. “what sort?” said aaron. “why, how do you mean, what sort? we are dilettanti, i suppose.” “no--what is your instrument? the piano?” “yes--the pianoforte. and my wife sings. but we are very much out of practice. i have been at the war four years, and we have had our home in paris. my wife was in paris, she did not wish to stay in italy alone. and so--you see--everything goes--” “but you will begin again?” “yes. we have begun already. we have music on saturday mornings. next saturday a string quartette, and violin solos by a young florentine woman--a friend--very good indeed, daughter of our professor tortoli, who composes--as you may know--” “yes,” said aaron. “would you care to come and hear--?” “awfully nice if you would--” suddenly said the wife, quite simply, as if she had merely been tired, and not talking before. “i should like to very much--” “do come then.” while they were making the arrangements, algy came up in his blandest manner. “now marchesa--might we hope for a song?” “no--i don't sing any more,” came the slow, contralto reply. “oh, but you can't mean you say that deliberately--” “yes, quite deliberately--” she threw away her cigarette and opened her little gold case to take another. “but what can have brought you to such a disastrous decision?” “i can't say,” she replied, with a little laugh. “the war, probably.” “oh, but don't let the war deprive us of this, as of everything else.” “can't be helped,” she said. “i have no choice in the matter. the bird has flown--” she spoke with a certain heavy languor. “you mean the bird of your voice? oh, but that is quite impossible. one can hear it calling out of the leaves every time you speak.” “i'm afraid you can't get him to do any more than call out of the leaves.” “but--but--pardon me--is it because you don't intend there should be any more song? is that your intention?” “that i couldn't say,” said the marchesa, smoking, smoking. “yes,” said manfredi. “at the present time it is because she will not--not because she cannot. it is her will, as you say.” “dear me! dear me!” said algy. “but this is really another disaster added to the war list.--but--but--will none of us ever be able to persuade you?” he smiled half cajoling, half pathetic, with a prodigious flapping of his eyes. “i don't know,” said she. “that will be as it must be.” “then can't we say it must be song once more?” to this sally she merely laughed, and pressed out her half-smoked cigarette. “how very disappointing! how very cruel of--of fate--and the war--and--and all the sum total of evils,” said algy. “perhaps--” here the little and piquant host turned to aaron. “perhaps mr. sisson, your flute might call out the bird of song. as thrushes call each other into challenge, you know. don't you think that is very probable?” “i have no idea,” said aaron. “but you, marchesa. won't you give us hope that it might be so?” “i've no idea, either,” said she. “but i should very much like to hear mr. sisson's flute. it's an instrument i like extremely.” “there now. you see you may work the miracle, mr. sisson. won't you play to us?” “i'm afraid i didn't bring my flute along,” said aaron “i didn't want to arrive with a little bag.” “quite!” said algy. “what a pity it wouldn't go in your pocket.” “not music and all,” said aaron. “dear me! what a _comble_ of disappointment. i never felt so strongly, marchesa, that the old life and the old world had collapsed.--really--i shall soon have to try to give up being cheerful at all.” “don't do that,” said the marchesa. “it isn't worth the effort.” “ah! i'm glad you find it so. then i have hope.” she merely smiled, indifferent. the teaparty began to break up--aaron found himself going down the stairs with the marchesa and her husband. they descended all three in silence, husband and wife in front. once outside the door, the husband asked: “how shall we go home, dear? tram or carriage--?” it was evident he was economical. “walk,” she said, glancing over her shoulder at aaron. “we are all going the same way, i believe.” aaron said where he lived. they were just across the river. and so all three proceeded to walk through the town. “you are sure it won't be too much for you--too far?” said the little officer, taking his wife's arm solicitously. she was taller than he. but he was a spirited fellow. “no, i feel like walking.” “so long as you don't have to pay for it afterwards.” aaron gathered that she was not well. yet she did not look ill--unless it were nerves. she had that peculiar heavy remote quality of pre-occupation and neurosis. the streets of florence were very full this sunday evening, almost impassable, crowded particularly with gangs of grey-green soldiers. the three made their way brokenly, and with difficulty. the italian was in a constant state of returning salutes. the grey-green, sturdy, unsoldierly soldiers looked at the woman as she passed. “i am sure you had better take a carriage,” said manfredi. “no--i don't mind it.” “do you feel at home in florence?” aaron asked her. “yes--as much as anywhere. oh, yes--quite at home.” “do you like it as well as anywhere?” he asked. “yes--for a time. paris for the most part.” “never america?” “no, never america. i came when i was quite a little girl to europe--madrid--constantinople--paris. i hardly knew america at all.” aaron remembered that francis had told him, the marchesa's father had been ambassador to paris. “so you feel you have no country of your own?” “i have italy. i am italian now, you know.” aaron wondered why she spoke so muted, so numbed. manfredi seemed really attached to her--and she to him. they were so simple with one another. they came towards the bridge where they should part. “won't you come and have a cocktail?” she said. “now?” said aaron. “yes. this is the right time for a cocktail. what time is it, manfredi?” “half past six. do come and have one with us,” said the italian. “we always take one about this time.” aaron continued with them over the bridge. they had the first floor of an old palazzo opposite, a little way up the hill. a man-servant opened the door. “if only it will be warm,” she said. “the apartment is almost impossible to keep warm. we will sit in the little room.” aaron found himself in a quite warm room with shaded lights and a mixture of old italian stiffness and deep soft modern comfort. the marchesa went away to take off her wraps, and the marchese chatted with aaron. the little officer was amiable and kind, and it was evident he liked his guest. “would you like to see the room where we have music?” he said. “it is a fine room for the purpose--we used before the war to have music every saturday morning, from ten to twelve: and all friends might come. usually we had fifteen or twenty people. now we are starting again. i myself enjoy it so much. i am afraid my wife isn't so enthusiastic as she used to be. i wish something would rouse her up, you know. the war seemed to take her life away. here in florence are so many amateurs. very good indeed. we can have very good chamber-music indeed. i hope it will cheer her up and make her quite herself again. i was away for such long periods, at the front.--and it was not good for her to be alone.--i am hoping now all will be better.” so saying, the little, odd officer switched on the lights of the long salon. it was a handsome room in the italian mode of the empire period--beautiful old faded tapestry panels--reddish--and some ormolu furniture--and other things mixed in--rather conglomerate, but pleasing, all the more pleasing. it was big, not too empty, and seemed to belong to human life, not to show and shut-upedness. the host was happy showing it. “of course the flat in paris is more luxurious than this,” he said. “but i prefer this. i prefer it here.” there was a certain wistfulness as he looked round, then began to switch off the lights. they returned to the little salotta. the marchesa was seated in a low chair. she wore a very thin white blouse, that showed her arms and her throat. she was a full-breasted, soft-skinned woman, though not stout. “make the cocktails then, manfredi,” she said. “do you find this room very cold?” she asked of aaron. “not a bit cold,” he said. “the stove goes all the time,” she said, “but without much effect.” “you wear such thin clothes,” he said. “ah, no, the stove should give heat enough. do sit down. will you smoke? there are cigarettes--and cigars, if you prefer them.” “no, i've got my own, thanks.” she took her own cigarette from her gold case. “it is a fine room, for music, the big room,” said he. “yes, quite. would you like to play for us some time, do you think?” “do you want me to? i mean does it interest you?” “what--the flute?” “no--music altogether--” “music altogether--! well! i used to love it. now--i'm not sure. manfredi lives for it, almost.” “for that and nothing else?” asked aaron. “no, no! no, no! other things as well.” “but you don't like it much any more?” “i don't know. perhaps i don't. i'm not sure.” “you don't look forward to the saturday mornings?” he asked. “perhaps i don't--but for manfredi's sake, of course, i do. but for his sake more than my own, i admit. and i think he knows it.” “a crowd of people in one's house--” said aaron. “yes, the people. but it's not only that. it's the music itself--i think i can't stand it any more. i don't know.” “too emotional? too much feeling for you?” “yes, perhaps. but no. what i can't stand is chords, you know: harmonies. a number of sounds all sounding together. it just makes me ill. it makes me feel so sick.” “what--do you want discords?--dissonances?” “no--they are nearly as bad. no, it's just when any number of musical notes, different notes, come together, harmonies or discords. even a single chord struck on the piano. it makes me feel sick. i just feel as if i should retch. isn't it strange? of course, i don't tell manfredi. it would be too cruel to him. it would cut his life in two.” “but then why do you have the music--the saturdays--then?” “oh, i just keep out of the way as much as possible. i'm sure you feel there is something wrong with me, that i take it as i do,” she added, as if anxious: but half ironical. “no--i was just wondering--i believe i feel something the same myself. i know orchestra makes me blind with hate or i don't know what. but i want to throw bombs.” “there now. it does that to me, too. only now it has fairly got me down, and i feel nothing but helpless nausea. you know, like when you are seasick.” her dark-blue, heavy, haunted-looking eyes were resting on him as if she hoped for something. he watched her face steadily, a curious intelligence flickering on his own. “yes,” he said. “i understand it. and i know, at the bottom, i'm like that. but i keep myself from realising, don't you know? else perhaps, where should i be? because i make my life and my living at it, as well.” “at music! do you! but how bad for you. but perhaps the flute is different. i have a feeling that it is. i can think of one single pipe-note--yes, i can think of it quite, quite calmly. and i can't even think of the piano, or of the violin with its tremolo, or of orchestra, or of a string quartette--or even a military band--i can't think of it without a shudder. i can only bear drum-and-fife. isn't it crazy of me--but from the other, from what we call music proper, i've endured too much. but bring your flute one day. bring it, will you? and let me hear it quite alone. quite, quite alone. i think it might do me an awful lot of good. i do, really. i can imagine it.” she closed her eyes and her strange, sing-song lapsing voice came to an end. she spoke almost like one in a trance--or a sleep-walker. “i've got it now in my overcoat pocket,” he said, “if you like.” “have you? yes!” she was never hurried: always slow and resonant, so that the echoes of her voice seemed to linger. “yes--do get it. do get it. and play in the other room--quite--quite without accompaniment. do--and try me.” “and you will tell me what you feel?” “yes.” aaron went out to his overcoat. when he returned with his flute, which he was screwing together, manfredi had come with the tray and the three cocktails. the marchesa took her glass. “listen, manfredi,” she said. “mr. sisson is going to play, quite alone in the sala. and i am going to sit here and listen.” “very well,” said manfredi. “drink your cocktail first. are you going to play without music?” “yes,” said aaron. “i'll just put on the lights for you.” “no--leave it dark. enough light will come in from here.” “sure?” said manfredi. “yes.” the little soldier was an intruder at the moment. both the others felt it so. but they bore him no grudge. they knew it was they who were exceptional, not he. aaron swallowed his drink, and looked towards the door. “sit down, manfredi. sit still,” said the marchesa. “won't you let me try some accompaniment?” said the soldier. “no. i shall just play a little thing from memory,” said aaron. “sit down, dear. sit down,” said the marchesa to her husband. he seated himself obediently. the flash of bright yellow on the grey of his uniform seemed to make him like a chaffinch or a gnome. aaron retired to the other room, and waited awhile, to get back the spell which connected him with the woman, and gave the two of them this strange isolation, beyond the bounds of life, as it seemed. he caught it again. and there, in the darkness of the big room, he put his flute to his lips, and began to play. it was a clear, sharp, lilted run-and-fall of notes, not a tune in any sense of the word, and yet a melody, a bright, quick sound of pure animation, a bright, quick, animate noise, running and pausing. it was like a bird's singing, in that it had no human emotion or passion or intention or meaning--a ripple and poise of animate sound. but it was unlike a bird's singing, in that the notes followed clear and single one after the other, in their subtle gallop. a nightingale is rather like that--a wild sound. to read all the human pathos into nightingales' singing is nonsense. a wild, savage, non-human lurch and squander of sound, beautiful, but entirely unaesthetic. what aaron was playing was not of his own invention. it was a bit of mediaeval phrasing written for the pipe and the viol. it made the piano seem a ponderous, nerve-wracking steam-roller of noise, and the violin, as we know it, a hateful wire-drawn nerve-torturer. after a little while, when he entered the smaller room again, the marchesa looked full into his face. “good!” she said. “good!” and a gleam almost of happiness seemed to light her up. she seemed like one who had been kept in a horrible enchanted castle--for years and years. oh, a horrible enchanted castle, with wet walls of emotions and ponderous chains of feelings and a ghastly atmosphere of must-be. she felt she had seen through the opening door a crack of sunshine, and thin, pure, light outside air, outside, beyond this dank and beastly dungeon of feelings and moral necessity. ugh!--she shuddered convulsively at what had been. she looked at her little husband. chains of necessity all round him: a little jailor. yet she was fond of him. if only he would throw away the castle keys. he was a little gnome. what did he clutch the castle-keys so tight for? aaron looked at her. he knew that they understood one another, he and she. without any moral necessity or any other necessity. outside--they had got outside the castle of so-called human life. outside the horrible, stinking human castle of life. a bit of true, limpid freedom. just a glimpse. “charming!” said the marchese. “truly charming! but what was it you played?” aaron told him. “but truly delightful. i say, won't you play for us one of these saturdays? and won't you let me take the accompaniment? i should be charmed, charmed if you would.” “all right,” said aaron. “do drink another cocktail,” said his hostess. he did so. and then he rose to leave. “will you stay to dinner?” said the marchesa. “we have two people coming--two italian relatives of my husband. but--” no, aaron declined to stay to dinner. “then won't you come on--let me see--on wednesday? do come on wednesday. we are alone. and do bring the flute. come at half-past six, as today, will you? yes?” aaron promised--and then he found himself in the street. it was half-past seven. instead of returning straight home, he crossed the ponte vecchio and walked straight into the crowd. the night was fine now. he had his overcoat over his arm, and in a sort of trance or frenzy, whirled away by his evening's experience, and by the woman, he strode swiftly forward, hardly heeding anything, but rushing blindly on through all the crowd, carried away by his own feelings, as much as if he had been alone, and all these many people merely trees. leaving the piazza vittorio emmanuele a gang of soldiers suddenly rushed round him, buffeting him in one direction, whilst another gang, swinging round the corner, threw him back helpless again into the midst of the first gang. for some moments he struggled among the rude, brutal little mob of grey-green coarse uniforms that smelt so strong of soldiers. then, irritated, he found himself free again, shaking himself and passing on towards the cathedral. irritated, he now put on his overcoat and buttoned it to the throat, closing himself in, as it were, from the brutal insolence of the sunday night mob of men. before, he had been walking through them in a rush of naked feeling, all exposed to their tender mercies. he now gathered himself together. as he was going home, suddenly, just as he was passing the bargello, he stopped. he stopped, and put his hand to his breast pocket. his letter-case was gone. he had been robbed. it was as if lightning ran through him at that moment, as if a fluid electricity rushed down his limbs, through the sluice of his knees, and out at his feet, leaving him standing there almost unconscious. for a moment unconscious and superconscious he stood there. he had been robbed. they had put their hand in his breast and robbed him. if they had stabbed him, it could hardly have had a greater effect on him. and he had known it. he had known it. when the soldiers jostled him so evilly they robbed him. and he knew it. he had known it as if it were fate. even as if it were fated beforehand. feeling quite weak and faint, as if he had really been struck by some evil electric fluid, he walked on. and as soon as he began to walk, he began to reason. perhaps his letter-case was in his other coat. perhaps he had not had it with him at all. perhaps he was feeling all this, just for nothing. perhaps it was all folly. he hurried forward. he wanted to make sure. he wanted relief. it was as if the power of evil had suddenly seized him and thrown him, and he wanted to say it was not so, that he had imagined it all, conjured it up. he did not want to admit the power of evil--particularly at that moment. for surely a very ugly evil spirit had struck him, in the midst of that gang of italian soldiers. he knew it--it had pierced him. it had _got_ him. but he wanted to say it was not so. reaching the house, he hastened upwards to his far-off, lonely room, through the dark corridors. once in his own apartment, he shut the door and switched on the light, a sensation like fear at his heart. then he searched his other pockets. he looked everywhere. in vain. in vain, truly enough. for he _knew_ the thing was stolen. he had known it all along. the soldiers had deliberately plotted, had deliberately rushed him and taken his purse. they must have watched him previously. they must have grinned, and jeered at him. he sat down in a chair, to recover from the shock. the pocket-book contained four hundred francs, three one-pound notes, and various letters and private effects. well, these were lost. but it was not so much the loss as the assault on his person that caused him to feel so stricken. he felt the jeering, gibing blows they had given as they jostled him. and now he sat, weak in every limb, and said to himself: “yes--and if i hadn't rushed along so full of feeling: if i hadn't exposed myself: if i hadn't got worked up with the marchesa, and then rushed all kindled through the streets, without reserve, it would never have happened. i gave myself away: and there was someone ready to snatch what i gave. i gave myself away. it is my own fault. i should have been on my guard. i should be always on my guard: always, always. with god and the devil both, i should be on my guard. godly or devilish, i should hold fast to my reserve and keep on the watch. and if i don't, i deserve what i get.” but still he sat in his chair in his bedroom, dazed. one part of his soul was saying emphatically: it serves you right. it is nothing but right. it serves everybody right who rushes enkindled through the street, and trusts implicitly in mankind and in the life-spirit, as if mankind and the life-spirit were a playground for enkindled individuals. it serves you right. you have paid about twelve pounds sterling for your lesson. fool, you might have known beforehand, and then you needn't have paid at all. you can ill afford twelve pounds sterling, you fool. but since paid you have, then mind, mind the lesson is learned. never again. never expose yourself again. never again absolute trust. it is a blasphemy against life, is absolute trust. has a wild creature ever absolute trust? it minds itself. sleeping or waking it is on its guard. and so must you be, or you'll go under. sleeping or waking, man or woman, god or the devil, keep your guard over yourself. keep your guard over yourself, lest worse befall you. no man is robbed unless he incites a robber. no man is murdered unless he attracts a murderer. then be not robbed: it lies within your own power. and be not murdered. or if you are, you deserve it. keep your guard over yourself, now, always and forever. yes, against god quite as hard as against the devil. he's fully as dangerous to you.... thus thinking, not in his mind but in his soul, his active, living soul, he gathered his equanimity once more, and accepted the fact. so he rose and tidied himself for dinner. his face was now set, and still. his heart also was still--and fearless. because its sentinel was stationed. stationed, stationed for ever. and aaron never forgot. after this, it became essential to him to feel that the sentinel stood guard in his own heart. he felt a strange unease the moment he was off his guard. asleep or awake, in the midst of the deepest passion or the suddenest love, or in the throes of greatest excitement or bewilderment, somewhere, some corner of himself was awake to the fact that the sentinel of the soul must not sleep, no, never, not for one instant. chapter xvii. high up over the cathedral square aaron and lilly sat in argyle's little loggia, high up under the eaves of the small hotel, a sort of long attic-terrace just under the roof, where no one would have suspected it. it was level with the grey conical roof of the baptistery. here sat aaron and lilly in the afternoon, in the last of the lovely autumn sunshine. below, the square was already cold in shadow, the pink and white and green baptistery rose lantern-shaped as from some sea-shore, cool, cold and wan now the sun was gone. black figures, innumerable black figures, curious because they were all on end, up on end--aaron could not say why he expected them to be horizontal--little black figures upon end, like fishes that swim on their tails, wiggled endlessly across the piazza, little carriages on natural all-fours rattled tinily across, the yellow little tram-cars, like dogs slipped round the corner. the balcony was so high up, that the sound was ineffectual. the upper space, above the houses, was nearer than the under-currents of the noisy town. sunlight, lovely full sunlight, lingered warm and still on the balcony. it caught the facade of the cathedral sideways, like the tips of a flower, and sideways lit up the stem of giotto's tower, like a lily stem, or a long, lovely pale pink and white and green pistil of the lily of the cathedral. florence, the flowery town. firenze--fiorenze--the flowery town: the red lilies. the fiorentini, the flower-souled. flowers with good roots in the mud and muck, as should be: and fearless blossoms in air, like the cathedral and the tower and the david. “i love it,” said lilly. “i love this place, i love the cathedral and the tower. i love its pinkness and its paleness. the gothic souls find fault with it, and say it is gimcrack and tawdry and cheap. but i love it, it is delicate and rosy, and the dark stripes are as they should be, like the tiger marks on a pink lily. it's a lily, not a rose; a pinky white lily with dark tigery marks. and heavy, too, in its own substance: earth-substance, risen from earth into the air: and never forgetting the dark, black-fierce earth--i reckon here men for a moment were themselves, as a plant in flower is for the moment completely itself. then it goes off. as florence has gone off. no flowers now. but it has flowered. and i don't see why a race should be like an aloe tree, flower once and die. why should it? why not flower again? why not?” “if it's going to, it will,” said aaron. “our deciding about it won't alter it.” “the decision is part of the business.” here they were interrupted by argyle, who put his head through one of the windows. he had flecks of lather on his reddened face. “do you think you're wise now,” he said, “to sit in that sun?” “in november?” laughed lilly. “always fear the sun when there's an 'r' in the month,” said argyle. “always fear it 'r' or no 'r,' _i_ say. i'm frightened of it. i've been in the south, i know what it is. i tell you i'm frightened of it. but if you think you can stand it--well--” “it won't last much longer, anyhow,” said lilly. “too long for me, my boy. i'm a shady bird, in all senses of the word, in all senses of the word.--now are you comfortable? what? have another cushion? a rug for your knees? you're quite sure now? well, wait just one moment till the waiter brings up a syphon, and you shall have a whiskey and soda. precious--oh, yes, very precious these days--like drinking gold. thirty-five lire a bottle, my boy!” argyle pulled a long face, and made a noise with his lips. “but i had this bottle given me, and luckily you've come while there's a drop left. very glad you have! very glad you have.” here he poked a little table through the window, and put a bottle and two glasses, one a tooth-glass, upon it. then he withdrew again to finish shaving. the waiter presently hobbled up with the syphon and third glass. argyle pushed his head through the window, that was only a little higher than the balcony. he was soon neatly shaved, and was brushing his hair. “go ahead, my boys, go ahead with that whiskey!” he said. “we'll wait for you,” said lilly. “no, no, don't think of it. however, if you will, i shall be one minute only--one minute only. i'll put on the water for the tea now. oh, damned bad methylated spirit they sell now! and six francs a litre! six francs a litre! i don't know what i'm going to do, the air i breathe costs money nowadays--just one moment and i'll be with you! just one moment--” in a very little while he came from the tiny attic bedroom, through the tiniest cupboard of a sitting-room under the eaves, where his books were, and where he had hung his old red india tapestries--or silk embroideries--and he emerged there up above the world on the loggia. “now then--_siamo nel paradiso_, eh? paradisal enough for you, is it?” “the devil looking over lincoln,” said lilly laughing, glancing up into argyle's face. “the devil looking over florence would feel sad,” said argyle. “the place is fast growing respectable--oh, piety makes the devil chuckle. but respectability, my boy, argues a serious diminution of spunk. and when the spunk diminishes we-ell--it's enough to make the most sturdy devil look sick. what? no doubt about it, no doubt whatever--there--!” he had just finished settling his tie and buttoning his waistcoat. “how do i look, eh? presentable?--i've just had this suit turned. clever little tailor across the way there. but he charged me a hundred and twenty francs.” argyle pulled a face, and made the little trumping noise with his lips. “however--not bad, is it?--he had to let in a bit at the back of the waistcoat, and a gusset, my boy, a gusset--in the trousers back. seems i've grown in the arsal region. well, well, might do worse.--is it all right?” lilly eyed the suit. “very nice. very nice indeed. such a good cloth! that makes all the difference.” “oh, my dear fellow, all the difference! this suit is eleven years old--eleven years old. but beautiful english cloth--before the war, before the war!” “it looks quite wonderfully expensive and smart now,” said lilly. “expensive and smart, eh! ha-ha-ha! well, it cost me a hundred and twenty francs to have it turned, and i found that expensive enough. well, now, come--” here argyle's voice took on a new gay cheer. “a whiskey and soda, lilly? say when! oh, nonsense, nonsense! you're going to have double that. you're no lily of the valley here, remember. not with me. not likely. _siamo nel paradiso_, remember.” “but why should we drink your whiskey? tea would do for us just as well.” “not likely! not likely! when i have the pleasure of your company, my boy, we drink a glass of something, unless i am utterly stripped. say when, aaron.” “when,” said aaron. argyle at last seated himself heavily in a small chair. the sun had left the loggia, but was glowing still on giotto's tower and the top of the cathedral facade, and on the remoter great red-tiled dome. “look at my little red monthly rose,” said argyle. “wonderful little fellow! i wouldn't have anything happen to him for the world. oh, a bacchic little chap. i made pasquale wear a wreath of them on his hair. very becoming they were, very.--oh, i've had a charming show of flowers. wonderful creatures sunflowers are.” they got up and put their heads over the balcony, looking down on the square below. “oh, great fun, great fun.--yes, i had a charming show of flowers, charming.--zinnias, petunias, ranunculus, sunflowers, white stocks--oh, charming. look at that bit of honeysuckle. you see the berries where his flowers were! delicious scent, i assure you.” under the little balcony wall argyle had put square red-tiled pots, all round, and in these still bloomed a few pansies and asters, whilst in a corner a monthly rose hung flowers like round blood-drops. argyle was as tidy and scrupulous in his tiny rooms and his balcony as if he were a first-rate sea-man on a yacht. lilly remarked on this. “do you see signs of the old maid coming out in me? oh, i don't doubt it. i don't doubt it. we all end that way. age makes old maids of us all. and tanny is all right, you say? bring her to see me. why didn't she come today?” “you know you don't like people unless you expect them.” “oh, but my dear fellow!--you and tanny; you'd be welcome if you came at my busiest moment. of course you would. i'd be glad to see you if you interrupted me at any crucial moment.--i am alone now till august. then we shall go away together somewhere. but you and tanny; why, there's the world, and there's lilly: that's how i put it, my boy.” “all right, argyle.--hoflichkeiten.” “what? gar keine hoflichkeiten. wahrhaftiger kerl bin ich.--when am i going to see tanny? when are you coming to dine with me?” “after you've dined with us--say the day after tomorrow.” “right you are. delighted--. let me look if that water's boiling.” he got up and poked half himself inside the bedroom. “not yet. damned filthy methylated spirit they sell.” “look,” said lilly. “there's del torre!” “like some sort of midge, in that damned grey-and-yellow uniform. i can't stand it, i tell you. i can't stand the sight of any more of these uniforms. like a blight on the human landscape. like a blight. like green-flies on rose-trees, smother-flies. europe's got the smother-fly in these infernal shoddy militarists.” “del torre's coming out of it as soon as he can,” said lilly. “i should think so, too.” “i like him myself--very much. look, he's seen us! he wants to come up, argyle.” “what, in that uniform! i'll see him in his grandmother's crinoline first.” “don't be fanatical, it's bad taste. let him come up a minute.” “not for my sake. but for yours, he shall,” argyle stood at the parapet of the balcony and waved his arm. “yes, come up,” he said, “come up, you little mistkafer--what the americans call a bug. come up and be damned.” of course del torre was too far off to hear this exhortation. lilly also waved to him--and watched him pass into the doorway far below. “i'll rinse one of these glasses for him,” said argyle. the marchese's step was heard on the stone stairs: then his knock. “come in! come in!” cried argyle from the bedroom, where he was rinsing the glass. the marchese entered, grinning with his curious, half courteous greeting. “go through--go through,” cried argyle. “go on to the loggia--and mind your head. good heavens, mind your head in that doorway.” the marchese just missed the top of the doorway as he climbed the abrupt steps on to the loggia.--there he greeted lilly and aaron with hearty handshakes. “very glad to see you--very glad, indeed!” he cried, grinning with excited courtesy and pleasure, and covering lilly's hand with both his own gloved hands. “when did you come to florence?” there was a little explanation. argyle shoved the last chair--it was a luggage stool--through the window. “all i can do for you in the way of a chair,” he said. “ah, that is all right,” said the marchese. “well, it is very nice up here--and very nice company. of the very best, the very best in florence.” “the highest, anyhow,” said argyle grimly, as he entered with the glass. “have a whiskey and soda, del torre. it's the bottom of the bottle, as you see.” “the bottom of the bottle! then i start with the tail-end, yes!” he stretched his blue eyes so that the whites showed all round, and grinned a wide, gnome-like grin. “you made that start long ago, my dear fellow. don't play the _ingenue_ with me, you know it won't work. say when, my man, say when!” “yes, when,” said del torre. “when did i make that start, then?” “at some unmentionably young age. chickens such as you soon learn to cheep.” “chickens such as i soon learn to cheap,” repeated del torre, pleased with the verbal play. “what is cheap, please? what is to cheap?” “cheep! cheep!” squeaked argyle, making a face at the little italian, who was perched on one strap of the luggage-stool. “it's what chickens say when they're poking their little noses into new adventures--naughty ones.” “are chickens naughty? oh! i thought they could only be good!” “featherless chickens like yourself, my boy.” “oh, as for featherless--then there is no saying what they will do.--” and here the marchese turned away from argyle with the inevitable question to lilly: “well, and how long will you stay in florence?” lilly did not know: but he was not leaving immediately. “good! then you will come and see us at once....” argyle rose once more, and went to make the tea. he shoved a lump of cake--or rather panetone, good currant loaf--through the window, with a knife to cut it. “help yourselves to the panetone,” he said. “eat it up. the tea is coming at once. you'll have to drink it in your glasses, there's only one old cup.” the marchese cut the cake, and offered pieces. the two men took and ate. “so you have already found mr. sisson!” said del torre to lilly. “ran straight into him in the via nazionale,” said lilly. “oh, one always runs into everybody in florence. we are all already acquainted: also with the flute. that is a great pleasure.” “so i think.--does your wife like it, too?” “very much, indeed! she is quite _eprise_. i, too, shall have to learn to play it.” “and run the risk of spoiling the shape of your mouth--like alcibiades.” “is there a risk? yes! then i shan't play it. my mouth is too beautiful.--but mr. sisson has not spoilt his mouth.” “not yet,” said lilly. “give him time.” “is he also afraid--like alcibiades?” “are you, aaron?” said lilly. “what?” “afraid of spoiling your beauty by screwing your mouth to the flute?” “i look a fool, do i, when i'm playing?” said aaron. “only the least little bit in the world,” said lilly. “the way you prance your head, you know, like a horse.” “ah, well,” said aaron. “i've nothing to lose.” “and were you surprised, lilly, to find your friend here?” asked del torre. “i ought to have been. but i wasn't really.” “then you expected him?” “no. it came naturally, though.--but why did you come, aaron? what exactly brought you?” “accident,” said aaron. “ah, no! no! there is no such thing as accident,” said the italian. “a man is drawn by his fate, where he goes.” “you are right,” said argyle, who came now with the teapot. “a man is drawn--or driven. driven, i've found it. ah, my dear fellow, what is life but a search for a friend? a search for a friend--that sums it up.” “or a lover,” said the marchese, grinning. “same thing. same thing. my hair is white--but that is the sum of my whole experience. the search for a friend.” there was something at once real and sentimental in argyle's tone. “and never finding?” said lilly, laughing. “oh, what would you? often finding. often finding. and losing, of course.--a life's history. give me your glass. miserable tea, but nobody has sent me any from england--” “and you will go on till you die, argyle?” said lilly. “always seeking a friend--and always a new one?” “if i lose the friend i've got. ah, my dear fellow, in that case i shall go on seeking. i hope so, i assure you. something will be very wrong with me, if ever i sit friendless and make no search.” “but, argyle, there is a time to leave off.” “to leave off what, to leave off what?” “having friends: or a friend, rather: or seeking to have one.” “oh, no! not at all, my friend. not at all! only death can make an end of that, my friend. only death. and i should say, not even death. not even death ends a man's search for a friend. that is my belief. you may hang me for it, but i shall never alter.” “nay,” said lilly. “there is a time to love, and a time to leave off loving.” “all i can say to that is that my time to leave off hasn't come yet,” said argyle, with obstinate feeling. “ah, yes, it has. it is only a habit and an idea you stick to.” “indeed, it is no such thing. indeed, it is no such thing. it is a profound desire and necessity: and what is more, a belief.” “an obstinate persistency, you mean,” said lilly. “well, call it so if it pleases you. it is by no means so to me.” there was a brief pause. the sun had left the cathedral dome and the tower, the sky was full of light, the square swimming in shadow. “but can a man live,” said the marchese, “without having something he lives for: something he wishes for, or longs for, and tries that he may get?” “impossible! completely impossible!” said argyle. “man is a seeker, and except as such, he has no significance, no importance.” “he bores me with his seeking,” said lilly. “he should learn to possess himself--to be himself--and keep still.” “ay, perhaps so,” said aaron. “only--” “but my dear boy, believe me, a man is never himself save in the supreme state of love: or perhaps hate, too, which amounts to the same thing. never really himself.--apart from this he is a tram-driver or a money-shoveller or an idea-machine. only in the state of love is he really a man, and really himself. i say so, because i know,” said argyle. “ah, yes. that is one side of the truth. it is quite true, also. but it is just as true to say, that a man is never less himself, than in the supreme state of love. never less himself, than then.” “maybe! maybe! but what could be better? what could be better than to lose oneself with someone you love, entirely, and so find yourself. ah, my dear fellow, that is my creed, that is my creed, and you can't shake me in it. never in that. never in that.” “yes, argyle,” said lilly. “i know you're an obstinate love-apostle.” “i am! i am! and i have certain standards, my boy, and certain ideals which i never transgress. never transgress. and never abandon.” “all right, then, you are an incurable love-maker.” “pray god i am,” said argyle. “yes,” said the marchese. “perhaps we are all so. what else do you give? would you have us make money? or do you give the centre of your spirit to your work? how is it to be?” “i don't vitally care either about money or my work or--” lilly faltered. “or what, then?” “or anything. i don't really care about anything. except that--” “you don't care about anything? but what is that for a life?” cried the marchese, with a hollow mockery. “what do you care for?” asked lilly. “me? i care for several things. i care for my wife. i care for love. and i care to be loved. and i care for some pleasures. and i care for music. and i care for italy.” “you are well off for cares,” said lilly. “and you seem to me so very poor,” said del torre. “i should say so--if he cares for nothing,” interjaculated argyle. then he clapped lilly on the shoulder with a laugh. “ha! ha! ha!--but he only says it to tease us,” he cried, shaking lilly's shoulder. “he cares more than we do for his own way of loving. come along, don't try and take us in. we are old birds, old birds,” said argyle. but at that moment he seemed a bit doddering. “a man can't live,” said the italian, “without an object.” “well--and that object?” said lilly. “well--it may be many things. mostly it is two things.--love, and money. but it may be many things: ambition, patriotism, science, art--many things. but it is some objective. something outside the self. perhaps many things outside the self.” “i have had only one objective all my life,” said argyle. “and that was love. for that i have spent my life.” “and the lives of a number of other people, too,” said lilly. “admitted. oh, admitted. it takes two to make love: unless you're a miserable--” “don't you think,” said aaron, turning to lilly, “that however you try to get away from it, if you're not after money, and can't fit yourself into a job--you've got to, you've got to try and find something else--somebody else--somebody. you can't really be alone.” “no matter how many mistakes you've made--you can't really be alone--?” asked lilly. “you can be alone for a minute. you can be alone just in that minute when you've broken free, and you feel heart thankful to be alone, because the other thing wasn't to be borne. but you can't keep on being alone. no matter how many tunes you've broken free, and feel, thank god to be alone (nothing on earth is so good as to breathe fresh air and be alone), no matter how many times you've felt this--it wears off every time, and you begin to look again--and you begin to roam round. and even if you won't admit it to yourself, still you are seeking--seeking. aren't you? aren't you yourself seeking?” “oh, that's another matter,” put in argyle. “lilly is happily married and on the shelf. with such a fine woman as tanny i should think so--rather! but his is an exceptional nature, and an exceptional case. as for me, i made a hell of my marriage, and i swear it nearly sent me to hell. but i didn't forswear love, when i forswore marriage and woman. not by any means.” “are you not seeking any more, lilly?” asked the marchese. “do you seek nothing?” “we married men who haven't left our wives, are we supposed to seek anything?” said lilly. “aren't we perfectly satisfied and in bliss with the wonderful women who honour us as wives?” “ah, yes, yes!” said the marchese. “but now we are not speaking to the world. now we try to speak of that which we have in our centre of our hearts.” “and what have we there?” said lilly. “well--shall i say? we have unrest. we have another need. we have something that hurts and eats us, yes, eats us inside. do i speak the truth?” “yes. but what is the something?” “i don't know. i don't know. but it is something in love, i think. it is love itself which gnaws us inside, like a cancer,” said the italian. “but why should it? is that the nature of love?” said lilly. “i don't know. truly. i don't know.--but perhaps it is in the nature of love--i don't know.--but i tell you, i love my wife--she is very dear to me. i admire her, i trust her, i believe her. she is to me much more than any woman, more even than my mother.--and so, i am very happy. i am very happy, she is very happy, in our love and our marriage.--but wait. nothing has changed--the love has not changed: it is the same.--and yet we are not happy. no, we are not happy. i know she is not happy, i know i am not--” “why should you be?” said lilly. “yes--and it is not even happiness,” said the marchese, screwing up his face in a painful effort of confession. “it is not even happiness. no, i do not ask to be happy. why should i? it is childish--but there is for both of us, i know it, something which bites us, which eats us within, and drives us, drives us, somewhere, we don't know where. but it drives us, and eats away the life--and yet we love each other, and we must not separate--do you know what i mean? do you understand me at all in what i say? i speak what is true.” “yes, i understand. i'm in the same dilemma myself.--but what i want to hear, is why you think it is so. why is it?” “shall i say what i think? yes? and you can tell me if it is foolish to you.--shall i tell you? well. because a woman, she now first wants the man, and he must go to her because he is wanted. do you understand?--you know--supposing i go to a woman--supposing she is my wife--and i go to her, yes, with my blood all ready, because it is i who want. then she puts me off. then she says, not now, not now, i am tired, i am not well. i do not feel like it. she puts me off--till i am angry or sorry or whatever i am--but till my blood has gone down again, you understand, and i don't want her any more. and then she puts her arms round me, and caresses me, and makes love to me--till she rouses me once more. so, and so she rouses me--and so i come to her. and i love her, it is very good, very good. but it was she who began, it was her initiative, you know.--i do not think, in all my life, my wife has loved me from my initiative, you know. she will yield to me--because i insist, or because she wants to be a good submissive wife who loves me. so she will yield to me. but ah, what is it, you know? what is it a woman who allows me, and who has no answer? it is something worse than nothing--worse than nothing. and so it makes me very discontented and unbelieving.--if i say to her, she says it is not true--not at all true. then she says, all she wants is that i should desire her, that i should love her and desire her. but even that is putting her will first. and if i come to her so, if i come to her of my own desire, then she puts me off. she puts me off, or she only allows me to come to her. even now it is the same after ten years, as it was at first. but now i know, and for many years i did not know--” the little man was intense. his face was strained, his blue eyes so stretched that they showed the whites all round. he gazed into lilly's face. “but does it matter?” said lilly slowly, “in which of you the desire initiates? isn't the result the same?” “it matters. it matters--” cried the marchese. “oh, my dear fellow, how much it matters--” interrupted argyle sagely. “ay!” said aaron. the marchese looked from one to the other of them. “it matters!” he cried. “it matters life or death. it used to be, that desire started in the man, and the woman answered. it used to be so for a long time in italy. for this reason the women were kept away from the men. for this reason our catholic religion tried to keep the young girls in convents, and innocent, before marriage. so that with their minds they should not know, and should not start this terrible thing, this woman's desire over a man, beforehand. this desire which starts in a woman's head, when she knows, and which takes a man for her use, for her service. this is eve. ah, i hate eve. i hate her, when she knows, and when she wills. i hate her when she will make of me that which serves her desire.--she may love me, she may be soft and kind to me, she may give her life for me. but why? only because i am hers. i am that thing which does her most intimate service. she can see no other in me. and i may be no other to her--” “then why not let it be so, and be satisfied?” said lilly. “because i cannot. i cannot. i would. but i cannot. the borghesia--the citizens--the bourgeoisie, they are the ones who can. oh, yes. the bourgeoisie, the shopkeepers, these serve their wives so, and their wives love them. they are the marital maquereaux--the husband-maquereau, you know. their wives are so stout and happy, and they dote on their husbands and always betray them. so it is with the bourgeoise. she loves her husband so much, and is always seeking to betray him. or she is a madame bovary, seeking for a scandal. but the bourgeois husband, he goes on being the same. he is the horse, and she the driver. and when she says gee-up, you know--then he comes ready, like a hired maquereau. only he feels so good, like a good little boy at her breast. and then there are the nice little children. and so they keep the world going.--but for me--” he spat suddenly and with frenzy on the floor. “you are quite right, my boy,” said argyle. “you are quite right. they've got the start of us, the women: and we've got to canter when they say gee-up. i--oh, i went through it all. but i broke the shafts and smashed the matrimonial cart, i can tell you, and i didn't care whether i smashed her up along with it or not. i didn't care one single bit, i assure you.--and here i am. and she is dead and buried these dozen years. well--well! life, you know, life. and women oh, they are the very hottest hell once they get the start of you. there's nothing they won't do to you, once they've got you. nothing they won't do to you. especially if they love you. then you may as well give up the ghost: or smash the cart behind you, and her in it. otherwise she will just harry you into submission, and make a dog of you, and cuckold you under your nose. and you'll submit. oh, you'll submit, and go on calling her my darling. or else, if you won't submit, she'll do for you. your only chance is to smash the shafts, and the whole matrimonial cart. or she'll do for you. for a woman has an uncanny, hellish strength--she's a she-bear and a wolf, is a woman when she's got the start of you. oh, it's a terrible experience, if you're not a bourgeois, and not one of the knuckling-under money-making sort.” “knuckling-under sort. yes. that is it,” said the marchese. “but can't there be a balancing of wills?” said lilly. “my dear boy, the balance lies in that, that when one goes up, the other goes down. one acts, the other takes. it is the only way in love--and the women are nowadays the active party. oh, yes, not a shadow of doubt about it. they take the initiative, and the man plays up. that's how it is. the man just plays up.--nice manly proceeding, what!” cried argyle. “but why can't man accept it as the natural order of things?” said lilly. “science makes it the natural order.” “all my ---to science,” said argyle. “no man with one drop of real spunk in him can stand it long.” “yes! yes! yes!” cried the italian. “most men want it so. most men want only, that a woman shall want them, and they shall then play up to her when she has roused them. most men want only this: that a woman shall choose one man out, to be her man, and he shall worship her and come up when she shall provoke him. otherwise he is to keep still. and the woman, she is quite sure of her part. she must be loved and adored, and above all, obeyed, particularly in her sex desire. there she must not be thwarted, or she becomes a devil. and if she is obeyed, she becomes a misunderstood woman with nerves, looking round for the next man whom she can bring under. so it is.” “well,” said lilly. “and then what?” “nay,” interrupted aaron. “but do you think it's true what he says? have you found it like that? you're married. has your experience been different, or the same?” “what was yours?” asked lilly. “mine was the same. mine was the same, if ever it was,” said aaron. “and mine was extremely similar,” said argyle with a grimace. “and yours, lilly?” asked the marchese anxiously. “not very different,” said lilly. “ah!” cried del torre, jerking up erect as if he had found something. “and what's your way out?” aaron asked him. “i'm not out--so i won't holloa,” said lilly. “but del torre puts it best.--what do you say is the way out, del torre?” “the way out is that it should change: that the man should be the asker and the woman the answerer. it must change.” “but it doesn't. prrr!” argyle made his trumpeting noise. “does it?” asked lilly of the marchese. “no. i think it does not.” “and will it ever again?” “perhaps never.” “and then what?” “then? why then man seeks a _pis-aller_. then he seeks something which will give him answer, and which will not only draw him, draw him, with a terrible sexual will.--so he seeks young girls, who know nothing, and so cannot force him. he thinks he will possess them while they are young, and they will be soft and responding to his wishes.--but in this, too, he is mistaken. because now a baby of one year, if it be a female, is like a woman of forty, so is its will made up, so it will force a man.” “and so young girls are no good, even as a _pis-aller_.” “no good--because they are all modern women. every one, a modern woman. not one who isn't.” “terrible thing, the modern woman,” put in argyle. “and then--?” “then man seeks other forms of loves, always seeking the loving response, you know, of one gentler and tenderer than himself, who will wait till the man desires, and then will answer with full love.--but it is all _pis-aller_, you know.” “not by any means, my boy,” cried argyle. “and then a man naturally loves his own wife, too, even if it is not bearable to love her.” “or one leaves her, like aaron,” said lilly. “and seeks another woman, so,” said the marchese. “does he seek another woman?” said lilly. “do you, aaron?” “i don't want to,” said aaron. “but--i can't stand by myself in the middle of the world and in the middle of people, and know i am quite by myself, and nowhere to go, and nothing to hold on to. i can for a day or two--but then, it becomes unbearable as well. you get frightened. you feel you might go funny--as you would if you stood on this balcony wall with all the space beneath you.” “can't one be alone--quite alone?” said lilly. “but no--it is absurd. like saint simeon stylites on a pillar. but it is absurd!” cried the italian. “i don't mean like simeon stylites. i mean can't one live with one's wife, and be fond of her: and with one's friends, and enjoy their company: and with the world and everything, pleasantly: and yet know that one is alone? essentially, at the very core of me, alone. eternally alone. and choosing to be alone. not sentimental or lonely. alone, choosing to be alone, because by one's own nature one is alone. the being with another person is secondary,” said lilly. “one is alone,” said argyle, “in all but love. in all but love, my dear fellow. and then i agree with you.” “no,” said lilly, “in love most intensely of all, alone.” “completely incomprehensible,” said argyle. “amounts to nothing.” “one man is but a part. how can he be so alone?” said the marchese. “in so far as he is a single individual soul, he is alone--ipso facto. in so far as i am i, and only i am i, and i am only i, in so far, i am inevitably and eternally alone, and it is my last blessedness to know it, and to accept it, and to live with this as the core of my self-knowledge.” “my dear boy, you are becoming metaphysical, and that is as bad as softening of the brain,” said argyle. “all right,” said lilly. “and,” said the marchese, “it may be so by reason. but in the heart--? can the heart ever beat quite alone? plop! plop!--can the heart beat quite alone, alone in all the atmosphere, all the space of the universe? plop! plop! plop!--quite alone in all the space?” a slow smile came over the italian's face. “it is impossible. it may eat against the heart of other men, in anger, all in pressure against the others. it may beat hard, like iron, saying it is independent. but this is only beating against the heart of mankind, not alone.--but either with or against the heart of mankind, or the heart of someone, mother, wife, friend, children--so must the heart of every man beat. it is so.” “it beats alone in its own silence,” said lilly. the italian shook his head. “we'd better be going inside, anyhow,” said argyle. “some of you will be taking cold.” “aaron,” said lilly. “is it true for you?” “nearly,” said aaron, looking into the quiet, half-amused, yet frightening eyes of the other man. “or it has been.” “a miss is as good as a mile,” laughed lilly, rising and picking up his chair to take it indoors. and the laughter of his voice was so like a simple, deliberate amiability, that aaron's heart really stood still for a second. he knew that lilly was alone--as far as he, aaron, was concerned. lilly was alone--and out of his isolation came his words, indifferent as to whether they came or not. and he left his friends utterly to their own choice. utterly to their own choice. aaron felt that lilly was _there_, existing in life, yet neither asking for connection nor preventing any connection. he was present, he was the real centre of the group. and yet he asked nothing of them, and he imposed nothing. he left each to himself, and he himself remained just himself: neither more nor less. and there was a finality about it, which was at once maddening and fascinating. aaron felt angry, as if he were half insulted by the other man's placing the gift of friendship or connection so quietly back in the giver's hands. lilly would receive no gift of friendship in equality. neither would he violently refuse it. he let it lie unmarked. and yet at the same time aaron knew that he could depend on the other man for help, nay, almost for life itself--so long as it entailed no breaking of the intrinsic isolation of lilly's soul. but this condition was also hateful. and there was also a great fascination in it. chapter xviii. the marchesa so aaron dined with the marchesa and manfredi. he was quite startled when his hostess came in: she seemed like somebody else. she seemed like a demon, her hair on her brows, her terrible modern elegance. she wore a wonderful gown of thin blue velvet, of a lovely colour, with some kind of gauzy gold-threaded filament down the sides. it was terribly modern, short, and showed her legs and her shoulders and breast and all her beautiful white arms. round her throat was a collar of dark-blue sapphires. her hair was done low, almost to the brows, and heavy, like an aubrey beardsley drawing. she was most carefully made up--yet with that touch of exaggeration, lips slightly too red, which was quite intentional, and which frightened aaron. he thought her wonderful, and sinister. she affected him with a touch of horror. she sat down opposite him, and her beautifully shapen legs, in frail, goldish stockings, seemed to glisten metallic naked, thrust from out of the wonderful, wonderful skin, like periwinkle-blue velvet. she had tapestry shoes, blue and gold: and almost one could see her toes: metallic naked. the gold-threaded gauze slipped at her side. aaron could not help watching the naked-seeming arch of her foot. it was as if she were dusted with dark gold-dust upon her marvellous nudity. she must have seen his face, seen that he was _ebloui_. “you brought the flute?” she said, in that toneless, melancholy, unstriving voice of hers. her voice alone was the same: direct and bare and quiet. “yes.” “perhaps i shall sing later on, if you'll accompany me. will you?” “i thought you hated accompaniments.” “oh, no--not just unison. i don't mean accompaniment. i mean unison. i don't know how it will be. but will you try?” “yes, i'll try.” “manfredi is just bringing the cocktails. do you think you'd prefer orange in yours?” “ill have mine as you have yours.” “i don't take orange in mine. won't you smoke?” the strange, naked, remote-seeming voice! and then the beautiful firm limbs thrust out in that dress, and nakedly dusky as with gold-dust. her beautiful woman's legs, slightly glistening, duskily. his one abiding instinct was to touch them, to kiss them. he had never known a woman to exercise such power over him. it was a bare, occult force, something he could not cope with. manfredi came in with the little tray. he was still in uniform. “hello!” cried the little italian. “glad to see you--well, everything all right? glad to hear it. how is the cocktail, nan?” “yes,” she said. “all right.” “one drop too much peach, eh?” “no, all right.” “ah,” and the little officer seated himself, stretching his gaitered legs as if gaily. he had a curious smiling look on his face, that aaron thought also diabolical--and almost handsome. suddenly the odd, laughing, satanic beauty of the little man was visible. “well, and what have you been doing with yourself?” said he. “what did you do yesterday?” “yesterday?” said aaron. “i went to the uffizi.” “to the uffizi? well! and what did you think of it?” “very fine.” “i think it is. i think it is. what pictures did you look at?” “i was with dekker. we looked at most, i believe.” “and what do you remember best?” “i remember botticelli's venus on the shell.” “yes! yes!--” said manfredi. “i like her. but i like others better. you thought her a pretty woman, yes?” “no--not particularly pretty. but i like her body. and i like the fresh air. i like the fresh air, the summer sea-air all through it--through her as well.” “and her face?” asked the marchesa, with a slow, ironic smile. “yes--she's a bit baby-faced,” said aaron. “trying to be more innocent than her own common-sense will let her,” said the marchesa. “i don't agree with you, nan,” said her husband. “i think it is just that wistfulness and innocence which makes her the true venus: the true modern venus. she chooses not to know too much. and that is her attraction. don't you agree, aaron? excuse me, but everybody speaks of you as aaron. it seems to come naturally. most people speak of me as manfredi, too, because it is easier, perhaps, than del torre. so if you find it easier, use it. do you mind that i call you aaron?” “not at all. i hate misters, always.” “yes, so do i. i like one name only.” the little officer seemed very winning and delightful to aaron this evening--and aaron began to like him extremely. but the dominating consciousness in the room was the woman's. “do you agree, mr. sisson?” said the marchesa. “do you agree that the mock-innocence and the sham-wistfulness of botticelli's venus are her great charms?” “i don't think she is at all charming, as a person,” said aaron. “as a particular woman, she makes no impression on me at all. but as a picture--and the fresh air, particularly the fresh air. she doesn't seem so much a woman, you know, as the kind of out-of-doors morning-feelings at the seaside.” “quite! a sort of sea-scape of a woman. with a perfectly sham innocence. are you as keen on innocence as manfredi is?” “innocence?” said aaron. “it's the sort of thing i don't have much feeling about.” “ah, i know you,” laughed the soldier wickedly. “you are the sort of man who wants to be anthony to cleopatra. ha-ha!” aaron winced as if struck. then he too smiled, flattered. yet he felt he had been struck! did he want to be anthony to cleopatra? without knowing, he was watching the marchesa. and she was looking away, but knew he was watching her. and at last she turned her eyes to his, with a slow, dark smile, full of pain and fuller still of knowledge. a strange, dark, silent look of knowledge she gave him: from so far away, it seemed. and he felt all the bonds that held him melting away. his eyes remained fixed and gloomy, but with his mouth he smiled back at her. and he was terrified. he knew he was sulking towards her--sulking towards her. and he was terrified. but at the back of his mind, also, he knew there was lilly, whom he might depend on. and also he wanted to sink towards her. the flesh and blood of him simply melted out, in desire towards her. cost what may, he must come to her. and yet he knew at the same time that, cost what may, he must keep the power to recover himself from her. he must have his cake and eat it. and she became cleopatra to him. “age cannot wither, nor custom stale--” to his instinctive, unwilled fancy, she was cleopatra. they went in to dinner, and he sat on her right hand. it was a smallish table, with a very few daisy-flowers: everything rather frail, and sparse. the food the same--nothing very heavy, all rather exquisite. they drank hock. and he was aware of her beautiful arms, and her bosom; her low-crowded, thick hair, parted in the centre: the sapphires on her throat, the heavy rings on her fingers: and the paint on her lips, the fard. something deep, deep at the bottom of him hovered upon her, cleaved to her. yet he was as if sightless, in a stupor. who was she, what was she? he had lost all his grasp. only he sat there, with his face turned to hers, or to her, all the time. and she talked to him. but she never looked at him. indeed she said little. it was the husband who talked. his manner towards aaron was almost caressive. and aaron liked it. the woman was silent mostly, and seemed remote. and aaron felt his life ebb towards her. he felt the marvellousness, the rich beauty of her arms and breast. and the thought of her gold-dusted smooth limbs beneath the table made him feel almost an idiot. the second wine was a gold-coloured moselle, very soft and rich and beautiful. she drank this with pleasure, as one who understands. and for dessert there was a dish of cacchi--that orange-coloured, pulpy japanese fruit--persimmons. aaron had never eaten these before. soft, almost slimy, of a wonderful colour, and of a flavour that had sunk from harsh astringency down to that first decay-sweetness which is all autumn-rich. the marchese loved them, and scooped them out with his spoon. but she ate none. aaron did not know what they talked about, what was said. if someone had taken his mind away altogether, and left him with nothing but a body and a spinal consciousness, it would have been the same. but at coffee the talk turned to manfredi's duties. he would not be free from the army for some time yet. on the morrow, for example, he had to be out and away before it was day. he said he hated it, and wanted to be a free man once more. but it seemed to aaron he would be a very bored man, once he was free. and then they drifted on to talk of the palazzo in which was their apartment. “we've got such a fine terrace--you can see it from your house where you are,” said manfredi. “have you noticed it?” “no,” said aaron. “near that tuft of palm-trees. don't you know?” “no,” said aaron. “let us go out and show it him,” said the marchesa. manfredi fetched her a cloak, and they went through various doors, then up some steps. the terrace was broad and open. it looked straight across the river at the opposite lungarno: and there was the thin-necked tower of the palazzo vecchio, and the great dome of the cathedral in the distance, in shadow-bulk in the cold-aired night of stars. little trams were running brilliant over the flat new bridge on the right. and from a garden just below rose a tuft of palm-trees. “you see,” said the marchesa, coming and standing close to aaron, so that she just touched him, “you can know the terrace, just by these palm trees. and you are in the nardini just across there, are you? on the top floor, you said?” “yes, the top floor--one of the middle windows, i think.” “one that is always open now--and the others are shut. i have noticed it, not connecting it with you.” “yes, my window is always open.” she was leaning very slightly against him, as he stood. and he knew, with the same kind of inevitability with which he knew he would one day die, that he would be the lover of this woman. nay, that he was her lover already. “don't take cold,” said manfredi. she turned at once indoors. aaron caught a faint whiff of perfume from the little orange trees in tubs round the wall. “will you get the flute?” she said as they entered. “and will you sing?” he answered. “play first,” she said. he did as she wished. as the other night, he went into the big music-room to play. and the stream of sound came out with the quick wild imperiousness of the pipe. it had an immediate effect on her. she seemed to relax the peculiar, drug-like tension which was upon her at all ordinary times. she seemed to go still, and yielding. her red mouth looked as if it might moan with relief. she sat with her chin dropped on her breast, listening. and she did not move. but she sat softly, breathing rather quick, like one who has been hurt, and is soothed. a certain womanly naturalness seemed to soften her. and the music of the flute came quick, rather brilliant like a call-note, or like a long quick message, half command. to her it was like a pure male voice--as a blackbird's when he calls: a pure male voice, not only calling, but telling her something, telling her something, and soothing her soul to sleep. it was like the fire-music putting brunnhilde to sleep. but the pipe did not flicker and sink. it seemed to cause a natural relaxation in her soul, a peace. perhaps it was more like waking to a sweet, morning awakening, after a night of tormented, painful tense sleep. perhaps more like that. when aaron came in, she looked at him with a gentle, fresh smile that seemed to make the fard on her face look like a curious tiredness, which now she might recover from. and as the last time, it was difficult for her to identify this man with the voice of the flute. it was rather difficult. except that, perhaps, between his brows was something of a doubt, and in his bearing an aloofness that made her dread he might go away and not come back. she could see it in him, that he might go away and not come back. she said nothing to him, only just smiled. and the look of knowledge in her eyes seemed, for the moment, to be contained in another look: a look of faith, and at last happiness. aaron's heart stood still. no, in her moment's mood of faith and at last peace, life-trust, he was perhaps more terrified of her than in her previous sinister elegance. his spirit started and shrank. what was she going to ask of him? “i am so anxious that you should come to play one saturday morning,” said manfredi. “with an accompaniment, you know. i should like so much to hear you with piano accompaniment.” “very well,” said aaron. “will you really come? and will you practise with me, so that i can accompany you?” said manfredi eagerly. “yes. i will,” said aaron. “oh, good! oh, good! look here, come in on friday morning and let us both look through the music.” “if mr. sisson plays for the public,” said the marchesa, “he must not do it for charity. he must have the proper fee.” “no, i don't want it,” said aaron. “but you must earn money, mustn't you?” said she. “i must,” said aaron. “but i can do it somewhere else.” “no. if you play for the public, you must have your earnings. when you play for me, it is different.” “of course,” said manfredi. “every man must have his wage. i have mine from the italian government---” after a while, aaron asked the marchesa if she would sing. “shall i?” she said. “yes, do.” “then i will sing alone first, to let you see what you think of it--i shall be like trilby--i won't say like yvette guilbert, because i daren't. so i will be like trilby, and sing a little french song. though not malbrouck, and without a svengali to keep me in tune.” she went near the door, and stood with heir hands by her side. there was something wistful, almost pathetic now, in her elegance. “derriere chez mon pere _vole vole mon coeur, vole_! derriere chez mon pere il y a un pommier doux. _tout doux, et iou et iou, tout doux. il y a unpommier doux_. trois belles princesses _vole vole mon coeur, vole_! trois belles princesses sont assis dessous. _tout doux, et iou et iou, tout doux. sont asses dessous._” she had a beautiful, strong, sweet voice. but it was faltering, stumbling and sometimes it seemed to drop almost to speech. after three verses she faltered to an end, bitterly chagrined. “no,” she said. “it's no good. i can't sing.” and she dropped in her chair. “a lovely little tune,” said aaron. “haven't you got the music?” she rose, not answering, and found him a little book. “what do the words mean?” he asked her. she told him. and then he took his flute. “you don't mind if i play it, do you?” he said. so he played the tune. it was so simple. and he seemed to catch the lilt and the timbre of her voice. “come and sing it while i play--” he said. “i can't sing,” she said, shaking her head rather bitterly. “but let us try,” said he, disappointed. “i know i can't,” she said. but she rose. he remained sitting at the little table, the book propped up under the reading lamp. she stood at a little distance, unhappy. “i've always been like that,” she said. “i could never sing music, unless i had a thing drilled into me, and then it wasn't singing any more.” but aaron wasn't heeding. his flute was at his mouth, he was watching her. he sounded the note, but she did not begin. she was twisting her handkerchief. so he played the melody alone. at the end of the verse, he looked up at her again, and a half mocking smile played in his eyes. again he sounded the note, a challenge. and this time, as at his bidding, she began to sing. the flute instantly swung with a lovely soft firmness into the song, and she wavered only for a minute or two. then her soul and her voice got free, and she sang--she sang as she wanted to sing, as she had always wanted to sing, without that awful scotch, that impediment inside her own soul, which prevented her. she sang free, with the flute gliding along with her. and oh, how beautiful it was for her! how beautiful it was to sing the little song in the sweetness of her own spirit. how sweet it was to move pure and unhampered at last in the music! the lovely ease and lilt of her own soul in its motion through the music! she wasn't aware of the flute. she didn't know there was anything except her own pure lovely song-drift. her soul seemed to breathe as a butterfly breathes, as it rests on a leaf and slowly breathes its wings. for the first time! for the first time her soul drew its own deep breath. all her life, the breath had caught half-way. and now she breathed full, deep, to the deepest extent of her being. and oh, it was so wonderful, she was dazed. the song ended, she stood with a dazed, happy face, like one just coming awake. and the fard on her face seemed like the old night-crust, the bad sleep. new and luminous she looked out. and she looked at aaron with a proud smile. “bravo, nan! that was what you wanted,” said her husband. “it was, wasn't it?” she said, turning a wondering, glowing face to him. his face looked strange and withered and gnome-like, at the moment. she went and sat in her chair, quite silent, as if in a trance. the two men also sat quite still. and in the silence a little drama played itself between the three, of which they knew definitely nothing. but manfredi knew that aaron had done what he himself never could do, for this woman. and yet the woman was his own woman, not aaron's. and so, he was displaced. aaron, sitting there, glowed with a sort of triumph. he had performed a little miracle, and felt himself a little wonder-worker, to whom reverence was due. and as in a dream the woman sat, feeling what a joy it was to float and move like a swan in the high air, flying upon the wings of her own spirit. she was as a swan which never before could get its wings quite open, and so which never could get up into the open, where alone it can sing. for swans, and storks make their music only when they are high, high up in the air. then they can give sound to their strange spirits. and so, she. aaron and manfredi kept their faces averted from one another and hardly spoke to one another. it was as if two invisible hands pushed their faces apart, away, averted. and aaron's face glimmered with a little triumph, and a little grimace of obstinacy. and the italian's face looked old, rather monkey-like, and of a deep, almost stone-bare bitterness. the woman looked wondering from one man to the other--wondering. the glimmer of the open flower, the wonder-look, still lasted. and aaron said in his heart, what a goodly woman, what a woman to taste and enjoy. ah, what a woman to enjoy! and was it not his privilege? had he not gained it? his manhood, or rather his maleness, rose powerfully in him, in a sort of mastery. he felt his own power, he felt suddenly his own virile title to strength and reward. suddenly, and newly flushed with his own male super-power, he was going to have his reward. the woman was his reward. so it was, in him. and he cast it over in his mind. he wanted her--ha, didn't he! but the husband sat there, like a soap-stone chinese monkey, greyish-green. so, it would have to be another time. he rose, therefore, and took his leave. “but you'll let us do that again, won't you?” said she. “when you tell me, i'll come,” said he. “then i'll tell you soon,” said she. so he left, and went home to his own place, and there to his own remote room. as he laid his flute on the table he looked at it and smiled. he remembered that lilly had called it aaron's rod. “so you blossom, do you?--and thorn as well,” said he. for such a long time he had been gripped inside himself, and withheld. for such a long time it had been hard and unyielding, so hard and unyielding. he had wanted nothing, his desire had kept itself back, fast back. for such a long time his desire for woman had withheld itself, hard and resistant. all his deep, desirous blood had been locked, he had wanted nobody, and nothing. and it had been hard to live, so. without desire, without any movement of passionate love, only gripped back in recoil! that was an experience to endure. and now came his desire back. but strong, fierce as iron. like the strength of an eagle with the lightning in its talons. something to glory in, something overweening, the powerful male passion, arrogant, royal, jove's thunderbolt. aaron's black rod of power, blossoming again with red florentine lilies and fierce thorns. he moved about in the splendour of his own male lightning, invested in the thunder of the male passion-power. he had got it back, the male godliness, the male godhead. so he slept, and dreamed violent dreams of strange, black strife, something like the street-riot in milan, but more terrible. in the morning, however, he cared nothing about his dreams. as soon as it was really light, he rose, and opened his window wide. it was a grey, slow morning. but he saw neither the morning nor the river nor the woman walking on the gravel river-bed with her goose nor the green hill up to san miniato. he watched the tuft of palm-trees, and the terrace beside it. he could just distinguish the terrace clearly, among the green of foliage. so he stood at his window for a full hour, and did not move. motionless, planted, he stood and watched that terrace across above the arno. but like a statue. after an hour or so, he looked at his watch. it was nine o'clock. so he rang for his coffee, and meanwhile still stood watching the terrace on the hill. he felt his turn had come. the phoenix had risen in fire again, out of the ashes. therefore at ten o'clock he went over the bridge. he wrote on the back of his card a request, would she please let him have the little book of songs, that he might practise them over. the manservant went, and came back with the request that aaron should wait. so aaron entered, while the man took his hat. the manservant spoke only french and spanish, no english. he was a spaniard, with greyish hair and stooping shoulders, and dark, mute-seeming eyes. he spoke as little as possible. the marchesa had inherited him from her father. aaron sat in the little sitting-room and waited. after a rather long time the marchesa came in--wearing a white, thin blouse and a blue skirt. she was hardly made up at all. she had an odd pleased, yet brooding look on her face as she gave aaron her hand. something brooded between her brows. and her voice was strange, with a strange, secret undertone, that he could not understand. he looked up at her. and his face was bright, and his knees, as he sat, were like the knees of the gods. “you wanted the book of _chansons_?” she said. “i wanted to learn your tunes,” he replied. “yes. look--here it is!” and she brought him the little yellow book. it was just a hand-book, with melody and words only, no accompaniment. so she stood offering him the book, but waiting as if for something else, and standing as if with another meaning. he opened the leaves at random. “but i ought to know which ones you sing,” said he, rising and standing by her side with the open book. “yes,” she said, looking over his arm. he turned the pages one by one. “_trois jeunes tambours_,” said she. “yes, that.... yes, _en passant par la lorraine_.... _aupres de ma blonde_.... oh, i like that one so much--” he stood and went over the tune in his mind. “would you like me to play it?” he said. “very much,” said she. so he got his flute, propped up the book against a vase, and played the tune, whilst she hummed it fragmentarily. but as he played, he felt that he did not cast the spell over her. there was no connection. she was in some mysterious way withstanding him. she was withstanding him, and his male super-power, and his thunderbolt desire. she was, in some indescribable way, throwing cold water over his phoenix newly risen from the ashes of its nest in flames. he realised that she did not want him to play. she did not want him to look at the songs. so he put the book away, and turned round, rather baffled, not quite sure what was happening, yet feeling she was withstanding him. he glanced at her face: it was inscrutable: it was her cleopatra face once more, yet with something new and warm in it. he could not understand it. what was it in her face that puzzled him? almost angered him? but she could not rob him of his male power, she could not divest him of his concentrated force. “won't you take off your coat?” she said, looking at him with strange, large dark eyes. a strange woman, he could not understand her. yet, as he sat down again, having removed his overcoat, he felt her looking at his limbs, his physical body. and this went against him, he did not want it. yet quite fixed in him too was the desire for her, her beautiful white arms, her whole soft white body. and such desire he would not contradict nor allow to be contradicted. it was his will also. her whole soft white body--to possess it in its entirety, its fulness. “what have you to do this morning?” she asked him. “nothing,” he said. “have you?” he lifted his head and looked at her. “nothing at all,” said she. and then they sat in silence, he with his head dropped. then again he looked at her. “shall we be lovers?” he said. she sat with her face averted, and did not answer. his heart struck heavily, but he did not relax. “shall we be lovers?” came his voice once more, with the faintest touch of irony. her face gradually grew dusky. and he wondered very much to see it. “yes,” said she, still not looking at him. “if you wish.” “i do wish,” he said. and all the time he sat with his eyes fixed on her face, and she sat with her face averted. “now?” he said. “and where?” again she was silent for some moments, as if struggling with herself. then she looked at him--a long, strange, dark look, incomprehensible, and which he did not like. “you don't want emotions? you don't want me to say things, do you?” he said. a faint ironic smile came on her face. “i know what all that is worth,” she said, with curious calm equanimity. “no, i want none of that.” “then--?” but now she sat gazing on him with wide, heavy, incomprehensible eyes. it annoyed him. “what do you want to see in me?” he asked, with a smile, looking steadily back again. and now she turned aside her face once more, and once more the dusky colour came in her cheek. he waited. “shall i go away?” he said at length. “would you rather?” she said, keeping her face averted. “no,” he said. then again she was silent. “where shall i come to you?” he said. she paused a moment still, then answered: “i'll go to my room.” “i don't know which it is,” he said. “i'll show it you,” she said. “and then i shall come to you in ten minutes. in ten minutes,” he reiterated. so she rose, and led the way out of the little salon. he walked with her to the door of her room, bowed his head as she looked at him, holding the door handle; and then he turned and went back to the drawing-room, glancing at his watch. in the drawing-room he stood quite still, with his feet apart, and waited. he stood with his hands behind him, and his feet apart, quite motionless, planted and firm. so the minutes went by unheeded. he looked at his watch. the ten minutes were just up. he had heard footsteps and doors. so he decided to give her another five minutes. he wished to be quite sure that she had had her own time for her own movements. then at the end of the five minutes he went straight to her room, entered, and locked the door behind him. she was lying in bed, with her back to him. he found her strange, not as he had imagined her. not powerful, as he had imagined her. strange, in his arms she seemed almost small and childish, whilst in daily life she looked a full, womanly woman. strange, the naked way she clung to him! almost like a sister, a younger sister! or like a child! it filled him with a curious wonder, almost a bewilderment. in the dark sightlessness of passion, she seemed almost like a clinging child in his arms. and yet like a child who in some deep and essential way mocked him. in some strange and incomprehensible way, as a girl-child blindly obstinate in her deepest nature, she was against him. he felt she was not his woman. through him went the feeling, “this is not my woman.” when, after a long sleep, he awoke and came fully to himself, with that click of awakeness which is the end, the first shades were closing on the afternoon. he got up and reached for his watch. “quarter past four,” he said. her eyes stretched wide with surprise as she looked at him. but she said nothing. the same strange and wide, perhaps insatiable child-like curiosity was in her eyes as she watched him. he dressed very quickly. and her eyes were wide, and she said no single word. but when he was dressed, and bent over her to say goodbye, she put her arms round him, that seemed such frail and childish arms now, yet withal so deadly in power. her soft arms round his neck, her tangle of hair over his face. and yet, even as he kissed her, he felt her deadly. he wanted to be gone. he wanted to get out of her arms and her clinging and her tangle of hair and her curiosity and her strange and hateful power. “you'll come again. we'll be like this again?” she whispered. and it was hard for him to realise that this was that other woman, who had sat so silently on the sofa, so darkly and reservedly, at the tea at algy's. “yes! i will! goodbye now!” and he kissed her, and walked straight out of the room. quickly he took his coat and his hat, quickly, and left the house. in his nostrils was still the scent with which the bed linen was faintly scented--he did not know what it was. but now he wiped his face and his mouth, to wipe it away. he had eaten nothing since coffee that morning, and was hungry, faint-feeling. and his face, and his mind, felt withered. curiously he felt blasted as if blighted by some electricity. and he knew, he knew quite well he was only in possession of a tithe of his natural faculties. and in his male spirit he felt himself hating her: hating her deeply, damnably. but he said to himself: “no, i won't hate her. i won't hate her.” so he went on, over the ponte vecchio, where the jeweller's windows on the bridge were already blazing with light, on into the town. he wanted to eat something, so he decided to go to a shop he knew, where one could stand and eat good tiny rolls split into truffle or salami sandwiches, and drink marsala. so one after the other he ate little truffle rolls, and drank a few glasses of marsala. and then he did not know what to do. he did not want to eat any more, he had had what he wanted. his hunger had been more nervous than sensual. so he went into the street. it was just growing dark and the town was lighting up. he felt curiously blazed, as if some flame or electric power had gone through him and withered his vital tissue. blazed, as if some kind of electric flame had run over him and withered him. his brain felt withered, his mind had only one of its many-sighted eyes left open and unscorched. so many of the eyes of his mind were scorched now and sightless. yet a restlessness was in his nerves. what should he do? he remembered he had a letter in his pocket from sir william franks. sir william had still teased him about his fate and his providence, in which he, aaron, was supposed to trust. “i shall be very glad to hear from you, and to know how your benevolent providence--or was yours a fate--has treated you since we saw you---” so, aaron turned away, and walked to the post office. there he took paper, and sat down at one of the tables in the writing room, and wrote his answer. it was very strange, writing thus when most of his mind's eyes were scorched, and it seemed he could hardly see to hold the pen, to drive it straight across the paper. yet write he must. and most of his faculties being quenched or blasted for the moment, he wrote perhaps his greatest, or his innermost, truth.--“i don't want my fate or my providence to treat me well. i don't want kindness or love. i don't believe in harmony and people loving one another. i believe in the fight and in nothing else. i believe in the fight which is in everything. and if it is a question of women, i believe in the fight of love, even if it blinds me. and if it is a question of the world, i believe in fighting it and in having it hate me, even if it breaks my legs. i want the world to hate me, because i can't bear the thought that it might love me. for of all things love is the most deadly to me, and especially from such a repulsive world as i think this is....” well, here was a letter for a poor old man to receive. but, in the dryness of his withered mind, aaron got it out of himself. when a man writes a letter to himself, it is a pity to post it to somebody else. perhaps the same is true of a book. his letter written, however, he stamped it and sealed it and put it in the box. that made it final. then he turned towards home. one fact remained unbroken in the debris of his consciousness: that in the town was lilly: and that when he needed, he could go to lilly: also, that in the world was lottie, his wife: and that against lottie, his heart burned with a deep, deep, almost unreachable bitterness.--like a deep burn on his deepest soul, lottie. and like a fate which he resented, yet which steadied him, lilly. he went home and lay on his bed. he had enough self-command to hear the gong and go down to dinner. white and abstract-looking, he sat and ate his dinner. and then, thank god, he could go to bed, alone, in his own cold bed, alone, thank god. to be alone in the night! for this he was unspeakably thankful. chapter xix. cleopatra, but not anthony aaron awoke in the morning feeling better, but still only a part himself. the night alone had restored him. and the need to be alone still was his greatest need. he felt an intense resentment against the marchesa. he felt that somehow, she had given him a scorpion. and his instinct was to hate her. and yet he avoided hating her. he remembered lilly--and the saying that one must possess oneself, and be alone in possession of oneself. and somehow, under the influence of lilly, he refused to follow the reflex of his own passion. he refused to hate the marchesa. he _did_ like her. he did _esteem_ her. and after all, she too was struggling with her fate. he had a genuine sympathy with her. nay, he was not going to hate her. but he could not see her. he could not bear the thought that she might call and see him. so he took the tram to settignano, and walked away all day into the country, having bread and sausage in his pocket. he sat for long hours among the cypress trees of tuscany. and never had any trees seemed so like ghosts, like soft, strange, pregnant presences. he lay and watched tall cypresses breathing and communicating, faintly moving and as it were walking in the small wind. and his soul seemed to leave him and to go far away, far back, perhaps, to where life was all different and time passed otherwise than time passes now. as in clairvoyance he perceived it: that our life is only a fragment of the shell of life. that there has been and will be life, human life such as we do not begin to conceive. much that is life has passed away from men, leaving us all mere bits. in the dark, mindful silence and inflection of the cypress trees, lost races, lost language, lost human ways of feeling and of knowing. men have known as we can no more know, have felt as we can no more feel. great life-realities gone into the darkness. but the cypresses commemorate. in the afternoon, aaron felt the cypresses rising dark about him, like so many high visitants from an old, lost, lost subtle world, where men had the wonder of demons about them, the aura of demons, such as still clings to the cypresses, in tuscany. all day, he did not make up his mind what he was going to do. his first impulse was never to see her again. and this was his intention all day. but as he went home in the tram he softened, and thought. nay, that would not be fair. for how had she treated him, otherwise than generously. she had been generous, and the other thing, that he felt blasted afterwards, which was his experience, that was fate, and not her fault. so he must see her again. he must not act like a churl. but he would tell her--he would tell her that he was a married man, and that though he had left his wife, and though he had no dogma of fidelity, still, the years of marriage had made a married man of him, and any other woman than his wife was a strange woman to him, a violation. “i will tell her,” he said to himself, “that at the bottom of my heart i love lottie still, and that i can't help it. i believe that is true. it isn't love, perhaps. but it is marriage. i am married to lottie. and that means i can't be married to another woman. it isn't my nature. and perhaps i can't bear to live with lottie now, because i am married and not in love. when a man is married, he is not in love. a husband is not a lover. lilly told me that: and i know it's true now. lilly told me that a husband cannot be a lover, and a lover cannot be a husband. and that women will only have lovers now, and never a husband. well, i am a husband, if i am anything. and i shall never be a lover again, not while i live. no, not to anybody. i haven't it in me. i'm a husband, and so it is finished with me as a lover. i can't be a lover any more, just as i can't be aged twenty any more. i am a man now, not an adolescent. and to my sorrow i am a husband to a woman who wants a lover: always a lover. but all women want lovers. and i can't be it any more. i don't want to. i have finished that. finished for ever: unless i become senile---” therefore next day he gathered up his courage. he would not have had courage unless he had known that he was not alone. the other man was in the town, and from this fact he derived his strength: the fact that lilly was there. so at teatime he went over the river, and rang at her door. yes, she was at home, and she had other visitors. she was wearing a beautiful soft afternoon dress, again of a blue like chicory-flowers, a pale, warm blue. and she had cornflowers in her belt: heaven knows where she had got them. she greeted aaron with some of the childish shyness. he could tell that she was glad he had come, and that she had wondered at his not coming sooner. she introduced him to her visitors: two young ladies and one old lady and one elderly italian count. the conversation was mostly in french or italian, so aaron was rather out of it. however, the visitors left fairly early, so aaron stayed them out. when they had gone, he asked: “where is manfredi?” “he will come in soon. at about seven o'clock.” then there was a silence again. “you are dressed fine today,” he said to her. “am i?” she smiled. he was never able to make out quite what she felt, what she was feeling. but she had a quiet little air of proprietorship in him, which he did not like. “you will stay to dinner tonight, won't you?” she said. “no--not tonight,” he said. and then, awkwardly, he added: “you know. i think it is better if we are friends--not lovers. you know--i don't feel free. i feel my wife, i suppose, somewhere inside me. and i can't help it---” she bent her head and was silent for some moments. then she lifted her face and looked at him oddly. “yes,” she said. “i am sure you love your wife.” the reply rather staggered him--and to tell the truth, annoyed him. “well,” he said. “i don't know about love. but when one has been married for ten years--and i did love her--then--some sort of bond or something grows. i think some sort of connection grows between us, you know. and it isn't natural, quite, to break it.--do you know what i mean?” she paused a moment. then, very softly, almost gently, she said: “yes, i do. i know so well what you mean.” he was really surprised at her soft acquiescence. what _did_ she mean? “but we can be friends, can't we?” he said. “yes, i hope so. why, yes! goodness, yes! i should be sorry if we couldn't be friends.” after which speech he felt that everything was all right--everything was a-one. and when manfredi came home, the first sound he heard was the flute and his wife's singing. “i'm so glad you've come,” his wife said to him. “shall we go into the sala and have real music? will you play?” “i should love to,” replied the husband. behold them then in the big drawing-room, and aaron and the marchese practising together, and the marchesa singing an italian folk-song while her husband accompanied her on the pianoforte. but her singing was rather strained and forced. still, they were quite a little family, and it seemed quite nice. as soon as she could, the marchesa left the two men together, whilst she sat apart. aaron and manfredi went through old italian and old german music, tried one thing and then another, and seemed quite like brothers. they arranged a piece which they should play together on a saturday morning, eight days hence. the next day, saturday, aaron went to one of the del torre music mornings. there was a string quartette--and a violin soloist--and the marchese at the piano. the audience, some dozen or fourteen friends, sat at the near end of the room, or in the smaller salotta, whilst the musicians performed at the further end of the room. the lillys were there, both tanny and her husband. but apart from these, aaron knew nobody, and felt uncomfortable. the marchesa gave her guests little sandwiches and glasses of wine or marsala or vermouth, as they chose. and she was quite the hostess: the well-bred and very simple, but still the conventional hostess. aaron did not like it. and he could see that lilly too was unhappy. in fact, the little man bolted the moment he could, dragging after him the indignant tanny, who was so looking forward to the excellent little sandwiches. but no--lilly just rudely bolted. aaron followed as soon as he could. “will you come to dinner tomorrow evening?” said his hostess to him as he was leaving. and he agreed. he had really resented seeing her as a conventional hostess, attending so charmingly to all the other people, and treating him so merely as one of the guests, among many others. so that when at the last moment she quietly invited him to dinner next day, he was flattered and accepted at once. the next day was sunday--the seventh day after his coming together with the marchesa--which had taken place on the monday. and already he was feeling much less dramatic in his decision to keep himself apart from her, to be merely friends. already the memory of the last time was fanning up in him, not as a warning but as a terrible incitement. again the naked desire was getting hold of him, with that peculiar brutal powerfulness which startled him and also pleased him. so that by the time sunday morning came, his recoil had exhausted itself, and he was ready again, eager again, but more wary this time. he sat in his room alone in the morning, playing his flute, playing over from memory the tunes she loved, and imagining how he and she would get into unison in the evening. his flute, his aaron's rod, would blossom once again with splendid scarlet flowers, the red florentine lilies. it was curious, the passion he had for her: just unalloyed desire, and nothing else. something he had not known in his life before. previously there had been always _some_ personal quality, some sort of personal tenderness. but here, none. she did not seem to want it. she seemed to hate it, indeed. no, all he felt was stark, naked desire, without a single pretension. true enough, his last experience had been a warning to him. his desire and himself likewise had broken rather disastrously under the proving. but not finally broken. he was ready again. and with all the sheer powerful insolence of desire he looked forward to the evening. for he almost expected manfredi would not be there. the officer had said something about having to go to padua on the saturday afternoon. so aaron went skipping off to his appointment, at seven o'clock. judge of his chagrin, then, when he found already seated in the salotta an elderly, quite well-known, very cultured and very well-connected english authoress. she was charming, in her white hair and dress of soft white wool and white lace, with a long chain of filigree gold beads, like bubbles. she was charming in her old-fashioned manner too, as if the world were still safe and stable, like a garden in which delightful culture, and choice ideas bloomed safe from wind and weather. alas, never was aaron more conscious of the crude collapse in the world than when he listened to this animated, young-seeming lady from the safe days of the seventies. all the old culture and choice ideas seemed like blowing bubbles. and dear old corinna wade, she seemed to be blowing bubbles still, as she sat there so charming in her soft white dress, and talked with her bright animation about the influence of woman in parliament and the influence of woman in the periclean day. aaron listened spell-bound, watching the bubbles float round his head, and almost hearing them go pop. to complete the party arrived an elderly litterateur who was more proud of his not-very-important social standing than of his literature. in fact he was one of those english snobs of the old order, living abroad. perfectly well dressed for the evening, his grey hair and his prim face was the most well-dressed thing to be met in north italy. “oh, so glad to see you, mr. french. i didn't know you were in florence again. you make that journey from venice so often. i wonder you don't get tired of it,” cried corinna wade. “no,” he said. “so long as duty to england calls me to florence, i shall come to florence. but i can live in no town but venice.” “no, i suppose you can't. well, there is something special about venice: having no streets and no carriages, and moving about in a gondola. i suppose it is all much more soothing.” “much less nerve-racking, yes. and then there is a quality in the whole life. of course i see few english people in venice--only the old venetian families, as a rule.” “ah, yes. that must be very interesting. they are very exclusive still, the venetian _noblesse_?” said miss wade. “oh, very exclusive,” said mr. french. “that is one of the charms. venice is really altogether exclusive. it excludes the world, really, and defies time and modern movement. yes, in spite of the steamers on the canal, and the tourists.” “that is so. that is so. venice is a strange back-water. and the old families are very proud still, in these democratic days. they have a great opinion of themselves, i am told.” “well,” said mr. french. “perhaps you know the rhyme: “'veneziano gran' signore padovano buon' dotore. vicenzese mangia il gatto veronese tutto matto---'” “how very amusing!” said miss wade. “_veneziana_ gran' signore. the venetian is a great gentleman! yes, i know they are all convinced of it. really, how very amusing, in these advanced days. to be born a venetian, is to be born a great gentleman! but this outdoes divine right of king.” “to be born a venetian gentleman, is to be born a great gentleman,” said mr. french, rather fussily. “you seriously think so?” said miss wade. “well now, what do you base your opinion on?” mr. french gave various bases for his opinion. “yes--interesting. very interesting. rather like the byzantines--lingering on into far other ages. anna comnena always charmed me very much. how she despised the flower of the north--even tancred! and so the lingering venetian families! and you, in your palazzo on the grand canal: you are a northern barbarian civilised into the old venetian signoria. but how very romantic a situation!” it was really amusing to see the old maid, how she skirmished and hit out gaily, like an old jaunty free lance: and to see the old bachelor, how prim he was, and nervy and fussy and precious, like an old maid. but need we say that mr. aaron felt very much out of it. he sat and listened, with a sardonic small smile on his face and a sardonic gleam in his blue eyes, that looked so very blue on such an occasion. he made the two elderly people uncomfortable with his silence: his democratic silence, miss wade might have said. however, miss wade lived out towards galuzzo, so she rose early, to catch her tram. and mr. french gallantly and properly rose to accompany her, to see her safe on board. which left aaron and the marchesa alone. “what time is manfredi coming back?” said he. “tomorrow,” replied she. there was a pause. “why do you have those people?” he asked. “who?” “those two who were here this evening.” “miss wade and mr. french?--oh, i like miss wade so very much. she is so refreshing.” “those old people,” said aaron. “they licked the sugar off the pill, and go on as if everything was toffee. and we've got to swallow the pill. it's easy to be refreshing---” “no, don't say anything against her. i like her so much.” “and him?” “mr. french!--well, he's perhaps a little like the princess who felt the pea through three feather-beds. but he can be quite witty, and an excellent conversationalist, too. oh yes, i like him quite well.” “matter of taste,” said aaron. they had not much to say to one another. the time passed, in the pauses. he looked at his watch. “i shall have to go,” he said. “won't you stay?” she said, in a small, muted voice. “stay all night?” he said. “won't you?” “yes,” he said quietly. did he not feel the strength of his desire on him. after which she said no more. only she offered him whiskey and soda, which he accepted. “go then,” he said to her. “and i'll come to you.--shall i come in fifteen minutes?” she looked at him with strange, slow dark eyes. and he could not understand. “yes,” she said. and she went. and again, this night as before, she seemed strangely small and clinging in his arms. and this night he felt his passion drawn from him as if a long, live nerve were drawn out from his body, a long live thread of electric fire, a long, living nerve finely extracted from him, from the very roots of his soul. a long fine discharge of pure, bluish fire, from the core of his soul. it was an excruciating, but also an intensely gratifying sensation. this night he slept with a deeper obliviousness than before. but ah, as it grew towards morning how he wished he could be alone. they must stay together till the day was light. and she seemed to love clinging to him and curling strangely on his breast. he could never reconcile it with her who was a hostess entertaining her guests. how could she now in a sort of little ecstasy curl herself and nestle herself on his, aaron's breast, tangling his face all over with her hair. he verily believed that this was what she really wanted of him: to curl herself on his naked breast, to make herself small, small, to feel his arms around her, while he himself was remote, silent, in some way inaccessible. this seemed almost to make her beside herself with gratification. but why, why? was it because he was one of her own race, and she, as it were, crept right home to him? he did not know. he only knew it had nothing to do with him: and that, save out of _complaisance_, he did not want it. it simply blasted his own central life. it simply blighted him. and she clung to him closer. strange, she was afraid of him! afraid of him as of a fetish! fetish afraid, and fetish-fascinated! or was her fear only a delightful game of cat and mouse? or was the fear genuine, and the delight the greater: a sort of sacrilege? the fear, and the dangerous, sacrilegious power over that which she feared. in some way, she was not afraid of him at all. in some other way she used him as a mere magic implement, used him with the most amazing priestess-craft. himself, the individual man which he was, this she treated with an indifference that was startling to him. he forgot, perhaps, that this was how he had treated her. his famous desire for her, what had it been but this same attempt to strike a magic fire out of her, for his own ecstasy. they were playing the same game of fire. in him, however, there was all the time something hard and reckless and defiant, which stood apart. she was absolutely gone in her own incantations. she was absolutely gone, like a priestess utterly involved in her terrible rites. and he was part of the ritual only, god and victim in one. god and victim! all the time, god and victim. when his aloof soul realised, amid the welter of incantation, how he was being used,--not as himself but as something quite different--god and victim--then he dilated with intense surprise, and his remote soul stood up tall and knew itself alone. he didn't want it, not at all. he knew he was apart. and he looked back over the whole mystery of their love-contact. only his soul was apart. he was aware of the strength and beauty and godlikeness that his breast was then to her--the magic. but himself, he stood far off, like moses' sister miriam. she would drink the one drop of his innermost heart's blood, and he would be carrion. as cleopatra killed her lovers in the morning. surely they knew that death was their just climax. they had approached the climax. accept then. but his soul stood apart, and could have nothing to do with it. if he had really been tempted, he would have gone on, and she might have had his central heart's blood. yes, and thrown away the carrion. he would have been willing. but fatally, he was not tempted. his soul stood apart and decided. at the bottom of his soul he disliked her. or if not her, then her whole motive. her whole life-mode. he was neither god nor victim: neither greater nor less than himself. his soul, in its isolation as she lay on his breast, chose it so, with the soul's inevitability. so, there was no temptation. when it was sufficiently light, he kissed her and left her. quietly he left the silent flat. he had some difficulty in unfastening the various locks and bars and catches of the massive door downstairs, and began, in irritation and anger, to feel he was a prisoner, that he was locked in. but suddenly the ponderous door came loose, and he was out in the street. the door shut heavily behind him, with a shudder. he was out in the morning streets of florence. chapter xx. the broken rod the day was rainy. aaron stayed indoors alone, and copied music and slept. he felt the same stunned, withered feeling as before, but less intensely, less disastrously, this time. he knew now, without argument or thought that he would never go again to the marchesa: not as a lover. he would go away from it all. he did not dislike her. but he would never see her again. a great gulf had opened, leaving him alone on the far side. he did not go out till after dinner. when he got downstairs he found the heavy night-door closed. he wondered: then remembered the signorina's fear of riots and disturbances. as again he fumbled with the catches, he felt that the doors of florence were trying to prevent his egress. however, he got out. it was a very dark night, about nine o'clock, and deserted seeming. he was struck by the strange, deserted feeling of the city's atmosphere. yet he noticed before him, at the foot of the statue, three men, one with a torch: a long torch with naked flames. the men were stooping over something dark, the man with the torch bending forward too. it was a dark, weird little group, like mediaeval florence. aaron lingered on his doorstep, watching. he could not see what they were doing. but now, the two were crouching down; over a long dark object on the ground, and the one with the torch bending also to look. what was it? they were just at the foot of the statue, a dark little group under the big pediment, the torch-flames weirdly flickering as the torch-bearer moved and stooped lower to the two crouching men, who seemed to be kneeling. aaron felt his blood stir. there was something dark and mysterious, stealthy, in the little scene. it was obvious the men did not want to draw attention, they were so quiet and furtive-seeming. and an eerie instinct prevented aaron's going nearer to look. instead, he swerved on to the lungarno, and went along the top of the square, avoiding the little group in the centre. he walked the deserted dark-seeming street by the river, then turned inwards, into the city. he was going to the piazza vittoria emmanuele, to sit in the cafe which is the centre of florence at night. there he could sit for an hour, and drink his vermouth and watch the florentines. as he went along one of the dark, rather narrow streets, he heard a hurrying of feet behind him. glancing round, he saw the torch-bearer coming along at a trot, holding his flaming torch up in front of him as he trotted down the middle of the narrow dark street. aaron shrank under the wall. the trotting torch-bearer drew near, and now aaron perceived the other two men slowly trotting behind, stealthily, bearing a stretcher on which a body was wrapped up, completely and darkly covered. the torch-bearer passed, the men with the stretcher passed too, hastily and stealthily, the flickering flames revealing them. they took no notice of aaron, no notice of anything, but trotted softly on towards the centre of the city. their queer, quick footsteps echoed down the distance. then aaron too resumed his way. he came to the large, brilliantly-lighted cafe. it was sunday evening, and the place was full. men, florentines, many, many men sat in groups and in twos and threes at the little marble tables. they were mostly in dark clothes or black overcoats. they had mostly been drinking just a cup of coffee--others however had glasses of wine or liquor. but mostly it was just a little coffee-tray with a tiny coffee pot and a cup and saucer. there was a faint film of tobacco smoke. and the men were all talking: talking, talking with that peculiar intensity of the florentines. aaron felt the intense, compressed sound of many half-secret voices. for the little groups and couples abated their voices, none wished that others should hear what they said. aaron was looking for a seat--there was no table to him-—when suddenly someone took him by the arm. it was argyle. “come along, now! come and join us. here, this way! come along!” aaron let himself be led away towards a corner. there sat lilly and a strange man: called levison. the room was warm. aaron could never bear to be too hot. after sitting a minute, he rose and took off his coat, and hung it on a stand near the window. as he did so he felt the weight of his flute--it was still in his pocket. and he wondered if it was safe to leave it. “i suppose no one will steal from the overcoat pockets,” he said, as he sat down. “my dear chap, they'd steal the gold filling out of your teeth, if you happened to yawn,” said argyle. “why, have you left valuables in your overcoat?” “my flute,” said aaron. “oh, they won't steal that,” said argyle. “besides,” said lilly, “we should see anyone who touched it.” and so they settled down to the vermouth. “well,” said argyle, “what have you been doing with yourself, eh? i haven't seen a glimpse of you for a week. been going to the dogs, eh?” “or the bitches,” said aaron. “oh, but look here, that's bad! that's bad! i can see i shall have to take you in hand, and commence my work of reform. oh, i'm a great reformer, a zwingli and savonarola in one. i couldn't count the number of people i've led into the right way. it takes some finding, you know. strait is the gate--damned strait sometimes. a damned tight squeeze....” argyle was somewhat intoxicated. he spoke with a slight slur, and laughed, really tickled at his own jokes. the man levison smiled acquiescent. but lilly was not listening. his brow was heavy and he seemed abstracted. he hardly noticed aaron's arrival. “did you see the row yesterday?” asked levison. “no,” said aaron. “what was it?” it was the socialists. they were making a demonstration against the imprisonment of one of the railway-strikers. i was there. they went on all right, with a good bit of howling and gibing: a lot of young louts, you know. and the shop-keepers shut up shop, and nobody showed the italian flag, of course. well, when they came to the via benedetto croce, there were a few mounted carabinieri. so they stopped the procession, and the sergeant said that the crowd could continue, could go on where they liked, but would they not go down the via verrocchio, because it was being repaired, the roadway was all up, and there were piles of cobble stones. these might prove a temptation and lead to trouble. so would the demonstrators not take that road--they might take any other they liked.--well, the very moment he had finished, there was a revolver shot, he made a noise, and fell forward over his horse's nose. one of the anarchists had shot him. then there was hell let loose, the carabinieri fired back, and people were bolting and fighting like devils. i cleared out, myself. but my god--what do you think of it?” “seems pretty mean,” said aaron. “mean!--he had just spoken them fair--they could go where they liked, only would they not go down the one road, because of the heap of stones. and they let him finish. and then shot him dead.” “was he dead?” said aaron. “yes--killed outright, the nazione says.” there was a silence. the drinkers in the cafe all continued to talk vehemently, casting uneasy glances. “well,” said argyle, “if you let loose the dogs of war, you mustn't expect them to come to heel again in five minutes.” “but there's no fair play about it, not a bit,” said levison. “ah, my dear fellow, are you still so young and callow that you cherish the illusion of fair play?” said argyle. “yes, i am,” said levison. “live longer and grow wiser,” said argyle, rather contemptuously. “are you a socialist?” asked levison. “am i my aunt tabitha's dachshund bitch called bella,” said argyle, in his musical, indifferent voice. “yes, bella's her name. and if you can tell me a damneder name for a dog, i shall listen, i assure you, attentively.” “but you haven't got an aunt called tabitha,” said aaron. “haven't i? oh, haven't i? i've got two aunts called tabitha: if not more.” “they aren't of any vital importance to you, are they?” said levison. “not the very least in the world--if it hadn't been that my elder aunt tabitha had christened her dachshund bitch bella. i cut myself off from the family after that. oh, i turned over a new leaf, with not a family name on it. couldn't stand bella amongst the rest.” “you must have strained most of the gnats out of your drink, argyle,” said lilly, laughing. “assiduously! assiduously! i can't stand these little vermin. oh, i am quite indifferent about swallowing a camel or two--or even a whole string of dromedaries. how charmingly eastern that sounds! but gnats! not for anything in the world would i swallow one.” “you're a bit of a socialist though, aren't you?” persisted levison, now turning to lilly. “no,” said lilly. “i was.” “and am no more,” said argyle sarcastically. “my dear fellow, the only hope of salvation for the world lies in the re-institution of slavery.” “what kind of slavery?” asked levison. “slavery! slavery! when i say slavery i don't mean any of your damned modern reform cant. i mean solid sound slavery on which the greek and the roman world rested. far finer worlds than ours, my dear chap! oh far finer! and can't be done without slavery. simply can't be done.--oh, they'll all come to realise it, when they've had a bit more of this democratic washer-women business.” levison was laughing, with a slight sneer down his nose. “anyhow, there's no immediate danger--or hope, if you prefer it--of the re-instituting of classic slavery,” he said. “unfortunately no. we are all such fools,” said argyle. “besides,” said levison, “who would you make slaves of?” “everybody, my dear chap: beginning with the idealists and the theorising jews, and after them your nicely-bred gentlemen, and then perhaps, your profiteers and rothschilds, and all politicians, and ending up with the proletariat,” said argyle. “then who would be the masters?--the professional classes, doctors and lawyers and so on?” “what? masters. they would be the sewerage slaves, as being those who had made most smells.” there was a moment's silence. “the only fault i have to find with your system,” said levison, rather acidly, “is that there would be only one master, and everybody else slaves.” “do you call that a fault? what do you want with more than one master? are you asking for several?--well, perhaps there's cunning in that.--cunning devils, cunning devils, these theorising slaves--” and argyle pushed his face with a devilish leer into aaron's face. “cunning devils!” he reiterated, with a slight tipsy slur. “that be-fouled epictetus wasn't the last of 'em--nor the first. oh, not by any means, not by any means.” here lilly could not avoid a slight spasm of amusement. “but returning to serious conversation,” said levison, turning his rather sallow face to lilly. “i think you'll agree with me that socialism is the inevitable next step--” lilly waited for some time without answering. then he said, with unwilling attention to the question: “i suppose it's the logically inevitable next step.” “use logic as lavatory paper,” cried argyle harshly. “yes--logically inevitable--and humanly inevitable at the same time. some form of socialism is bound to come, no matter how you postpone it or try variations,” said levison. “all right, let it come,” said lilly. “it's not my affair, neither to help it nor to keep it back, or even to try varying it.” “there i don't follow you,” said levison. “suppose you were in russia now--” “i watch it i'm not.” “but you're in italy, which isn't far off. supposing a socialist revolution takes place all around you. won't that force the problem on you?--it is every man's problem,” persisted levison. “not mine,” said lilly. “how shall you escape it?” said levison. “because to me it is no problem. to bolsh or not to bolsh, as far as my mind goes, presents no problem. not any more than to be or not to be. to be or not to be is simply no problem--” “no, i quite agree, that since you are already existing, and since death is ultimately inevitable, to be or not to be is no sound problem,” said levison. “but the parallel isn't true of socialism. that is not a problem of existence, but of a certain mode of existence which centuries of thought and action on the part of europe have now made logically inevitable for europe. and therefore there is a problem. there is more than a problem, there is a dilemma. either we must go to the logical conclusion--or--” “somewhere else,” said lilly. “yes--yes. precisely! but where else? that's the one half of the problem: supposing you do not agree to a logical progression in human social activity. because after all, human society through the course of ages only enacts, spasmodically but still inevitably, the logical development of a given idea.” “well, then, i tell you.--the idea and the ideal has for me gone dead--dead as carrion--” “which idea, which ideal precisely?” “the ideal of love, the ideal that it is better to give than to receive, the ideal of liberty, the ideal of the brotherhood of man, the ideal of the sanctity of human life, the ideal of what we call goodness, charity, benevolence, public spirited-ness, the ideal of sacrifice for a cause, the ideal of unity and unanimity--all the lot--all the whole beehive of ideals--has all got the modern bee-disease, and gone putrid, stinking.--and when the ideal is dead and putrid, the logical sequence is only stink.--which, for me, is the truth concerning the ideal of good, peaceful, loving humanity and its logical sequence in socialism and equality, equal opportunity or whatever you like.--but this time he stinketh--and i'm sorry for any christus who brings him to life again, to stink livingly for another thirty years: the beastly lazarus of our idealism.” “that may be true for you--” “but it's true for nobody else,” said lilly. “all the worse for them. let them die of the bee-disease.” “not only that,” persisted levison, “but what is your alternative? is it merely nihilism?” “my alternative,” said lilly, “is an alternative for no one but myself, so i'll keep my mouth shut about it.” “that isn't fair.” “i tell you, the ideal of fairness stinks with the rest.--i have no obligation to say what i think.” “yes, if you enter into conversation, you have--” “bah, then i didn't enter into conversation.--the only thing is, i agree in the rough with argyle. you've got to have a sort of slavery again. people are not men: they are insects and instruments, and their destiny is slavery. they are too many for me, and so what i think is ineffectual. but ultimately they will be brought to agree--after sufficient extermination--and then they will elect for themselves a proper and healthy and energetic slavery.” “i should like to know what you mean by slavery. because to me it is impossible that slavery should be healthy and energetic. you seem to have some other idea in your mind, and you merely use the word slavery out of exasperation--” “i mean it none the less. i mean a real committal of the life-issue of inferior beings to the responsibility of a superior being.” “it'll take a bit of knowing, who are the inferior and which is the superior,” said levison sarcastically. “not a bit. it is written between a man's brows, which he is.” “i'm afraid we shall all read differently.” “so long as we're liars.” “and putting that question aside: i presume that you mean that this committal of the life-issue of inferior beings to someone higher shall be made voluntarily--a sort of voluntary self-gift of the inferiors--” “yes--more or less--and a voluntary acceptance. for it's no pretty gift, after all.--but once made it must be held fast by genuine power. oh yes--no playing and fooling about with it. permanent and very efficacious power.” “you mean military power?” “i do, of course.” here levison smiled a long, slow, subtle smile of ridicule. it all seemed to him the preposterous pretentiousness of a megalomaniac--one whom, after a while, humanity would probably have the satisfaction of putting into prison, or into a lunatic asylum. and levison felt strong, overwhelmingly strong, in the huge social power with which he, insignificant as he was, was armed against such criminal-imbecile pretensions as those above set forth. prison or the lunatic asylum. the face of the fellow gloated in these two inevitable engines of his disapproval. “it will take you some time before you'll get your doctrines accepted,” he said. “accepted! i'd be sorry. i don't want a lot of swine snouting and sniffing at me with their acceptance.--bah, levison--one can easily make a fool of you. do you take this as my gospel?” “i take it you are speaking seriously.” here lilly broke into that peculiar, gay, whimsical smile. “but i should say the blank opposite with just as much fervour,” he declared. “do you mean to say you don't mean what you've been saying?” said levison, now really looking angry. “why, i'll tell you the real truth,” said lilly. “i think every man is a sacred and holy individual, never to be violated; i think there is only one thing i hate to the verge of madness, and that is bullying. to see any living creature bullied, in any way, almost makes a murderer of me. that is true. do you believe it--?” “yes,” said levison unwillingly. “that may be true as well. you have no doubt, like most of us, got a complex nature which--” c r a s h! there intervened one awful minute of pure shock, when the soul was in darkness. out of this shock aaron felt himself issuing amid a mass of terrible sensations: the fearful blow of the explosion, the noise of glass, the hoarse howl of people, the rushing of men, the sudden gulf, the awful gulfing whirlpool of horror in the social life. he stood in agony and semi-blindness amid a chaos. then as he began to recover his consciousness, he found himself standing by a pillar some distance from where he had been sitting: he saw a place where tables and chairs were all upside down, legs in the air, amid debris of glass and breakage: he saw the cafe almost empty, nearly everybody gone: he saw the owner, or the manager, advancing aghast to the place of debris: he saw lilly standing not far off, white as a sheet, and as if unconscious. and still he had no idea of what had happened. he thought perhaps something had broken down. he could not understand. lilly began to look round. he caught aaron's eye. and then aaron began to approach his friend. “what is it?” he asked. “a bomb,” said lilly. the manager, and one old waiter, and three or four youths had now advanced to the place of debris. and now aaron saw that a man was lying there--and horror, blood was running across the floor of the cafe. men began now hastily to return to the place. some seized their hats and departed again at once. but many began to crowd in--a black eager crowd of men pressing to where the bomb had burst--where the man was lying. it was rather dark, some of the lamps were broken--but enough still shone. men surged in with that eager, excited zest of people, when there has been an accident. grey carabinieri, and carabinieri in the cocked hat and fine sunday uniform pressed forward officiously. “let us go,” said lilly. and he went to the far corner, where his hat hung. but aaron looked in vain for his own hat. the bomb had fallen near the stand where he had hung it and his overcoat. “my hat and coat?” he said to lilly. lilly, not very tall, stood on tiptoe. then he climbed on a chair and looked round. then he squeezed past the crowd. aaron followed. on the other side of the crowd excited angry men were wrestling over overcoats that were mixed up with a broken marble table-top. aaron spied his own black hat under the sofa near the wall. he waited his turn and then in the confusion pressed forward to where the coats were. someone had dragged out his, and it lay on the floor under many feet. he managed, with a struggle, to get it from under the feet of the crowd. he felt at once for his flute. but his trampled, torn coat had no flute in its pocket. he pushed and struggled, caught sight of a section, and picked it up. but it was split right down, two silver stops were torn out, and a long thin spelch of wood was curiously torn off. he looked at it, and his heart stood still. no need to look for the rest. he felt utterly, utterly overcome--as if he didn't care what became of him any further. he didn't care whether he were hit by a bomb, or whether he himself threw the next bomb, and hit somebody. he just didn't care any more about anything in life or death. it was as if the reins of his life slipped from his hands. and he would let everything run where it would, so long as it did run. then he became aware of lilly's eyes on him--and automatically he joined the little man. “let us go,” said lilly. and they pushed their way through the door. the police were just marching across the square. aaron and lilly walked in the opposite direction. groups of people were watching. suddenly lilly swerved--in the middle of the road was a large black glisten of blood, trickling horribly. a wounded man had run from the blow and fallen here. aaron did not know where he was going. but in the via tournabuoni lilly turned towards the arno, and soon they were on the ponte santa trinita. “who threw the bomb?” said aaron. “i suppose an anarchist.” “it's all the same,” said aaron. the two men, as if unable to walk any further, leaned on the broad parapet of the bridge and looked at the water in the darkness of the still, deserted night. aaron still had his flute section in his hand, his overcoat over his arm. “is that your flute?” asked lilly. “bit of it. smashed.” “let me look.” he looked, and gave it back. “no good,” he said. “oh, no,” said aaron. “throw it in the river, aaron,” said lilly. aaron turned and looked at him. “throw it in the river,” repeated lilly. “it's an end.” aaron nervelessly dropped the flute into the stream. the two men stood leaning on the bridge-parapet, as if unable to move. “we shall have to go home,” said lilly. “tanny may hear of it and be anxious.” aaron was quite dumbfounded by the night's event: the loss of his flute. here was a blow he had not expected. and the loss was for him symbolistic. it chimed with something in his soul: the bomb, the smashed flute, the end. “there goes aaron's rod, then,” he said to lilly. “it'll grow again. it's a reed, a water-plant--you can't kill it,” said lilly, unheeding. “and me?” “you'll have to live without a rod, meanwhile.” to which pleasant remark aaron made no reply. chapter xxi. words he went home to bed: and dreamed a strange dream. he dreamed that he was in a country with which he was not acquainted. night was coming on, and he had nowhere to sleep. so he passed the mouth of a sort of cave or house, in which a woman, an old woman, sat. therefore he entered, and though he could not understand the language, still his second self understood. the cave was a house: and men came home from work. his second self assumed that they were tin-miners. he wandered uneasily to and fro, no one taking any particular notice of him. and he realized that there was a whole vast country spreading, a sort of underworld country, spreading away beyond him. he wandered from vast apartment to apartment, down narrow corridors like the roads in a mine. in one of the great square rooms, the men were going to eat. and it seemed to him that what they were going to eat was a man, naked man. but his second self knew that what appeared to his eyes as a man was really a man's skin stuffed tight with prepared meat, as the skin of a bologna sausage. this did not prevent his seeing the naked man who was to be eaten walk slowly and stiffly across the gangway and down the corridor. he saw him from behind. it was a big handsome man in the prime of life, quite naked and perhaps stupid. but of course he was only a skin stuffed with meat, whom the grey tin-miners were going to eat. aaron, the dream-aaron, turned another way, and strayed along the vast square rooms, cavern apartments. he came into one room where there were many children, all in white gowns. and they were all busily putting themselves to bed, in the many beds scattered about the room at haphazard. and each child went to bed with a wreath of flowers on its head, white flowers and pink, so it seemed. so there they all lay, in their flower-crowns in the vast space of the rooms. and aaron went away. he could not remember the following part. only he seemed to have passed through many grey domestic apartments, where were all women, all greyish in their clothes and appearance, being wives of the underground tin-miners. the men were away and the dream-aaron remembered with fear the food they were to eat. the next thing he could recall was, that he was in a boat. and now he was most definitely two people. his invisible, _conscious_ self, what we have called his second self, hovered as it were before the prow of the boat, seeing and knowing, but unseen. his other self, the palpable aaron, sat as a passenger in the boat, which was being rowed by the unknown people of this underworld. they stood up as they thrust the boat along. other passengers were in the boat too, women as well, but all of them unknown people, and not noticeable. the boat was upon a great lake in the underworld country, a lake of dark blue water, but crystal clear and very beautiful in colour. the second or invisible aaron sat in the prow and watched the fishes swimming suspended in the clear, beautiful dark-blue water. some were pale fish, some frightening-looking, like centipedes swimming, and some were dark fish, of definite form, and delightful to watch. the palpable or visible aaron sat at the side of the boat, on the end of the middle seat, with his naked right elbow leaning out over the side. and now the boat entered upon shallows. the impalpable aaron in the bows saw the whitish clay of the bottom swirl up in clouds at each thrust of the oars, whitish-clayey clouds which would envelope the strange fishes in a sudden mist. and on the right hand of the course stakes stood up in the water, at intervals, to mark the course. the boat must pass very near these stakes, almost touching. and aaron's naked elbow was leaning right over the side. as they approached the first stake, the boatmen all uttered a strange cry of warning, in a foreign language. the flesh-and-blood aaron seemed not even to hear. the invisible aaron heard, but did not comprehend the words of the cry. so the naked elbow struck smartly against the stake as the boat passed. the rowers rowed on. and still the flesh-and-blood aaron sat with his arm over the side. another stake was nearing. “will he heed, will he heed?” thought the anxious second self. the rowers gave the strange warning cry. he did not heed, and again the elbow struck against the stake as the boat passed. and yet the flesh-and-blood aaron sat on and made no sign. there were stakes all along this shallow part of the lake. beyond was deep water again. the invisible aaron was becoming anxious. “will he never hear? will he never heed? will he never understand?” he thought. and he watched in pain for the next stake. but still the flesh-and-blood aaron sat on, and though the rowers cried so acutely that the invisible aaron almost understood their very language, still the aaron seated at the side heard nothing, and his elbow struck against the third stake. this was almost too much. but after a few moments, as the boat rowed on, the palpable aaron changed his position as he sat, and drew in his arm: though even now he was not aware of any need to do so. the invisible aaron breathed with relief in the bows, the boat swung steadily on, into the deep, unfathomable water again. they were drawing near a city. a lake-city, like mexico. they must have reached a city, because when aaron woke up and tried to piece together the dream of which these are mere fragments, he could remember having just seen an idol. an astarte he knew it as, seated by the road, and in her open lap, were some eggs: smallish hen's eggs, and one or two bigger eggs, like swan's, and one single little roll of bread. these lay in the lap of the roadside astarte.... and then he could remember no more. he woke, and for a minute tried to remember what he had been dreaming, and what it all meant. but he quickly relinquished the effort. so he looked at his watch: it was only half-past three. he had one of those american watches with luminous, phosphorescent figures and fingers. and tonight he felt afraid of its eerily shining face. he was awake a long time in the dark--for two hours, thinking and not thinking, in that barren state which is not sleep, nor yet full wakefulness, and which is a painful strain. at length he went to sleep again, and did not wake till past eight o'clock. he did not ring for his coffee till nine. outside was a bright day--but he hardly heeded it. he lay profitlessly thinking. with the breaking of the flute, that which was slowly breaking had finally shattered at last. and there was nothing ahead: no plan, no prospect. he knew quite well that people would help him: francis dekker or angus guest or the marchese or lilly. they would get him a new flute, and find him engagements. but what was the good? his flute was broken, and broken finally. the bomb had settled it. the bomb had settled it and everything. it was an end, no matter how he tried to patch things up. the only thing he felt was a thread of destiny attaching him to lilly. the rest had all gone as bare and bald as the dead orb of the moon. so he made up his mind, if he could, to make some plan that would bring his life together with that of his evanescent friend. lilly was a peculiar bird. clever and attractive as he undoubtedly was, he was perhaps the most objectionable person to know. it was stamped on his peculiar face. aaron thought of lilly's dark, ugly face, which had something that lurked in it as a creature under leaves. then he thought of the wide-apart eyes, with their curious candour and surety. the peculiar, half-veiled surety, as if nothing, nothing could overcome him. it made people angry, this look of silent, indifferent assurance. “nothing can touch him on the quick, nothing can really get at him,” they felt at last. and they felt it with resentment, almost with hate. they wanted to be able to get at him. for he was so open-seeming, so very outspoken. he gave himself away so much. and he had no money to fall back on. yet he gave himself away so easily, paid such attention, almost deference to any chance friend. so they all thought: here is a wise person who finds me the wonder which i really am.--and lo and behold, after he had given them the trial, and found their inevitable limitations, he departed and ceased to heed their wonderful existence. which, to say the least of it, was fraudulent and damnable. it was then, after his departure, that they realised his basic indifference to them, and his silent arrogance. a silent arrogance that knew all their wisdom, and left them to it. aaron had been through it all. he had started by thinking lilly a peculiar little freak: gone on to think him a wonderful chap, and a bit pathetic: progressed, and found him generous, but overbearing: then cruel and intolerant, allowing no man to have a soul of his own: then terribly arrogant, throwing a fellow aside like an old glove which is in holes at the finger-ends. and all the time, which was most beastly, seeing through one. all the time, freak and outsider as he was, lilly _knew_. he knew, and his soul was against the whole world. driven to bay, and forced to choose. forced to choose, not between life and death, but between the world and the uncertain, assertive lilly. forced to choose, and yet, in the world, having nothing left to choose. for in the world there was nothing left to choose, unless he would give in and try for success. aaron knew well enough that if he liked to do a bit of buttering, people would gladly make a success of him, and give him money and success. he could become quite a favourite. but no! if he had to give in to something: if he really had to give in, and it seemed he had: then he would rather give in to the little lilly than to the beastly people of the world. if he had to give in, then it should be to no woman, and to no social ideal, and to no social institution. no!--if he had to yield his wilful independence, and give himself, then he would rather give himself to the little, individual man than to any of the rest. for to tell the truth, in the man was something incomprehensible, which had dominion over him, if he chose to allow it. as he lay pondering this over, escaping from the _cul de sac_ in which he had been running for so long, by yielding to one of his pursuers: yielding to the peculiar mastery of one man's nature rather than to the quicksands of woman or the stinking bogs of society: yielding, since yield he must, in some direction or other: yielding in a new direction now, to one strange and incalculable little individual: as aaron lay so relaxing, finding a peculiar delight in giving his soul to his mind's hero, the self-same hero tapped and entered. “i wondered,” he said, “if you'd like to walk into the country with me: it is such a nice day. i thought you might have gone out already. but here you are in bed like a woman who's had a baby.--you're all right, are you?” “yes,” said aaron. “i'm all right.” “miserable about your flute?--ah, well, there are more flutes. get up then.” and lilly went to the window, and stood looking out at the river. “we're going away on thursday,” he said. “where to?” said aaron. “naples. we've got a little house there for the winter--in the country, not far from sorrento--i must get a bit of work done, now the winter is coming. and forget all about everything and just live with life. what's the good of running after life, when we've got it in us, if nobody prevents us and obstructs us?” aaron felt very queer. “but for how long will you settle down--?” he asked. “oh, only the winter. i am a vagrant really: or a migrant. i must migrate. do you think a cuckoo in africa and a cuckoo in essex is one and the same bird? anyhow, i know i must oscillate between north and south, so oscillate i do. it's just my nature. all people don't have the same needs.” “perhaps not,” said aaron, who had risen and was sitting on the side of the bed. “i would very much like to try life in another continent, among another race. i feel europe becoming like a cage to me. europe may be all right in herself. but i find myself chafing. another year i shall get out. i shall leave europe. i begin to feel caged.” “i guess there are others that feel caged, as well as you,” said aaron. “i guess there are.” “and maybe they haven't a chance to get out.” lilly was silent a moment. then he said: “well, i didn't make life and society. i can only go my own way.” aaron too was silent. a deep disappointment was settling over his spirit. “will you be alone all winter?” “just myself and tanny,” he answered. “but people always turn up.” “and then next year, what will you do?” “who knows? i may sail far off. i should like to. i should like to try quite a new life-mode. this is finished in me--and yet perhaps it is absurd to go further. i'm rather sick of seekers. i hate a seeker.” “what,” said aaron rather sarcastically--“those who are looking for a new religion?” “religion--and love--and all that. it's a disease now.” “oh, i don't know,” said aaron. “perhaps the lack of love and religion is the disease.” “ah--bah! the grinding the old millstones of love and god is what ails us, when there's no more grist between the stones. we've ground love very small. time to forget it. forget the very words religion, and god, and love--then have a shot at a new mode. but the very words rivet us down and don't let us move. rivets, and we can't get them out.” “and where should we be if we could?” said aaron. “we might begin to be ourselves, anyhow.” “and what does that mean?” said aaron. “being yourself--what does it mean?” “to me, everything.” “and to most folks, nothing. they've got to have a goal.” “there is no goal. i loathe goals more than any other impertinence. gaols, they are. bah--jails and jailers, gaols and gaolers---” “wherever you go, you'll find people with their noses tied to some goal,” said aaron. “their wagon hitched to a star--which goes round and round like an ass in a gin,” laughed lilly. “be damned to it.” aaron got himself dressed, and the two men went out, took a tram and went into the country. aaron could not help it--lilly put his back up. they came to a little inn near a bridge, where a broad stream rustled bright and shallow. it was a sunny warm day, and aaron and lilly had a table outside under the thin trees at the top of the bank above the river. the yellow leaves were falling--the tuscan sky was turquoise blue. in the stream below three naked boys still adventurously bathed, and lay flat on the shingle in the sun. a wagon with two pale, loving, velvety oxen drew slowly down the hill, looking at each step as if they were going to come to rest, to move no more. but still they stepped forward. till they came to the inn, and there they stood at rest. two old women were picking the last acorns under three scrubby oak-trees, whilst a girl with bare feet drove her two goats and a sheep up from the water-side towards the women. the girl wore a dress that had been blue, perhaps indigo, but which had faded to the beautiful lavender-purple colour which is so common, and which always reminded lilly of purple anemones in the south. the two friends sat in the sun and drank red wine. it was midday. from the thin, square belfry on the opposite hill the bells had rung. the old women and the girl squatted under the trees, eating their bread and figs. the boys were dressing, fluttering into their shirts on the stream's shingle. a big girl went past, with somebody's dinner tied in a red kerchief and perched on her head. it was one of the most precious hours: the hour of pause, noon, and the sun, and the quiet acceptance of the world. at such a time everything seems to fall into a true relationship, after the strain of work and of urge. aaron looked at lilly, and saw the same odd, distant look on his face as on the face of some animal when it lies awake and alert, yet perfectly at one with its surroundings. it was something quite different from happiness: an alert enjoyment of rest, an intense and satisfying sense of centrality. as a dog when it basks in the sun with one eye open and winking: or a rabbit quite still and wide-eyed, with a faintly-twitching nose. not passivity, but alert enjoyment of being central, life-central in one's own little circumambient world. they sat thus still--or lay under the trees--for an hour and a half. then lilly paid the bill, and went on. “what am i going to do this winter, do you think?” aaron asked. “what do you want to do?” “nay, that's what i want to know.” “do you want anything? i mean, does something drive you from inside?” “i can't just rest,” said aaron. “can't you settle down to something?--to a job, for instance?” “i've not found the job i could settle down to, yet,” said aaron. “why not?” “it's just my nature.” “are you a seeker? have you got a divine urge, or need?” “how do i know?” laughed aaron. “perhaps i've got a damned urge, at the bottom of me. i'm sure it's nothing divine.” “very well then. now, in life, there are only two great dynamic urges--do you believe me--?” “how do i know?” laughed aaron. “do you want to be believed?” “no, i don't care a straw. only for your own sake, you'd better believe me.” “all right then--what about it?” “well, then, there are only two great dynamic urges in life: love and power.” “love and power?” said aaron. “i don't see power as so very important.” “you don't see because you don't look. but that's not the point. what sort of urge is your urge? is it the love urge?” “i don't know,” said aaron. “yes, you do. you know that you have got an urge, don't you?” “yes--” rather unwillingly aaron admitted it. “well then, what is it? is it that you want to love, or to be obeyed?” “a bit of both.” “all right--a bit of both. and what are you looking for in love?--a woman whom you can love, and who will love you, out and out and all in all and happy ever after sort of thing?” “that's what i started out for, perhaps,” laughed aaron. “and now you know it's all my eye!” aaron looked at lilly, unwilling to admit it. lilly began to laugh. “you know it well enough,” he said. “it's one of your lost illusions, my boy. well, then, what next? is it a god you're after? do you want a god you can strive to and attain, through love, and live happy ever after, countless millions of eternities, immortality and all that? is this your little dodge?” again aaron looked at lilly with that odd double look of mockery and unwillingness to give himself away. “all right then. you've got a love-urge that urges you to god; have you? then go and join the buddhists in burmah, or the newest fangled christians in europe. go and stick your head in a bush of nirvana or spiritual perfection. trot off.” “i won't,” said aaron. “you must. if you've got a love-urge, then give it its fulfilment.” “i haven't got a love-urge.” “you have. you want to get excited in love. you want to be carried away in love. you want to whoosh off in a nice little love whoosh and love yourself. don't deny it. i know you do. you want passion to sweep you off on wings of fire till you surpass yourself, and like the swooping eagle swoop right into the sun. i know you, my love-boy.” “not any more--not any more. i've been had too often,” laughed aaron. “bah, it's a lesson men never learn. no matter how sick they make themselves with love, they always rush for more, like a dog to his vomit.” “well, what am i to do then, if i'm not to love?” cried aaron. “you want to go on, from passion to passion, from ecstasy to ecstasy, from triumph to triumph, till you can whoosh away into glory, beyond yourself, all bonds loosened and happy ever after. either that or nirvana, opposite side of the medal.” “there's probably more hate than love in me,” said aaron. “that's the recoil of the same urge. the anarchist, the criminal, the murderer, he is only the extreme lover acting on the recoil. but it is love: only in recoil. it flies back, the love-urge, and becomes a horror.” “all right then. i'm a criminal and a murderer,” said aaron. “no, you're not. but you've a love-urge. and perhaps on the recoil just now. but listen to me. it's no good thinking the love-urge is the one and only. _niente_! you can whoosh if you like, and get excited and carried away loving a woman, or humanity, or god. swoop away in the love direction till you lose yourself. but that's where you're had. you can't lose yourself. you can try. but you might just as well try to swallow yourself. you'll only bite your fingers off in the attempt. you can't lose yourself, neither in woman nor humanity nor in god. you've always got yourself on your hands in the end: and a very raw and jaded and humiliated and nervous-neurasthenic self it is, too, in the end. a very nasty thing to wake up to is one's own raw self after an excessive love-whoosh. look even at president wilson: he love-whooshed for humanity, and found in the end he'd only got a very sorry self on his hands. “so leave off. leave off, my boy. leave off love-whooshing. you can't lose yourself, so stop trying. the responsibility is on your own shoulders all the time, and no god which man has ever struck can take it off. you are yourself and so be yourself. stick to it and abide by it. passion or no passion, ecstasy or no ecstasy, urge or no urge, there's no goal outside you, where you can consummate like an eagle flying into the sun, or a moth into a candle. there's no goal outside you--and there's no god outside you. no god, whom you can get to and rest in. none. it's a case of: 'trot, trot to market, to buy a penny bun, and trot, trot back again, as fast as you can run.' but there's no god outside you, whom you can rise to or sink to or swoop away to. you can't even gum yourself to a divine nirvana moon. because all the time you've got to eat your dinner and digest it. there is no goal outside you. none. “there is only one thing, your own very self. so you'd better stick to it. you can't be any bigger than just yourself, so you needn't drag god in. you've got one job, and no more. there inside you lies your own very self, like a germinating egg, your precious easter egg of your own soul. there it is, developing bit by bit, from one single egg-cell which you were at your conception in your mother's womb, on and on to the strange and peculiar complication in unity which never stops till you die--if then. you've got an innermost, integral unique self, and since it's the only thing you have got or ever will have, don't go trying to lose it. you've got to develop it, from the egg into the chicken, and from the chicken into the one-and-only phoenix, of which there can only be one at a time in the universe. there can only be one of you at a time in the universe--and one of me. so don't forget it. your own single oneness is your destiny. your destiny comes from within, from your own self-form. and you can't know it beforehand, neither your destiny nor your self-form. you can only develop it. you can only stick to your own very self, and never betray it. and by so sticking, you develop the one and only phoenix of your own self, and you unfold your own destiny, as a dandelion unfolds itself into a dandelion, and not into a stick of celery. “remember this, my boy: you've never got to deny the holy ghost which is inside you, your own soul's self. never. or you'll catch it. and you've never got to think you'll dodge the responsibility of your own soul's self, by loving or sacrificing or nirvaning--or even anarchising and throwing bombs. you never will....” aaron was silenced for a moment by this flood of words. then he said smiling: “so i'd better sit tight on my soul, till it hatches, had i?” “oh, yes. if your soul's urge urges you to love, then love. but always know that what you are doing is the fulfilling of your own soul's impulse. it's no good trying to act by prescription: not a bit. and it's no use getting into frenzies. if you've got to go in for love and passion, go in for them. but they aren't the goal. they're a mere means: a life-means, if you will. the only goal is the fulfilling of your own soul's active desire and suggestion. be passionate as much as ever it is your nature to be passionate, and deeply sensual as far as you can be. small souls have a small sensuality, deep souls a deep one. but remember, all the time, the responsibility is upon your own head, it all rests with your own lonely soul, the responsibility for your own action.” “i never said it didn't,” said aaron. “you never said it did. you never accepted. you thought there was something outside, to justify you: god, or a creed, or a prescription. but remember, your soul inside you is your only godhead. it develops your actions within you as a tree develops its own new cells. and the cells push on into buds and boughs and flowers. and these are your passion and your acts and your thoughts and expressions, your developing consciousness. you don't know beforehand, and you can't. you can only stick to your own soul through thick and thin. “you are your own tree of life, roots and limbs and trunk. somewhere within the wholeness of the tree lies the very self, the quick: its own innate holy ghost. and this holy ghost puts forth new buds, and pushes past old limits, and shakes off a whole body of dying leaves. and the old limits hate being empassed, and the old leaves hate to fall. but they must, if the tree-soul says so....” they had sat again during this harangue, under a white wall. aaron listened more to the voice than the words. it was more the sound value which entered his soul, the tone, the strange speech-music which sank into him. the sense he hardly heeded. and yet he understood, he knew. he understood, oh so much more deeply than if he had listened with his head. and he answered an objection from the bottom of his soul. “but you talk,” he said, “as if we were like trees, alone by ourselves in the world. we aren't. if we love, it needs another person than ourselves. and if we hate, and even if we talk.” “quite,” said lilly. “and that's just the point. we've got to love and hate moreover--and even talk. but we haven't got to fix on any one of these modes, and say that's the only mode. it is such imbecility to say that love and love alone must rule. it is so obviously not the case. yet we try and make it so.” “i feel that,” said aaron. “it's all a lie.” “it's worse. it's a half lie. but listen. i told you there were two urges--two great life-urges, didn't i? there may be more. but it comes on me so strongly, now, that there are two: love, and power. and we've been trying to work ourselves, at least as individuals, from the love-urge exclusively, hating the power-urge, and repressing it. and now i find we've got to accept the very thing we've hated. “we've exhausted our love-urge, for the moment. and yet we try to force it to continue working. so we get inevitably anarchy and murder. it's no good. we've got to accept the power motive, accept it in deep responsibility, do you understand me? it is a great life motive. it was that great dark power-urge which kept egypt so intensely living for so many centuries. it is a vast dark source of life and strength in us now, waiting either to issue into true action, or to burst into cataclysm. power--the power-urge. the will-to-power--but not in nietzsche's sense. not intellectual power. not mental power. not conscious will-power. not even wisdom. but dark, living, fructifying power. do you know what i mean?” “i don't know,” said aaron. “take what you call love, for example. in the real way of love, the positive aim is to make the other person--or persons--happy. it devotes itself to the other or to others. but change the mode. let the urge be the urge of power. then the great desire is not happiness, neither of the beloved nor of oneself. happiness is only one of many states, and it is horrible to think of fixing us down to one state. the urge of power does not seek for happiness any more than for any other state. it urges from within, darkly, for the displacing of the old leaves, the inception of the new. it is powerful and self-central, not seeking its centre outside, in some god or some beloved, but acting indomitably from within itself. “and of course there must be one who urges, and one who is impelled. just as in love there is a beloved and a lover: the man is supposed to be the lover, the woman the beloved. now, in the urge of power, it is the reverse. the woman must submit, but deeply, deeply submit. not to any foolish fixed authority, not to any foolish and arbitrary will. but to something deep, deeper. to the soul in its dark motion of power and pride. we must reverse the poles. the woman must now submit--but deeply, deeply, and richly! no subservience. none of that. no slavery. a deep, unfathomable free submission.” “you'll never get it,” said aaron. “you will, if you abandon the love idea and the love motive, and if you stand apart, and never bully, never force from the conscious will. that's where nietzsche was wrong. his was the conscious and benevolent will, in fact, the love-will. but the deep power-urge is not conscious of its aims: and it is certainly not consciously benevolent or love-directed.--whatever else happens, somewhere, sometime, the deep power-urge in man will have to issue forth again, and woman will submit, livingly, not subjectedly.” “she never will,” persisted aaron. “anything else will happen, but not that.” “she will,” said lilly, “once man disengages himself from the love-mode, and stands clear. once he stands clear, and the other great urge begins to flow in him, then the woman won't be able to resist. her own soul will wish to yield itself.” “woman yield--?” aaron re-echoed. “woman--and man too. yield to the deep power-soul in the individual man, and obey implicitly. i don't go back on what i said before. i do believe that every man must fulfil his own soul, every woman must be herself, herself only, not some man's instrument, or some embodied theory. but the mode of our being is such that we can only live and have our being whilst we are implicit in one of the great dynamic modes. we must either love, or rule. and once the love-mode changes, as change it must, for we are worn out and becoming evil in its persistence, then the other mode will take place in us. and there will be profound, profound obedience in place of this love-crying, obedience to the incalculable power-urge. and men must submit to the greater soul in a man, for their guidance: and women must submit to the positive power-soul in man, for their being.” “you'll never get it,” said aaron. “you will, when all men want it. all men say, they want a leader. then let them in their souls submit to some greater soul than theirs. at present, when they say they want a leader, they mean they want an instrument, like lloyd george. a mere instrument for their use. but it's more than that. it's the reverse. it's the deep, fathomless submission to the heroic soul in a greater man. you, aaron, you too have the need to submit. you, too, have the need livingly to yield to a more heroic soul, to give yourself. you know you have. and you know it isn't love. it is life-submission. and you know it. but you kick against the pricks. and perhaps you'd rather die than yield. and so, die you must. it is your affair.” there was a long pause. then aaron looked up into lilly's face. it was dark and remote-seeming. it was like a byzantine eikon at the moment. “and whom shall i submit to?” he said. “your soul will tell you,” replied the other. the end 