"Pour rendre la société commode il faut que chacun conserve sa liberté."
"Pour rendre la société commode il faut que chacun conserve sa liberté."
Those who have rattled over the cobble stones of old Paris will understand that we had no opportunity of conversation during our drive from the Tuileries to the Rue des Palmiers. Lucille, with her white lace scarf half concealing her face, sat back in her corner with closed eyes and seemed to be asleep. As we passed the street lamps their light flashing across Madame's face showed her to be alert, attentive and sleepless. On crossing the Pont Napoleon I saw that the sky behind the towers of Notre Dame was already of a pearly grey. The dawn was indeed at hand, and the great city, wrapped in a brief and fitful slumber, would soon be rousing itself to another day of gaiety and tears, of work and play, of life and death.
The Rue des Palmiers was yet still. A sleepy servant opened the door, and we crept quietly upstairs, lest we should disturb the Vicomte, who, tired from his great journey, had retired to bedwhile I changed my clothes for the Imperial ball.
"Good-night," said Lucille, without looking round at the head of the stairs. Madame followed her daughter, but I noticed that she gave me no salutation.
I turned to my study, of which the door stood open, and where a shaded lamp discreetly burned. I threw aside my coat and attended to the light. My letters lay on the table, but before I had taken them up the rustle of a woman's dress in a gallery drew my attention elsewhere.
It was Madame, who came in bearing a small tray, whereon stood wine and biscuits.
"You are tired out," she said. "You had no refreshment at the Tuileries. You must drink this glass of wine."
"Thank you, Madame," I answered, and turned to my letters, among which were a couple of telegrams. But she laid her quiet hand upon them and pointed with the other to the glass that she had filled. She watched me drink the strong wine, which was, indeed, almost a cordial, then took up the letters in her hands.
"My poor friend," she said, "there is bad news for you here. You must be prepared."
Handing me the letters, she went to the door, but did not quit the room. She merely stood therewith her back turned to me, exhibiting a strange, silent patience while I slowly opened the letters and read that my father and I had quarrelled for the last time.
It was I who moved first and broke the silence of that old house. The daylight was glimmering through the closed jalousies, making stripes of light upon the ceiling.
"Madame," I said, "I must go home—to England—by the early train, this morning! May I ask you to explain to Monsieur le Vicomte."
"Yes," she answered, turning and facing me. "Your coffee will be ready at seven o'clock. And none of us will come downstairs until after your departure. At such times a man is better alone—is it not so? For a woman it is different."
I extinguished the useless lamp, and we passed round the gallery together. At the door of my bedroom she stopped, and turning, laid her hand—as light as a child's—upon my arm.
"What will you, my poor friend?" she said, with a queer little smile. "C'est la vie."
It is not my intention to dwell at length upon my journey to England and all that awaited me there. There are times in his life when—as Madame de Clericy said, with her wise smile—a man is better alone. And are there not occasions when the most eloquent of us is best dumb?
I had for travelling companion on the bright autumn morning when I quitted Paris my father's friend, John Turner—called suddenly to England on matters of business. He gave a grunt when he saw me in the Northern station.
"Better have taken my advice," he said, "to go home and make it up with your father, rather than stay here to run after that girl with the pretty hair—at your time of life. Avoid quarrels and seek a reconciliation—that is my plan. Best way is to ask the other chap to dinner and do him well. What are you going home for now? It is too late."
As, indeed, I knew without the telling. For when I reached Hopton my father had already been laid in the old churchyard beneath the shadow of the crumbling walls of the ruined church, which is now no longer used. They have built a gaudy new edifice farther inland, but so long as a Howard owns Hopton Hall, we shall, I think, continue to lie in the graveyard nearer to the sea.
I suppose we are a quarrelsome race, for I fell foul of several persons almost as soon as I arrived. The lawyers vowed that there were difficulties—but none, I protest, but what such parchment minds as theirs would pause to heed. One thing, however, was certain. Did I not read it in black and white myself? My obstinate old father—and, by gad! Irespect him for it—had held to his purpose. He had left me penniless unless I consented to marry Isabella Gayerson. The estate was bequeathed in trust, to be administered by said trustees during my lifetime, unless I acceded to a certain matrimonial arrangement entertained for me. Those were the exact words. So Isabella had no cause to blush when the will was published abroad. And we may be sure that the whole county knew it soon enough, and vowed that they had always thought so.
"If one may inquire the nature of the matrimonial arrangement so vaguely specified?"... said the respectable Norwich solicitor who, like all his kind, had a better coat than his client, for those who live on the vanity and greed of their neighbours live well.
"One may," I replied, "and one may go to the devil and ask him."
The lawyer gave a dry laugh as he turned over his papers, and I make no doubt charged some one for his wounded feelings.
So the secret was kept between me and the newly raised stone in Hopton churchyard. And I felt somehow that there was a link between us in the fact that my father had kept the matter of our quarrel from the mouths of gossips and tattlers, leaving it to my honour to obey or disobey him, and abide by the result.
I am not one of those who think it right to remember their dead as saints who lived a blameless life, and passed away from a world that was not good enough for them. Is it not wiser to remember them as they were, men and women like ourselves, with faults in number, and a half-developed virtue or two, possessing something beyond copybook good or evil, which won our love in life, and will keep their memory green after death? I did not fall into the error of thinking that death had hallowed wishes which I had opposed in life; and while standing by my father's grave, where he lay, after long years, by the side of the fair girl whom I had called mother, I respected him for having died without changing his opinion, while recognising no call to alter mine.
The hall, it appeared, was to be held at my disposal to live in whenever I so wished, but I was forbidden to let it. A young solicitor of Yarmouth, working up, as they say, a practice, wrote to me in confidence, saying that the will was an iniquitous one, and presuming that I intended to contest its legality. He further informed me that such work was, singularly enough, a branch of the profession of which he had made a special study. I replied that persons who presumed rendered themselves liable to kicks, and heard no more from Yarmouth.
The neighbours were kind enough to offer meadvice or hospitality, according to their nature, neither of which I felt inclined, at that time, to accept, but made some small return for their good will by inviting them to extend their shooting over the Hopton preserves, knowing that my poor old sire would turn in his grave were the birds allowed to go free.
Among others I received a letter from Isabella Gayerson, conveying the sympathy of her aged father and mother in my bereavement.
"As for myself," she wrote, "you know, Dick, that no one feels more keenly for you at this time, and wishes more sincerely that she could put her sympathy to some practical use. The hall must necessarily be but a sad and lonely dwelling for you now, and we want you to recollect that Fairacre is now, as at all times, a second home, where an affectionate welcome awaits you."
So wrote the subject of our quarrel, and in a like friendly tone I made reply. Whether Isabella was aware of the part she had played in my affairs, wiser heads must decide for themselves. If such was the case, she made no sign, and wrote at intervals letters of a spirit similar to that displayed in the paragraph above transcribed. On such affairs, men are but poor prophets in the strange country of a woman's mind. A small experience of the sex leads me, however, to suggest that, as a rule,women—ay, and schoolgirls—have a greater knowledge of such matters of the heart than they are credited with—that, indeed, women usually err on the side of knowing too much—knowing, in a word, facts that do not exist.
So disgusted was I with the whole business that I turned my back on the land of my birth and left the lawyers to fight over their details. I appointed a London solicitor to watch my interests, who smiled at my account of the affair, saying that things would be better settled among members of the legal profession—that my ways were not theirs. For which compliment I fervently thanked him, and shook the dust of London from off my feet.
The Vicomte de Clericy had notified to me by letter that my post would be held vacant and at my disposal for an indefinite period, but that at the same time my presence would be an infinite relief to him. This was no doubt the old gentleman's courteous way of putting it, for I had done little enough to make my absence of any note.
Travelling all night, I arrived in the Rue des Palmiers at nine o'clock one morning, and took coffee as usual in my study. At ten o'clock Monsieur de Clericy came to me there, and was kind enough to express both sympathy at my bereavement and pleasure at my return. In reply I thanked him.
"But," I added, "I regret that I must resign my post."
"Resign," cried the old gentleman. "Mon Dieu! do not talk of it. Why do you think of such a thing?"
"I am no secretary. I have never had the taste for such work nor a chance of learning to do it."
The Vicomte looked at me thoughtfully.
"But you are what I want," he replied. "A man—a responsible man, and not a machine."
"Bah," said I, shrugging my shoulders, "what are we doing—work that any could do. What am I wanted for? I have done nothing but write a few letters and frighten a handful of farmers in Provence."
The Vicomte de Clericy coughed confidentially.
"My dear Howard," he answered, looking at the door to make sure that it was closed. "I am getting an old man. I am only fit to manage my affairs while all is tranquil and in order. Tell me—as man to man—will things remain tranquil and in order? You know as well as I do that the Emperor has a malady from which there is no recovery. And the Empress, ah! yes—she is a clever woman. She has spirit. It is not every woman who would take this journey to Egypt to open the Suez Canal and make that great enterprisea French undertaking. But has a woman ever governed France successfully—from the boudoir or the throne? Look back into history, my dear Howard, and tell me what the end of a woman's government has always been."
It was the first time that my old patron had named politics in my hearing, or acknowledged their bearing upon the condition of private persons in France. His father had been of the emigration. He himself had been born in exile. The family prestige was but a ghost of its former self—and I had hitherto treated the subject as a sore one and beyond my province.
The Vicomte had sat down at my table. As for me, I was already on the broad window seat, looking down into the garden. Lucille was there upbraiding a gardener. I could see the nature of their conversation from the girl's face. She was probably wanting something out of season. Women often do. The man was deprecatory, and pointed contemptuously towards the heavens with a rake. There was a long silence in the room which was called my study.
"I think, mon ami," said my companion at length, "that there is another reason."
"Yes," answered I, bluntly, "there is."
I did not look round, but continued to watch Lucille in the garden. The Vicomte sat in silence—waiting, no doubt, for a further explanation. Failing to get this, he said, rather testily as I thought:
"Is the reason in the garden, my friend, that your eyes are fixed there?"
"Yes, it is. It is scolding the gardener. And I think I am better away from the Hôtel Clericy, Monsieur le Vicomte."
The old man slowly rose and came to the window, standing behind me.
"Oh—la, la!" he muttered in his quaint way—an exclamation uncomplimentary to myself; for our neighbours across channel reserve the syllables exclusively for their disasters.
We looked down at Lucille, standing amid the chrysanthemums, lending to their pink and white bloom a face as fresh as any of the flowers.
"But it is a child, mon ami," said the Vicomte, with his tolerant smile.
"Yes—I ought to know better, I admit," answered I, rising and attending to the papers on the writing table, and I laughed without feeling very merry. I sat down and began mechanically to work. At all events, my conscience had won this time—and if the Vicomte pressed me to stay, he did so with full knowledge of the danger.
The window was open. The Evil One prompted Lucille at that moment to break into one of thosefoolish little songs of Provence, and the ink dried on my pen.
STANDING AMID THE CHRYSANTHEMUMS, LENDING TO THEIR PINK AND WHITE BLOOM A FACE AS FRESH AS ANY OF THE FLOWERS.STANDING AMID THE CHRYSANTHEMUMS, LENDING TO THEIR PINK AND WHITE BLOOM A FACE AS FRESH AS ANY OF THE FLOWERS.
The Vicomte broke the silence that followed.
"The ladies are going away for the winter months," he said. "They are going to Draguignan, in Var. At all events, stay with me until they return."
"I cannot think why you ever took me."
"An old man's fancy, mon cher. You will not forsake me."
"No."
"Autant d'amoureux, autant d'amours; chacun aime comme il est."
"Autant d'amoureux, autant d'amours; chacun aime comme il est."
The chateau of La Pauline stands at the head of the valley of the Nartubie in the department of Var, and looks down upon Draguignan, the capital of that division of France. La Pauline, and its surrounding lands formed thedotof the Vicomtesse de Clericy, and the products of its rich terraces were of no small account in the family revenues.
It was to this spot that Lucille and her mother repaired in the month of December. Not far away the Baron Giraud had his estate—the modern castle of "Mon Plaisir," with its little white turret, its porcelain bas-reliefs in brilliant colours let into the walls, its artificial gardens ornamented with gold and silver balls, and summer-houses of which the windows were glazed with playful fancy that outdid nature in clothing the prospect in the respective hues of spring, summer, autumn and winter.
Very different from this was the ancient chateau of La Pauline, perched half-way up the mountain on a table-land—its grey stone face showing grimly against a sombre background of cypress trees. The house was built, as the antiquarians of Draguignan avow, of stone that was hewn by the Romans for less peaceful purposes. That an ancient building must have stood here would, indeed, be to some extent credible, from the fact that in front of the house lies a lawn of that weedless turf which is only found in this country in such places as the Arena at Fréjus. In the center of the lawn stands a sun dial—grey, green and ancient—a relic of those days when men lived by hours, and not by minutes, as we do to-day. It is all of the old world—of that old, old world of France beside which our British antiquities are, with a few exceptions, youthful. This was the birthplace of Madame de Clericy and of Lucille herself. Hither the ladies always returned with a quiet joy. There is no more peaceful spot on earth than La Pauline, chiefly, perhaps, because there is nothing in nature so still and lifeless as an olive grove. Why, by the way, do the birds of the air never build their nests in these trees—why do they rarely rest and never ring there? Behind La Pauline—so close, indeed, that the little chapel stands in the grey hush of the trees, guarded, of course, by a sentinel circle ofcypresses—rise the olive terraces and stretch up, tier above tier, till the pines are reached. Below the grey house the valley opens out like a fan, and far away to the south the rugged crags of Roquebrune stand out against a faint blue haze, which is the Mediterranean.
No better example of Peace on Earth is to be found than La Pauline after sunset, at which time the olive groves are a silver fairyland—when the chapel bell tinkles in vain for the faithful to come to vespers—when the stout old placid curé sits down philosophically in the porch to read the office to himself, knowing well that a hot day in the vineyards turns all footsteps homewards.
When the ladies are in residence at the chateau, it is a different matter. Then, indeed, the curé lays aside his old soutane and dons that fine new clerical habit presented to him by Mademoiselle Lucille at the time of her first communion, when the Bishop of Fréjus came to Draguignan, and the whole valley assembled to do him honour there.
The ladies came, as we have said, in December, and at the gate the curé met them as usual—making there, as was his custom, a great hesitation as to kissing Lucille, now that she was a demoiselle of the great world, having—the rogue!—shaved with extraordinary care for that very purpose, a few hours earlier. Indeed, it is to be feared thatthe good curé did not always present so cleanly an appearance as he did on the arrival of the ladies. Here the family lived a quiet life among the peasants, who loved them, and Lucille visited them in their cottages, taking what simple hospitality they could offer her with a charm and appetite unrivalled, as the parishioners themselves have often told the writer. In these humble homes she found children with skins as white, with hair as fair and bright, as her own, and if the traveller wander so far from the beaten track, he can verify my statement. For in Var, by some racial freak—which, like all such matters, is in point of fact inexplicable—a large proportion of the people are of fair or ruddy complexions.
Had the Vicomtesse desired it, the neighbourhood offered society of a loftier, and, as some consider, more interesting, nature, but that lady did not hold much by social gatherings, and it was only from a sense of duty that she invited a few friends, about the time of Lucille's birthday—her twenty-first birthday, indeed—to pass some days at La Pauline.
These friends were bidden for the 26th December, and among them were the Baron Giraud and his son Alphonse.
Alphonse arrived on horseback in a costume which would have done credit to the head-groom of a racing stable. The right-hand twist of hismustache was eminently successful, but the left-hand extremity drooped with a lamentable effect, which he was not able to verify until after he had greeted the ladies, whom he met in the garden, as he rode toward the chateau.
"My father," he cried, as he descended from the saddle, "that dear old man, arrives on the instant. He is in a carriage—a close carriage, and he smokes. Picture it to yourselves—when there is this air to breathe—when there are horses to ride. Madame la Vicomtesse"—he took that lady's hand—"what a pleasure! Mademoiselle Lucille—as beautiful as ever."
"Even more so," replied Lucille with her gay laugh. "What exquisite riding-boots! But are they not a little tight, Alphonse?"
For Lucille could not perceive why playmates should suddenly begin to monsieur and mademoiselle each other after years of intimacy. This was the rock in that path which Alphonse, like the rest of us, found anything but smooth. Lucille was so gay. It is difficult to make serious love to a person who is not even impressed by English riding-boots.
"WHAT EXQUISITE RIDING-BOOTS! BUT ARE THEY NOT A LITTLE TIGHT, ALPHONSE?""WHAT EXQUISITE RIDING-BOOTS! BUT ARE THEY NOT A LITTLE TIGHT, ALPHONSE?"
At this moment the Baron's carriage appeared on the zig-zag road below the chateau, and Madame de Clericy's face assumed an expression of placid resignation. In due time the vehicle, with itsgorgeous yellow wheels, reached the level space upon which the party stood. The Baron Giraud emerged from the satin-lined recesses of the dainty carriage like a stout caterpillar from a rose, a stumpy little man with no neck and a red face. A straggling dyed mustache failed to hide an unpleasant mouth, with lips too red and loose. Cunning little dark eyes relieved the countenance of the Baron Giraud from mere animalism. They were intelligent little eyes, that looked to no high things and made no mistake in low places. But the Baron Giraud did not make one proud of the human race. This was a man who handled millions with consummate skill and daring, and by a certain class of persons he was almost worshipped. Personally, a 'longshore loafer who can handle a boat with the same intrepidity is to me a pleasanter object, though skill of any description must command a certain respect.
There were other guests to whom the Baron was presently introduced, and towards these he carried himself with the pomposity and hauteur which are only permissible to the very highest rank of new wealth. Lucille, as I learnt from Monsieur Alphonse later—indeed, our friendship was based on the patience with which I listened to his talk of that young lady—was dressed on this particular afternoon in white, but such matters as these bungled between two men will interest no one.Her hair she wore half in curls, according to the hideous custom of that day. Is it not always safe to abuse the old fashion? And at no time safer than the present, when the whole world gapes with its great, foolish mouth after every novelty. I remember that Lucille looked pretty enough; but you, mesdames, who laugh at me, are no doubt quite right, and a thousand times more beautiful in your mannish attire.
The guests presently dispersed in the shady garden, and the Baron accepted Madame's offer of refreshment on the terrace, whither a servant brought a tray of liqueurs. The pleasant habit of afternoon tea had not yet been introduced across the channel, and French ladies had still something to learn.
"Ah, Madame!" said the Baron Giraud in a voice that may be described as metallic, inasmuch as it was tinny, "these young people!"
With a wave of his thick white hand he indicated Alphonse and Lucille, who had wandered down an alley entirely composed of orange trees, where, indeed, a yellow glow seemed to hover, so thickly hung the fruit on the branches. Madame followed the direction of his glance with a non-committing bow of the head.
"I shall have to ask Monsieur le Vicomte what he proposes doing in the way of a 'dot,'" pursuedthe financier with a cackling laugh, which was not silvery, though it savoured of bullion. The Vicomtesse smiled gravely, and offered the Baron one of those little square biscuits peculiar to Fréjus.
"Madame knows nothing of such matters?"
"Nothing," answered she, meeting the twinkling eyes.
"Ah!" murmured the Baron, addressing, it would seem, the distant mountains. "Such details are not, of course, for the ladies. It is the other side of the question"—he laid his hand upon his waistcoat—"the side of the affections—the heart, my dear Vicomtesse, the heart."
"Yes," answered Madame, looking at him with that disquieting straight glance of hers—"the heart."
In the mean time—in the orange alley—Alphonse was attempting to get a serious hearing from Lucille, and curiously enough was making use of the same word as that passing between their elders on the terrace above them.
"Have you no heart?" he cried, stamping his foot on the mossy turf, "that you always laugh when I am serious—have you no heart, Lucille?"
"I do not know what you mean by heart," answered the girl with a little frown, as if the subject did not please her. And wiser men than Alphonse Giraud could not have enlightened her.
"Then you are incapable of feeling," he cried, spreading out his hands as if in invocation to the trees to hear him.
"That may be, but I do not see that it is proved by the fact that I am not always grave. You, yourself, are gay enough when others are by, and it is then that I like you best. It is only when we are alone that you are—tragic. Is that—heart, Alphonse? And are those who laugh heartless? I doubt it."
"You know I love you," he muttered gloomily, and the expression on his round face did not seem at home there.
"Well," she answered, with a severity gathered heaven knows whence—I cannot think they taught it to her in the convent—"you have told me so twice since you became aware of my continued existence at the ball last month. But you are hopelessly serious to-day. Let us go back to the terrace."
She stooped and picked up an orange that had fallen, throwing it subsequently along the smooth turf for her dog to chase.
"See," she said gaily, "Talleyrand will scarcely trouble to run now. He is so stout and dignified. He is afraid that the country dogs should see him. It is Paris. Paris spoils—so much."
"You know my father's plans concerning us,"said Alphonse, after a pause, which served to set aside Talleyrand and the orange.
"The Baron's plans are, I am told, wonderful, but"—she paused and gave a little laugh—"I do not understand finance."
They walked up the steps together, between the trim borders, where spring flowers were already breaking into bud. On the terrace they found the Vicomtesse and the Baron Giraud. A servant was going towards the house carrying carelessly a small silver salver. The Baron was standing with an unopened envelope in his hand.
"You will permit me, Madame," they heard him say with his strident little self-satisfied laugh. "A man of affairs is the slave of the moment. And the affairs of state are never still. A great country moves even in its sleep."
Having the permission of Madame, he tore open the envelope, enjoying the importance of the moment. But his face changed as soon as his glance fell on the paper.
"The government has fallen," he gasped, with white lips and a face wherefrom the colour faded in blotches. He seemed to forget the ladies, and looked only at his son. "It may mean—much. I must go to Paris at once. The place is in an uproar. Mon Dieu—where will it end!"
He excused himself hurriedly, and in a few minutes his carriage rattled through the grey stone gateway.
"An uproar in Paris," repeated Lucille, anxiously, when she was alone with her mother. "What does he mean? Is there any danger? Will papa be safe?"
"Yes," answered the Vicomtesse quietly; "he will be safe, I think."
"Le plus grand art d'un habile homme est celui de savior cacher son habileté."
"Le plus grand art d'un habile homme est celui de savior cacher son habileté."
It will be necessary to dwell to a certain extent on those events of the great world that left their mark on the obscure lives of which the present history treats. An old man may be excused for expressing his opinion—or rather his agreement with the opinions of greater minds—that our little existence here on earth is but part of a great scheme—that we are but pawns moved hither and thither on a vast chess-board, and that, while our vision is often obscured by some knight or bishop or king, whose neighbourhood overshadows us, yet our presence may affect the greater moves as certainly as we are affected by them.
I first became aware of the fact that my existence was amenable to every political wind that might blow a week or so after Lucille went to La Pauline, without, indeed, vouchsafing an explanation of her sudden coldness.
In my study I was one evening smoking, and, I admit it, thinking of Lucille—thinking very practically, however. For I was reflecting with satisfaction over some small improvements I had effected—with a Norfolk energy which, no doubt, gave offence to some—during the short time that the Vicomte and I had passed in the Provençal chateau. I had the pleasant conviction that Lucille's health could, at all events, come to no harm from a residence in one of the oldest castles in France. No very lover-like reflections, the high-flown will cry. So be it. Each must love in his own way. "Air and water—air and water!" the Vicomte had cried when he saw the men at work under my directions. "You Englishmen are mad on the subject."
While I was engaged in these thoughts the old gentleman came to my room, and in the next few minutes made known to me a new and unsuspected side of his character. His manner was singularly alert. He seemed to be years younger.
"I said I should want a man at my side—young and strong," he began, seating himself. "Let us understand each other, Mr. Howard."
"By all means."
He gave a little laugh, and leaning forward took a quill pen from my writing-table, disliking idle fingers while he talked.
"That time has come, my friend. Do you mean to stand by me?"
"LET US UNDERSTAND EACH OTHER, MR. HOWARD.""LET US UNDERSTAND EACH OTHER, MR. HOWARD."
"Yes."
"You are a man of few words," he answered, looking at me with a new keenness which sat strangely on his benign features. "But I want no more. The government has fallen—the doctors say the Emperor's life is not worth that!"
And he snapped his finger and thumb, glancing at the clock. It was eight o'clock. We had dined at half-past six.
"Can you come with me now? I want to show you the state of Paris—the condition of the people, the way of their thoughts. One cannot know too much of the ... people—for they will some day rule the world."
"And rule it devilish badly," I added, putting my papers together.
"We shall be late in returning," the Vicomte said to the servant who held the carriage door. I had heard—through my thoughts—the stamping of the horses in the courtyard and the rattle of the harness, but took no great note of them, as the Vicomte had the habit of going out in the evening. I noticed we never crossed the river during our silent drive. A river has two sides, just as a street, and one of them is usually in the shade. It was among the shadows that our business lay this evening.
"You know," said the Vicomte, as we climbedthe narrow staircase of a quiet house in the neighbourhood of the great wine stores that adjoin the Jardin des Plantes—"you know that this is the day of the talkers—the Rocheforts, the Pyats—the windbags. Mon Dieu, what nonsense! But a windbag may burst and do harm. One must watch these gentry."
Republicanism was indeed in the air at this time. And has not history demonstrated that those who cry loudest for a commonwealth are such as wish to draw from that wealth and add nothing to it? The reddest Republican is always the man who has nothing to lose and all to gain by a social upheaval.
I was not surprised, therefore, when we found ourselves in a room full of bad hats and unkempt heads. A voice was shouting their requirements. I knew that they wanted a wash more than anything else.
The room was a large, low one, and looked larger through an atmosphere blue with smoke and the fumes of absinthe. The Vicomte—a little man, as I have said—slipped in unperceived. I was less fortunate, being of a higher stature. I saw that my advent did not pass unobserved on the platform, where a party of patriots sat in a row, like the Christy Minstrels, showing the soles of their boots to all whom it might concern. In this case aworking cobbler would have been deeply interested, as in a vast field of labour. The Vicomte slipped a few yards away from me, and the shoulders of his fellow-countrymen obscured him. I could find no such retreat, for your true Socialist never has much to recommend him to the notice of society, being usually a poor, mean man to look at, who seeks to add a cubit to his stature by encouraging the growth of his hair.
One such stood on the platform, mouthing the bloodthirsty periods of his creed. He caught sight of me.
"Ah!" he cried, "here is a new disciple. And a hardy one!Un grand gaillard, my brethren, who can strike a solid blow for liberty, equality and fraternity. Say, brother, you are with us; is it not so?"
"If you open the casements, not otherwise," I answered. The French crowd is ever ready for blood or laughter. I have seen the Republic completely set in the background by a cat looking in a window and giving voice to the one word assigned to it by nature. Some laughed now, and the orator deemed it wise to leave me in peace. I took advantage of my obscurity to look around me, and was duly edified by what I saw. The Parisvaurienis worth less than any man on earth, and these were choice specimens from the gutter.
We were wasting our time in such a galley, and as I thus reflected a note was slipped into my hand.
"Follow me, but not at once." I read and hid the paper in my pocket. Without staring about me too much, I watched the Vicomte make his way towards a door half hidden by a dirty curtain—another to that by which we had entered. Thither I followed him after a decent interval—no one molesting me. One of the patriots on the platform seemed to watch me with understanding, and when I reached the curtained doorway, my glance meeting his, he dismissed me with his eyelids.
I found myself in a dark passage, and with his gentle laugh the Vicomte took my arm.
"All that out there," he whispered, "is a mere blind. It is in the inner room that they act. Out there they merely talk. Come with me. Gently—there are two steps—my dear Howard. These are the men—he paused with his fingers on the handle of a door—who will rule France when the Emperor is dead or deposed."
With that we entered, and those assembled—some sitting at a table, others standing about the room—saluted the Vicomte de Clericy almost as a leader. Some of the faces I knew—indeed, they are to be found in the illustrated histories of France. The thoughts of others were known to me, for many were journalists of repute—men of advancedviews and fiery pens. Perhaps, after all, I knew as little of the Vicomte de Clericy as of any man there. For he seemed to have laid aside that pleasant and garrulous senility which had awakened my dull conscience.
Although he did not deliver a speech during the proceedings, as did some, his attitude was rather that of a leader than of a mere on-looker. Here was no mere watching, thought I. My patron was known to all, and went from group to group talking in the ear of many. There was, indeed, much talking as I have always found in the world, and but little listening. The Vicomte introduced me to some of his friends.
"Mr. Howard," he said, "an English gentleman who is kind enough to act as my secretary. Mr. Howard is too wise to trouble himself with politics."
And I thought some of them had a queer way of looking at me.
"A deceiver or a dupe?" I heard one ask another, trusting too far the proverbial dulness of British ears.
The topic of the evening was, of course, the fall of the ministry—a matter of great moment at that time, and, it may be, through all the ages—though a recital of its possible effects would be but dull reading to-day. When a chain is riven, the casualon-looker takes but small interest in the history of each link. This event of December, 1869, was in truth an important link in the chain of strange events that go to make up the history of the shortest and most marvellous of the great dynasties of the world.
I stood among those politicians and wondered what the greatest of their race at that time living thought of these matters in the Tuileries Palace hard by. I could picture him sitting, as was his wont—a grave man with a keen sense of humour—with his head a little on one side, his large, still face drawn and pale—the evidence of his malady around his dull eyes. Was the game played out? The greatest since that so gloriously won—so miserably lost at length—by his uncle. The Bonapartes were no common men—and it was no common blood that trickled unstanched ten years later into the sand of the African veldt, leaving the world the poorer of one of its greatest races.
I gathered that the fall of the ministry was no great surprise to these men assembled in this inner room. They formed, so far as I could discover, a sort of administration—a committee which gathered the opinions of the more intelligent citizens of the larger towns of France—a head-center of news and public thought. Their meeting place was furnished without ostentation, and in excellent taste.
These were no mere adventurers, but men of position and wealth, who had somewhat to lose and every desire to retain the same. They did not rave of patriotism, nor was there any cant of equality and fraternity. It seemed rather that, finding themselves placed in stirring times, they deemed it wise to guide by some means or other the course of events into such channels as might ensure safety to themselves and their possessions. And who can blame them for such foresight? Patriots are, according to my experience, men who look for a substantialquid pro quo. They serve their country with the view of making their country serve them.
Whatever the usual deliberations of the body among whom I found myself might be, the all-absorbing topic of the evening set all else aside.
"We approach the moment," cried one, a young man with a lisping intonation and great possessions, as I afterwards learnt. "Now is the time for all to do as I have done. I have sent everything out of the country. I and my sword remain for France."
He spoke truly. He and his sword now lie side by side—in French soil.
"Let all do the same," growled an old man, with eyes flashing beneath his great white brows.
"All who know," suggested one, significantly. Whereupon arose a great discussion, and many names were uttered that were familiar to me—amongothers, indeed, that of my friend, John Turner. I noticed that many laughed when his name was mentioned.
"Oh!" they cried. "You may leave John Turner to care for his own affairs.Il est fin celui-là."
Again a familiar name fell on my ears, and this was received with groans and derisive laughter. It was that of the Baron Giraud. I gathered that there was question of warning certain financiers and rich persons outside of this circle of some danger known only to the initiated. Indeed, the wealthy were sending their money out of the country as fast and as secretly as possible.
"No, no," cried the young man I have mentioned; "the Baron Giraud—a fine Baron, heaven knows!—has risen with the Empire—nor has he been over-scrupulous as to whom he trod underfoot. With the Empire he must fall."
And one and all fell to abusing the Baron Giraud. He was a thief, and a despoiler of the widow and orphan. His wealth had been acquired not honestly, but at the expense,—nay, at the ruin—of others. He was an unwholesome growth of a mushroom age—a bad man, whose god was gold and gain his only ambition.
"If such men are to grow in France and govern her, then woe to France," cried one prophetic voice.
Indeed, if half we heard was true of the Baron Giraud, he must have been a fine scoundrel, and I had little compunction in agreeing that he deserved no consideration at the hands of honest men. The cooler heads deemed it wise to withhold from the Baron certain details of the public feeling, not out of spite, but because such knowledge could not be trusted in notoriously unscrupulous hands. He would but turn it to money.
For the greater safety, all present bound themselves upon honour not to reveal the result of their deliberations to certain named persons, and the Baron Giraud had the privilege of heading this list. I was surprised that no form of mutual faith was observed. These men seemed to trust each other without so much as a word—and indeed, what stronger tie can men have than the common gain?
"We are not conspirators," said one to me. "Our movements are known."
And he nodded his head in the direction of the Tuileries. I made no doubt that all, indeed, was known in that quarter, but the fatalist who planned and schemed there would meet these men the next day with his gentle smile, betraying nothing.
As my interest became aroused by these proceedings, I became aware of the Vicomte's closescrutiny. It seemed that he was watching me—noting the effect of every speech and word.
"You were interested," he said, casually, as we drove home smoking our cigars.
"Yes."
He looked out of the carriage window for some time, and then, turning, he laid his hand on my knee.
"And it is not a game," he said, with his little laugh, which somehow sounded quite different—less senile, less helpless. "It is not a game, my friend!"