A SWEET REVENGE.
Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte is a dull little town, situated in Cotentin, that long eastern strip of the coast of Normandy which extends directly in front of the lovely isles of Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney, and Sark. Cherbourg lies to the north of it, but we only mention that facten passant; for the incident related in these pages occurred long before the Second Empire, long before Cherbourg attracted visitors to admire its naval displays, long before railways had shortened distances and brought the Cotentinians within daily hearing of their “ne plus ultra” of cities—inimitable Paris. The little towns then slumbered peaceably amidst their corn-fields and apple-orchards; and none slept sounder than Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte, whose very existence was scarcely known beyond the limits of its native district. It was remarkable, indeed, for nothing; its church was old and fine, as most French provincial churches are; the open space around it formed the market-place, deserted and silent except on market-days; and the Grande Rue contained the one hostelry of the town—the Hôtel Royale—and various stores.
But there were also a few cross-streets, interspersed with flowery, bowery gardens, and it is in a house situated in one of these that our scene is laid. It was a plain, unpretending dwelling, but large and exquisitely neat. It had the widest local reputation of being the snuggest in winter, the coolest in summer, and the most hospitable at allseasons of any in Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte—nay, in the whole stretch of Cotentin! The garden behind it, too, was famous; the owners, M. and Mme. Dupuis, cultivated it themselves with rare enthusiasm and taste. Alphonse Karr’s world-celebrated flowers would have been considered pale and scentless beside Mme. Dupuis’—at least, by the Cotentinians. And the fruits—the peaches and green-gages, the pears and grapes—it was not believed possible that the like could be found even in Paris. Let us add that, when in their first flush of ripeness and bloom, the greater portion of these carefully-tended flowers and fruits were culled by Mme. Dupuis’ own hands, and sent forth to carry light and beauty, perfume and freshness, into every sick-room of the little town.
The Dupuis were a thoroughly worthy couple; they had married young, for love, and had been blessed with an only child, a daughter, good and pretty as her mother, and, like her mother, wedded early and happily.
When the episode in their lives which is the subject of this little story took place, they had passed together thirty years of tranquil, uneventful felicity. M. Dupuis had shortly before sold his business—he was a notary—and was now enjoying a well-earned rest. He was a man of sixty, well-educated, intelligent, and still strong, active, and enthusiastic. His plump little wife had just completed her fifty-fifth year—she did not appear to be forty-five.She was of a deeper, more thoughtful nature than her husband, but nevertheless her sympathy with him was unbounded—she loved all he loved, the same people and the same things. She was the type of a true wife and of a true Christian.
Too modest and timid to have any personal pretensions, Mme. Dupuis’ great pride lay in her well-ordered home, her exquisitely clean house, her nicely-arranged kitchen, and, though last, certainly not least, in her cook and housemaid, whom she considered absolutely unparalleled in their several vocations. And it must be allowed that Jeannette and Marianne had, during twenty years, fully justified their mistress’ good opinion of them. During all this time the two women had constantly studied her every wish, and the result was the perfection of domestic economy.
The family party was completed by a large white Angora cat, promoted since the marriage of Mlle. Dupuis to the enviable position of “pet of the household,” and universally considered in Cotentin to be the most remarkable animal of its species.
One winter’s evening, when the snow lay deep in the streets and the north wind whistled fiercely around the eaves, M. Dupuis’ dining-room looked particularly cheerful. The heavy tapestry curtains were drawn close before the windows, and a flaming wood fire showered sparkles of reflected light on the crystal and silver placed on the round dining-table, and lighted up the portraits of some sober-looking personages in powdered wigs which adorned the walls. The handsome tortoise-shell and copper clock, a masterpiece of thestyle Louis Quinze, standing on a hanging shelf above the sofa, was, perhaps, the best article of furniture in the room; the chimney-piece was too encumbered with porcelain shepherds and shepherdesses, and china jars filled with artificial flowers and covered with great glass globes, for the taste of the present day. Fashion had slumbered in Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte for many a long year. But there was light and warmth, and a pervading feeling of comfort, worth all the gilded, satin-covered chairs and lounges that Parisian taste can devise, all the Venetian mirrors and Sevres vases that luxury can afford. Mme. Dupuis’ dining-room was certainly rococo and provincial, incongruous in some respects, deficient in harmony, but what sincere, cordial hospitality those four walls had witnessed! what pleasant repasts! what real good, wholesome eating! what merry toasts had been drunk there in claret, in sherry, and champagne—wines as bright as Mme. Dupuis’ eyes, and as pure and unadulterated as her heart!
A second clock, a very ugly one it must be confessed, a representative of the bad taste of the First Empire, which stood in the centre of the already too encumbered mantel-shelf, marked five minutes past six, and Mme. Dupuis was seated at the head of her dining-table. She was neatly dressed in black silk; her dark brown hair, streaked here and there with silver threads, was arranged in simple bandeaux on each side of her temples, and a small lace cap trimmed with a few knots of pink ribbon concealed the paucity of the “back hair”; for Mme. Dupuis was behind her time. She had not “marched with her age,” and had not yet learned to wear a “switch.”
M. Dupuis, somewhat old-fashioned in his attire, but scrupulously neat, sat opposite to her. At an equal distance from each was placed a gentleman as old apparently as the ex-notary, but infinitely more pretentious in his style both of dress and manner. His coat and trowsers were of Parisian cut; his beard in the latest mode; his voice dictatorial—a man of the world evidently, and evidently also accustomed to think more of himself than of any one else. The little party was busily engaged in the agreeable duty of eating sundry “plats” which diffused a most appetizing odor. Marianne, madame’s right hand and faithful aid during many long years, waited at table, while the beautiful Angora sought its fortune around and under.
“Well, it happened just as I tell you,” said Mme. Dupuis, as she handed her guest a delicious-looking chop—“it happened just as I tell you, M. Rouvière. I believed that he had gone crazy—completely crazy; get down, puss! He came rushing up-stairs, four steps at a time, crying at the top of his voice, ‘It’s Tom! it’s Tom Rouvière, that fellow Tom!’ Excuse me, M. Rouvière, but that’s his word, you know. As for me, I followed, stumbling as I went along, killing myself trying to make him hear that it was much more likely to be M. du Luc in his new carriage; for I knew through Mme. le Rendu that M. du Luc was to dine to-day at Semonville, and, as he never passes through Saint-Sauveur without stopping to wish us good-day, I had every reason to believe....”
“O my dear Reine!” interrupted M. Dupuis, “what necessity is there for telling all that to Rouvière? He knows nothing about M. du Luc and Mme. le Rendu;how can all that interest him? Besides, you know that M. du Luc never has post-horses to his carriage, so it could not be he.”
“But I believed it was,” replied madame.
“Allons! never mind now, dear,” returned her husband, “but do keep your cat off; she is teasing Rouvière.”
“Puss! puss!” cried Mme. Dupuis, “come here and behave yourself, do. Now, George,” she continued, “you must acknowledge that it was much more natural that I should expect to see M. du Luc, our country neighbor, than M. Rouvière, whom I did not know, and from whom you had never heard for more than thirty years—really, now. What doyousay, M. Rouvière? You shall be judge.”
M. Rouvière, who during this dialogue had been silently eating and drinking with evident appetite, looked up from his plate with an expression of impatience anything but flattering to the lady.
“Of course you are right, madame,” replied he sharply; “of course you are right. But, God bless me, madame, I really believe that your chops are fried with crumbs!”
Poor Mme. Dupuis started at this abrupt interpellation; her good-tempered smile vanished; one might have fancied there was a tear in her eye as she answered gently: “I am so sorry! It was I who made Jeannette crumb them. I thought they would be more delicate.”
“What heresy!” exclaimed Rouvière. “My dear lady, nobody now fries chops in crumbs, just as nobody now wears leg-of-mutton sleeves! Gracious heavens! Providence has granted you one of the very best articles of food that theculinary art is acquainted with—real, genuine,pré-salémutton, pure Miels mutton—and you fry it in crumbs—you actuallydareto fry it in crumbs!Parbleu!I have sailed round the world, but I had to come to Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte to see Miels mutton fried in crumbs.”
“How sorry I am!” cried poor Mme. Dupuis humbly. “Let me help you to some sole, M. Rouvière. We have a market for fish only once a week, but, as M. Dupuis is very fond of fish, I have made an arrangement with a fisherman from Porthail, so that we have a little extra ‘plat’ every Wednesday, and as, most fortunately, to-day happens to be Wednesday....”
“Oh! come, Reine,” interrupted M. Dupuis, who had been listening with a very vexed expression of countenance to what was passing between his wife and his friend, “don’t go on with all these details; what interest can they have for Rouvière? Well, Tom, tell me, now, where were you eight days ago at this very hour?”
“Eight days’ ago, George,” said Rouvière, and he stopped eating to reflect—“eight days ago I was in Dublin.”
“In Dublin!” exclaimed Dupuis admiringly. “What a fellow!”
“From Dublin,” continued M. Rouvière, “I went to London, and from London to Jersey, and from Jersey—here!”
“And was it when you got to Jersey that the happy thought occurred to you to come and stir up your old friend?” asked Dupuis; and his bright, soft eyes rested affectionately on Rouvière’s face.
“Yesterday morning, my dear boy,” replied Rouvière. “There was a map of Normandy hanging up in the hall of the hotel where I was staying, and I was looking at italmost mechanically, when suddenly I came across the name of Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte. ‘Saint Sauveur-le-Vicomte!’ I repeated two or three times to myself. ‘Isn’t that the name of the little town where George Dupuis used to live—my friend George? I’ve a mind to go and dine with him, if he be still alive.’”
M. Rouvière seemed to be looking for something on the table as he finished these words. Mme. Dupuis, watching every feature, anxiously inquired what he wanted.
“Some lemon, madame, for this sole,” replied he. “Marianne—I think I heard you call her Marianne,” he added, turning towards his hostess—“Marianne, haven’t you a lemon?”
“Here is one,” exclaimed Mme. Dupuis, rising hastily and running to the sideboard. “Now tell me, M. Rouvière,” she said with her pleasant smile, as she laid the lemon by his plate, “have you really been going up and down the highways and by-ways of the world during thirty long years, just like the Wandering Jew?”
“I have indeed, madame,” replied her guest, squeezing the lemon-juice out over his sole.
“You must have eaten some strange things in your travels,” continued the lady.
“I rather think so,” replied Rouvière, with his mouth full of fish; “thingsyounever heard of! Marianne, my good girl, I smell coffee roasting in your kitchen. Now, nearly every one, especially here in the provinces, roasts it too much—all the aroma is driven off; run quick, that’s a good lass, and tell the cook—Jeannette, isn’t it?—that the coffee must only be toasted—just scorched. Do you understand, eh?”
“Yes, yes, I understand well enough,” muttered Marianne as she went out; “that fellow seems to like nothing!”
“My dear lady,” went on Rouvière, turning to Mme. Dupuis, “the very accident I feared for your coffee has happened to your chicken—it is cooked too much, or rather it has been cooked too fast. It is a great pity, for it was an excellent fowl!”
“Oh! dear, oh! dear,” exclaimed Mme. Dupuis, who was beginning to feel a kind of despair thus far unknown to her. All her dinners hitherto had been subjects of compliment;thiswas quite a new experience. “Oh! dear, oh! dear, how many misfortunes at one time. Pray excuse me, M. Rouvière; you came so unexpectedly, you know. We had no time to do things well. But do, pray, stay a few days with us, and you shall see. I promise you that everything shall be better.”
“Impossible, madame,” replied the guest, as he accepted a fine snipe done to a turn; “you are very kind, but at nine o’clock this evening I must be on the road again. Yes, madame, you may well say that I have eaten strange things,” he continued, raising his voice. “I’ve eaten kouskoussou under the Arab’s tent; curry—that incendiary curry—on the shores of the Ganges; I’ve dined off the frightful tripang in Java; and in China on swallows’ nests stewed in castor-oil!”
“Good gracious!” ejaculated Mme. Dupuis.
“What a wonderful fellow!” exclaimed M. Dupuis enthusiastically.
M. Dupuis was unwontedly silent; he was evidently exceedingly annoyed, and it was pitiful to seethe deprecating glances his little wife directed towards him from time to time. He, however, kept his eyes fixed steadily on his plate.
“In Panama,” went on Rouvière, “I’ve eaten roasted monkey. But what need to enumerate? There’s nothing edible in creation that I have not swallowed. So that I believe I may say,” here he bowed thanks for a second snipe, “there does not exist a man under the firmament of heaven easier to satisfy than myself. The Rocky Mountain Indians—those Indians are most extraordinarily sagacious—the Rocky Mountain Indians, I say, gave me a surname while I was among them—‘Choc-ugh-tou-saw,’ which signifies good-humored stomach, because I was always satisfied with my dinner!”
“What a wonderful fellow!” reiterated Dupuis. “Come, Tom, try this Burgundy; your throat must be dry. What a wonderful fellow, to be sure!”
“Do let me prevail on you to take another snipe,” said Mme. Dupuis, holding up to the guest’s acceptance a third fine, fat bird; “I’m so glad to find that you like them!”
“No, madame, no, a thousand thanks. Yes, I don’t deny that I am fond of snipes, but, I’m sorry—I can’t deceive you—these are not just what they ought to be. In the first place, they have not been killed long enough; and, secondly, you have forgotten to pepper them—a process absolutely necessary with game. But, excuse me, for the last half-hour I’ve been looking at that covered dish, wondering what there is in it. I really don’t believe that I have ever felt more curiosity in the whole course of my life; excuse me, I must look into it.”
He raised the cover as he spoke, peering in with eyes and nose.
“In the name of all the saints, what is it?” he exclaimed, as he contemplated the contents and sniffed up the steam.
“My dear friend,” answered Dupuis, a little nervously, “it is something I had concocted on purpose for you—it is macaroni.”
“Macaroni!Thatmacaroni!” shouted Rouvière, as if never more surprised in his life.
“Yes, M. Rouvière,” explained Mme. Dupuis, no longer smiling, poor little woman! “This dish was inspired by George’s friendship. He remembered that you were very fond of Italy, so I sent in haste to the grocer’s; he fortunately had still a small quantity of macaroni on hand, and then, with the help of my cookery-book—for Jeannette couldn’t manage it—I made you aplat à l’italienne.”
“A l’italienne!” repeated George’s old friend with a sneering laugh. “My dear, good lady, that’s not macaronià l’italienne! Oh! no, no. However, who knows?—it may be good to eat all the same. Let us try!” So saying, M. Rouvière helped himself to a spoonful, while his hosts looked on anxiously.
“Well, how do you like it?” asked George, when the taster, after many grimaces, had got down a mouthful.
“Like it!” replied Rouvière, “why, not at all; you might as well try to masticate organ-pipes! It really is something remarkable; it’s fossil macaroni, petrified macaroni! The grocer who sold it to you deserves the jail;Ishouldn’t wonder if he belonged to some secret society!”
“Marianne, quick! change M. Rouvière’s plate,” said Dupuis sharply—for the old servant was gazing at her master’s friend with a very unmistakable expression of disgust on her honest face. “Mydear Tom,” he continued, “what a bad dinner you have made!”
“You are jesting,” replied Rouvière carelessly; “at all events, your wine is capital.”
“I don’t know what to say,” sighed poor Mme. Dupuis. “I feel ready to die with vexation. But, dear M. Rouvière,” with a pretty supplicatory gesture, “do, I beg and pray of you, do taste my rice-pudding.”
“Very willingly, my dear lady,” answered the terrible guest—“very willingly; only let me first finish eating these green peas, which have been very well preserved, and would be really perfect had the cook spared her butter a little!”
At this moment the church bells began to ring theAngelus, and Mme. Dupuis rose precipitately from the table.
“You will pardon my leaving you to finish dinner with George,” said she to Rouvière; “I shall be back long before you go.”
“Surely you are not going out such an evening as this!” exclaimed Rouvière. “Why, there’s a foot deep of snow in the streets!”
“My wife goes to church every evening, winter and summer, at theAngelus, no matter what the weather,” remarked George. “She has done so for nearly fifty years, and nothing will break her of the habit now.”
“Ah! very well,” returned Rouvière. “I hope you like your pastor, Mme. Dupuis?”
“Oh! yes, indeed I do,” replied the good little woman enthusiastically; “he is a most worthy man. Do stay twenty-four hours longer with us, M. Rouvière, and I will ask him to dine with us; you will be glad to know him, I am quite sure.”
“So am I,” returned her husband’sold chum, with the little sneering laugh which seemed to be natural to him; “but I must wait for another opportunity.”
“Now, George,” said Mme. Dupuis, as she tied her wadded hood and slipped on the cloak and india-rubber shoes which had been placed ready for her on a chair, “do beg your friend to taste the rice-pudding; and, M. Rouvière, do try my preserves. I make them myself, and I really believe that they are excellent. Good-by for the present!”
“Good-by, madame.”
“Hem! hem!” ejaculated Rouvière as the door closed behind the lady, “so! so! Now let us look at this rice. Your wife’s given to piety, eh, George?”
“Yes, she is a religious woman,” replied George slowly; then added, with some slight eagerness in his manner, “but she never imposes her opinions upon any one. She never teases me, I can assure you, although I do happen to be somewhat lukewarm about church matters. But tell me, Tom”—here M. Dupuis hesitated and appeared embarrassed—“don’t you find her very provincial, very rustic?”
“Oh! no, not at all,” answered Rouvière in a tone which seemed to imply the contrary of his words.
“Yes, you do—I know you do!” cried George passionately. “But whatcanyou expect? It’s not her fault! She has lived in this hole all her life. And your unexpected visit has excited her—upset her. She really talked as if she did not know what she was saying—such nonsense, such silly gossip!”
“Oh! no, not at all,” repeated Rouvière, as he steadily devoured the rice-pudding.
“Parbleu!yes; don’t deny it!” cried Dupuis peevishly. “It madeyou nervous—I saw it did. It irritated me, I know: it really seemed as if she was trying to show you her defects. It vexed me more, too, because she really has many good qualities—admirable qualities, poor little woman!”
“My dear George,” returned Rouvière, pushing away his plate and coolly wiping his mouth with his napkin, “I don’t doubt it in the least; her rice-pudding is certainly delicious.”
Dupuis at this moment caught sight of the pretty Angora with one soft white paw laid in silent petition on his friend’s knee. His irritation, with difficulty kept under so far, instantly boiled over on the head of the innocent cat. “Get down!” he roared, “get down, you brute! I’ll drown that beast one of these days! Take that animal away,” he continued, turning angrily towards Marianne, who had just brought in the coffee; “if she comes into this room again, I’ll throw her out of the window!”
“Come to me, pussy,” said Marianne in an extra-gentle tone of voice, taking the cat in her arms and kissing it; “these Parisian gentlemen don’t like you, it seems. A regular Turk he is, too, turning the house topsy-turvy,” she muttered as she went out of the room, scowling over her shoulder at the visitor.
Rouvière had risen from the table during this episode, and, tongs in hand, was busy with the bright wood fire. He smiled maliciously when the cat was carried away, and, as if in very lightness of heart, broke forth in song:
“‘O bell’ alma innamorata! O bell’ alma innamorata!’ Tell me, George,” he interrupted himself to say, “have you a good theatre here in Saint-Sauveur?”
“A theatre? That’s an idea! Well, yes, we have a theatre once a year, on the fair-day at mid-Lent!”
“That’s too bad!” laughed Rouvière. “How on earth do you contrive to get through your evenings?”
“Well, in winter,” answered George, “we chat by the side of the fire, or my wife and I play at piquet; sometimes two or three neighbors come in, and then we have a game of whist!”
“Phew!” whistled the man of the world. “With thecuré, I’ll swear,” said he presently with his customary mocking smile, as he planted himself comfortably with his back to the blaze and his coattails gathered up under his arms.
“Yes,” went on George simply, apparently unconscious of his friend’s sneer; “sometimes with thecuré. And then in summer I water my garden, and Reine and I take a walk on the highroad up to the top of the hill, or in the wood by the river’s side; and then—well, everybody goes to bed early here.”
“Very moral, indeed!” sneered Rouvière again, picking his teeth.
By this time Marianne had cleared away the dinner things, and, after placing a provision of glasses and a bottle of brandy, another of rum, and a case of liqueurs on the table, had finally departed to dine in her turn with Jeannette, and to confide her observations on the obnoxious Parisian to her companion’s sympathizing ear.
“So at last we are alone!” exclaimed Dupuis with a sigh of satisfaction, as the maid closed the door behind her. “Now, Tom, sit down and let us drink. Come andtell me what you think of this brandy. Here’s to your health, old friend!” filling himself a glass of old Cognac and tossing it off excitedly. “Do you know how many years it is since we last met, Tom? Five-and-thirty, Tom—five-and-thirty years!”
“Yes,parbleu!” said Rouvière, helping himself to the brandy. “I suppose it must be some thirty-five years since we parted in the diligence yard, Rue Montmartre. I remember that we swore eternal friendship and constant correspondence. The correspondence did not last long—less than two years, it seems to me—but our friendship, George, it smouldered under its ashes, but it kept alive, my boy!”
The two friends clasped each other’s hands for a moment silently.
“Your brandy is first-rate,” remarked Rouvière presently, as he finished hispetit-verre.
“You like it? Bravo! Well, there are still some pleasant hours in life—aren’t there now, Tom?”
“I believe you,” answered the guest meditatively.
“Who should know it better than you, fortunate fellow as you are! But I say, Tom, how does it happen that you have not changed in the least? Not in the least, by Jove! You’ve remained young and handsome.... ‘I was young and handsome!’—do you remember how magnificently Talma used to say that? Your beard and moustaches might belong to an African lion! You make me think of Henri Quatre! But drink, Tom; you don’t drink!”
“My dear old George,” said Rouvière in a quiet, confidential tone of voice, and resting his two arms on the table, while he fixedhis eyes on his friend’s flushed face—“my dear old George, whatwasyour reason for burying yourself alive in Cotentin? Tell me.”
“Why do you ask me that, Tom?” cried Dupuis, who suddenly became serious. “You find me rusty, then?”
“No, no; butwhatwas your reason? Tell me in confidence, you know.”
“Yes, I am rusty; I feel it!” said poor Dupuis mournfully. “I tell you what, Tom, the provinces of France deserve all that is said against them. They are like those springs of mineral waters which turn to stone every living creature you throw into them! What reason had I, do you ask? Gracious heavens! What is life, Tom, but a series of chances; some fatality gets you into a groove, and you are pushed on and on until you reach your grave. Try this rum, Tom.”
“Do you indulge in such prolonged libations every evening?” asked Rouvière.
“No, never. These are in honor of you.”
“So I suspected. This is the rum, isn’t it? Come, go on, George; I want to hear the rest of yourOdyssey.”
“Well, Tom,” resumed his friend, taking a sip at his glass of rum and breathing at the same time a sigh which was almost a groan, “you remember that my prospects were pretty bright in Paris. I fully intended to buy that solicitor’s office where I was working—it had been offered to me on good conditions; but some family affairs called me home here, and here I stayed. I don’t know how it happened, but it is certain that I found a charm in this provincial life—in its futile comfort, its indolent habits, its tame monotony.”
Here poor Dupuis stopped, that he might give vent to an angry gust of self-reproach by punching the fire with the tongs; after a sip of rum he continued: “All these got possession of me, wound themselves around me like a net, and I remained their captive.”
His head bowed itself forward, and he sat gazing regretfully on the ugly clock in the middle of the chimney-piece.
“All right, George!” laughed Rouvière; “you don’t say it, but I suspect that Madame Dupuis had a good deal to do with this final catastrophe!”
“It is true, Tom,” replied the other, his countenance lighting up for a moment; “and you may believe it or not, as you like, but I swear that she was a charming girl! Moreover, my dear old mother was living then, and it was a great pleasure to her to have me settle here where we were all born. The long and the short of it was that I married, bought my father-in-law’s office, and all was over—the die was cast! Take some of the Kirschwasser, Tom,” he added hurriedly, as if his remembrances were too painful to be dwelt on.
“Presently,” said Rouvière, a smile flickering over his worldly-wise face; “but tell me, first, you’ve not stayed walled up in Saint-Sauveur, I hope, all these thirty-five years? You take a run to Paris every once in a while, don’t you?”
“Don’t mention it,” groaned Dupuis. “I’ve not seen Paris since I said good-by to you in the Rue Montmartre!”
“Phew!” whistled Rouvière, helping himself to the Kirschwasser. The friends remained silent for a time, gazing at the fire.
“But you used to like to travel,” exclaimed Rouvière, at last.
“And so I do still, my dear Tom; my taste has not changed in that respect, I can assure you. But what could I do? When I married, my idea was to work steadily for fifteen years, and then sell my business and live on what I had saved. I intended then to take a trip to Paris with my wife, after that to the Pyrenees—I always wished so much to see the Pyrenees! But it was not to be; as the old women say, Man proposes and God disposes. We had been married just five years when our daughter was born....”
“What’s that you say—you have a daughter?” interrupted his friend.
“A daughter and a granddaughter, Tom,” replied George, with an inflection in his voice that sounded very like pride, and a soft look in his eyes; “so you understand that I had to stick to my business for ten years more, that I might get her a dowry; and then, when at last I did sell out—well, I was old ... and I couldn’t think of anything pleasanter than just to stay quietly in my arm-chair! Didn’t I tell you that my life has been nothing but a chapter of accidents from beginning to end? Come, shall we have some punch, Tom? I’ll make it.”
“If you will. So you have a daughter! And she is married! Well married, I hope?”
“Well, yes; her husband is a sub-prefect.”
George’s voice again took a tone of gratified pride, which elicited a smile from his observant friend.
“A sub-prefect! Bravo, bravissimo! But you’re putting too much lemon into that punch.”
“Do you think so? And now, Tom, that I’ve made a clean breast of it—told you all—you must explain something to me that I nevercould comprehend: howhaveyou contrived to make your modest fortune suffice for nearly half a century’s constant travel?”
“It is easy enough to explain,” said Rouvière, sitting up straight in his chair and becoming very animated and somewhat loud as he proceeded. “I began life with ten thousand francs a year in land; my first operation was to change my patrimony into bank-notes, by which means I doubled my income; then I invested it in the sinking funds, which trebled it. And then, freed from every narrow calculation, from every family tie, from every social trammel, I took my flight into space! Here’s to your health, my old friend George! Hip! hip! hurrah!”
“What a wonderful fellow!” cried George in a paroxysm of admiration, excited, very probably, much more by the brandy and the rum and the punch than by Rouvière’s comprehension of life and happiness. “What energy! what grandeur!”
“I consecrated my youth,” continued Tom in a declamatory style, “to distant adventures, reserving Europe for the autumn of life. My foot—this foot, this very foot, George, which now touches yours on this carpet—has left its print among those of the tiger and the elephant on the sands of India! Nay, it has even followed those terrible prowlers into their forests of bamboo, lofty and solemn as our cathedrals!”
“Ah! that was something like living!” ejaculated Dupuis, who listened with almost breathless interest.
“Two years later I arrived in Canton. What an arrival, ye gods! Never shall I forget the scene. It was a lovely summer night. Theaccession of the emperor of the Celestials to his ancestral throne was being celebrated. Our canoe could scarcely force its way among the junks and flower-boats, all of them decorated with innumerable paper lanterns. Fireworks of a thousand different hues were reflected, mingled with the stars, in the flowing river, and we could watch their rainbow tints playing on the porcelain temples that rise on its banks!”
“What a fairy-like sight! Happy, happy Tom!” murmured Dupuis.
“From China,” pursued Rouvière, after quaffing off his glass of punch, “I sailed for the Americas. I travelled about there for several years, going to and fro, from north to south, from the savannas to the pampas, from the great austere Canadian woods to the smiling Brazilian forests; sometimes on foot, sometimes on horseback, oftenest in apirogue. My longest stay was in Peru. I could not tear myself away from that coquettish city of Lima!”
“Ha! ha!traître, gay deceiver! O Tom, Tom!” laughed Dupuis, shaking his head in ecstasy.
“I turned gamester, too. It is impossible for you, George, to conceive the immense attraction a gaming-table possesses in that land of gold and silver and jewels. One might almost fancy that one of those fabulous trees we read of in Oriental tales had been shaken over the green cloth! There is little or no regular coined money to be seen on it, but dull yellow ingots, bright golden spangles, fiery diamonds, and milk-white, lustrous pearls are heaped up there pell-mell! All the treasures of earth and ocean seem to be brought together on that table, tumbled and jostled in dazzling confusion!You can stay whole nights by that board—nights that fly like minutes—your eyes fascinated, your brain on fire! Twenty times in twenty-four hours you are raised to the throne of Rothschild—as often precipitated down, down to Job’s dunghill. You become bald, you may become mad, but you feel what life is—you live!”
“It is true, it is true!” cried Dupuis in a state of intense excitement; “you are right, Tom, there is no doubt of that. And to think that I have never played at anything but that blackguard whist at a sou the counter! But go on, Tom, go on; you really electrify me!”
“Everything has its end,” continued Rouvière, highly flattered by the effect he was producing; “there came a day of sadness and discouragement, and I took passage on board an American whaler bound for the south pole. Yes, my hand has touched the frozen limits of our globe; I have contemplated, with feelings akin to awe, those creatures with human-like faces, the morse, on their pedestals of ice, recumbent and dreamy as the sphinx of Thebes. And in the midst of those silent spaces, so strangely different from all I had hitherto seen, I experienced sensations that seemed to belong to another world. A kind ofposthumousillusion of being in another planet took possession of me. Certainly I am much deceived if the days and nights I saw in those regions of ice do not resemble those in our pale satellite. What more shall I tell you, my dear friend? Three years after this I found myself in Rio Janeiro, whence I returned to Europe, after having literally described the whole circumference of our globe with the end of my walkingstick!And thus passed away my youth!”
M. Rouvière here threw himself back in his arm-chair, and stroked his beard with a sigh.
“Every king living might envy you, Tom!” cried Dupuis. “But tell me more. What have you been doing since then?”
“Since then, George,” said Rouvière with nonchalance, “I have not travelled; I have merely made excursions. First upon the Mediterranean—but, pshaw! it was like sailing on the basin in the Tuileries’ garden! I have visited all the countries on its shore. And by degrees, as I grew older, my circle became smaller, so that now I live entirely in Europe, going from city to city, according to the attraction of the moment. Indeed, I may say, my dear fellow, that Europe is my property, my domain!” Here the speaker began to wax warmer and louder. “Every festival given by nature or man in Europe is given to amuse me. For me Naples displays her bay and her volcano, and keeps open her grand theatre, San Carlos; for my recreation Paris adorns her boulevards and builds her opera-house; to amuse me Madrid has a Prado and bull-fights. All the great exhibitions were made for me, beginning with that of London.Evviva la libertà!Let’s drink!” So saying, he filled for himself a brimming bumper of punch, and tossed it off with a very self-satisfied smile.
“Tom!” cried Dupuis delightedly, “you are a genius! But you have said nothing about the great monuments—the Alhambra, the Coliseum, the Parthenon.”
“Pshaw! those are your friends!” retorted Tom with his peculiar sneer. “I’ve said nothing aboutthem because they are dragged about everywhere. Who hasn’t seenthem?”
There was a minute of silence, broken by an emphatic “Ah!” breathed not loudly but deeply by the excited listener. Starting from his seat, and thrusting his hands into his pockets, he began hurriedly to pace up and down the room. His friend glanced at him uneasily.
“What’s the matter? What annoys you?” he asked.
“O Tom, Tom!” cried George, still continuing his agitated walk, “I blush when I compare your life with mine. While your heart has counted each pulsation by some noble or beautiful emotion, mine has stupidly gone on ticking off the hours and days and years as calmly as a kitchen clock! Have I really lived, tell me?” He stopped in front of his friend, gesticulating violently. “I was born, and I have slept, and I have eaten; but what else? And what has been the result? My intelligence is extinguished; I have dried up; I have descended in the scale of being, until I have come to be on a level with the idiot of the Alps, with a shellfish, with an oyster!”
“Come, come, George, you’re going too far!” said Rouvière soothingly. “Even supposing that you no longer possess as much freshness of imagination, as much vivacity of wit, as you used to have....”
“I thought so! I knew it!” interrupted Dupuis, resuming his hurried walk backwards and forwards; “you acknowledge that you find me rusty!”
M. Rouvière rose slowly from his seat, and, after lighting a cigar, remained standing with his back against the chimney-piece, his eyes fixed on his friend, who paused in front of him at his first word.
“Listen to me, George,” said he seriously, caressing his moustache with his fingers as he spoke; “I will be frank with you. You know that I always used to be frank with you. The impression your house made on me when I first entered it was, I must confess, a sinister one. I seemed to breathe the air of a cemetery in it. I could have fancied that I was in one of those long-buried dwellings which the patient labor of enthusiastic antiquaries has restored to light and life. While the servant went to call you I could not prevent myself from examining, with a kind of wondering, stupid curiosity, the old-fashioned furniture, and the pictures, and those dismal tapestries worthy of figuring in a museum! I remembered the delicacy of your character, the elegance of your manners, your intelligent taste, your love of art; and positively I could not reconcile the bright memories I retained of you with the dull, insipid existence of which I had the evidence before my eyes. You came to me; I looked at you; you spoke. What was it? Was my sight affected, or my judgment biassed by the thoughts which were literallypreyingon me at that moment? I can’t tell what it was—I can’t explain—but your language astonished me! Your forehead actually seemed to me to have grown narrower! I wiped away a secret tear, and I sighed as I should have sighed had I been standing by your grave! I even half spoke the words, ‘This, then, is all that remains of my friend!’ You’re not offended, George?” added M. Rouvière, stopping short and looking inquiringly into his victim’s anxious, attentive face.
“Not a bit, Tom; not a bit,” replied George. “I tell you I felt thatI had sunk; at least, I suspected it, and the suspicion was intolerable. I prefer the certainty.” He turned away with an attempt at a smile, and resumed his agitated walk up and down the room.
Rouvière applied himself to the fire, put on a new log of wood, shovelled up the glowing embers and ashes and threw them with much care and skill to the back, gazed on his work for a minute, and, finally assuming again his favoritepose, with his back leaning against the chimney-piece, started the conversation afresh in a lively, chatty tone.
“Let us change the subject,” said he. “You have sold your business; what do you think of doing now?”
“What do you expect me to do?” cried Dupuis vehemently. “I shall finish by dying!”
“Morbleu!you had better resuscitate. Let us talk seriously, George. When you married you created for yourself new duties, which you have fulfilled to the utmost, honestly and generously. You have provided amply for the future of your wife and daughter. What is there, then, to prevent you now from plunging yourself for two or three years into the vortex of life, and so awaken and reinvigorate your benumbed faculties? The facilities of travel nowadays are wonderful. In the space of two years you can run over the whole of Europe, and even explore a part of Asia and Africa. All the freshness and vivacity of thought you once possessed will return to you when you find yourself in contact with the most glorious creations of art and nature. In the course of two years—two years, mark you!—you can lay at rest for ever every one of those regretful feelings whichare now eating out your heart and shortening your life! Choose now: suicide or travel? Remember that you are free in your choice—you are free to do as you like!”
“Pish!” cried George, turning on his heel and pursuing his walk. “Is it probable that at my time of life I shall set out alone to scour the highways of Europe?”
“But who wants you to go alone?” said Rouvière, going up to him and laying a hand on his shoulder. “Am not I ready to go with you? My experience, my post-chaise, my servant—everything I have is at your service, George!”
“Is it possible, Tom? Are you really in earnest?” exclaimed Dupuis, gratified beyond expression at this proof of his friend’s affection. “You really will accompany me?”
“I will lead you by the hand, my boy!” answered Rouvière gaily; and, falling into step with George, the two friends paced the room together. “I will spare you the torment of guides and ciceroni, and all that species of vermin which besets the tourist. No, don’t thank me,” he continued, when Dupuis began to express his gratitude. “The thought delights me as much as it does you. Your new impressions will revive mine of past days. And won’t it be delicious, George, to end our lives as we began them—participating in the same adventures, in the same pleasures, and even sharing our purses? Come, now, is it settled?”
“My dear friend,” replied Dupuis, with a slight hesitation in his voice, “I will confess to you that no project was ever more agreeable to me, but....”
“No buts! no buts!” cried Rouvière imperatively; “itissettled! We will go direct from this to Paris and wait there until the spring.The museums and theatres will help us to while away the time. I will take you behind the scenes; you shall hear Ristori and Patti! You used to love music!”
“I love it still,” said George, smiling; “I play the flute!”
“So much the better!” cried Tom with increasing animation, as they continued to pace the room side by side; “so much the better! You shall bring your flute with you. What was I saying? Oh! yes; well, the winter in Paris—that’s settled; but at the very beginning of spring we’ll cross the Pyrenees and spend three glorious months in Spain. Then we’ll take advantage of the summer to visit all the principal cities of Germany; and after that we’ll get down into Italy by Trieste and Venice. What do you say to this programme?”
“I say,” replied Dupuis, stopping in his walk and speaking in a strong, decisive tone—“I say that it opens Paradise to me. Give me a cigar, Tom. I say that you are right. Ihavelived long enough for others. Ihaveoffered up a sufficiently large portion of my life as a sacrifice. Bah! a man has duties towards himself.” He lighted his cigar and puffed vigorously for a minute or two. “Providence has conferred gifts on us,” he resumed, “for which we have to render an account. Intellect, imagination, the feeling of the beautiful—these are gifts which bind us. Savages only ought to be capable of such a crime as to allow these sacred flames to die out for want of nourishment!”
“Well said!” exclaimed Rouvière exultingly; “that’s my old George again! Now let us strike while the iron’s hot. Marianne!” He went towards the door to open it as he spoke.
“Hush! hush!” cried Dupuis,stopping him and speaking under his breath; “what do you want with her?”
“I want to tell her that you are going away to-night, and that she must look after your portmanteau. Marianne!” he called again.
“Hush, I beg of you!” repeated poor George earnestly. “Surely we are not going to start to-night?”
“At nine o’clock to-night,” answered Rouvière decisively; “you know very well that I ordered horses for nine o’clock.”
“Yes, I know,” said Dupuis, hesitating and embarrassed; “but the night is going to be deucedly cold—Siberian. I think we should do better to wait until to-morrow morning.”
“Now, just let me tell you this, George,” cried the other impatiently: “if you’re afraid of frosted fingers or toes, and of a night in a post-chaise, you’d better pull your night-cap over your ears at once and go to bed, and never talk again about travelling!”
“I’m afraid of nothing and of nobody,” replied poor Dupuis, driven to his wits’ end; “but the truth is this haste rather puts me out. I had reckoned upon two or three days to look about me and to make my preparations.”
“Preparations! What preparations?” cried Tom in a tone of indignant surprise. “You need a portmanteau and a few shirts and stockings, and you have an hour before you to get them together, and that’s more than time enough. Come, now, George, no childishness; if you defer your departure for two or three days, you know just as well as I do that you won’t go at all. I’ve no need to tell you what influences will be brought to bear on you, what obstacles will rise up before you, to unman youand break down your resolution. Believe me, my dear fellow, in such cases as this, however you yourself may suffer andmakesuffer, youmustcut down to the quick or give up....”
“Once more you are right, Tom,” said Dupuis after a moment’s silent thought. “I’m your man; there’s my hand on it.”
“Marianne!” shouted Rouvière, shaking his friend’s hand with a will.
“No, no, don’t call Marianne,” cried Dupuis hurriedly, and getting between Rouvière and the door. “I know better than she does what I shall need. I shall pack my portmanteau myself as soon as my wife comes in. It’s just eight now,” looking at the clock; “she’ll not be long. Well,” he continued with some agitation, “I shall have to pass a few minutes—sad ones they will be, I know—but my conscience reproaches me with nothing; ... and after all, if my cup be filled with generous wine, what does it matter though the edge be a little bitter?... O Tom!” he continued after a moment’s pause, during which he seemed to have roused his courage, “what a perspective you have opened out before me—what a horizon! Granada! Venice! Naples! It is a dream!” He glanced at the clock and his voice fell. “Five minutes past eight! I would willingly give twenty-five louis to be a quarter of an hour older—a quarter of an hour! I know that I am very weak, but....”
“Shall I tell your wife for you?” interrupted Rouvière, who was watching him anxiously.
“Well, frankly, Tom, you would do me a service,” cried Dupuis eagerly.
“Go and pack your trunk, then, and I’ll settle the business.”
“There’s no danger of a scene,” said George, stopping short near the door; “you would be quite mistaken in your estimate of her character if you feared that.”
“I shall see,” returned his friend laconically.
“Tell her that I entreat her to keep calm. Tears might unman me, but could change nothing in my plans.”
“I’ll tell her. Go to your trunk.”
“I’m going, Tom.”
He opened the door, hesitated, then closed it again and came back to the fireplace, near which Rouvière was still standing.
“My dear friend,” said he softly, laying his hand on Tom’s arm, “you will be very gentle with her, will you not?”
A kind smile gleamed in the usually cold, sharp eyes of the traveller, as he looked in his friend’s anxious, agitated face.
“Don’t be afraid,” he replied; “but you—don’t you desert me when I’ve gone to the front.”
“Desert during the battle! You don’t know me, Tom!”
“Why, you see,” said Tom, “I should look wondrous silly if you did!”
“Tom Rouvière,” cried Dupuis solemnly, “permit me to assure you that my mind is made up, and that this evening at nine o’clock, come what will, I go with you. I pledge you my word of honor. Are you satisfied?”
“Go and pack your trunk!” laughed Rouvière, taking him by the shoulders and pushing him out of the room.
Left to himself, M. Rouvière returned to the chimney-piece and stood over the fire, rubbing his hands meditatively, and from time to time breaking out into words.
“Now then, Mme. Dupuis, it’sbetween you and me,” said he, half-aloud, with a kind of chuckle. “It’s very certain that my principal object is to make poor George something like himself again, but I really sha’n’t be sorry to try the effect of a thunder-bolt on that serene-looking lady!” Here M. Rouvière rubbed his hands gleefully and laughed heartily; picturing to himself, probably, the poor wife’s consternation and despair when he should announce the fatal news.
“I’m not a Turk,” he muttered presently—“far from it, I’m sure; until now I always believed, like every true Christian, that polygamy deserved the gallows; but, hang it! only think of a decent man condemned to perpetual communion with such a disagreeable creature as that old village sauce-pan! Such a life is clearly impossible!” A minute’s silent thought followed, and then M. Rouvière roused himself, and sat down before the fire to warm the soles of his feet. But not for long.
“I understood that woman,” he suddenly exclaimed, starting up from his seat and beginning to pace rapidly up and down the floor—“I understood her and judged her before I saw her! I knew her to be exactly what she is, from her cap to her shoes! She was always odious to me! Just see with what stupid symmetry all this furniture is arranged: two chairs here and two chairs there, everything square with its neighbor, all at equal distances—how wearisome! That old barometer, too, and these absurd curiosities”—he stopped, as he spoke, in front of the chimney: “a stuffed bird, a shell-box, spun-glass, and horrid cocoanut cups carved by galley-slaves! They absolutely give one the height and the breadth and the weight of thewoman, both physically and morally. Poor George! an intelligent man, too. I was sorry for him,” he continued, taking a seat in front of the fire, “but I couldn’t help it. How I pegged into her all dinnertime! Ha, ha, ha! I was as disgusting as a Kalmuck! I reallywasashamed of myself! but, the deuce take it! every one’s nerves are not made of bronze. M. du Luc! Mme. le Rendu! and her fish ... and her cat ... and hercuré... hang it! Icouldn’tstand it.”
Here M. Rouvière interrupted his monologue for a minute to examine the toe of his boot; satisfied that it was intact, he resumed his train of thought.
“No, I really don’t believe that it would be possible to meet with a more perfect type of the humdrum existence, the narrow-minded ideas, and flat conversation prevalent in these provincial mole-hills than this dowdy female presents! That good fellow—how much he must have suffered before he learnt to bow his intellect beneath her imbecile yoke! God bless me! I know the whole story. He probably struggled hard at first, and then, little by little, he was bowed and bent and broken, as so many others have been, by the continued pressure of a feminine will! Thirty years’ martyrdom. But, ha! ha! Mme. Dupuis,yourhour has come; he shall be avenged.”
Here M. Rouvière drew himself up straight in his chair and laughed merrily. “It reminds me,” continued he half-aloud, “of my battle with that old Indian woman when I stole her idol while she was asleep. What a good-for-nothing hussy she was! Extraordinary how much old women resemble one another all the world over.”
[TO BE CONCLUDED NEXT MONTH.]