CHAPTER XXVI
“IS that thing yours?” asked Cartier.
It was Sunday evening in the vast solitude of Cartier’s music room. There was nothing in it but space—a couple ofarmchairs and theblur of tobacco smoke. The sound of Jean’s playing on Cartier’s perfect grand reached his listener’s ear without anything to deaden or blur the clear stream of the falling notes.
“Yes, it’s mine,” replied Jean wearily. “At least I suppose it is—it may be an imitation of yours,mon maître, for anything I know to the contrary. I was half dead with sleep last night when it came to me. Flaubert broke down, you know, after his ball, and went off for a week—so I’ve been doing his work for him—and, to tell you the truth, I prefer his work to his company. But you like it—this little idea? I call it ‘Autumn in Spring’—because I feel it is that moment when the dead leaves are still in the ground and yet life stirs.”
“I don’t know whether I like it or not,” said Cartier slowly, “but you should do nothing else.”
“That is easily said,” Jean answered a little bitterly; “only there must be a basis for bread and butter—I used to think one had nothing to do but to sit and hear music come, but when everything else went I found myself getting up and going after it. Counterpoint and harmony—even the study ofles vieux—they weren’t worth the smell of a cup of coffee and a freshpetit pain; and—well, it’s thanks to you, Cartier, that I’m not starving now.”
“It’s not thanks to me,” said Cartier quietly. “But, Jean, you’ve got to get back to counterpoint and harmony andles vieux! I never much cared for the Toriallis for you; it’s a footman’s place with the jingle of the piano thrown in. Now you’re on your feet again I have another idea. I want you to throw it up and come with me to Russia for a year. I promised to go back to play through the winter at St. Petersburg, but I have a notion to go off somewhere into the country for the summer. They’ve fine forests there and silences deeper than anything you’ve ever dreamed of. Friends of mine have offered me a house the size of a Paris boulevard. I don’t want to go alone—but if you’d come with me it would give you time enough to yourself to hammer out a little stuff—and I should see then better what is in you. For me, unless I have one ofles jeunesatmy side I grow top-heavy and old-fashioned. Let it be a bargain then—you shall have all expenses paid and whatever the good Toriallis have seen fit to dole out to you thrown in!”
Jean drew a deep breath; then he got up and crossed the big, soundingsalonto Cartier’s side.
“That would be worth Heaven to me,mon maître,” he said, “and it’s rather like the other place having to say ‘No!’ But to tell the truth I’m in what’s called a difficult position. I hadn’t meant to consult you about it yet, but I can’t let you think I give up your offer lightly. I’ve discovered that Flaubert is a thief and a fraud! He’s worse.Mon Dieu!it’s like touching dirt to speak of him! And Madame trusts him! Torialli too. I’ve got my proofs, but I’m hesitating. When he comes back I shall confront him with them and ask him to resign; if he will not, I suppose I must expose him. But it will be a shock I should like to spare them.”
Cartier looked up quickly at Jean and puffed cautiously at his pipe for a moment; then he said in a tone Jean had never heard him use before: “Sit down, my boy. Now what is it exactly you propose to tell the Toriallis?”
Jean flushed a little; then he sat down and poured out in a quick, flashing stream of indignation the pent-up suspicions of six months, with the sequel of Margot’s preposterous account.
“You’d better not tell Madame Torialli that,”said Cartier quietly, when Jean had finished. “Part of it wouldn’t be any news to Madame, the part about the accounts. They make them up together. Of course I never knew to what length they carried it, but every one has known for some time that there was something a little sharp and backstairs about the business—only what will you—it’s the best method in Paris? I don’t say Torialli knows, probably not, but he must have to make an effort to remain ignorant!Au reste——” Cartier shut his eyes, opened them and shrugged his shoulders. “You won’t break Madame’s heart by pointing out the treachery ofce beau garçonof hers, but you’ll annoy her pretty considerably, and I shouldn’t choose to be the one who annoyedle petit angeGabriel—she likes to be left to make her own annunciations!”
“What do you mean, Cartier?” asked Jean. He leaned forward; his eyes flickered like a trapped animal’s—they seemed almost to grow into Cartier’s face.
“Mais—c’est connu,” answered his companion. “Surely you are not ignorant that Torialli’s secretary is—en général—the lover of Madame? She doesn’t lose her heart, you understand, but she finds it works better. She has a great deal of discretion, but Flaubert doesn’t happen to be of the rightgenre. So it’s leaked out. Don’t take it too hard, my boy—all Paris knows it—except Torialli. There again he opens his mouth andshuts his eyes—and Madame fills it with what she thinks good for him. I think we may agree that it usuallyisgood for him, though many men would prefer a more meagre diet, administered with a little less discretion.”
Then Cartier got up and walked away from Jean; he could not bear to see the boy’s face.
“It is not true,” muttered Jean, “it is not true!” but he did not get up and go after Cartier.
For a long while neither of the two men spoke. Then Cartier said:
“I wish you’d come with me to Russia, Jean; it’s the best place for you to get the taste of Paris out of your mouth! Paris is like this! You won’t get on here. You don’t understand her little ways. You think of things as if they were made of jewels; they’re not: they’re made, for the most part, of paste. When one knows that one pays the price for paste, but to pay as you do is to be ruined.”
“To tell the truth I had no idea how far things had gone. I believed it was only a case of the occasional bleeding of the rich—that one winks at oneself—it relieves the system, as it were—and at the same time there is always a profit for the anæmic. Torialli is a good fellow, he wouldn’t want more than that; but she’s ambitious—she’s gone, even for Paris, a little far. Still, if I were you, I’d get that account of Margot’s paid. I wouldn’t fight her!”
“Fight her!” muttered Jean. “Mon Dieu!fight Gabrielle!”
“Don’t think of her like that!” cried Cartier sharply, “or you’ll go mad. Think of her as she is, a cleverintrigante, with her hand in the pocket of the public.”
“The Devil!” cried Jean, springing to his feet. “Don’t push me too far, Cartier. I’ve stood a good deal because I suppose you believe what you say——” Jean stopped.
Cartier nodded. “You, too,” he said quietly, “believe what I say. You’re at liberty to knock me down if it’ll relieve you. After all, I let you in for this thing. Only keep hold of the truth. Madame Torialli isn’t worth breaking a stick for, let alone a man’s life! You’ve got talent, my boy,—pull yourself together and use it. You happen to have seen a good woman, even though you haven’t, I fancy, looked at her. Still, they exist, you know, and will continue to, but they’re not as a rule quite as clever as Madame. We’ll go to Russia next week if you’re ready.”
Jean made no answer; he hunted blindly for his hat, found it, and rushed out into the street.
It was a stifling May night; the hot air from the pavement rose up to meet the sultry breath of the sky. Jean did not feel it, it even seemed to him to be cold. He knew nothing, and saw nothing. A merciful blankness had descended upon his mind. He had this much of an idea—that hemust go—but he was not sure where, or how. When he crossed a street he passed through the traffic as if it were something flung upon a screen. People shouted after him, but he paid no attention to their cries. He did not dream of committing suicide, he did not feel as if there was anything as real as suicide. He neither knew nor cared where he went, though he was conscious of a feeling of ease as the hard glare of the Champs Élysées melted into the softer darkness of the Bois.
There were trees now, and whole empty spaces where the little figures of men and women ceased to jerk past him like children’s painted toys.
By and by he came to a seat in the shadow of a big tree. It was quite dark and empty and Jean huddled there, cowering beside it as if it could afford him some kind of shelter against a special danger. He knew now that he was afraid. There was still something that might happen to him. He might remember Gabrielle’s face.
The birds twittered and murmured to each other in the trees, the far-off voice of Paris came lightly to Jean, without the menace of its accustomed speed. He tried to think of Margot and picture what she was doing, but something quickly warned him not to do that. If he thought of Margot he might remember what he was trying to forget; and then it came; though he had shut his eyes and covered his face with his hands he saw her. He saw Gabrielle’s face.
She was smiling at him as she had smiled last night with serene and intimate tenderness.
The merciful blankness was over now, pain poured into him, pain so abominable and heart-rending that he cried aloud. He could not bear it. He must not bear it, it was as physical as scorching flame. He saw the way she moved, her dresses and the crystal heart she wore and played with in her delicate hands.
The birds were quiet now, but it was no longer any use their being quiet. He heard instead every tone of her delicious voice, its little soft falls into contralto like the depth of velvet, or its sudden lifting into clear, sweet notes like the chiming of a silver bell. She was horribly near him, the night was full of her, he could even breathe the exquisite faint perfume of her hair.
He flung himself face downwards on the ground.
Oh, to grow into the stupid, painless earth, to feel without sense or sound the slow pulsations of the grass! To lose himself, to forget himself and her!
The sweet, soft night passed over him, hour by hour, until it seemed as if the earth below him turned in sleep. He lifted his face up to the sky. There was no moon and all the stars were small and glimmered far away. At first he thought still that it was the night; and then he knew that the darkness was moving.
The dawn wind rose and sent its stealthywhispering through the trees. The birds awoke and called short, sharp liquid cries of half-awakened love. Then a gust, borne across the speeding darkness, broke in a soft shower of rain. It was the last gift of the retreating night.
Jean stumbled to his feet and crept back to Paris to meet the new, intolerable day.