ZUT 
 
 OTHER 
 
 CUV WETMORE CARRYL 
 

 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 Rare Books 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 John W. McConnell 
 
University of California Berkeley 
 
CarrpL 
 
 THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR. Crown 
 8vo, $1.50. 
 
 ZUT, AND OTHER PARISIANS. Crown 
 8vo, #1.50. 
 
 GRIMM TALES MADE GAY. Illustrated 
 by ALBERT LEVERING. Square crown 
 8vo $1.50, net. Postpaid, $1.62. 
 
 HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & COMPANY, 
 BOSTON AND NEW YORK. 
 
GUY 
 
 Zut 
 
 AND OTHER PARISIANS 
 
 HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY 
 
 The T^iverside Press, Cambridge 
 
 1908 
 
Copyright 1903 by Guy Wetmore Carryl 
 All rights reserved 
 
 Published September, 1903 
 
 THIRD IMPRESSION REPRINTED JANUARY, 1908 
 
C. F. G. 
 
 {Mon cber ami : 
 
 En souvenir de maints beaux 
 jours dont tu as partage Vall'egresse : en at- 
 tendant d'autres a venir : de ceux-la encore 
 dont tu as adouci la souffrance et V ennui: 
 par reconnaissance de conseils qu'on n'oublie 
 jamais et de prevqyances dont on se sowvient 
 toujours : je te dedie les contes suivants. Tu 
 y retrouveras beaucoup d'amis et peut-etre 
 autant d'inconnus : tu les acceuilleras assure- 
 went, les uns et les autres, aroec cette belle 
 bospitalite qui ne s'est jamais d'ementie, et qui 
 m'a rendu et me rendra encore esperons-le ! 
 ton oblige et reconnaissant 
 
 G. W. C. 
 
Page 
 ZUT 3 ~ 
 
 CAFFIARD, Dcus ex Macbina 28 - 
 
 THE NEXT CORNER 56 - 
 
 THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER ....... 84 
 
 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 109 
 
 LE POCHARD 138 
 
 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 161 
 
 POIRE! 190 
 
 PAPALABESSE 215 
 
 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 245 - 
 
 LITTLE TAPIN 275 
 
Zut 
 
Zut 
 
 SIDE by side, on the avenue de la Grande 
 Amide, stand the epicene of Jean-Baptiste 
 Caille and the salle de coiffure of Hip- 
 polyte Sergeot, and between these two there 
 is a great gulf fixed, the which has come to be 
 through the acerbity of Alexandrine Caille 
 (according to Esperance Sergeot), through the 
 duplicity of Esperance Sergeot (according to 
 Alexandrine Caille). But the veritable root of 
 all evil is Zut, and Zut sits smiling in Jean- 
 Baptiste's doorway, and cares naught for any- 
 thing in the world, save the sunlight and her 
 midday meal. 
 
4 ZUT 
 
 When Hippolyte found himself in a position 
 to purchase the salle de coiffure, he gave evi- 
 dence of marked acumen by uniting himself in 
 the holy and civil bonds of matrimony with 
 the retiring patron's daughter, whose dot ran 
 into the coveted five figures, and whose heart, 
 said Hippolyte, was as good as her face was 
 pretty, which, even by the unprejudiced, was 
 acknowledged to be forcible commendation. 
 The installation of the new establishment was 
 a nine days' wonder in the quartier. It is a 
 busy thoroughfare at its western end, is the 
 avenue de la Grande Armee, crowded with bi- 
 cyclists and with a multitude of creatures fear- 
 fully and wonderfully clad, who do incompre- 
 hensible things in connection with motor-car- 
 riages. Also there are big cafes in plenty, whose 
 waiters must be smoothly shaven : and more- 
 over, at the time when Hippolyte came into his 
 own, the porte Maillot station of the Metropoli- 
 tan! had already pushed its entree and sortie 
 up through the soil, not a hundred metres from 
 his door, where they stood like atrocious yellow 
 tulips, art nouveau, breathing people out and in 
 by thousands. There was no lack of possible 
 custom. The problem was to turn possible into 
 
ZUT 5 
 
 probable, and probable into permanent j and 
 here the seven wits and the ten thousand 
 francs of Esperance came prominently to the 
 fore. She it was who sounded the progressive 
 note, which is half the secret of success. 
 
 " Pour attirer les gens," she said, with her 
 arms akimbo, "il faut d'abord les e'pater." 
 
 In her creed all that was worth doing at all 
 was worth doing gloriously. So, under her 
 guidance, Hippolyte journeyed from shop to 
 shop in the faubourg St. Antoine, and spent 
 hours of impassioned argument with carpen- 
 ters and decorators. In the end, the salle de 
 coiffure was glorified by fresh paint without and 
 within, and by the addition of a long mirror in 
 a gilt frame, and a complicated apparatus of 
 gleaming nickel-plate, which went by the im- 
 posing title of appareil antiseptique, and the 
 acquisition of which was duly proclaimed by a 
 special placard that swung at right angles to 
 the door. The shop was rechristened, too, and 
 the black and white sign across its front which 
 formerly bore the simple inscription " Kilbert, 
 Coiffeur," now blazoned abroad the vastly 
 more impressive legend " Salon Malakoff." 
 The window shelves fairly groaned beneath 
 
6 ZUT 
 
 their burden of soaps, toilet waters, and per- 
 fumery, a string of bright yellow sponges occu- 
 pied each corner of the window, and, through 
 the agency of white enamel letters on the pane 
 itself, public attention was drawn to the appar- 
 ently contradictory facts that English was spo- 
 ken and " schampoing " given within. Then 
 Hippolyte engaged two assistants, and clad 
 them in white duck jackets, and his wife fab- 
 ricated a new blouse of blue silk, and seated 
 herself behind the desk with an engaging smile. 
 The enterprise was fairly launched, and expe- 
 rience was not slow in proving the theories of 
 Espe'rance to be well founded. The quartier 
 was epate from the start, and took with enthu- 
 siasm the bait held forth. The affairs of the 
 Salon Malakoff prospered prodigiously. 
 
 But there is a serpent in every Eden, and 
 in that of the Sergeot this role was assumed 
 by Alexandrine Caille. The worthy epicier 
 himself was of too torpid a temperament to 
 fall a victim to the gnawing tooth of envy, but 
 in the soul of his wife the launch, and, what 
 was worse, the immediate prosperity of the 
 Salon Malakoff, bred dire resentment. Her 
 own establishment had grown grimy with the 
 
ZUT 7 
 
 passage of time, and the annual profits dis- 
 played a constant and disturbing tendency 
 toward complete evaporation, since the com- 
 ing of the big cafes, and the resultant subver- 
 sion of custom to the wholesale dealers. This 
 persistent narrowing of the former appreciable 
 gap between purchase and selling price ran- 
 kled in Alexandrine's mind, but her misguided 
 efforts to maintain the percentage of profit by 
 recourse to inferior qualities only made bad 
 worse, and, even as the Sergeot were steering 
 the Salon Malakoff forth upon the waters of 
 prosperity, there were nightly conferences in 
 the household next door, at which impending 
 ruin presided, and exasperation sounded the 
 keynote of every sentence. The resplendent 
 fagade of Hippolyte's establishment, the tide 
 of custom which poured into and out of his 
 door, the loydly expressed admiration of his 
 ability and thrift, which greeted her ears on 
 every side, and, finally, the sight of Esperance, 
 fresh, smiling, and prosperous, behind her lit- 
 tle counter, all these were as gall and worm- 
 wood to Alexandrine, brooding over her ac- 
 cumulating debts and her decreasing earnings, 
 among her dusty stacks of jars and boxes. 
 
8 ZUT 
 
 Once she had called upon her neighbor, some- 
 what for courtesy's sake, but more for curios- 
 ity's, and since then the agreeable scent of 
 violet and lilac perfumery dwelt always in her 
 memory, and mirages of scrupulously polished 
 nickel and glass hung always before her eyes. 
 The air of her own shop was heavy with the 
 pungent odors of raw vegetables, cheeses, and 
 dried fish, and no brilliance redeemed the 
 sardine and biscuit boxes which surrounded 
 her. Life became a bitter thing to Alexan- 
 drine Caille, for if nothing is more gratifying 
 than one's own success, surely nothing is less 
 so than that of one's neighbor. Moreover, her 
 visit had never been returned, and this again 
 was fuel for her rage. 
 
 But the sharpest thorn in her flesh and 
 even in that of her phlegmatic husband was 
 the base desertion to the enemy's camp of 
 Abel Flique. In the days when Madame 
 Caille was unmarried, and when her ninety 
 kilos were fifty still, Abel had been youngest 
 commis in the very shop over which she now 
 held sway, and the most devoted suitor in all 
 her train. Even after his prowess in the black 
 days of '71 had won him the attention of the 
 
ZUT 9 
 
 civil authorities, and a grateful municipality 
 had transformed the grocer-soldier into a guard- 
 ian of law and order, he still hung upon the 
 favor of his heart's first love, and only gave up 
 the struggle when Jean-Baptiste bore off the 
 prize and enthroned her in state as presiding 
 genius of his newly acquired epicerie. Later, an 
 unwittingly kindly prefect had transferred Abel 
 to the seventeenth arrondissement, and so the 
 old friendship was picked up where it had been 
 dropped, and the ruddy-faced agent found it 
 both convenient and agreeable to drop in fre- 
 quently at Madame Caille's on his way home, 
 and exchange a few words of reminiscence or 
 banter for a box of sardines or a minute pack- 
 age of tea. But, with the deterioration in his 
 old friends' wares, and the almost simulta- 
 neous appearance of the Salon MalakofT, his 
 loyalty wavered. Flique sampled the advan- 
 tages of Hippolyte's establishment, and, being 
 won over thereby, returned again and again. 
 His hearty laugh came to be heard almost 
 daily in the salle de coiffure, and because he 
 was a brave homme and a good customer, who 
 did not stand upon a question of a few sous, 
 but allowed Hippolyte to work his will, and 
 
10 ZUT 
 
 trim and curl and perfume him to his heart's 
 content, there was always a welcome for him, 
 and a smile from Madame Sergeot, and occa- 
 sionally a little present of brillantine or per- 
 fumery, for friendship's sake, and because it 
 is well to have the good-will of the all-powerful 
 police. 
 
 From her window Madame Caille observed 
 the comings and goings of Abel with a resent- 
 ful eye. It was rarely now that he glanced 
 into the epicerie as he passed, and still more 
 rarely that he greeted his former flame with a 
 stiff nod. Once she had hailed him from the 
 doorway, sardines in hand, but he had replied 
 that he was pressed for time, and had passed 
 rapidly on. Then indeed did blackness de- 
 scend upon the soul of Alexandrine, and in 
 her deepest consciousness she vowed to have 
 revenge. Neither the occasion nor the method 
 was as yet clear to her, but she pursed her lips 
 ominously, and bided her time. 
 
 In the existence of Madame Caille there was 
 one emphatic consolation for all misfortunes, 
 the which "was none other than Zut, a white 
 angora cat of surpassing beauty and prodigious 
 size. She had come into Alexandrine's pos- 
 
ZUT 11 
 
 session as a kitten, and, what with much eating 
 and an inherent distaste for exercise, had at- 
 tained her present proportions and her superb 
 air of unconcern. It was from the latter that 
 she derived her name, the which, in Parisian 
 argot, at once means everything and nothing, 
 but is chiefly taken to signify complete and 
 magnificent indifference to all things mundane 
 and material : and in the matter of indiffer- 
 ence Zut was past-mistress. Even for Madame 
 Caille herself, who fed her with the choicest 
 morsels from her own plate, brushed her fine 
 fur with excessive care, and addressed caress- 
 ing remarks to her at minute intervals through- 
 out the day, Zut manifested a lack of interest 
 that amounted to contempt. As she basked in 
 the warm sun at the shop door, the round face 
 of her mistress beamed upon her from the little 
 desk, and the voice of her mistress sent ful- 
 some flattery winging toward her on the heavy 
 air. Was she beautiful, mon Dieu ! In effect, 
 all that one could dream of the most beauti- 
 ful ! And her eyes, of a blue like the heaven, 
 were they not wise and calm? Mon Dieu, 
 yes ! It was a cat among thousands, a mimi 
 almost divine. 
 
12 ZUT 
 
 Jean-Baptiste, appealed to for confirmation 
 of these statements, replied that it was so. 
 There was no denying that this was a magnifi- 
 cent beast. And of a chic. And caressing 
 (which was exaggeration). And of an affec- 
 tion (which was doubtful). And courageous 
 (which was wholly untrue.) Mazette, yes ! 
 A cat of cats ! And was the boy to be the 
 whole afternoon in delivering a cheese, he de- 
 manded of her ? And Madame Caille would 
 challenge him to ask her that but it was a 
 good, great beast all the same ! and so bury 
 herself again in her accounts, until her atten- 
 tion was once more drawn to Zut, and fresh 
 flattery poured forth. For all of this Zut cared 
 less than nothing. In the midst of her mis- 
 tress's sweetest cajolery, she simply closed her 
 sapphire eyes, with an inexpressibly eloquent 
 air of weariness, or turned to the intricacies of 
 her toilet, as who should say : " Continue. I 
 am listening. But it is unimportant." 
 
 But long familiarity with her disdain had 
 deprived it of any sting, so far as Alexandrine 
 was concerned. Passive indifference she could 
 suffer. It was only when Zut proceeded to 
 an active manifestation of ingratitude that she 
 
ZUT 13 
 
 inflicted an irremediable wound. Returning 
 from her marketing one morning, Madame 
 Caille discovered her graceless favorite seated 
 complacently in the doorway of the Salon 
 Malakoff, and, in a paroxysm of indignation, 
 bore down upon her, and snatched her to her 
 breast. 
 
 " Unhappy one ! " she cried, planting her- 
 self in full view of EspeVance, and, while rain- 
 ing the letter of her reproach upon the truant, 
 contriving to apply its spirit wholly to her 
 neighbor. " What hast thou done ? Is it that 
 thou desertest me for strangers, who may de- 
 stroy thee? Name of a name, hast thou no 
 heart ? They would steal thee from me and 
 above all, now ! Well then, no ! One shall 
 see if such things are permitted ! Vaga- 
 bond ! " And with this parting shot, which 
 passed harmlessly over the head of the of- 
 fender, and launched itself full at Madame Ser- 
 geot, the outraged epiciere flounced back into 
 her own domain, where, turning, she threatened 
 the empty air with a passionate gesture. 
 
 "Vagabond!" she repeated. "Good-for- 
 nothing ! Is it not enough to have robbed me 
 of my friends, that you must steal my child as 
 
14 ZUT 
 
 well ? We shall see ! " then, suddenly soften- 
 ing " Thou art beautiful, and good, and wise. 
 Mon Dieu, if I should lose thee, and above all, 
 now ! " 
 
 Now there existed a marked, if unvoiced, 
 community of feeling between Esperance and 
 her resentful neighbor, for the former's passion 
 for cats was more consuming even than the 
 latter's. She had long cherished the dream of 
 possessing a white angora, and when, that morn- 
 ing, of her own accord, Zut stepped into the 
 Salon Malakoif, she was received with demon- 
 strations even warmer than those to which she 
 had long since become accustomed. And, 
 whether it was the novelty of her surroundings, 
 or merely some unwonted instinct which made 
 her unusually susceptible, her habitual indiffer- 
 ence then and there gave place to animation, 
 and her satisfaction was vented in her long, 
 appreciative purr, wherewith it was not once 
 a year that she vouchsafed to gladden her 
 owner's heart. Esperance hastened to prepare 
 a saucer of milk, and, when this was exhausted, 
 added a generous portion of fish, and Zut then 
 made a tour of the shop, rubbing herself against 
 the chair-legs, and receiving the homage of cus- 
 
ZUT 15 
 
 tomers and duck-clad assistants alike. Flique. 
 his ruddy face screwed into a mere knot of 
 features, as Hippolyte worked violet hair-tonic 
 into his brittle locks, was moved to satire by 
 the apparition. 
 
 " Tiens ! It is with the cat as with the 
 clients. All the world forsakes the Caille." 
 
 Strangely enough, the wrathful words oi 
 Alexandrine, as she snatched her darling from 
 the doorway, awoke in the mind of Espe'rance 
 her first suspicion of this smouldering resent- 
 ment. Absorbed in the launching of her hus- 
 band's affairs, and constantly employed in the 
 making of change and with the keeping of her 
 simple accounts, she had had no time to bestow 
 upon her neighbors, and, even had her atten- 
 tion been free, she could hardly have been ex- 
 pected to deduce the rancor of Madame Caille 
 from the evidence at hand. But even if she 
 had been able to ignore the significance of that 
 furious outburst at her very door, its meaning 
 had not been lost upon the others, and her own 
 half-formed conviction was speedily confirmed. 
 
 " What has she ? " cried Hippolyte, pausing 
 in the final stage of his operations upon the 
 highly perfumed Flique. 
 
16 ZUT 
 
 " Do I know ? " replied his wife with a shrug. 
 " She thinks I stole her cat //" 
 
 " Quite simply, she hates you," put in Flique. 
 " And why not ? She is old, and fat, and her 
 business is taking itself off, like that ! You 
 are young and " with a bow, as he rose 
 " beautiful, and your affairs march to a mar- 
 vel. She is jealous, c'est tout ! It is a bad 
 character, that." 
 
 " But, mon Dieu ! " 
 
 " But what does that say to you ? Let her 
 go her way, she and her cat. Au r'voir, 'sieurs, 
 'dame." 
 
 And, rattling a couple of sous into the little 
 urn reserved for tips, the policeman took his 
 departure, amid a chorus of " Merci, m'sieu', 
 au r'voir, m'sieu'," from Hippolyte and his 
 duck-clad aids. 
 
 But what he had said remained behind. All 
 day Madame Sergeot pondered upon the inci- 
 dent of the morning and Abel Flique's com- 
 ments thereupon, seeking out some more plaus- 
 ible reason for this hitherto unsuspected enmity 
 than the mere contrast between her material 
 conditions and those of Madame Caille seemed 
 to her to afford. For, to a natural placidity of 
 
ZUT 17 
 
 temperament, which manifested itself in a re- 
 luctance to incur the displeasure of any one, 
 had been lately added in Esperance a shrewd 
 commercial instinct, which told her that the 
 fortunes of the Salon Malakoff might readily 
 be imperiled by an unfriendly tongue. In the 
 quartier, gossip spread quickly and took deep 
 root. It was quite imaginably within the power 
 of Madame Caille to circulate such rumors of 
 Sergeot dishonesty as should draw their lately 
 won custom from them and leave but empty 
 chairs and discontent where now all was pros- 
 perity and satisfaction. 
 
 Suddenly there came to her the memory of 
 that visit which she had never returned. Mon 
 Dieu ! and was not that reason enough ? She, 
 the youngest patronne in the quartier, to ignore 
 deliberately the friendly call of a neighbor ! 
 At least it was not too late to make amends. 
 So, when business lagged a little in the late 
 afternoon, Madame Sergeot slipped from her 
 desk, and, after a furtive touch to her hair, 
 went in next door to pour oil upon the troubled 
 waters. 
 
 Madame Caille, throned at her counter, re- 
 ceived her visitor with unexampled frigidity. 
 
18 ZUT 
 
 " Ah, it is you," she said. " You have come 
 to make some purchases, no doubt." 
 
 " Eggs, madame," answered her visitor, dis- 
 concerted, but tactfully accepting the hint. 
 
 " The best quality or ? " demanded 
 Alexandrine, with the suggestion of a sneer. 
 
 "The best, evidently, madame. Six, if you 
 please. Spring weather at last, it would 
 seem." 
 
 To this generality the other made no reply. 
 Descending from her stool, she blew sharply 
 into a small paper bag, thereby distending it 
 into a miniature balloon, and began select- 
 ing the eggs from a basket, holding each one 
 to the light, and then dusting it with exagger- 
 ated care before placing it in the bag. While 
 she was thus employed Zut advanced from a 
 secluded corner, and, stretching her fore legs 
 slowly to their utmost length, greeted her ac- 
 quaintance of the morning with a yawn. Find- 
 ing in the cat an outlet for her embarrassment, 
 Esperance made another effort to give the 
 interview a friendly turn. 
 
 " He is beautiful, madame, your matou," she 
 said. 
 
 "It is a female,'* replied Madame Caille, 
 
ZUT 19 
 
 turning abruptly from the basket, " and she 
 does not care for strangers." 
 
 This second snub was not calculated to en- 
 courage neighborly overtures, but Madame Ser- 
 geot had felt herself to be in the wrong, and 
 was not to be so readily repulsed. 
 
 "We do not see Monsieur Caille at the 
 Salon Malakoff," she continued. " We should 
 be enchanted " 
 
 " My husband shaves himself," retorted Alex- 
 andrine, with renewed dignity. 
 
 " But his hair " ventured Esperance. 
 
 " /cut it ! " thundered her foe. 
 
 Here Madame Sergeot made a false move. 
 She laughed. Then, in confusion, and striv- 
 ing, too late, to retrieve herself " Pardon, 
 madame," she added, " but it seems droll to 
 me, that. After all, ten sous is a sum so 
 small " 
 
 " All the world, unfortunately," broke in 
 Madame Caille, "has not the wherewithal to 
 buy mirrors, and pay itself frescoes and appa- 
 reils antiseptiques ! The eggs are twenty-four 
 sous but we do not pride ourselves upon our 
 eggs. Perhaps you had better seek them else- 
 where for the future ! " 
 
20 ZUT 
 
 For sole reply Madame Sergeot had recourse 
 to her expressive shrug, and then laying two 
 francs upon the counter, and gathering up the 
 sous which Alexandrine rather hurled at than 
 handed her, she took her way toward the door 
 with all the dignity at her command. But 
 Madame Caille, feeling her snub to have been 
 insufficient, could not let her go without a 
 final thrust. 
 
 " Perhaps your husband will be so amiable 
 as to shampoo my cat ! " she shouted. " She 
 seems to like your ' Salon ' ! " 
 
 But Esperance, while for concord's sake 
 inclined to tolerate all rudeness to herself, was 
 not prepared to hear Hippolyte insulted, and 
 so, wheeling at the doorway, flung all her re- 
 sentment into two words. 
 
 " Mai e'leve'e ! " 
 
 " Gueuse ! " screamed Alexandrine from the 
 desk. And so they parted. 
 
 Now, even at this stage, an armed truce 
 might still have been preserved, had Zut been 
 content with the evil she had wrought, and 
 not thought it incumbent upon her further to 
 embitter a quarrel that was a very pretty quar- 
 rel as it stood. But, whether it was that the 
 
ZUT 21 
 
 milk and fish of the Salon Malakoff lay sweeter 
 upon her memory than any of the familiar 
 dainties of the epicerie Caille, or that, by her 
 unknowable feline instinct, she was irresist- 
 ibly drawn toward the scent of violet and lilac 
 brillantine, her first visit to the Sergeot was 
 soon repeated, and from this visit other visits 
 grew, until it was almost a daily occurrence 
 for her to saunter slowly into the salle de 
 coiffure, and there receive the food and hom- 
 age which were rendered as her undisputed 
 due. For, whatever was the bitterness of Es- 
 p^rance toward Madame Caille, no part thereof 
 descended upon Zut. On the contrary, at each 
 visit her heart was more drawn toward the 
 sleek angora, and her desire but strengthened 
 to possess her peer. But white angoras are a 
 luxury, and an expensive one at that, and, how- 
 ever prosperous the Salon Malakoff might be, 
 its proprietors were not as yet in a position to 
 squander eighty francs upon a whim. So, until 
 profits should mount higher, Madame Sergeot 
 was forced to content herself with the volun- 
 tary visits of her neighbor's pet. 
 
 Madame Caille did not yield her rights of 
 sovereignty without a struggle. On the occa- 
 
22 ZUT 
 
 sion of Zut's third visit, she descended upon 
 the Salon Malakoff, robed in wrath, and found 
 the adored one contentedly feeding on fish in 
 the very bosom of the family Sergeot. An 
 appalling scene ensued. 
 
 " If," she stormed, crimson of countenance, 
 and threatening Esperance with her fist, "if 
 you must entice my cat from her home, at least 
 I will thank you not to give her food. I pro- 
 vide all that is necessary ; and, for the -rest, 
 how do I know what is in that saucer ? " 
 
 And she surveyed the duck-clad assistants 
 and the astounded customers with tremendous 
 scorn. 
 
 " You others," she added, " I ask you, is it 
 just ? These people take my cat, and feed her 
 feed her with I know not what ! It is over- 
 whelming, unheard of and, above all, now ! " 
 
 But here the peaceful Hippolyte played 
 trumps. 
 
 " It is the privilege of the vulgar," he cried, 
 advancing, razor in hand, " when they are at 
 home, to insult their neighbors, but here no ! 
 My wife has told me of you and of your say- 
 ings. Beware ! or I shall arrange your affair 
 for you ! Go ! you and your cat ! " 
 
ZUT 23 
 
 And, by way of emphasis, he fairly kicked 
 Zut into her astonished owner's arms. He was 
 magnificent, was Hippolyte ! 
 
 This anecdote, duly elaborated, was poured 
 into the ears of Abel Flique an hour later, and 
 that evening he paid his first visit in many 
 months to Madame Caille. She greeted him 
 effusively, being willing to pardon all the past 
 for the sake of regaining this powerful friend. 
 But the glitter in the agent's eye would have 
 cowed a fiercer spirit than hers. 
 
 " You amuse yourself," he said sternly, look- 
 ing straight at her over the handful of raisins 
 which she tendered him, "by wearying my 
 friends. I counsel you to take care. One 
 does not sell inferior eggs in Paris without 
 hearing of it sooner or later. I know more 
 than I have told, but not more than I can tell, 
 if I choose." 
 
 " Our ancient friendship " faltered Alex- 
 andrine, touched in a vulnerable spot. 
 
 " preserves you thus far," added Flique, 
 no less unmoved. " Beware how you abuse 
 it!" 
 
 And so the calls of Zut were no longer dis- 
 turbed. 
 
24 ZUT 
 
 But the rover spirit is progressive, and thus 
 short visits became long visits, and finally the 
 angora spent whole nights in the Salon Mala- 
 koff, where a box and a bit of carpet were pro- 
 vided for her. And one fateful morning the 
 meaning of Madame Caille's significant words 
 " and above all, now ! " was made clear. 
 
 The prosperity of Hippolyte's establishment 
 had grown apace, so that, on the morning in 
 question, the three chairs were occupied, and 
 yet other customers awaited their turn. The 
 air was laden with violet and lilac. A stout 
 chauffeur, in a leather suit, thickly coated with 
 dust, was undergoing a shampoo at the hands 
 of one of the duck-clad, and, under the skill- 
 fully plied razor of the other, the virgin down 
 slid from the lips and chin of a slim and some- 
 what startled youth, while from a vaporizer 
 Hippolyte played a fine spray of perfumed 
 water upon the ruddy countenance of Abel 
 Flique. It was an eloquent moment, emi- 
 nently fitted for some dramatic incident, and 
 that dramatic incident Zut supplied. She ad- 
 vanced slowly and with an air of conscious 
 dignity from the corner where was her carpeted 
 box, and in her mouth was a limp something, 
 
ZUT 25 
 
 which, when deposited in the immediate centre 
 of the Salon Malakoff, resolved itself into an 
 angora kitten, as white as snow ! 
 
 " Epatant ! " said Flique, mopping his per- 
 fumed chin. And so it was. 
 
 There was an immediate investigation of 
 Zut's quarters, which revealed four other 
 kittens, but each of these was marked with 
 black or tan. It was the flower of the flock 
 with which the proud mother had won her 
 public. 
 
 " And they are all yours ! " cried Flique, 
 when the question of ownership arose. " Mon 
 Dieu, yes ! There was such a case not a month 
 ago, in the eighth arrondissement a conci- 
 erge of the avenue Hoche who made a con- 
 trary claim. But the courts decided against 
 her. They are all yours, Madame Sergeot. 
 My felicitations ! " 
 
 Now, as we have said, Madame Sergeot was 
 of a placid temperament which sought not 
 strife. But the unprovoked insults of Madame 
 Caille had struck deep, and, after all, she was 
 but human. 
 
 So it was that, seated at her little desk, she 
 composed the following masterpiece of satire : 
 
26 ZUT 
 
 CHERE MADAME, We send you back your 
 cat, and the others all but one. One kitten 
 was of a pure white, more beautiful even than 
 its mother. As we have long desired a white 
 angora, we keep this one as a souvenir of you. 
 We regret that we do not see the means of 
 accepting the kind offer you were so amiable 
 as to make us. We fear that we shall not find 
 time to shampoo your cat, as we shall be so 
 busy taking care of our own. Monsieur Flique 
 will explain the rest. 
 
 We pray you to accept, madame, the assur- 
 ance of our distinguished consideration, 
 
 HlPPOLYTE AND ESPERANCE SERGEOT. 
 
 It was Abel Flique who conveyed the above 
 epistle, and Zut, and four of Zut's kittens, to 
 Alexandrine Caille, and, when that wrathful 
 person would have rent him with tooth and 
 nail, it was Abel Flique who laid his finger on 
 his lip, and said, 
 
 " Concern yourself with the superior kitten, 
 madame, and I concern myself with the in- 
 ferior eggs ! " 
 
 To which Alexandrine made no reply. Af- 
 ter Flique had taken his departure, she remained 
 
ZUT 27 
 
 speechless for five consecutive minutes for the 
 first time in the whole of her waking existence, 
 gazing at the spot at her feet where sprawled 
 the white angora, surrounded by her mottled 
 offspring. Even when the first shock of her 
 defeat had passed, she simply heaved a deep 
 sigh, and uttered two words, 
 
 The which, in Parisian argot, at once means 
 everything and nothing. 
 
Caffiard 
 
 DEUS EX MACHINA 
 
 THE studio was tucked away in the ex- 
 treme upper northeast corner of 13 ter 
 rue Visconti, higher even than that cin- 
 quieme, dearly beloved of the impecunious, 
 and of whoso, between stairs and street odors, 
 chooses the lesser evil, and is more careful of 
 lungs than legs. After the six long flights had 
 been achieved, around a sharp corner and up 
 a little winding stairway, was the door which 
 bore the name of Pierre Vauquelin. Inside, 
 after stumbling along a narrow hall, as black 
 as Erebus, and floundering through a curtained 
 
CAFFIARD 29 
 
 doorway, one came abruptly into the studio, 
 and, in all probability, fell headlong over a 
 little rattan stool, or an easel, or a box of 
 paints, and was picked up by the host, and 
 dusted, and put to rights, and made much of, 
 like a bumped child. Thus restored to equa- 
 nimity one was better able to appreciate what 
 Pierre called la Boite. 
 
 The Box was a room eight metres in width 
 by ten in length, with a skylight above, ancj a 
 great, square window in the north wall, which 
 latter sloped inward from floor to ceiling, by 
 reason of the mansarde roof. Of what might 
 be called furniture there was but little, a Nor- 
 man cupboard of black wood, heavily carved, 
 a long divan, contrived from various packing 
 boxes and well-worn rugs, a large, square table, 
 a half dozen chairs, three easels, and a repul- 
 sive little stove with an interminable pipe, 
 which, with its many twists and turns, gave 
 one the impression of a thick, black snake, 
 that had, a moment before, been swaying about 
 in the room, and had suddenly found a hole in 
 the roof through which to thrust its head. 
 
 But of minor things the Box was full to over- 
 flowing. The Norman cupboard was crammed 
 
30 CAFFIARD 
 
 with an assortment of crockery, much of it 
 sadly nicked and cracked, the divan was strewn 
 with boxes of broken pastels, paint-brushes, 
 and palettes coated with dried colors, the table 
 littered with papers, sketches, and books, and 
 every chair had its own particular trap for the 
 unwary, in the form of thumb-tacks or a glass 
 half full of cloudy water : and in the midst of 
 this chaos, late on a certain mid-May after- 
 noon, stood the painter himself, with his hands 
 thrust deep into the pockets of his corduroy 
 trousers, and his back turned upon the portrait 
 upon which he had been at work. It was evi- 
 dent that something untoward was in the air, 
 because Pierre, who always smoked, was not 
 smoking, and Pierre, who never scowled, was 
 scowling. 
 
 In the Quartier that Quartier which alone, 
 of them all, is spelt with a capital Q there 
 was, in ordinary, no gayer, more happy-go- 
 lucky type than this same Pierre. He lived, 
 as did a thousand of his kind, on eighty sous 
 a day (there were those who lived on less, 
 pardi !), and breakfasted, and dined, at that, 
 yes, and paid himself an absinthe at the Deux 
 Magots at six o'clock, and a package of green 
 
CAFFIARD 31 
 
 cigarettes, into the bargain. For the rest of 
 the time, he was understood to be working on 
 a portrait in his studio, and, what is more 
 surprising, often was. There was nothing re- 
 markable about Pierre's portraits, except that 
 occasionally he sold one, and for money for 
 actual money, the astonishing animal ! But if 
 any part of the modest proceeds of such a 
 transaction remained, after the rent had been 
 paid and a new canvas purchased, it was not 
 the caisse d'epargne which saw it, be sure of 
 that ! For Pierre lived always for the next 
 twenty-four hours, and let the rest of time and 
 eternity look out for themselves. 
 
 Yet he took his work seriously. That was 
 the trouble. Even admitting that, thus far, 
 his orders had come only from the more pros- 
 perous tradesmen of the Quartier, did that 
 mean, par exemple, that they would not come 
 in time from the millionaires of the sixteenth 
 arrondissement ? By no means, whatever, said 
 Pierre. To be sure, he had never had the Salon 
 in the palm of his hand, so to speak, but what 
 of that ? Jean-Paul himself would tell you that 
 it was all favoritism ! So Pierre toiled away 
 at his portrait painting, and made a little com- 
 
32 CAFFIARD 
 
 petency, but, if the truth were told, no appre- 
 ciable progress from year's beginning to year's 
 end. 
 
 For once, however, his luck had played him 
 false. The fat restaurateur, whose wife's por- 
 trait he had finished that afternoon and carried 
 at top speed, with the paint not yet dry, to the 
 rue du Bac, was out of town on business, and 
 would not return until the following evening ; 
 and that, so far as Pierre was concerned, was 
 quite as bad as if he were not expected until 
 the following year. Pierre's total wealth 
 amounted to one five-franc piece and three 
 sous, and he had been relying upon the res- 
 taurateur's four louis, to enable him to fulfill 
 his promise to Mimi. For the next day was her 
 fete, and they were to have breakfasted in the 
 country, and taken a boat upon the Seine, and 
 returned to dine under the trees. Not at Su- 
 resnes or St. Cloud, ah, non ! Something bet- 
 ter than that the true country, sapristi ! at 
 Poissy, twenty-eight kilometres from Paris. 
 All of which meant at least a louis, and, no 
 doubt, more ! And where, demanded Pierre 
 of the great north window, where was a louis 
 to be found ? 
 
CAFFIARD 33 
 
 For there was a tacit understanding among 
 the comrades in the Quartier that there must 
 be no borrowing and lending of money. It 
 was a clause of their creed, which had been 
 adopted in the early days of their companion- 
 ship, for what was, clearly, the greatest general 
 good, the chances being that no one of them 
 would ever possess sufficient surplus capital 
 either to accommodate another or to repay an 
 accommodation. For a moment, to be sure, the 
 thought had crossed Pierre's mind, but he had 
 rejected it instantly as impracticable. Aside 
 from the unwritten compact, there was no one 
 of them all who could have been of service, 
 had he so willed. Even Jacques Courbet, who 
 possessed a disposition which would have im- 
 pelled him to chop off his right hand with the 
 utmost cheerfulness, if thereby he could have 
 gratified a friend, was worse than useless in 
 this emergency. Had it been a matter of forty 
 sous but a louis ! As well have asked him 
 for the Venus de Milo, and had done with it. 
 
 So it was that, with the premonition of 
 Mimi's disappointed eyes cutting great gaps 
 in his tender heart, Pierre had four times 
 shrugged his shoulders, and quoted to himself 
 
34 CAFFIARD 
 
 this favorite scrap of his remarkable philoso- 
 phy, " Oh, lala ! All this will arrange it- 
 self ! " and four times had paused, in the act 
 of lighting a cigarette, and plunged again into 
 the depths of despondent reverie. As he was 
 on the point of again repeating this entirely 
 futile operation, a distant clock struck six, and 
 Pierre, remembering that Mimi must even now 
 be waiting for him at the west door of St. Ger- 
 main-des-Pres, clapped on his cap, and sallied 
 forth into the gathering twilight. 
 
 It was aperitif hour at the Cafe des Deux 
 Magots, and the long, leather-covered benches 
 against the windows, and the double row of 
 little marble-topped tables in front were rapidly 
 filling, as Pierre and Mimi took their places, 
 and ordered two Turins a 1'eau. A group of 
 American Beaux Arts men at their right were 
 chattering in their uncouth tongue, with occa- 
 sional scraps of Quartier slang, by way of local 
 color, and now and again hailing a newcomer 
 with exclamations, apparently of satisfaction, 
 which began with " Hello ! " The boulevard 
 St. Germain was alive with people, walking 
 past with the admirable lack of haste which 
 distinguishes the Parisian, or waiting, in pa- 
 
CAFFIARD 35 
 
 tient, voluble groups, for a chance to enter the 
 constantly arriving and departing trams and 
 omnibuses ; and an unending succession of 
 open cabs filed slowly along the curb, their 
 drivers scanning the terrasse of the cafe for a 
 possible fare. The air was full of that min- 
 gled odor of wet wood pavements and horse- 
 chestnut blossoms, which is the outward, in- 
 visible sign of that most wonderful of inward 
 and spiritual combinations Paris and Spring ! 
 And, at the table directly behind Pierre and 
 Mimi sat Caffiard. 
 
 There was nothing about Caffiard to suggest 
 a deus ex machina, or anything else, for that 
 matter, except a preposterously corpulent old 
 gentleman with an amiable smile. But in no- 
 thing were appearances ever more deceitful 
 than in Caffiard. For it was he, with his enor- 
 mous double chin, and his general air of harm- 
 less fatuity, who edited the little colored sheet 
 entitled La Blague, which sent half Paris into 
 convulsions of merriment every Thursday morn- 
 ing, and he who knew every caricaturist in 
 town, and was beloved of them all for the 
 heartiness of his appreciation and the liberality 
 of his payments. In the first regard he was 
 
36 CAFFIARD 
 
 but one of many Parisian editors : but in the 
 second he stood without a peer. Caran d'Ache, 
 Learidre, Willette, Forain, Hermann Paul, Abel 
 Faivre they rubbed their hands when they 
 came out of Caffiard's private office, and if the 
 day chanced to be Saturday, there was some- 
 thing in their hands worth rubbing. A fine 
 example, Caffiard ! 
 
 Mimi's black eyes sparkled like a squirrel's 
 as she watched Pierre over the rim of her 
 tumbler of vermouth. She was far from being 
 blind, Mimi, and already, though they had 
 been together but six minutes, she had noted 
 that unusual little pucker between his eye- 
 brows, that sad little droop at the corners of 
 his merry mouth. She told herself that Pierre 
 had been overworking himself, that Pierre was 
 tired, that Pierre needed cheering up. So 
 Mimi, who was never tired, not even after ten 
 hours in Madame Fraichel's millinery estab- 
 lishment, secretly declared war upon the un- 
 usual little pucker and the sad little droop. 
 
 " Voyons done, my Pierrot ! " she said. " It 
 is not a funeral to which we go to-morrow, at 
 least ! Thou must be gay, for we have much to 
 talk of, thou knowest. One dines at La Boite ? " 
 
CAFFIARD 37 
 
 " The dinner is there, such as it is," replied 
 Pierre gloomily. 
 
 " What it is now, is not the question," said 
 Mimi, with confidence, " but what I make of it 
 pas ? And then there is to-morrow ! Oh, 
 lala, lalala ! What a pleasure it will be, if only 
 the good God gives us beautiful weather. Dis, 
 done, great thunder-cloud, dost thou know it, 
 this Poissy ? " 
 
 Pierre had begun a caricature on the back 
 of the wine-card, glancing now and again at his 
 model, an old man selling newspapers on the 
 curb. He shook his head without replying. 
 
 " Eh, b'en, my little one, thou mayest believe 
 me that it is of all places the most beautiful ! 
 One eats at the Esturgeon, on the Seine, but 
 on the Seine, with the water quite near, like 
 that chair. He names himself Jarry, the pro- 
 prietor, and it is a good type fat and hand- 
 some. I adore him ! Art thou jealous, species 
 of thinness of a hundred nails ? B'en, after- 
 wards, one takes a boat, and goes, softly, softly, 
 down the little arm of the Seine, and creeps 
 under the willows, and, perhaps, fishes. But 
 no, for it is the closed season. But one sings, 
 eh ? What does one sing ? Voyons ! " 
 
CAFFIARD 
 
 She bent forward, and, in a little voice, like 
 an elf's, very thin and sweet, hummed a snatch 
 of a song they both knew. 
 
 " C'est votre ami Pierrot qui vient vous voir : 
 Bonsoir, madame la lune ! 
 
 " And then," she went on, as Pierre con- 
 tinued his sketch in silence, " and then, one 
 disembarks at Villennes and has a Turin under 
 the arbors of Bodin. Another handsome type, 
 Bodin ! Flut ! What a man ! " 
 
 Mimi paused suddenly, and searched his 
 cloudy face with her earnest, tender little eyes. 
 
 " Pierrot," she said, softly, " what hast thou ? 
 Thou art not angry with thy gosseline ? " 
 
 Pierre surveyed the outline of the newspaper 
 vender thoughtfully, touched it, here and there, 
 with his pencil-point, squinted, and then pushed 
 the paper toward the girl. 
 
 " Not bad," he said, replacing his pencil in 
 his pocket. 
 
 But Mimi had no eyes for the caricature, 
 and merely flicked the wine-card to the ground. 
 
 " Pierrot " she repeated. 
 
 Vauquelin plunged his hands in his pockets 
 and looked at her. 
 
CAFFIARD 39 
 
 " Well, then," he announced, almost brutally, 
 " we do not go to-morrow." 
 
 "Pierrtl" 
 
 It was going to be much worse than he had 
 supposed, this little tragedy. Bon Dieu, how 
 pretty she was, with her startled, hurt eyes, 
 already filling with tears, and her parted lips, 
 and her little white hand, that had flashed up 
 to her cheek at his words ! Oh, much worse 
 than he had supposed ! But she must be told : 
 there was nothing but that. So Pierre put his 
 elbows o.n the table, and his chin in his hands, 
 and brought his face close to hers. 
 
 " Voyons ! " he explained, " thou dost not 
 believe me angry ! Mais non, mais non ! But 
 listen. It is I who am the next to the last of 
 idiots, since I have never a sou in pocket, 
 never ! And the imbecile restaurateur, whose 
 wife I have been painting, will not return until 
 to-morrow, and so I am not paid. Voila ! " 
 
 He placed his five-franc piece upon the table, 
 and shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " One full moon ! " he said, and piled the 
 three sous upon it. " And three soldiers. As 
 I sit here, that is all, until to-morrow night. 
 We cannot go ! " 
 
40 CAFFIARD 
 
 Brave little Mimi ! Already she was wink- 
 ing back her tears, and smiling. 
 
 " But that that is nothing ! " she answered. 
 " I do not care to go. No but truly ! Look ! 
 We shall spend the day in the studio, and break- 
 fast on the balcony, and pretend the rue Vis- 
 conti is the Seine." 
 
 " I am an empty siphon ! " said Pierre, yield- 
 ing to desperation. 
 
 " Non ! " said Mimi firmly. 
 
 " I am a pierced basket, a box of matches ! " 
 
 " Non ! Non /" said Mimi, with tremendous 
 earnestness. "Thou art Pierrot, and I love 
 thee ! Let us say no more. I shall go back 
 and prepare the dinner, and thou shalt remain 
 and drink a Pernod. It will give thee heart. 
 But follow quickly. Give me the key." 
 
 She laid her wide-spread hand on his, palm 
 upward, like a little pink starfish. 
 
 " We go together, and I adore thee ! " said 
 Pierre, and kissed her in the sight of all men, 
 and was not ashamed. 
 
 Caffiard leaned forward, picked up the fallen 
 wine-card, pretended to consult it, and ponder- 
 ously arose. As Pierre was turning the key 
 
CAFFIARD 41 
 
 in the door of the little apartment, they heard 
 a sound of heavy breathing, and the deus ex 
 machina came lumbering up the winding stair. 
 
 " Monsieur is seeking some one ? " asked the 
 painter politely. 
 
 There was no breath left in Caffiard. He 
 was only able, by way of reply, to point at the 
 top button of Pierre's coat, and nod helplessly : 
 then, as Mimi ran ahead to light the gas, he 
 labored along the corridor, staggered through 
 the curtained doorway, stumbled over a rattan 
 stool, was rescued by Pierre, and, finally, estab- 
 lished upon the divan, very red and gasping. 
 
 For a time there was silence, Pierre and 
 Mimi busying themselves in putting the studio 
 to rights, with an instinctive courtesy which 
 took no notice of their visitor's snorts and 
 wheezes ; and Caffiard taking note of his sur- 
 roundings with his round, blinking eyes. Oppo- 
 site him, against the wall, reposed the portrait 
 of the restaurateur's wife, as dry and pasty as 
 a stale cream cheese upon the point of crum- 
 bling, and on an easel was another that of 
 Monsieur Pantin, the rich shirt-maker of the 
 boulevard St. Germain on which Pierre was 
 at work. A veritable atrocity this, with a green 
 
42 CAFFIARD 
 
 background which trespassed upon Monsieur 
 Pantin's hair, and a featureless face, gaunt and 
 haggard with yellow and purple undertones. 
 There was nothing in either picture to refute 
 one's natural suspicion that soap had been the 
 medium employed. Caffiard blinked harder 
 still as his eyes rested upon the portraits, and 
 he secretly consulted the crumpled wine-card 
 in his hand. Then he seemed to recover his 
 breath by means of a profound sigh. 
 
 " Monsieur makes caricatures ? " he inquired. 
 
 " Ah, monsieur," said Pierre, " at times, and 
 for amusement only. I am a portraitist." And 
 he pointed proudly to the picture against the 
 wall. 
 
 For they are all alike, these painters 
 proudest of what they do least well ! 
 
 "Ah! Then," said Caffiard, with an air of 
 resignation, " I must ask monsieur's pardon, 
 and descend. I am not interested in portraits. 
 When it comes to caricatures " 
 
 " They are well enough in their way," put in 
 Pierre, " but as a serious affair to sell, for 
 instance well, monsieur comprehends that 
 one does not debauch one's art ! " 
 
 Oh, yes, they are all alike, these painters ! 
 
CAFFIARD 43 
 
 " What is serious, what is not serious ? Jf 
 answered Caffiard. " It is all a matter of 
 opinion. One prefers to have his painting 
 glued to the wall of the Salon, next the ceiling, 
 another to have his drawing on the front page 
 of La Blague." 
 
 " Oh, naturally La Blague," protested Pierre. 
 
 " I am its editor," said Caffiard superbly. 
 
 " Eigh /" exclaimed Pierre. For Mimi had 
 cruelly pinched his arm. Before the sting had 
 passed, she was seated at Caffiard's side, tug- 
 ging at the strings of a great portfolio. 
 
 " Are they imbeciles, these painters, mon- 
 sieur ? " she was saying. " Now you shall see. 
 This great baby is marvelous, but marvelous, 
 with his caricatures. Not Leandre himself 
 it is I who assure you, monsieur ! and to 
 hear him, one would think but thou tirest 
 me, Pierrot ! With his portraits ! No, it is 
 too much ! " 
 
 She spread the portfolio wide, and began to 
 shuffle through the drawings it contained. 
 
 Caffiard's eyes glistened as he saw them. 
 Even in her enthusiasm, Mimi had not over- 
 shot the mark. They were marvelous indeed, 
 these caricatures, mere outlines for the most 
 
44 CAFFIARD 
 
 part, with a dot, here and there, of red, or a 
 little streak of green, which lent them a curi- 
 ous, unusual charm. The subjects were legion. 
 Here was Loubet, with a great band of crimson 
 across his shirt bosom, here Waldeck-Rousseau, 
 with eyes as round and prominent as agate mar- 
 bles, or Yvette, with a nose on which one might 
 have hung an overcoat, or Chamberlain, all 
 monocle, or Wilhelmina, growing out of a tu- 
 lip's heart, and as pretty as an old print, with 
 her tight-fitting Dutch cap and broidered bod- 
 ice. And then a host of types cochers, gri- 
 settes, flower women, camelots, Heaven knows 
 what not ! the products of half a hundred 
 idle hours, wherein great-hearted, foolish Pierre 
 had builded better than he knew ! 
 
 Caffiard selected five at random, and then, 
 from a waistcoat pocket that clung as closely 
 to his round figure as if it had been glued 
 thereto, produced a hundred-franc note. 
 
 " I must have these for La Blague, monsieur," 
 he said. " Bring me two caricatures a week at 
 my office in the rue St. Joseph, and you shall 
 be paid at the same rate. It is not much, to be 
 sure. But you will have ample time left for 
 your for your portrait-painting, monsieur I " 
 
CAFFIARD 45 
 
 For a moment the words of Caffiard affected 
 Pierre and Mimi as the stairs had affected Caf- 
 fiard. They stared at him, opening and shut- 
 ting their mouths and gasping, like fish newly 
 landed. Then, suddenly, animated by a com- 
 mon impulse, they rushed into each other's 
 arms, and set out, around the studio, in a mad 
 waltz, which presently resolved itself into an 
 impromptu can-can, with Mimi skipping like a 
 fairy, and Pierre singing : " Hi ! Hi! I Hi ! ! ! " 
 and snapping at her flying feet with a red-bor- 
 dered handkerchief. After this Mimi kissed 
 Cafnard twice: once on the top of his bald 
 head, and once on the end of his stubby nose. 
 It was like being brushed by the floating down 
 of a dandelion. And, finally, nothing would 
 do but that he must accompany them upon the 
 morrow; and she explained to him in detail 
 the plan which had so nearly fallen through, 
 and the deus ex machina did not betray by so 
 much as a wink that he had heard the entire 
 story only half an hour before. 
 
 But, in the end, he protested. But she was 
 insane, the little one, completely ! Had he 
 then the air of one who gave himself into those 
 boats there, name of a pipe? But let us be 
 
46 CAFFIARD 
 
 reasonable, voyons ! He was not young like 
 Pierre and Mimi one comprehended that 
 these holidays did not recommence when one 
 was sixty. What should he do, he demanded 
 of them, trailing along, as one might say, he 
 and his odious fatness ? Ah, non ! For la belle 
 jeunesse was la belle jeunesse, there was no 
 means of denying it, and it was not for a spe- 
 cies of dried sponge to be giving itself the 
 airs of a fresh flower. " But no ! But no ! " 
 said Caffiard, striving to rise from the divan. 
 " In the morning I have my article to do for 
 the Figaro, and I am going with Caran to 
 Longchamp, en auto, for the races in the after- 
 noon. But no ! But no ! " 
 
 It was plain that Caffiard had known Mimi 
 no more than half an hour. One never said, 
 " But no ! But no ! " to Mimi, unless it was 
 for the express purpose of having one's mouth 
 covered by the softest little pink palm to be 
 found between the Seine and the Observatoire, 
 which, to do him justice, Caffiard was quite 
 capable of scheming to bring about, if only he 
 had known ! He had accepted the little dande- 
 lion-down kisses in a spirit of philosophy, know- 
 ing well that they were given not for his sake 
 
CAFFIARD 47 
 
 but for Pierre's. But now his protests came 
 to an abrupt termination, for Mimi suddenly 
 seated herself on his lap, and put one arm 
 around his neck. 
 
 It was nothing short of an achievement, this. 
 Even Caffiard himself had not imagined that 
 such a thing as his lap was still extant. Yet 
 here was Mimi, actually installed thereon, with 
 her cheek pressed against his, and her breath, 
 which was like clover, stirring the ends of his 
 moustache. But she was smiling at Pierre, 
 the witch ! Caffiard could see it out of the 
 corner of his eye. 
 
 " Mais non ! " he repeated, but more feebly. 
 
 " Mais non ! Mais non ! Mais non ! " mocked 
 Mimi. " Great farceur ! Will you listen, at 
 least ? Eh b'en, voila ! Here is my opinion. 
 As to insanity, if for any one to propose a day 
 in the country is insanity, well then, yes ? I 
 am insane ! Soit ! And, again, if you wish to 
 appear serious, in Paris, that is to say 
 soit, egalement ! But when you speak of odious 
 fatness, you are a type of monsieur extremely 
 low of ceiling, do you know ! Moreover, you 
 are going. Voila ! It is finished. As for 
 Caran, let him go his way and draw his cari- 
 
48 CAFFIARD 
 
 catures though they are not like Pierre's, all 
 the world knows ! and, without doubt, his 
 auto will refuse to move beyond the porte 
 Dauphine, yes, and blow up, bon Dieu ! when 
 he is in the act of mending it. One knows 
 these boxes of vapors, what they do. And as 
 for the Figaro, b'en, flut ! Evidently it will not 
 cease to exist for lack of your article eh, 
 1'ami ? And it is Mimi who asks you, Mimi, 
 do you understand, who invites you to her fete. 
 And you would refuse her toil" 
 
 " But no ! But no ! " said Caffiard hur- 
 riedly. And meant it. 
 
 At this point Pierre wrapped five two-sou 
 pieces in a bit of paper, and tossed them, out 
 of a little window across the hallway, to a 
 street-singer whimpering in the court below. 
 Pierre said that they weighed down his pockets. 
 They were in the way, the clumsy doublins, 
 said wonderful, spendthrift Pierre ! 
 
 For the wide sky of the Quartier is forever 
 dotted with little clouds, scudding, scudding, 
 all day long. And when one of these passes 
 across the sun, there is a sudden chill in the 
 air, and one walks for a time in shadow, though 
 the comrade over there, across the way, is 
 
CAFFIARD 49 
 
 still in the warm and golden glow. But when 
 the sun has shouldered the little cloud aside 
 again, ah, that is when life is good to live, and 
 goes gayly, to the tinkle of glasses and the 
 ripple of laughter, and the ring of silver bits. 
 And when the street-singer in the court receives 
 upon his head a little parcel of coppers that 
 are too heavy for the pocket, and smiles to 
 himself, who knows but what he understands ? 
 
 For what is also true of the Quartier is this 
 that, ir> sunshine or shadow, one finds a soft 
 little hand clasping his, firm, warm, encour- 
 aging and kindly, and hears a gay little voice 
 that, in foul weather, chatters of the bright 
 hours which it is so sweet to remember, and, 
 in fair, says never a word of the storms which 
 it is so easy to forget ! 
 
 The veriest bat might have foreseen the end, 
 when once Mimi had put her arm around the 
 neck of Caffiard. Before the deus ex machina 
 knew what he was about, he found his army of 
 objections routed, horse, foot, and dragoons, 
 and had promised to be at the gare St. Lazare 
 at eleven the following morning. 
 
 And what a morning it was ! Surely the 
 bon Dieu must have loved Mimi an atom better 
 
50 CAFFIARD 
 
 than other mortals, for in the blue-black cruci- 
 ble of the night he fashioned a day as clear 
 and glowing as a great jewel, and set it, blaz- 
 ing with warm light and vivid color, foremost 
 in the diadem of the year. And it was some- 
 thing to see Mimi at the carriage window, with 
 Pierre at her side and her left hand in his, and 
 in her right a huge bouquet Caffiard's con- 
 tribution while the deus ex machina himself, 
 breathing like a happy hippopotamus, beamed 
 upon the pair from the opposite corner. So 
 the train slipped past the fortifications, swung 
 through a trim suburb, slid smoothly out into 
 the open country. It was a Wednesday, and 
 there was no holiday crowd to incommode 
 them. They had the compartment to them- 
 selves ; and the half hour flew like six min- 
 utes, said Mimi, when at last they came to a 
 shuddering standstill, and two guards hastened 
 along the platform in opposite directions, one 
 droning " Poiss-y-y-y-y ! " and the other shouting 
 " Poiss ' ! Poiss ' ! Poiss ' ! " as if he had been 
 sneezing. It was an undertaking to get Caf- 
 fiard out of the carriage, just as it had been to 
 get him in. But finally it was accomplished, 
 a whistle trilled from somewhere as if it had 
 
CAFFIARD 51 
 
 been a bird, another wailed like a stepped-on 
 kitten, the locomotive squealed triumphantly, 
 and the next minute the trio were alone in 
 their glory. 
 
 It was a day that Caffiard never forgot. 
 They breakfasted at once, so as to have a 
 longer afternoon. Mimi was guide and com- 
 mand er-in-chief, as having been to the Estur- 
 geon before, so the table was set upon the 
 terrasse overlooking the Seine, and there were 
 radishes, and little individual omelettes, and a 
 famous matelote, which Monsieur Jarry himself 
 served with the air of a Lucullus, and, finally, 
 a great dish of quatre saisons, and, for each of 
 the party, a squat brown pot of fresh cream. 
 And, moreover, no ordinaire, but St. Emilion, 
 if you please, with a tin-foil cap which had to 
 be removed before one could draw the cork, 
 and a bottle of Source Badoit as well. And 
 Caffiard, who had dined with the Russian Am- 
 bassador on Monday and breakfasted with the 
 Nuncio on Tuesday, and been egregiously dis- 
 pleased with the fare in both instances, con- 
 sumed an unprecedented quantity of matelote, 
 and went back to radishes after he had eaten 
 his strawberries and cream : while, to cap the 
 
52 CAFFIARD 
 
 climax, Pierre paid the addition with a louis, 
 and gave all the change as a tip ! But it was 
 unheard-of ! 
 
 Afterwards they engaged a boat, and, with 
 much alarm on the part of Mimi, and satirical 
 comment from Caffiard, and severe admoni- 
 tions to prudence by Pierre, pushed out into 
 the stream and headed for Villennes, to the 
 enormous edification of three small boys, who 
 hung precariously over the railing of the ter- 
 race above them, and called Caffiard a captive 
 balloon. 
 
 They made the three kilometres at a snail's 
 pace, allowing the boat to drift with the cur- 
 rent for an hour at a time, and, now and again 
 creeping in under the willows at the water's 
 edge until they were wholly hidden from view, 
 and the voice of Mimi singing was as that 
 of some river nixie invisible to mortal eyes. 
 She sang " Bonsoir, Madame la Lune," so 
 sweetly and so sadly that Caffiard was moved 
 to tears. It was her favorite song, because 
 oh, because it was about Pierrot ! And her 
 own Pierrot responded with a gay soldier ballad, 
 a chanson de route which he had picked up at 
 the Noctambules ; and even Caffiard sang a 
 
CAFFIARD 53 
 
 ridiculous ditty it was, which scored the Eng- 
 lish and went to a rollicking air. They all 
 shouted the refrain, convulsed with merriment 
 at the drollery of the sound : 
 
 " Qu'est ce qui quitte ses pere et mtre 
 Afin de s'en aller 
 S'faire taper dans le nez ? 
 Cest le soldat d>Angleterre ! 
 
 Dou-gle-di-gle-dum ! 
 Avec les ba-a-a-alles dum-dum ! " 
 
 Caffiard was to leave them at Villennes after 
 they should have taken their aperitifs. They 
 protested, stormed at him, scolded and cajoled 
 by turns, and called him a score of fantastic 
 names for by this time they knew him inti- 
 mately as they sat in Monsieur Bodin's 
 arbor and sipped amer-menthe, but all in vain. 
 Pierre had Mimi's hand, as always, and he had 
 kissed her a half-hundred times in the course 
 of the afternoon. Mimi had a way of shaking 
 her hair out of her eyes with a curious little 
 backward jerk of her head when Pierre kissed 
 her, and then looking at him seriously, seri- 
 ously, but smiling when he caught her at it. 
 Caffiard liked that. And Pierre had a trick of 
 turning, as if to ask Mimi's opinion, or divine 
 
54 CAFFIARD 
 
 even her unspoken wishes whenever a question 
 came up for decision a choice of food or 
 drink, or direction, or what-not. And Caf- 
 fiard liked that. 
 
 He looked across the table at them now, 
 dreamily, through his cigarette smoke. 
 
 "Pierrot," he said, after he had persuaded 
 them to let him depart in peace when the train 
 should be due, " Pierrot. Yes, that is it. 
 You, with your garret, and your painting, and 
 your songs, and your black, black sadness at 
 one moment, and your laughter the next, and, 
 above all, your Pierrette, your bon-bon of a 
 Pierrette : you are Pierrot, the spirit of Paris 
 in powder and white muslin ! Eigho ! my 
 children, what a thing it is, la belle jeunesse ! 
 Tiens ! you have given me a taste of it to-day, 
 and I thank you. I thought I had forgotten. 
 But no, one never forgets. It all comes back, 
 youth, and strength, and beauty, love, and 
 music, and laughter, but only like a breath 
 upon a mirror, my children, only like a wind- 
 ripple on a pool ; for I am an old man." 
 
 He paused, looking up at the vine-leaves 
 on the trellis-roof, and murmured a few words 
 of Mimi's song : 
 
CAFFIARD 55 
 
 " Pierrette en songe va venir me voir : 
 Bonsoir, madame la lune ! " 
 
 Then his eyes came back to her face. 
 
 " I must be off," he said. " Why, what hast 
 thou, little one ? There are tears in those two 
 stars ! " 
 
 " C'est vrai ? " asked Mimi, smiling at him 
 and then at Pierre, and brushing her hand 
 across her eyes, " c'est vrai ? Well then, they 
 are gone as quickly as they came. Voila \ 
 Without his tears Pierrot is not Pierrot, and 
 without Pierrot " 
 
 She turned to Pierre suddenly, and buried 
 her face on his shoulder. 
 
 " Je faime!" she whispered. " Jc faime!" 
 
The Next Cor- 
 ner 
 
 ANTHONY CAZEBY was a man whom 
 the felicitous combination of an ad- 
 venturous disposition, sufficient ready 
 money, and a magnificent constitution had in- 
 troduced to many and various sensations, but 
 he was conscious that, so far as intensity went, 
 no one of them all had approached for a mo- 
 ment that with which he emerged from the 
 doorway of the Automobile Club, and, wink- 
 ing at the sting of the keen winter air, looked 
 out across the place de la Concorde, with its 
 globes of light, swung, like huge pearls on in- 
 
THE NEXT CORNER 57 
 
 visible strings, across the haze of the January 
 midnight. He paused for a moment, as if he 
 would allow his faculties to obtain a full and 
 final grasp of his situation, and motioned aside 
 the trim little club chasseur who stood before 
 him, with one cotton-gloved hand stretched out 
 expectantly for a supposititious carriage-check. 
 " Va, mon petit, je vais a pied ! " 
 Afoot ! Cazeby smiled to himself at the 
 tone of sudden caprice which rang in his voice, 
 and, turning his fur collar high up about his 
 ears, swung off rapidly toward the Cours la 
 Reine. After all, the avenue d'Eylau was only 
 an agreeable stroll's length distant. Why not 
 go home afoot ? But then, on the other hand, 
 why go home at all ? As this thought leaped 
 suddenly at Cazeby's throat out of the void of 
 the great unpremeditated, he caught his breath, 
 stopped suddenly in the middle of the driveway, 
 and then went on more slowly, thinking hard. 
 
 It had been that rarissima avis of social life, 
 even in Paris, a perfect dinner. Cazeby had 
 found himself wondering, at more than one 
 stage of its smooth and imposing progress, how 
 the Flints could afford to do it. But on each 
 recurrence of the thought he dismissed it with 
 
58 THE NEXT CORNER 
 
 a little frown of vexation. If there was one 
 thing more than another upon which Cazeby 
 prided himself, it was originality of thought, 
 word, and deed, and he was annoyed to find 
 himself, even momentarily, on a mental level 
 with the gossips of the American and English 
 colonies, whose time is equally divided between 
 wondering how the Choses can afford to do 
 what they do, and why the Machins cannot 
 afford to do what they leave undone. 
 
 People had said many things of Hartley 
 Flint, and still more of his wife, but no one 
 had ever had the ignorance or the perversity 
 to accuse them of inefficiency in the matter of 
 a dinner. Moreover, on this particular occa- 
 sion, they were returning the hospitality of the 
 Baroness Klemftt, who had, at the close of 
 the Exposition, impressed into her service the 
 chef of the Roumanian restaurant, and whose 
 dinners were, in consequence, the wonder and 
 despair of four foreign colonies. After her 
 latest exploit Hartley Flint had remarked to 
 his wife that it was "up to them to make 
 good," which, being interpreted, was to say 
 that it was at once his duty and his intention 
 to repay the Baroness in her own sterling coin. 
 
THE NEXT CORNER 59 
 
 The fact that the men of the party afterwards 
 commended Hartley's choice of wines, and that 
 the women expressed the opinion that " Kate 
 Flint looked really pretty ! " would seem to be 
 proof positive that the operation of " making 
 good " had been an unqualified success. 
 
 Now, Cazeby was wondering whether he 
 had actually enjoyed it all. Under the cir- 
 cumstances it seemed to him incredible, and 
 yet he could not recall a qualm of uneasiness 
 from the moment when the maitre d'hotel had 
 thrown open the doors of the private dining 
 room, until the Baroness had smiled at her 
 hostess out of a cloud of old Valenciennes, 
 and said, " Now there are two of us who give 
 impeccable dinners, Madame Flint." Even 
 now, even facing his last ditch, Cazeby was 
 conscious of a little thrill of self-satisfaction. 
 He had said the score of clever things which 
 each of his many hostesses expected of him, 
 and had told with great effect his story of the 
 little German florist, which had grown, that 
 season, under the persuasive encouragement 
 of society's applause, from a brief anecdote 
 into a veritable achievement of Teutonic dia- 
 lect. Also, he had worn a forty franc orchid, 
 
60 THE NEXT CORNER 
 
 and had left it in his coffee-cup because it had 
 begun to wilt. In brief, he had been Anthony 
 Cazeby at his extraordinary best, a mixture 
 of brilliancy and eccentricity, without which, 
 as Mrs. Flint was wont to say, no dinner was 
 complete. 
 
 But the sublime and the ridiculous are not 
 the only contrasting conditions that lie no 
 further than a step apart, and Cazeby was 
 painfully conscious of having, in the past five 
 minutes, crossed the short interval which di- 
 vides gay from grave. Reduced to its lowest 
 terms, his situation lay in his words to the 
 little chasseur. With the odor of the rarest 
 orchid to be found in Vaillant-Rozeau's whole 
 establishment yet clinging to his lapel, Anthony 
 Cazeby was going home on foot because the 
 fare from the Concorde to the avenue d'Eylau 
 was one franc fifty, and one franc fifty pre- 
 cisely ninety centimes more than he possessed 
 in the world. For a moment he straightened 
 himself, threw back his head, and looked up 
 at the dull saffron of the low-hanging sky, in an 
 attempt to realize this astounding fact, and then 
 went back to his thinking. 
 
 Well, it was not surprising. The life of a 
 
THE NEXT CORNER 61 
 
 popular young diplomat with extravagant tastes 
 is not conducive to economy, and the forty 
 thousand dollars which had come to Cazeby 
 at the beginning of his twenty-eighth year had 
 proved but a bad second best in the struggle 
 with Parisian gayety. His bibelots, his servants, 
 Auteuil, Longchamp, his baccarat at the Prince 
 de Treville's, a dancer at the Folies-Marigny, 
 Monte Carlo, Aix, Trouville, they had all 
 had their share, and now the piper was waiting 
 to be paid and the exchequer was empty. It 
 was an old story. Other men of his acquaint- 
 ance had done the same, but they had had 
 some final resource. The trouble was, as 
 Cazeby had already noted, that, in his case, 
 the final resource was not, as in theirs, pecuni- 
 ary. Quite on the contrary, it was a tidy little 
 weapon, of Smith and Wesson make, which lay 
 in the upper right hand drawer of his marque- 
 terie desk. He had looked long at it that same 
 afternoon, with all his worldly wealth, in the 
 shape of forty-two francs sixty, spread out be- 
 side it. That was before he had taken a fiacre 
 to Vaillant-Rozeau's. 
 
 At the very moment when Cazeby was con- 
 templating these doubtful assets, a grim old 
 
62 THE NEXT CORNER 
 
 gentleman was seated at another desk, three 
 thousand miles away, engaged upon a calcu- 
 lation of the monthly profits derived from a 
 wholesale leather business. But Cazeby pere 
 was one of the hopeless persons who believe 
 in economy. He was of the perverted opinion 
 that money hardly come by should be thought- 
 fully spent, or, preferably, invested in govern- 
 ment bonds, and he had violent prejudices 
 against "industrials," games of chance, and 
 young men who preferred the gayety of a for- 
 eign capital to the atmosphere of " the Swamp." 
 Also he was very rich. But Anthony had long 
 since ceased to regard his father as anything 
 more than a chance relation. He could have 
 told what would be the result of a frank con- 
 fession of his extremity as accurately as if the 
 avowal had been already made. There would 
 have been some brief reference to the sowing 
 of oats and their reaping, to the making of a 
 metaphorical bed and the inevitable occupancy 
 thereof, and to other proverbial illustrations 
 which, in a financial sense, are more orna- 
 mental than useful, and nothing more. The 
 essential spark of sympathy had been lacking 
 between these two since the moment when the 
 
THE NEXT CORNER 63 
 
 most eminent physician in New York had said, 
 " It is a boy, sir, but we cannot hope to 
 save the mother." The fault may have lain 
 on the one side, or the other, or on both, or on 
 neither ; but certain it is that to Anthony's 
 imagination Cazeby senior had never appealed 
 in the light of a final resource. 
 
 Somehow, in none of his calculations had 
 the idea of invoking assistance ever played a 
 part. Naturally, as a reasoning being, he had 
 foreseen the present crisis for some months, 
 but at the time when the inevitable catastrophe 
 first became clear to him it was already too late 
 to regain his balance, since the remainder of 
 his inheritance was so pitifully small that any 
 idea of retrieving his fortunes through its in- 
 strumentality was simply farcical. The swirl of 
 the rapids, as he had then told himself, had 
 already caught his boat. All that was left to 
 do was to go straighten to the sheer of the fall, 
 with his pennant flying and himself singing at 
 the helm. Then, on the brink, a well-placed 
 bullet no bungling for Anthony Cazeby ! 
 and the next day people would be talking of 
 the shocking accident which had killed him in 
 the act of cleaning his revolver, and saying the 
 
64 THE NEXT CORNER 
 
 usual things about a young man with a brilliant 
 future before him and everything in life for 
 which to live. 
 
 And this plan he had carried out in every 
 detail save the last, to which he was now 
 come ; and his was the satisfying conviction 
 that not one of the brilliant, careless men and 
 women, among whom he lived, and moved, and 
 had his being, suspected for a moment that the 
 actual circumstances differed in the least from 
 the outward appearances. He thought it all 
 over carefully now, and there was no play in 
 the entire game that he felt he would have 
 liked to have changed. 
 
 Sentiment had no part in the makeup of 
 Anthony Cazeby. Lacking from early child- 
 hood the common ties of home affection, and 
 by training and profession a diplomat, he 
 added to a naturally undemonstrative nature 
 the non-committal suavity of official poise. But 
 that was not all. He had never been known 
 to be ill at ease. This was something which 
 gained him a reputation for studious self-con- 
 trol. As a matter of fact it was due to nothing 
 of the sort. No one had ever come fairly at 
 the root of his character except Cazeby pere, 
 
THE NEXT CORNER 65 
 
 who once said, in a fit of passion, " You don't 
 care a brass cent, sir, whether you live and are 
 made President of the United States, or die 
 and are eternally damned ! " And that was 
 exactly the point. 
 
 Something of all this had passed through 
 Cazeby's mind, when he was suddenly aroused 
 to an appreciation of his whereabouts by the 
 sound of a voice, to find that the curious in- 
 stinct of direction which underlies advanced 
 inebriety and profound preoccupation alike, 
 had led him up the avenue du Trocadero, and 
 across the place, and that he had already ad- 
 vanced some little way along the avenue d'Ey- 
 lau in the direction of his apartment. The 
 street was dimly lighted, but, just behind him, 
 the windows of a tiny wine-shop gave out a 
 subdued glow, and from within came the sound 
 of a violin. Then Cazeby's attention came 
 around to the owner of the voice. This was a 
 youngish man of medium stature, in the famil- 
 iar street dress of a French laborer, jacket and 
 waistcoat of dull blue velveteen, peg-top trou- 
 sers of heavy corduroy, a crimson knot at his 
 throat, and a dark tam o'shanter pulled low 
 over one ear. As their eyes met, he apparently 
 
66 THE NEXT CORNER 
 
 saw that Cazeby had not heard his first remark, 
 and so repeated it. 
 
 " I have need of a drink ! " 
 
 There was nothing of the beggar in his tone 
 or manner. Both were threatening, rather ; 
 and, as soon as he had spoken, he thrust his 
 lower jaw forward, in the fashion common to 
 the thug of any and every nationality when the 
 next move is like to be a blow. But, for once, 
 these manifestations of hostility failed signally 
 of effect. Cazeby was the last person in the 
 world to select as the object of sudden attack, 
 with the idea that panic would make him easy 
 prey. In his present state of mind he went 
 further than preserving his equanimity: he was 
 even faintly amused. It was not that he did 
 not comprehend the other's purpose, but, to 
 his way of thinking, there was something dis- 
 tinctly humorous in the idea of holding up a 
 man with only sixty centimes to his name, and 
 menacing him with injury, when he himself 
 was on his way to the upper right hand drawer 
 of the marqueterie desk. 
 
 " I have need of a drink," repeated the 
 other, coming a step nearer. " Thou art not 
 deaf, at least ? " 
 
THE NEXT CORNER 67 
 
 " No," said Cazeby, pleasantly, " no, I am 
 not deaf, and I, too, have need of a drink. 
 Shall we take it together ? " And, without 
 waiting for a reply, he turned and stepped 
 through the doorway of the little wineshop. 
 The Frenchman hesitated, shrugged his shoul- 
 ders with an air of complete bewilderment, and, 
 after an instant also entered the shop and 
 placed himself at the small table where Cazeby 
 was already seated. 
 
 "A vitriol for me," he said. 
 
 Cazeby had not passed three years in Paris 
 for nothing. He received this remarkable re- 
 quest with the unconcern of one to whom the 
 slang of the exterior boulevards is sufficiently 
 familiar, and, as the proprietor leaned across 
 the nickled slab of his narrow counter with an 
 air of interrogation, duplicated his companion's 
 order. 
 
 " Deux vitriols ! " 
 
 The proprietor, vouchsafing the phrase a 
 grin of appreciation, lumbered heavily around 
 to the table, filled two small glasses from a 
 bottle of cheap cognac, and stood awaiting pay- 
 ment, hands on hips. 
 
 " Di-ze sous," he said. 
 
68 THE NEXT CORNER 
 
 There was no need to search for the exact 
 amount. Cazeby spun his fifty-centime piece 
 upon the marble, added his remaining two 
 sous by way of pourboire, and disposed of the 
 brandy at a gulp. 
 
 " Have you also need of a cigarette ? " he 
 inquired, politely, tendering the other his case. 
 
 For some minutes, as they smoked, the 
 diplomat and the vagabond took stock of each 
 other in silence. In many ways they were sin- 
 gularly alike. There was in both the same 
 irony of lip line, the same fair chiseling of chin 
 and nostril and brow, the same weariness of 
 eye. The difference was one of dress and 
 bearing alone, and, in those first moments of 
 mutual analysis, Cazeby realized that there 
 was about this street-lounger a vague air of the 
 gentleman, a subtle suggestion of good birth 
 and breeding, which even his slouching man- 
 ner and coarse speech were not wholly able to 
 conceal : and his guest was conscious that in 
 Cazeby he had to deal with no mere society 
 puppet, but with one in whom the limitations 
 of position had never wholly subdued the devil- 
 may-care instincts of the vagabond. The one 
 was a finished model of a man of the world, 
 
THE NEXT CORNER 69 
 
 the other a caricature, but the clay was the 
 same. 
 
 " I am also hungry," said the latter sud- 
 denly. 
 
 " In that respect," responded Cazeby, in 
 the same tone of even politeness, " I am, un- 
 fortunately, unable to assist you, unless you 
 will accept the hospitality of my apartment. 
 It is but a step, and I am rather an expert on 
 bacon and eggs. Also," he added, falling into 
 the idiom of the faubourgs, " there is a means 
 there of remedying the dryness of the sponge in 
 one's throat. My name is Antoine." 
 
 " I am Bibi-la-Raie," said the other shortly. 
 Then he continued, with instinctive suspicion, 
 " It is a strange fashion thou hast of introduc- 
 ing a type to these gentlemen." 
 
 " As a matter of fact," said Cazeby, " I do 
 not live over a poste. But whether or not you 
 will come is something for you to decide. It 
 is less trouble to cook eggs for one than for 
 two." 
 
 Bibi-la-Raie reflected briefly. Finally he had 
 recourse to his characteristic shrug. 
 
 " After all, what difference ? " he said. " As 
 well now as another time. I follow thee ! " 
 
70 THE NEXT CORNER 
 
 The strangely assorted companions entered 
 Cazeby's apartment as the clock was striking 
 one, and pressure of an electric button, flood- 
 ing the salon with light, revealed a little tea- 
 table furnished with cigarettes and cigars, 
 decanters of Scotch whiskey and liqueurs, 
 and Venetian goblets of oddly tinted glass. 
 Cazeby shot a swift glance at his guest as this 
 array sprang into view, and was curiously con- 
 tent to observe that he manifested no surprise. 
 Bibi-la-Raie had flung himself into a great 
 leather chair with an air of being entirely at 
 ease. 
 
 " Not bad, thy little box," he observed. " Is 
 it permitted ? " 
 
 He indicated the table with a nod. 
 
 " Assuredly," said Cazeby. " Do as if you 
 were at home. I shall be but a moment with 
 the supper." 
 
 When he returned from the kitchen, bearing 
 a smoking dish of bacon and eggs, butter, rye 
 bread, and Swiss cheese, Bibi-la-Raie was 
 standing in rapt contemplation before an etch- 
 ing of the " Last Judgment." 
 
 " What a genius, this animal of a Michel 
 Ange ! " he said. 
 
THE NEXT CORNER 71 
 
 " Rather deft at times," replied Cazeby, 
 arranging the dishes on the larger table. 
 
 " Je te crois ! " said Bibi, enthusiastically. 
 " Without him what ? Evidently, it was not 
 Leon Treize who built Saint Pierre ! " 
 
 The eggs had been peculiarly obstinate, as 
 it happened, and a growing irritability had 
 taken possession of Anthony. As they ate in 
 silence, the full force of his tragic position 
 returned to him. Even the unwontedness of 
 his chance encounter with Bibi-la-Raie had 
 not wholly dispelled the cloud that had been 
 gradually settling around him since he emerged 
 from the Automobile Club, and, as they finished 
 the little repast, he turned suddenly upon his 
 guest, in a burst of irritation. 
 
 " Who are you ? " he said. " And what does 
 all this mean ? Was I mistaken, when you first 
 spoke to me, in thinking you a mere voyou ? 
 Surely not ! You meant to rob me. You speak 
 the argot of the fortifications. Yet here I find 
 you discoursing on Michel Angelo as though 
 you were the conservateur of the Uffizzi ! What 
 am I to think ? " 
 
 Bibi-la-Raie lit another cigarette, blew forth 
 the smoke in a thin, gray wisp, and thrust his 
 
72 THE NEXT CORNER 
 
 thumbs into the arm-holes of his velveteen 
 waistcoat. 
 
 " And you" he said, slowly, abandoning the 
 familiar address he had been using, " who are 
 you ? No, you were not mistaken in thinking 
 I meant to rob you. Such is my profession. 
 But does a gentleman reply, in ordinary, to the 
 summons of a thief by paying that thief a drink ? 
 Does he invite him to his apartment and cook 
 a supper for him ? What am /to think ? " 
 
 There was a brief pause, and then he faced 
 his host squarely. 
 
 " Are you absolutely resolved to put an end 
 to it all to-night ? " he demanded. 
 
 Cazeby made a small sign of bewilderment. 
 
 "Ah, mon vieux," continued the other. "That, 
 you know, is of no. use with me. You ask me 
 who I am. For one thing, I am one who has 
 lived too long in touch with desperate men not 
 to know the look in the eyes when the end has 
 come. You think you are going to blow out 
 your brains to-night." 
 
 " Your wits are wandering ; that 's all," said 
 Cazeby, compassionately. 
 
 " Oh, far from it ! " said Bibi-la-Raie, with a 
 short laugh. " But one does not fondle one's 
 
THE NEXT CORNER 73 
 
 revolver in the daytime without a good reason, 
 nor does one leave it on top of letters post- 
 marked this morning unless one has been fon- 
 dling it quoi ? " 
 
 Cazeby was at the marqueterie desk in two 
 strides, tugging at the upper right hand drawer. 
 It was locked. He turned about slowly, and, 
 half seating himself on the edge of the desk, 
 surveyed his guest coolly. 
 
 " The revolver is in your pocket," he said. 
 
 " No," answered Bibi, with an air of cheerful- 
 ness. " I have one of my own. But the key 
 is." 
 
 "Why?" said Cazeby. 
 
 Bibi helped himself to yellow chartreuse, and 
 appeared to reflect. 
 
 " I am not sure that I know why, myself," 
 he said finally. " Perhaps, because you have 
 done me a kindness and I would not like to 
 have you burn your fingers in a moment of ab- 
 sent-mindedness. Perhaps, because we might 
 disagree, and I should not care to take the 
 chance of your shooting first ! " 
 
 He squinted at the liqueur, swallowed it 
 slowly and with extreme appreciation, smacked 
 his lips, and then, cocking his feet up on 
 
74 THE NEXT CORNER 
 
 Cazeby's brass club fender, began to smoke 
 again, staring into the dwindling fire. His 
 host watched him in silence, until he should 
 be ready to speak, which he presently began 
 to do, with his cigarette drooping from the cor- 
 ner of his month and moving in time to his 
 words. He had suddenly and curiously be- 
 come a man of the world of the grand monde 
 and his speech had shaken off all trace of 
 slang, and was tinged instead with the faint 
 club sarcasm which one hears in the glass card- 
 room of the Volney or over coffee on the roof 
 of the Automobile. Moreover, it was beautiful 
 French. Not Mounet himself could have done 
 better. 
 
 " The only man to whom one should con- 
 fide personal secrets," said Bibi-la-Raie, " is 
 he whom one has never seen before and will, 
 as is probable, never see again. I could tell 
 you many things, Monsieur Cazeby, since that 
 is your name, I have seen your morning's 
 mail, you know ! but, for the moment, let it 
 suffice to say that the voyou who accosted you 
 this evening is of birth as good as yours 
 pardon, but probably better ! Wein, weib, und 
 gesang you know the saying. Add cards 
 
THE NEXT CORNER 75 
 
 and the race-course, and you have, complete, 
 the short ladder of five rungs down which I 
 have been successful in climbing. I shall pre- 
 sume to the extent of supposing that you have 
 just accomplished the same descent. One learns 
 much thereby, but more after one has reached 
 the ground. In many ways I am afraid experi- 
 ence has made me cynical, but in one it has 
 taught me optimism. I have found, and I think 
 I shall continue to find, that there is always 
 something worth looking into around the next 
 corner of even the darkest street. The rue 
 des Sablons, for instance. It was very dark 
 to-night, very damp, and very cold. Assuredly, 
 as I turned into the avenue d'Eylau I had no 
 reason to foresee a supper, Russian cigarettes, 
 and chartreuse jaune. And yet, me voila ! Now 
 what most of us lack what you, in particular, 
 seem to lack, Monsieur Cazeby is the tena- 
 city needful if one is to get to that next turn- 
 ing." 
 
 " There are streets darker than the rue des 
 Sablons," put in Anthony, falling in with the 
 other's whimsical humor, "and that have no 
 turning." 
 
 " You speak from conjecture, not experi- 
 
76 THE NEXT CORNER 
 
 ence," said Bibi-la-Raie. " You can never have 
 seen one." 
 
 He glanced about the room, with the air of 
 one making a mental inventory. 
 
 " First," he added, " there come the pawn- 
 shop, the exterior boulevards, the somewhat 
 insufficient shelter of the Pont Royal. No, 
 you have not come to the last corner." 
 
 " All that," said Cazeby, " is simply a matter 
 of philosophy. Each of us has his own idea 
 of what makes life worth the while. When 
 that is no longer procurable, then that is the 
 last corner." 
 
 "For instance ?" 
 
 " For instance, my own case. You have ana- 
 lyzed my situation sufficiently well though 
 when you said I was about to blow out my 
 brains " 
 
 "It was a mere guess," interrupted Bibi, 
 "founded on circumstantial evidence. Then 
 I thought so. Now I know it." 
 
 "Let us grant you are right," continued 
 Cazeby, with a smile. " I have my own con- 
 ception of what I require to make existence 
 tolerable. It includes this apartment, or its 
 equivalent, a horse, two servants, two clubs, 
 
THE NEXT CORNER 77 
 
 and a sufficient income to dress, eat, entertain, 
 and amuse myself in the manner of my class, 
 an extravagant and unreasonable standard, 
 if you will, but such is my conviction. Now, 
 granted that the moment has come when it 
 is no longer possible for me to have these 
 things, and when there is no prospect of my 
 situation being bettered, I cannot conceive 
 what advantage there can be in continuing to 
 live." 
 
 " I perceive you are a philosopher," said the 
 other. " How about the religious view ? " 
 
 Cazeby shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " As to that," he said, " my religious views 
 are, so far as I know, stored away in the little 
 church which I was forced to attend three times 
 on every Sunday of my boyhood. They did 
 not come out with me on the last occasion, and 
 I have never met them since." 
 
 "Excellent!" said Bibi. "It is the same 
 with me. But I think you are mistaken in your 
 conviction of what makes life worth living. I 
 had my own delusions in the time. But I have 
 had a deal of schooling since then. There are 
 many things as amusing as luxury even on 
 the exterior boulevards. Of course, actual ex- 
 
78 THE NEXT CORNER 
 
 perience is essential. One never knows what 
 one would do under given conditions." 
 
 He turned suddenly, and looked Cazeby in 
 the eye. 
 
 " What, for example, would you do if you 
 were in my place ? " he asked. 
 
 "As you say, one never knows," said his 
 host. " I think that, in your place, I should 
 improve the opportunity you find open, and 
 carry out your late and laudable intention of 
 robbing Monsieur Antoine Cazeby. I may 
 be influenced by my knowledge that such a 
 proceeding would not irritate or incommode 
 him in the least, but that is what I think I 
 should do. 
 
 " I shall not need these things to-morrow," 
 he added, indicating his surroundings with a 
 gesture. "You were quite right about the 
 pistol. As to your prospective booty, I re- 
 gret to say that I spent my last sixty centimes 
 on our cognac, but there is a remarkably fine 
 scarf-pin on the table in my dressing-room." 
 
 " A sapphire, surrounded by black pearls," 
 put in the other. " You were rather long in 
 cooking those eggs." 
 
 " A sapphire, surrounded by black pearls," 
 
THE NEXT CORNER 79 
 
 agreed Cazeby. " Yes, upon reflection, I am 
 quite sure that that is what I should do." 
 
 Bibi-la-Raie smiled pleasantly. 
 
 " I am glad to find we are of one mind," he 
 said. " Of course, mine was made up, but it 
 is more agreeable to know that I am causing 
 you no inconvenience. I suppose it is un- 
 necessary to add that resistance will be quite 
 useless. I have the only available revolver, 
 and, moreover, I propose to tie you into this 
 extremely comfortable chair. It is not," he 
 added, " that I do not trust you, although our 
 acquaintance is, unfortunately, too recent to 
 inspire complete confidence. No, I have my 
 convictions as well as you, Monsieur Cazeby, 
 and one of them, curiously enough, is that, in 
 spite of appearances, I am doing you a kind- 
 ness in putting it out of your power, for to- 
 night, at least, to do yourself an injury. Who 
 knows ? Perhaps, in the morning, you may 
 find that there is something around the next 
 corner, after all. If not, there is no harm 
 done. Your servants come in early ? " 
 
 " At seven o'clock," said Anthony, briefly. 
 
 " Exactly. And I will leave the key in the 
 drawer." 
 
80 THE NEXT CORNER 
 
 Bibi was expeditious. When he had bound 
 Cazeby firmly, and with an art that showed 
 practice, he disappeared into the dressing- 
 room, returning in less than a minute with 
 the sapphire scarf-pin and several other arti- 
 cles of jewelry in his hand. 
 
 " I should like to add to these," he said, 
 going to the book-case, "this little copy of 
 Omar Khayyam. He is a favorite of mine. 
 There is something about his philosophy which 
 seems to accord with our own. But ' the bird 
 of time has but a little way to flutter ' " He 
 paused at the door. 
 
 " Can I do anything for you before I go ? " 
 he inquired politely. 
 
 " Be good enough to turn off the light," said 
 the other. " The button is on the right of the 
 door." 
 
 " Good-night," said Bibi-la-Raie. 
 
 " Good-night, brother ! " said Cazeby. 
 
 Then he heard the door of the apartment 
 close softly. 
 
 Anthony was awakened from a restless sleep 
 by the sound of its opening. Through the 
 gap between the window draperies the gray 
 light of the winter morning was creeping in. 
 
THE NEXT CORNER 81 
 
 His wrists and ankles were aching from the 
 pressure of the curtain cords with which he 
 had been bound, and he was gratified when, 
 after a brief interval, the salon door was opened 
 in its turn and the invaluable Jules came in, in 
 shirt-sleeves and long white apron, carrying 
 a handful of letters. 
 
 That impassive person was probably never 
 nearer to being visibly surprised. For a breath 
 he stopped, and the pupils of his round eyes 
 dilated like those of a cat in a dim light. But 
 his training stood him in good stead, and when 
 he spoke his voice was as innocent of emotion 
 as if he had been announcing dinner. 
 " Monsieur desires to be untied ? " 
 Left to himself, Cazeby turned his attention 
 to his letters, and from the top of the pile 
 picked up a cablegram. He was still reflect- 
 ing upon the singular experience of the night, 
 in an attempt to analyze his present emotions. 
 Was he in any whit changed by his enforced 
 reprieve ? He was glad to think not. Above 
 all minor faults he abhorred vacillation of 
 purpose. No, his situation and his purpose 
 remained unaltered. But he was conscious, 
 nevertheless, of an unwonted thrill at the 
 
82 THE NEXT CORNER 
 
 thought that, but for the merest chance, it 
 would have been for others to open the en- 
 velope he was even now fingering. Jules 
 would already have found him he wondered, 
 with the shadow of a smile, whether Jules 
 would still have been unsurprised ! and 
 would have brought up the concierge and the 
 police 
 
 Suddenly the cable message jumped at him 
 through his revery as if, at that moment, the 
 words had been instantaneously printed on 
 what was before blank paper, and he realized 
 that it was from his father's solicitor. 
 
 Mr. Cazeby died eight o'clock this evening 
 after making will your favor whole property. 
 Waiting instructions. 
 
 MILLIKEN. 
 
 Anthony straightened himself with a long 
 sigh, and, putting aside the curtain, looked out 
 across the mansardes, wet and gleaming under 
 a thin rain. His hand trembled a little on the 
 heavy velvet, and he frowned at it, and, going 
 across to the table, poured himself out a swal- 
 low of brandy. 
 
THE NEXT CORNER 83 
 
 With the glass at his lips he paused, his 
 eyes upon the chair where Bibi-la-Raie had 
 sat and wherein he himself had passed five 
 hours. Then, very ceremoniously, he bowed 
 and dipped his glass toward an imaginary oc- 
 cupant. 
 
 " Merci, monsieur ! " he said. 
 
The Only Son of 
 His Mother 
 
 IN the limited understanding of Pe'pin dwelt 
 one great Fact, in the shadow of which all 
 else shrank to insignificance, and that Fact 
 was the existence of Comte Victor de Viller- 
 sexel, the extremely tall and extraordinarily 
 imposing person who was, first of all, Officier 
 de la Legion d'Honneur, second, Membre de 
 I'Academie Franchise, and, lastly, father to 
 Pe'pin himself. It must be acknowledged that 
 to the more observing of his limited kinsfolk 
 and extensive acquaintance the clay feet of 
 Pe'pin 's idol were distinctly in evidence. How 
 
THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 85 
 
 he had contrived to attain to the proud emi- 
 nence which he occupied was, in the earlier 
 days of his publicity, a matter of curious con- 
 jecture and not over-plausible explanation. 
 Certainly no inherent merit or ability it was 
 which formed the first step of the stairway he 
 had climbed. In diplomacy the Comte de 
 Villersexel had never bettered his first appoint- 
 ment as second secretary of legation at Bel- 
 grade ; in literature his achievements were 
 limited to one ponderous work on feudalism, 
 remarkable chiefly for its surpassing futility ; 
 and in society his sole claim to consideration 
 lay in his marriage to a Brazilian heiress, who 
 had died within the year, leaving her husband 
 an income of two hundred thousand francs 
 and Pepin. In all this it was difficult to find 
 a sufficient reason for the crimson button and 
 the green embroidered coat, unless it was that 
 the family of de Villersexel went back to the 
 Crusades. That is not always a prudent thing 
 for a family to do, but the present instance 
 was an exception. 
 
 Born to the heritage of a name which his 
 predecessors had made notable, Comte Victor 
 was one of those whose greatness is thrust 
 
86 THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 
 
 upon them rather than achieved, one of the 
 bubbles in the ferment of Paris which their 
 very levity brings to the top, to show rainbow 
 tints in the sunlight of publicity. It is prob- 
 able that no one was more surprised than de 
 Villersexel himself at the honors which fell 
 to his share, but one thing even the most con- 
 temptuous had, perforce, to concede. Once 
 secure of his laurels, he wore them with a 
 confidence that was akin to conviction. His 
 reserve was iron-clad, his dignity stupendous. 
 It required considerable time for new acquaint- 
 ances to probe the secret of his insufficiency. 
 Victor de Villersexel was, as the irreverent 
 young military attache' at the American Em- 
 bassy once said of him, " a dazzling imitation 
 of the real thing." 
 
 But to Pepin the idol was an idol without 
 flaw. Through what shrewd appreciation of 
 occasional words and chance comments he had 
 contrived to grasp the significance of that speck 
 of scarlet upon the Count's lapel and that ap- 
 parently simple phrase, " de 1'Academie Fran- 
 9aise," which, in formal introductions, was wont 
 to follow his father's name, must be numbered 
 among childhood's mysteries. But before he 
 
THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 87 
 
 was seven, Pepin had solved these prob- 
 lems for himself, and the results of his reason- 
 ing were awestruck admiration and blind alle- 
 giance to the will of this wonderful creature 
 who never smiled. His own small individuality 
 was so completely overshadowed by that of his 
 father that in the latter's presence the child 
 was scarcely noticeable, dressed in his sober 
 blouses, and creeping about the stately rooms 
 of the great apartment in the avenue d'lena 
 with an absolutely noiseless step. He was all 
 brown, was Pepin : brown bare legs, and brown 
 hands, very small and slender, brown hair, 
 cropped short and primly parted, and deep 
 brown eyes, eloquent of unspoken and un- 
 speakable things. He was earnest, his tutor 
 said, earnest and willing, but not bright, poor 
 Pepin ! He spoke English, to be sure, with a 
 curious accent caught from his Cornish nurse, 
 but that was due not so much to ability as to 
 enforced association. In his French grammar 
 and such simple arithmetic as was required of 
 him he was slow and often stupid. But he was 
 rarely scolded, and never punished. Once, 
 indeed, the Comte had been about to strike 
 him for some trifling fault, but somehow the 
 
88 THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 
 
 blow, for which Pepin stood waiting, never 
 fell. 
 
 " He is like his mother," the legionnaire had 
 muttered, as he turned away, " an imbecile 
 but " 
 
 Pepin, catching the unfinished phrase, grew 
 sick with a great discouragement, mingled with 
 profound pity for the man before him. It must 
 be a dreadful thing for one so famous to be the 
 father of an imbecile ! From that day on the 
 child was more inconspicuous than before. 
 
 Deliberately affected in the first instance, 
 what was known in society as de Villersexel's 
 " academic manner " came in course of time 
 to be second nature. Practice made perfect 
 the chill reserve which was originally assumed 
 as a precaution against possible discovery of 
 his vapidity ; and as the image of what the 
 academician had been, before his election, 
 grew dimmer in society's recollection, his im- 
 pressive solemnity, barely disguised by a veneer 
 of superficial courtesy, did not fail of its effect. 
 He was spoken of as a man in whom much lay 
 below the surface, and his more recent acquaint- 
 ances coupled their estimate of his character 
 with the proverbial profundity of still waters, 
 
THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 89 
 
 and the familiar gloved fist of steel. Others, 
 more observant, smiled at the similes, but did 
 not go to the pains of proving them ill applied. 
 One of the most characteristic things about 
 the Comte de Villersexel was that he inspired 
 neither championship nor antagonism. 
 
 With all this, he was consistent, with that 
 curious obstinacy which is sometimes made 
 manifest in the shallowest natures. His role, 
 once assumed, was, as we have said, played to 
 perfection and never laid aside. The domestic 
 threshold, which is, for the majority of men, a 
 kind of uncloaking room, saw never an altera- 
 tion, even of voice or expression, in his pose. 
 The household affairs were regulated with al- 
 most military precision, and once a day, at 
 noon, Pe'pin and his father met in the large 
 salon, the Comte in his tall satin stock and 
 frock coat, and Pepin fresh from the careful 
 hands of his nurse. They shook hands gravely, 
 and then waited in silence, until the maitre 
 d'hotel announced breakfast, 
 
 " Ces messieurs sont servis ! " 
 
 What meals they were, to be sure, those de- 
 jeuners, solemnly served, and more solemnly 
 eaten, under the rigid observation of three 
 
90 THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 
 
 menservants ; de Villersexel, with his thin lips, 
 his cold eyes, and his finely pointed gray mus- 
 tache, barely moving save to raise his fork or 
 break a morsel from his roll, and Pepin, all 
 brown, perched like a mouse on the edge of a 
 great chair, and nibbling at tiny scraps of food 
 with downcast eyes ! 
 
 At the very end, as the Comte was about to 
 push back his chair, he would invariably raise 
 his glass of champagne and Pepin his, wherein 
 a few drops of red wine turned the Evian to 
 a pale heliotrope, and together they would 
 glance toward the full-length portrait which 
 hung above the mantel. 
 
 " Ta mere ! " said the Comte. 
 
 " Maman ! " replied Pe'pin. 
 
 And so they drank the toast of tribute to the 
 dead. 
 
 After breakfast, the father would read for 
 an hour to the child, and Pepin, seated on an- 
 other large chair, would listen, perfectly mo- 
 tionless, striving desperately to understand the 
 long sentences which fell in flawlessly pro- 
 nounced succession from the Academician's 
 lips. De Villersexel had a fairly clear recol- 
 lection of what books had been the compan- 
 
THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 91 
 
 ions of his childhood, and these he purchased 
 in the rarest editions, and clothed in the rich- 
 est bindings, and read to Pepin : only his re- 
 membrance did not extend to a very distinct 
 differentiation between seven and fifteen, for 
 it was at the latter age that he read " Te'le'- 
 maque " to himself, and at the former that he 
 read " Tele'maque " to his son. 
 
 Then would come a second formal hand- 
 shake, and Pe'pin, pausing an instant at the 
 door to make a slow, stiff bow, would creep off 
 down the long corridor to the nursery, and the 
 Comte turn again to his papers with a con- 
 sciousness of paternal duty done. 
 
 How Pe'pin contrived to spend the long 
 hours which his daily walk and his short les- 
 sons left at his disposal, only Pepin knew. He 
 talked rarely with the servants, "a thing," 
 his father told him, " that no gentleman would 
 wish to do ; " and other children never en- 
 tered at the de Villersexel door, "for," said 
 the Comte, " children sow unfortunate ideas 
 and spread disease." 
 
 But there were compensations. One was 
 the full-length portrait over the chimney-piece 
 in the dining-room. Pepin had no conception 
 
92 THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 
 
 of how great was the signature it bore, or of 
 the fabulous sum which it had cost, but he 
 knew it was very beautiful, and, besides, it was 
 his mother, the sad-eyed, pale dream-mother 
 he had never seen. 
 
 The portrait of the Comtesse de Villersexel 
 had been one of the sensations at the Salon of 
 seven years before. The young Brazilian was 
 represented at the moment when the bow left 
 the strings of her violin, and on her lips and in 
 her eyes yet dwelt the spirit of the music she 
 had been playing. A clinging gown of ivory- 
 white silk emphasized rather than hid the lines 
 of her figure, of strangely girlish slenderness, 
 but straight and proud as that of a young em- 
 press. In its frailty lay the keynote of the 
 portrait's charm. It was like a reflection in 
 clear water that a touch might disturb, or a 
 young anemone that a breath might destroy, 
 not a picture before which people disputed and 
 proffered noisy opinions, but one which im- 
 posed silence, like the barely audible note of a 
 distant Angelus. It stood before the memory 
 of its original, as it had been a spirit, finger on 
 lip, at the doorway of a tomb. 
 
 This portrait of his mother dominated the 
 
THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 93 
 
 life of Pepin like the half-remembered sub- 
 stance of a dream. He had known nothing of 
 her in the life, for the breath of being had 
 passed from her lips to his at the moment of 
 his birth, but with the intuition of childhood, 
 he seemed to know that this was one who 
 would have loved him and whom he would 
 have loved. He spent hours before the pic- 
 ture, silent, spell-bound, gazing into the deep 
 and tender eyes that shone with the same pa- 
 thetic pleading that lay so eloquently in his 
 own, and the only outbreak of rage which had 
 ever stirred his simple serenity was on one 
 occasion when his nurse had found him thus 
 absorbed, and, receiving no response to her 
 summons, half alarmed and half indignant, re- 
 proached him with wasting his time before a 
 stupid picture. Then Pepin had whirled around 
 upon her, his lips compressed, his small brown 
 hands clenched, and a look in his eyes that 
 terrified even the stout and prosaic Cornish- 
 woman out of her accustomed attitude of fat 
 complacency. 
 
 " A stupid picture ? " he stormed. " But it 
 is my mother, do you hear, my mother ! You 
 are a wicked woman, Elizabeth ! " 
 
94 THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 
 
 It was when Pepin was nearing his seventh 
 birthday that a wonderful thing happened. 
 The Comte was giving a great reception to the 
 Russian Ambassador, and on an impulse which, 
 perhaps, even he himself could hardly have 
 explained, sent for his son. The child was 
 aroused from sleep, and, but half awake and 
 totally uncomprehending, was submitted by the 
 worthy Elizabeth to a veritable cyclone of wash- 
 ing, combing, and brushing, and finally, clad 
 in spotless duck, was led by the maitre d'hotel 
 down the long corridor to the door of the grand 
 salon, which, at his approach, swung open un- 
 der the touch of one of the under servants. 
 Pepin, dazed by the radiance of many lights 
 and a great clamor of voices, paused on the 
 threshold, and, with a swift intuition of what 
 was demanded of him, made his slow, stiff bow. 
 
 " Le Vicomte de Villersexel," said the maitre 
 d'hotel in a loud voice at his side, and Pe'pin, 
 seeing his father beckon to him from the group 
 where he stood, slipped close to him through 
 the crowd, and was surprised to find that the 
 Comte took his hand in his, and bent forward 
 to say in a whisper, 
 
 "You are to hear Pazzini play the violin. 
 
THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 95 
 
 That is why I sent for you. He was your mo- 
 ther's teacher." 
 
 Like all that had gone before, what followed 
 was to Pepin like a dream a beautiful dream, 
 never to be forgotten. A great hush had set- 
 tled upon the brilliant assemblage, for even in 
 Paris there are still things which society will 
 check its chatter to hear, and the tall, gray- 
 bearded man, consulting with the pianist over 
 there, was Pazzini, the great Pazzini, whose 
 services had been more than once commanded 
 by royalty in vain. De Villersexel had drawn 
 Pe'pin nearer to the piano in the brief interval, 
 and as the opening chords of the introduction 
 were struck, he found himself but a few feet 
 from the famous violinist, his hand still linked 
 in that of his father, his eyes fixed in wonder 
 upon this unknown man who had been his 
 mother's teacher. 
 
 The first low note of the violin fell upon the 
 silence like a faint, far voice, heard across a 
 wide reach of calm water, and, as the marvel- 
 ous melody swelled into the fullness of its 
 motif, something new and strange stirred in 
 Pepin's heart, mounted and tightened in his 
 throat, ran tingling to his finger-tips. Through 
 
96 THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 
 
 his half parted lips the breath tiptoed in and 
 out, and his deep eyes grew every instant, could 
 he have known it, more like those of the pic- 
 ture that he loved. So he stood entranced, 
 seeing, hearing nothing but Pazzini and Pazzi- 
 ni's violin, till the sonata drew imperceptibly 
 toward its close. Like the child, the great 
 violinist seemed to be unconscious of all that 
 surrounded him. Slowly, tenderly, he led his 
 music through the last phrases, until he paused 
 before the supreme high sweetness of the final 
 note. How it was he could never have told, 
 but, in that infinitesimal fraction of time, the 
 training of years played him false. He knew 
 that his finger-tip slipped an incalculable atom 
 of space, but it was too late. The bow was on 
 the string, and the imperceptibly flatted note 
 swelled, sank, and died away, unrecognized, he 
 thought, with a throb of thankfulness, by any 
 save his master ear. And then 
 
 "AM /"said Pepin. 
 
 The long ripple of applause drowned the 
 child's whisper, and for ah instant the terror 
 in his heart grew still, believing his exclama- 
 tion unheard. Then it leaped to life again, for 
 Pazzini was looking at him, his bow hovering 
 
THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 97 
 
 above the instrument like his mother's in the 
 picture. In the mysterious solitude of the 
 crowded room the eyes of these two met, each 
 reading the other's as they had been an open 
 book, and in Pe'pin's was the pain of a wounded 
 animal, and in Pazzini's a great wonder and sor- 
 row, as of one who has hurt without intention, 
 and mutely pleads for pardon. 
 
 As the applause ceased, the violinist turned 
 to the Comte, and pointed to Pepin with his 
 bow. 
 
 " Who is that child ? " he asked. 
 
 The thaw in the de Villersexel's " academic 
 manner " had been but momentary. With the 
 renewed hum of conversation he was himself 
 again, pale, proud, and immovable. 
 
 " It is my son, Pepin," he replied, with stiff 
 courtesy. " How shall I thank you for your 
 playing ? It was the essence of perfection, as 
 it has ever been, and ever will be." 
 
 But he could not know, as he turned away 
 with Pepin, that in his heart the violinist said, 
 " Her boy ! I understand ! " 
 
 The miracle of his summons to the salon 
 that night was not, as it appeared, the actual 
 climax of existence, for a new marvel' awaited 
 
98 THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 
 
 Pe'pin on the morrow. The doors of the dining- 
 room had barely slid together behind them when 
 the Comte turned to him. 
 
 " Yesterday was Christmas," he said. 
 
 Pe'pin made no reply. In fact, the stupor 
 which descended upon him at this infraction 
 of the usual routine of life effectually deprived 
 him, for the moment, of the power of speech. 
 
 " It was Christmas," repeated the Comte, 
 " and because of that you are invited to a 
 a soire'e to-day. Do you know the English 
 children on the entresol ? " 
 
 "I have seen them," faltered Pe'pin, "but 
 we have never spoken. You told me " 
 
 " I have changed my mind," broke in his 
 father. " Monsieur 'Ameelton " stumbling 
 desperately over the English name " has 
 asked me to let you visit them this afternoon, 
 and I have said yes to him. Elizabeth will 
 dress you. Now you may go." 
 
 Barely conscious that Pepin had added a 
 timid " Merci, papa ! " to his customary bow, 
 de Villersexel turned to his writing-table, as 
 the door closed behind the little Vicomte, and, 
 unlocking a drawer, took therefrom a letter 
 which had come to him that morning, and, 
 
THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 99 
 
 burying himself in his arm-chair, proceeded to 
 its careful reperusal. It was in the fine Italian 
 handwriting of Pazzini, and ran as follows : 
 
 MY DEAR FRIEND, This is to be at once a 
 confession and a prayer. What would you say 
 if I were to tell you that Pazzini the flawless 
 Pazzini, as men are pleased to call me ! mur- 
 dered, yes, murdered last night's sonata by flat- 
 ting that wonderful final note ? Oh, it was a 
 very little thing, and passed unnoticed, for they 
 are stupid, these wise people who listen to me, 
 and they did not hear. Even you, my poor 
 friend, even you could not detect that tiny flaw 
 that was a monstrous crime. No, of all who 
 listened, there were but two that understood 
 what I had done. I was one of these, and tHe 
 other was your son Pepin. 
 
 Do you know what that means, Monsieur 
 le Comte de Villersexel ? Do you understand 
 that it is but one ear in millions that is so 
 finely keyed that this minutest deviation could 
 wound it like the most utter discord ? And I 
 wounded him, your Pepin. I saw it in his 
 eyes. Therefore I tell you I, who know 
 that he is a genius, a genius greater than his 
 
100 THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 
 
 mother, and that, like her, he must be my 
 pupil. I have none other now. It shall be 
 the work of my old age to make him the great- 
 est violinist of his day. Give him to me, my 
 friend, if not for his own sake, then for hers ! 
 
 PAZZINI. 
 
 Prime feature of all the year to the little 
 Hamiltons, on the entresol, was their Christmas 
 tree. It arrived in some unknowable way in 
 the corner of the grand salon on the morning 
 after Christmas, and, from the moment of its 
 advent, the doors were sealed, and only the 
 privileged world of grown-ups went in and out, 
 and could see the splendors within. Inch by 
 inch the hands of the tall clock in the anti- 
 chambre dragged themselves around successive 
 circles toward the hour of revelation, and, keyed 
 to the snapping point of frenzy, the slender 
 figure of George and the round, squat form of 
 John stood motionless before the inexorable 
 timepiece, awaiting the stroke of four. This 
 suspense was harrowing enough in itself, and 
 only made bearable by recourse to occasional 
 mad caperings up and down the hall, and 
 whoops of mingled ecstasy and exasperation. 
 
THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 101 
 
 What was worse was the delay in the arrival 
 of their guests. Later, the latter would be an 
 indispensable part of the festivities : just now 
 they were mere impediments in the path of 
 bliss. Even the grown-ups were more consid- 
 erate, and came on time. Well they might, 
 since they were granted immediate admission 
 to the enchanted room, and came out with 
 maddening accounts of what was to be seen 
 therein. They sat about the small salon, and 
 talked the stupid things of which they were so 
 fond of talking, Hamilton, tall, straight, and 
 with an amused twinkle in his eyes, while he 
 watched his wife vainly endeavoring to calm 
 her sons as they foamed and pranced at the 
 sealed doors ; Miss Kedgwick, who wrote 
 books, and invited boys to tea; Monsieur de 
 Bercy, who was odd because he spoke no Eng- 
 lish, but who cut heads out of nuts and apples, 
 and drew droll pictures on scraps of paper ; 
 Miss Lys, who played the piano for " Going to 
 Jerusalem ; " and Mr. Sedgely, who talked very 
 low in her ear, and said the great trouble with 
 " Going to Jerusalem " was that the players 
 could n't go there in good earnest whatever 
 that might mean. 
 
102 THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 
 
 But would the doors never open ? 
 
 The children arrived by twos and threes, 
 shook hands limply with their elders, greeted 
 their small hosts with embarrassed ceremony, 
 and then, as if suddenly inoculated with the 
 latter's madness, commenced to foam and 
 prance in their turn before the unyielding 
 portals. Last of all came Pepin, all brown, 
 who bowed at the door, and then in turn to 
 each of those who spoke to him. 
 
 Suddenly, with a shout, the children burst 
 through the opened doorway, and gathered in 
 voluble groups about the glistening miracle 
 which shone like a hundred stars in the gath- 
 ering twilight, For a half hour all was chaos, 
 and Pepin, standing a little apart, marveled 
 and was still. Dancing figures whirled about 
 him, bearing boxes of soldiers, toy villages, 
 dolls, trumpets, drums. The air was full of 
 the wailing of whistles, the cries of mechanical 
 animals, and the clamor of childish comment. 
 
 But to Pe'pin even the dazzling novelty of 
 his surroundings was as nothing, compared 
 to one object which drew and fixed his atten- 
 tion from the first instant, as the needle is held 
 rigid by the magnetic pole. High up upon the 
 
THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 103 
 
 tree, clearly outlined against its background 
 of deep green, and gleaming gorgeously with 
 fresh varnish in the light of the surrounding 
 candles, hung a violin not one like Mon- 
 sieur Pazzini's, large and of a dull brown, but 
 small a violin for Pepin himself to hold, 
 and new, and bright, and beyond all things 
 beautiful and to be desired ! 
 
 Then his attention was distracted for a mo- 
 ment. From the time of his entrance the eyes 
 of Miss Lys had followed the dignified and 
 silent little Frenchman, and where Miss Lys 
 went Mr. Sedgely followed, so that now the 
 two were so close that they brushed his elbow, 
 and Pepin, turning with an instinctive " Par- 
 don," saw that they were watching him curi- 
 ously. When, with a feeling of restlessness 
 under their scrutiny, he looked once more 
 towards the tree, the violin was gone ! An 
 instant later, he saw it in the madly sawing 
 hands of . George Hamilton, dancing like a 
 faun down the room, and he was conscious of 
 a great faintness, such as he had known but 
 once before, when he had cut his hand, and 
 the doctor had sewed it, as Elizabeth sewed 
 rips in cloth. 
 
104 THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 
 
 " He is adorable," said Ethel Lys, " but I 
 have never seen a sadder face. What eyes ! 
 two brown poems." 
 
 " He makes my heart ache," answered 
 Sedgely, slowly, " and yet I could hardly say 
 why. Ask him what he wants off the tree." 
 
 The girl was on her knees by Pepin before 
 the phrase was fairly finished. 
 
 " What didst thou have for Christmas ? " she 
 asked, falling unconsciously into that tender 
 second singular which slips so naturally from 
 the lips at sight of a French child. 
 
 "I? but nothing," replied the little Vi- 
 comte, pleased out of his anguish by the sound 
 of his own tongue amid the babel of English 
 phrases. 
 
 The girl at his side looked at him with so 
 frank an astonishment that he felt it necessary 
 to explain. 
 
 "I have my gifts on the day of the year. 
 Christmas is an English fete, and I am French. 
 So I have nothing." 
 
 " Nothing ! " replied Miss Lys blankly, and 
 then, of a sudden, slipped her arm around him, 
 and drew his head close to her own. 
 
 " What dost thou see on the tree that thou 
 
THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 105 
 
 wouldst like to have ? " she asked, eagerly. 
 " What is there, dearest ? " 
 
 And, at the unwonted tenderness of her 
 question, the floodgates of Pepin's reserve 
 suddenly gave way. Placing his hands upon 
 the girl's shoulders, he searched her face with 
 his eyes. 
 
 " If there were another violin " he began, 
 and, faltering, stopped, and turned away to 
 hide the tears that would come, strive as he 
 might to hold them back. 
 
 " Did you hear him and see him ? " queried 
 Miss Lys, a minute after, furiously backing 
 Sedgely into a corner by the lapels of his frock 
 coat. "You did you know you did! And 
 you are still here ? Lord ! What a man ! " 
 
 Sedgely shrugged his shoulders with a^ pre- 
 tense of utter bewilderment. 
 
 " What must I do ? " he inquired, blankly. 
 
 " Do?" stormed Miss Lys. "Do? Why, 
 scour Paris till you find a violin precisely like 
 that one George is doing his best to saw in 
 half. Here ! Cle'ment is at the door with the 
 trois-quarts. Tell him to drive you like mad 
 to the Printemps to the big place opposite 
 the Grand Hotel to the Louvre to the 
 
106 THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 
 
 Bon Marche anywhere everywhere ! But 
 inside of one hour I must have that violin ! " 
 
 When Sedgely returned, thirty minutes later, 
 violin in hand, Ethel met him at the door. 
 
 " They are all at tea," she said. " We '11 
 call Pe'pin out." 
 
 She placed the violin in the hands of the 
 Vicomte without a word, and without a word 
 Pepin took it from her. The instrument slid 
 to his cheek as if impelled by its own desire. 
 
 " Canst thou play ? " she asked him. 
 
 " No," said Pe'pin, " and, besides, it is but a 
 toy. I do not want to hear it. But I like to 
 feel it here." And he moved his cheek ca- 
 ressingly against the cheap varnish. 
 
 " Don't you think you might " began 
 Sedgely, and then found himself on the other 
 side of the door, and Miss Lys facing him with 
 an air of hopeless resignation. 
 
 "I act-u-ally be-lieve," she said, with an 
 effort at calm, " that you were going to ask him 
 to thank me for it ! " 
 
 " Why not ? " said Sedgely. 
 
 " Lord! What a man ! " said Miss Lys. 
 
 In the dining-room of the de Villersexel 
 
THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 107 
 
 apartment the Comte paced slowly to and fro, 
 with bent head, and fingers that locked and 
 unlocked behind his back. In the heavy chair 
 before the fire, Pazzini seemed shrunk to but 
 half his normal size, a mere rack of clothes, 
 two lean white hands, that gripped the drag- 
 ons' heads upon the arms of the fauteuil, and 
 a pale stern face that looked into the smoul- 
 dering embers, and beyond immeasurably 
 beyond. 
 
 " How did it happen ? " he asked, after a 
 time. 
 
 " Shall I ever know ? " broke out de Viller- 
 sexel irritably. " Pepin had been to a chil- 
 dren's party below there on the entresol, at the 
 English lawyer's. He and his imbecile of a 
 bonne were entering the ascenseur. She goes 
 from spasm to spasm, so there is no telling. 
 But it seems they had given Pepin a toy the 
 English and she wished to carry it and he 
 refused. So between them God knows how ! 
 it slipped from their hands as the ascenseur 
 cleared the gate and Pepin stooped to catch 
 it and fell. He died at midnight." 
 
 There was a long silence, broken only by the 
 snapping of the logs in the fireplace and the 
 
108 THE ONLY SON OF HIS MOTHER 
 
 almost inaudible footfalls of the Comte on the 
 thick carpet. Then 
 
 " He was his mother's son," said Pazzini. 
 
 "And mine," replied the other. "The last 
 of the de Villersexel." 
 
 He paused abruptly by a little table, and 
 took up a handful of splintered wood and tan- 
 gled catgut. 
 
 " The toy that killed him," he added in a 
 low voice, and hurled the fragments over Paz- 
 zini's shoulder into the embers. A thin tongue 
 of flame caught at them as they fell, and broke 
 into a brilliant blaze. Pazzini leaned forward 
 suddenly and peered at the little conflagra- 
 tion. 
 
 " A violin," he said. 
 
 " A violin," echoed the Comte. " Think of 
 dying for a violin ! " 
 
 Pazzini made no reply. His eyes had met 
 those of the portrait over the chimney and 
 he was smiling. 
 
The Tuition of 
 Dodo Chapuis 
 
 THE situation was best summed up in the 
 epigram of little Sacha Vitzoff, the sec- 
 ond secretary at the Russian Embassy, 
 who said that there was room enough in Paris 
 for two and a half millions of people and Ga- 
 brielle de Poirier, or for two and a half mil- 
 lions of people and Thai's de Tremonceau, but 
 that even the place de la Concorde was not 
 sufficiently wide for Gabrielle and Thai's to 
 pass without treading on each others' toes. 
 
 It was a rivalry of long standing, nourished 
 by innumerable petty jealousies and carefully 
 
110 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 
 
 treasured affronts. Gabrielle was tall and very 
 slender, with a clear, pale complexion, and hair 
 of a curious dark bronze that in certain lights 
 showed a hint of olive green. So Thai's called 
 her the Asparagus Woman la Femme As- 
 perge. Thai's was short and anything but slim, 
 and brown of hair, eyes, and skin. So Gabri- 
 elle called her the Mud-Ball la Boule de 
 Boue. And neither appellation was pleasing 
 to the object thereof. 
 
 These two great luminaries of the Parisian 
 demi-monde, blazing crimson with mutual jeal- 
 ousy, followed, for six months of the year, a 
 kind of right-triangular orbit, comprising the 
 restaurant of Armenonville, the race-course of 
 Auteuil, and the Cafe de Paris, and embracing 
 divers other points of common interest, the 
 Palais de Glace, of a Sunday afternoon, the 
 tea-room of the Elysee Palace Hotel, the Fo- 
 lies-Marigny, the Salon, and the Horse-Show ; 
 and, individually, Gabrielle's apartment on the 
 avenue Kle'ber, and Thai's's little hotel on the 
 rue de la Faisanderie. Between the last two, 
 as regards situation, cost, and general equip- 
 ment, there was not a straw's weight of differ- 
 ence, save in the estimation of their respective 
 
THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 111 
 
 occupants. The apartment had been rented 
 for a term of years, and furnished and deco- 
 rated, and supplied with four servants, by a 
 Russian millionaire, and the same was true of 
 the hotel in every, save one, detail, the de 
 Tremonceau's millionaire was a Brazilian. For 
 the rest, Gabrielle was of a literary bent, and 
 wrote occasional feuilletons for the Journal, 
 and short stories, staggering with emotion, for 
 the Gil Bias Illustre' : something which, in the 
 opinion of Thai's, was stupid and all there was 
 of the most ignoble. Thais herself was a spo- 
 radic feature at the Folies-Bergere, where she 
 sang songs of a melody and a propriety equally 
 doubtful, bunching up her silk skirts at the end 
 of the refrain, with her side toward the audi- 
 ence, and winking, with brazen effrontery, at a 
 spot midway between the heads of the bald 
 gentleman in the third row and the wide-eyed 
 little St. Cyrien across the aisle. The which 
 Gabrielle found to be the trade of a camel. 
 
 Each had her horses, and her carriage, in 
 which she was whirled three times up and three 
 times down the allee des Acacias each noon of 
 the season, and again at five o'clock, and each 
 spent hours daily in the rue de la Paix, trailing 
 
112 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 
 
 long skirts of tulle and satin before the mirrors 
 of the men-milliners, and pricing strings of 
 pearls in the private offices of servile jewelers. 
 Each was deftly veneered, as it were, with the 
 bearing of the grande dame, except at the 
 moment when she chanced to pass the other, 
 or refer to her in the course of conversation. 
 Then the irrepressible past came suddenly to 
 the fore in a word or a gesture, which babbled 
 of Gabrielle's early experience in the work- 
 room of the very Paquin she was now patron- 
 izing, and of Thais's salad days as assistant to 
 a florist on the grand boulevards. 
 
 Honors were even between the two when 
 Dodo Chapuis first came up to pay homage to 
 the queen capital, of which he had been dream- 
 ing for four years. He was only nineteen, the 
 son of a great manufacturer of Aries, who had 
 lived severely and frugally, and, dying a wid- 
 ower, left a cool half million of francs to be 
 divided between Dodo and his sister Louise. 
 There seems to have been no trace of doubt 
 in the mind of either as to the respective uses 
 to which their dazzling inheritances should be 
 applied. Louise promptly accepted a young 
 playwright with a record of fourteen rejected 
 
THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 113 
 
 revues, to whose suit her father had been most 
 violently opposed j and Dodo, as promptly, 
 took out a letter of credit for fifty thousand 
 francs and departed for Paris on the morning 
 following the funeral. 
 
 The story of Dodo's first six weeks in the 
 capital is the story of full a million of his 
 kind. A pocket filled with gold and a mind 
 emptied of responsibility j youth, health, and 
 craving for the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, 
 these foundations given, the aspect of the 
 structure erected thereupon is inevitable. 
 
 Dodo made his debut at the Moulin Rouge at 
 eight o'clock on the evening of his first day in 
 Paris. Despite appearances, this did not mean 
 that he was wholly a fool. One must remember 
 that it was the evening of the first day. He 
 walked leagues, it seemed to him, around the 
 crowded promenade, half stifled by an atmo- 
 sphere composed of equal parts of stale beer, 
 cigarette smoke, and cheap perfumery. He 
 watched a quadrille made up of shrill shrieks, 
 rouge, and an abundance of white lace. He 
 tossed balls into numbered holes in a long 
 board, and won a variety of prizes of pseudo- 
 Japanese make, which he immediately pre- 
 
114 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 
 
 sented to the exponents of the aforesaid quad- 
 rille. He squandered a louis in firing a rifle 
 at paper rabbits passing in monotonous suc- 
 cession over three feet of sickly green hillside. 
 He bought a citronade for a girl with blue eyes, 
 and a menthe glaciale for another with brown ; 
 and, at the end, rebuffing the proffered services 
 of a guide, who, by reason of his new tan over- 
 coat, and to his intense disgust, addressed him 
 in English, he returned to the Hotel du Rhin 
 in a state of profound despondency. 
 
 But that, as we have said, was on his first 
 evening. On the third, he had engaged a table 
 in advance at Maxim's, and supped in state on 
 caviar, langouste a I'Ame'ricaine, and Ruinart. 
 And with Antoinette Feria. It was not much 
 of an achievement, but it showed progress. 
 
 On the following day Dodo went to Auteuil, 
 won twelve francs fifty on a ten-franc bet, and 
 dined at Armenonville. It was here that Su- 
 zanne Derval looked cross-eyed at him, fin- 
 gered her pearls, and remarked that he had 
 beaux yeux. Dodo might be said to be fairly 
 launched. 
 
 It would be superfluous to note the further 
 stages of his initiation. They were strictly 
 
THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 115 
 
 conventional, and, under the circumstances, 
 it was remarkable that, at the end of six weeks, 
 he had drawn but seven thousand francs on his 
 letter of credit, and still retained his enthusi- 
 asms. It is not every one from the provinces 
 for whom Paris reserves her supreme surprise 
 for the forty-third day. 
 
 It chanced to be the first evening of the de 
 Tremonceau's annual engagement at the Folies- 
 Bergere, and for three days the eloquent legend 
 " La Belle Thais " had been glaring at the 
 boulevard throngs in huge block letters from 
 the posters on the colonnes Morris. Dodo, 
 meanwhile, had made many friends among men 
 of tastes similar to his own a feat which is 
 curiously easy of accomplishment in Paris, 
 when one has forty-odd thousand francs and 
 a desire for company. Of these was Sacha 
 Vitzoff, who, on occasion, had five louis, and 
 invariably spent them at once upon his friends, 
 before he should be tempted to put them to a 
 worse use. 
 
 So Sacha bought the box, and they sat, five 
 of them, through two hours of biograph, and 
 trained dogs, and Neapolitan ballet, until the 
 liveried attendants thrust cards bearing the 
 
116 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 
 
 number 19 into rococo frames at the side of 
 the proscenium, and the orchestra plunged into 
 Sarasate's " Zapateado," and various stout gen- 
 tlemen wrestled with mechanical devices for 
 supplying opera-glasses, and, conquering, sat 
 back in their seats and grunted. Then the 
 drop rose upon a pale pink and gray libel on 
 Versailles, and La Belle Thai's flashed out from 
 the wing, with a red silk scarf bound about her 
 head and a toreador's hat perched on one side. 
 There was no denying it. Despite her rouge, 
 despite her four decades (an eternity in Paris), 
 La Thai's was very beautiful. Dodo forgot his 
 cigarette, his champagne, and his companions. 
 He followed every swish of her spangled skirts, 
 every click of her castanets, every tap of her 
 pointed shoes, every movement of her gleam- 
 ing shoulders and her lithe, white arms. This, 
 then, was the reality of his dream, the soul and 
 substance of his vision, the essence of the 
 great city that had drawn him like a magnet 
 from his humdrum bourgeois life in the sub- 
 urbs of Aries, the ineffable, eternal Woman, 
 poured like oil upon the smouldering fire of 
 boyish imagination ! His slender hands gripped 
 the plush of the box-rail feverishly, his eyes 
 
THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 117 
 
 widened and brightened, his lips parted, and 
 his breath came short. Then, suddenly, there 
 was a final clash of tambourines and castanets 
 which brought La Belle Thai's to a standstill, 
 her head flung back, and one arm high in air ! 
 
 " She has charm even now ! " said Sacha, 
 emptying his glass. 
 
 Three days later, it was known to all the 
 world that concerns itself with such things that 
 Dodo Chapuis was latest in the train of victims 
 to the fascinations of Thai's de Tremonceau. 
 One cannot pretend to say what she saw in him 
 to divert her attention from richer and maturer 
 men. He was handsome yes but the 
 Comte d'Ys was handsomer. He was rich, 
 as such things go, and for the moment. But 
 he had no wit, poor Dodo and as for money, 
 which, after all, is the only other thing which 
 counts in the demi-monde, what were forty thou- 
 sand francs to one authorized to draw, ad libi- 
 tum, upon a Brazilian multi-millionaire ? No, 
 evidently, it was one of those strange whims to 
 which the slaves of self-interest are sometimes 
 subject. The de Tremonceau had nothing to 
 gain, and everything to lose, for, certainly, her 
 Brazilian miche would have been ill pleased 
 
118 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 
 
 to know that Dodo Chapuis was riding daily 
 six times up and six times down the allee des 
 Acacias in the victoria of La Belle Thai's. As 
 it chanced, he was in Buenos Ayres. Still, 
 he might return without warning. He had an 
 ignoble habit of doing that. But when those 
 sufficiently intimate suggested this to Thai's 
 she only laughed, and sang a snatch from La 
 Belle He'tene : 
 
 " Si par megarde il se hasarde 
 
 De rentrer chez lui tout h coup, 
 
 II est le maitre, mats c'est, peut-$tre. 
 
 Imprudent et de mauvais gout ! " 
 
 As for Dodo, he was in Elysium. He was 
 singularly innocent, Dodo, with his smooth 
 russet hair, and his steady gray eyes, and his 
 straight, fine nose, and his sensitive, patrician 
 mouth ; and, believe it or not as you will, he 
 cherished the project of marrying Thais de 
 Tremonceau ! He had fed himself on the 
 poetry of Alfred de Musset, giving doubtful 
 words and phrases his own interpretation, from 
 lack of experience, and, despite the lesson of 
 " Don Paez " and " La Nuit d'Octobre," he 
 believed in the power of trust to hold another 
 true. Alas, he was hopelessly conventional ! 
 
- THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 119 
 
 There is no one of us poor moths who is con- 
 tent with seeing his fellow singe his wings. 
 No, each must plunge into the radius of con- 
 suming heat and learn its peril for himself. 
 All of which is, no doubt, a wise ruling. For 
 if experience could be handed down from 
 father to son, and accepted on its face value, 
 then the child of the third or fourth genera- 
 tion would be a demi-god, or even a full one, 
 and there would be no further attraction in 
 heaven, and no further menace in hell. The 
 which morsel of morality may be allowed to 
 pass, if only for contrast's sake. We were 
 speaking of Thais de Tremonceau. 
 
 Dodo's Elysium lasted longer than such 
 mirages are wont to do. For a full month he 
 basked in the sultry sunshine of the de Tre- 
 monceau's smiles, dined almost nightly in the 
 rue de la Faisanderie, occupied a fauteuil at 
 the Folies while she whisked her spangled skirts 
 and sang " Hola ! Hola ! " to Sarasate's music, 
 supped with her afterwards at the Cafe' de Paris 
 or Paillard's, and paid the addition, and tipped 
 the garon, and the maitre d'hotel and the chef 
 d'orchestre, as liberally as if he had had a mil- 
 lion francs instead of a dwindling twenty thou- 
 
120 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 
 
 sand. And the delirium might have lasted even 
 longer had it not been for Louise Chapuis. 
 
 No one ever knew who told. There is a wire- 
 less telegraphy in such cases which defies de- 
 tection. Suffice it to say that, one morning, 
 the Hotel de Choiseuil numbered Mademoi- 
 selle Chapuis among its guests, and that, as 
 this name was inscribed upon the register, 
 the Fates rang up the curtain on the final act 
 of the brief comedy of the tuition of Dodo 
 Chapuis. 
 
 Where, when, and how Louise contrived, in 
 three days of Paris, to strike, full and firm- 
 fingered, the keynote of the situation remained 
 a mystery which none of those concerned was 
 capable of solving. In all the capital there was 
 but one person competent to deal conclusively 
 with the situation. That person was Gabrielle 
 de Poirier, and to Gabrielle de Poirier Louise 
 Chapuis applied. 
 
 There could have been no stranger meeting 
 than this between the young Arle'sienne, with 
 her blue eyes, and her embarrassed hands, and 
 her gown that all the plage turned to look at, 
 because it was in the fashion of more than 
 yester-year, and the cold, stately leader of the 
 
THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 121 
 
 demi-monde, with her air of languid ease, her 
 shimmer of diamonds, and her slow, tired voice, 
 roused to interest for the moment by this singu- 
 larly sudden and imperative demand upon her 
 good-will and ingenuity. 
 
 Louise found Gabrielle half buried among 
 the cushions of a great divan, with a yellow- 
 backed novel perched, tent-like, upon her knee. 
 For once, the demi-mondaine was alone, bored 
 to extinction by the blatant ribaldry of Octave 
 Mirbeau. She had fingered the simply-lettered 
 card of her unknown visitor for a full minute, 
 before bidding her valet-de-pied admit her. A 
 whim, a craving for novelty who knows 
 what ? The Open Sesame had been spoken, 
 and now, in the half-light of late afternoon, her 
 caller stood before her. 
 
 " Be seated," said Gabrielle courteously. 
 " Be seated, Ma ? " 
 
 " Demoiselle," replied Louise, complying 
 with the invitation. 
 
 There was a brief pause. Each woman 
 studied the other curiously. Then Louise be- 
 gan to speak, at first timidly. 
 
 " You think it strange, no doubt, madame, 
 this visit of mine. Let me be quite candid. 
 
122 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 
 
 I come to ask a favor of you I, who have no 
 right, save the right of one woman to crave 
 assistance from another. I have a brother " 
 . " Faith of God ! " said Gabrielle, lightly, " so 
 have I. A poor sample, if you will ! " 
 
 Her flippancy seemed suddenly to lend 
 the other fresh courage. She leaned forward 
 eagerly, clasping her gray-gloved hands upon 
 her knee. 
 
 " But mine," she said, " is but a boy. He 
 has come to Paris, seeking to know the world, 
 and, lately, he has become the friend of Made- 
 moiselle Thai's de Tremonceau." 
 
 " Zut ! " put in Gabrielle. " You say well 
 that it is but a boy ! " 
 
 " Is there need to tell you," continued Louise, 
 without heeding the sneer, " what this means 
 to me ? Is there need to tell you what it means 
 to him ? " 
 
 " My faith, no ! " said Mademoiselle de 
 Poirier. " It is acquainted with me, that 
 story. The end is not beautiful ! " 
 
 " Tout simplement," said her visitor, " I have 
 come to Paris to bring him back, to show him 
 the folly of his way. But I alone am power- 
 less. You you who are more admired, more 
 
THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 123 
 
 beautiful, more clever than this Mademoiselle 
 de Tre'monceau " (Oh, Louise !) " you 
 alone can aid me to rescue him." 
 
 Gabrielle raised her eyebrows slightly, and 
 let her lids droop with an air of unutterable 
 boredom. 
 
 " Truly, mademoiselle," she drawled, " I nei- 
 ther see in what fashion I can assist you, nor 
 why, in any event, I should concern myself 
 with this affair. If your brother has such 
 taste " 
 
 " Oh, madame, I know I have no right," 
 broke in Louise. " But you, of all women in 
 Paris, alone have the power to win him from 
 her." 
 
 " And when I have won him," demanded 
 Gabrielle, " what then ? Do you think your 
 precious brother will fare better with me than 
 with the de Tre'monceau ? " 
 
 Her calm was broken for a moment by a 
 flash of anger. 
 
 "The world is full of fools," she added. 
 " One more or less is no great matter. I am 
 not a Rescue Society, mademoiselle. Let your 
 brother go his way. His best cure will be ef- 
 fected by the woman herself. When his money 
 
124 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 
 
 is gone, there will be no need to win him from 
 her." 
 
 The sneer sent the blood racing to the oth- 
 er's cheeks. She had been counting, as she 
 realized with a pang of mortification, upon some 
 Quixotic quality which her reading had taught 
 lay always dormant, even in such a woman as 
 Gabrielle de Poirier, some innate nobility, 
 ready to spring into activity at the bidding of 
 such an appeal as she had just made. And, 
 too, beneath all her anxiety, she had believed 
 that Thai's loved her brother, that his peril lay 
 not so much in her making use of him and then 
 flinging him aside, as in the existence of actual 
 affection between him and a woman whom, 
 even as his wife, society would not recognize. 
 This brutal intrusion of money into the discus- 
 sion, this flippant classification of Dodo with 
 a world full of fools who flung away honor 
 and reputation for a passing fancy, only to be 
 flung away themselves in turn, suddenly seemed 
 to lay clear the whole situation, in all its sor- 
 did vulgarity, and with the revelation came a 
 white rage against this woman who was only 
 another of the same kind. She despised her- 
 self for having stooped to ask her aid, and a 
 fury of wounded pride blazed in her reply. 
 
THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 125 
 
 " You know yourself well, madame ! " she 
 said. " No, surely my brother would fare no bet- 
 ter with you, though that was not what I meant 
 to ask. I thought, in my folly, that, perhaps, 
 in the life of such a one as you, there might 
 come moments when you longed to be other 
 than you are, moments when you would like to 
 think that among all the men you have played 
 with, ruined, and spurned, there were one or 
 two who could speak and think of you as men 
 speak and think of honest women, who could 
 say that you had been an ennobling influence 
 in their lives, and whose word would count 
 upon the side of good when you come to an- 
 swer for the evil you have done. I thought 
 that, not for money's sake or vanity's, you 
 might wish to win my brother from this woman, 
 and, when you had won him, teach him how 
 sordid, how wicked, how futile such a life is, 
 and send him back to decency a better man I 
 I see how mistaken I was in judging you. 
 There is no compassion in you, no nobler in- 
 stinct than self-interest. Your motives are the 
 same as hers, love of admiration and love of 
 gold, and, perhaps, less worthy. I cannot 
 say. Hers, at least, I can only suspect : yours 
 
126 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 
 
 I have had from your own lips. Had my bro- 
 ther been more than the poor weak boy he is, 
 had he been brilliant, powerful, or a millionaire, 
 it would never have been necessary for me to 
 ask you to win him from her. No, madame, 
 for you would have done so of your own ac- 
 cord ! " 
 
 Now, there is such a thing as diplomacy, 
 and there is such a thing as luck, and of the 
 former Louise Chapuis had not an atom. An 
 impulse, made apparently reasonable by pure 
 imagination, led her to seek out Gabrielle, and 
 had she found her, as her fancy had painted 
 her, readily moved by the appeal of honest af- 
 fection and confidence, she was competent to 
 have won her end. Louise was one of the peo- 
 ple who, in foreseeing a dispute, invent the re- 
 plies to their own questions, and who, if the 
 actual answers accord with those preconceived, 
 will emerge from the ordeal triumphant, but 
 who lack the diplomat's gift of adapting the 
 line of argument to that of unexpected retort. 
 Confronted with a state of affairs wholly dif- 
 ferent from that which she had supposed ex- 
 istent, her sole resource was in this outburst 
 of disappointment and reproach, honest, but 
 
THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 127 
 
 inutile as the clamor of a baffled baby. So 
 much for diplomacy. 
 
 But, as we have said, there is also such a 
 thing as luck. Gabrielle de Poirier was insuf- 
 ferably bored. Her Russian was in Moscow, 
 her recent tips at Auteuil had proved disas- 
 trous, her latest feuilleton had been rejected. 
 For six hours she had been buried among the 
 cushions of the divan, clad materially in light 
 pink but mentally in deepest blue, skipping 
 from page to page of a novel that was not 
 amusing, and confronted every ten minutes by 
 the recurrent realization that the next event 
 on her calendar was a dinner at the Cafe de 
 Paris, which would not come for the eternity 
 of twenty-seven hours ! Despite her ungra- 
 cious reception of Louise, she had been grate- 
 ful for the diversion, and hardly had she 
 sneered at Dodo's position before she lit a 
 cigarette, and fell to studying the situation seri- 
 ously. Louise, pausing, breathless, after her 
 tirade, was surprised to find that she made no 
 reply, looking straight before her with her 
 great eyes half closed, and put down her si- 
 lence as equivalent to admission of the charges 
 hurled against her. The truth of the matter 
 
128 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 
 
 was, however, that Gabrielle had not heard 
 one word of her visitor's impassioned denun- 
 ciation ! 
 
 There was a long silence, and then the demi- 
 mondaine looked up. 
 
 " Where does your brother live ? " she asked, 
 touching an electric button at her side, "and 
 what is his first name ? " 
 
 " At the Hotel du Rhin," stammered Louise, 
 " and his name is Do I should say Charles, 
 Charles Chapuis. I am at the Hotel de 
 Choiseuil." 
 
 " Bon ! " said the other. " If you will go 
 home, mademoiselle, and keep your own coun- 
 sel, I think I can promise you that you will 
 shortly have your brother back." 
 
 Louise stepped forward impulsively. 
 
 " Oh, madame ! " she began. 
 
 But just then the valet-de-pied appeared at 
 the door, and Gabrielle, taking up her novel, 
 flounced back among the cushions. 
 
 " Bon jour, mademoiselle," she said, without 
 looking at Louise. " Achille, la porte ! And 
 send Mathilde to me." 
 
 The conference between mistress and maid 
 was brief but eloquent. 
 
THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 129 
 
 "Who," demanded Gabrielle, "is Dodo 
 Chapuis ? " 
 
 "The young monsieur of Boule-de-Boue," 
 responded Mathilde promptly. 
 
 " Parfaitement. I needed to refresh my 
 memory. And how long is it since we cabled 
 the last tuyau ? " 
 
 " Eight weeks, at least, madame before 
 the coming of Monsieur Chapuis." 
 
 "Bon!" said Gabrielle. "We cable an- 
 other tip at once." 
 
 (For it may be noted, in passing, that she 
 had one source of income which La Belle 
 Thai's little suspected !) 
 
 "What does Boule-de-Boue do to-night?" 
 she demanded again. 
 
 "Dines at home with Monsieur Chapuis," 
 replied the omniscient Mathilde, "dances at 
 the Fol' Berg' at eleven, sups at Paillard's with 
 Monsieur Chapuis." 
 
 (For it may also be noted, in passing, that 
 the maid of La Belle Thai's had one source of 
 income which her mistress totally ignored !) 
 
 " Tres bien ! " said Gabrielle. " Now a pen' 
 and paper, the inkstand, envelopes, sealing 
 wax, and a telegraph form, and write as I tell 
 thee." 
 
130 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 
 
 For ten minutes Mathilde wrote rapidly, and 
 then spread the results of her exertions out 
 before her, in the shape of two notes and a 
 cablegram, and read them aloud triumphantly. 
 The first note was directed to Monsieur Charles 
 Chapuis, at the Hotel du Rhin, place Ven- 
 dome : 
 
 " If Monsieur Chapuis is a man of honor," 
 it ran briefly, " he will break all engagements, 
 " however important, for this evening, and pre- 
 " sent himself chez Mademoiselle Gabrielle de 
 " Poirier at seven o'clock, on a matter inti- 
 " mately touching the good fame of his family. 
 " The sister of Monsieur, Mademoiselle Louise 
 " Chapuis, is chez Mademoiselle de Poirier." 
 
 The second note was addressed to Made- 
 moiselle Thai's de Tremonceau, at 27 bis. rue 
 de la Faisanderie. 
 
 " A friend advises Mademoiselle Thai's de 
 " Tremonceau that Monsieur Charles Chapuis 
 " dines with Mademoiselle Gabrielle de Poirier 
 " this evening at half past seven." 
 
 And the cablegram was to Senor Miguel 
 Cevasco, Reconquista 21, Buenos- Ayres, Re- 
 publique Argentine. 
 
 " 19 rides in the carriage of 52. 26." 
 
THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 131 
 
 The point of which observation lay in the 
 fact that Dodo confessed to nineteen, and 
 Senor Miguel to fifty-two, and Gabrielle to 
 twenty-six. 
 
 It was a bold play, and one foredoomed 
 to failure unless each link in the chain held 
 true. But Mademoiselle de Poirier was no 
 novice, and experience had long since taught 
 her that success is the child of audacity ; so, 
 ten minutes later, Achille was speeding, in one 
 cab, toward the place Vendome, pausing only 
 at the bureau de telegraphe on the corner of the 
 rue Pierre Charron and the avenue Marceau, 
 and Mathilde was speeding in another toward 
 the rue de la Faisanderie : and Gabrielle herself 
 
 * 
 
 was making life not worth living for Louis, her 
 long-suffering maitre-d 'hotel. 
 
 The upshot of this triple commotion was 
 that, as the clock on her mantel struck seven, 
 Mademoiselle Gabrielle de Poirier was pos- 
 ing on a chaise-longue in correct imitation of 
 David's " Madame Recamier," except for a 
 wonderful black gown, when Achille announced 
 Monsieur Charles Chapuis. 
 
 Dodo entered the room in immaculate even- 
 ing dress, but with a touch of embarrassment 
 
132 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 
 
 in his manner which betrayed his years. Ht 
 was good to look upon, was Dodo, tall, straight, 
 and slight, with the ruddy olive skin, the firm, 
 square fling of chest and shoulder, the nar- 
 rowness of waist, and the confident swing of 
 long, slender, but sinewy legs with which one 
 is blessed at nineteen in Bouches-du-Rhone. 
 Gabrielle, taking note of him from under her 
 covert, languid lids, was compelled, for once, 
 to mental candor. 
 
 " I comprehend Thai's," she said to herself, 
 but to Dodo, " Monsieur, I felicitate you. 
 You have the true spirit of chivalry." 
 
 " My sister " began Dodo. 
 
 " Is, no doubt, at the Hotel de Choiseuil," 
 answered Gabrielle, coolly, fanning herself. 
 " In any event she is not here. Oh, she was 
 here yes ; but she had gone gone before 
 I sent you the note. Be seated, monsieur." 
 
 Dodo selected a chair, dropped into it, and 
 awaited developments in silence. Six weeks 
 before, he would have demanded in a passion 
 the meaning of this subterfuge. But whatever 
 might be said of La Belle Thai's, one learned 
 diplomacy in her company. 
 
 " You are surprised, monsieur ! " 
 
THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 133 
 
 " I am infinitely surprised, madame," he 
 agreed, with charming candor. 
 
 " Shall we be frank with each other ? " asked 
 Gabrielle, pleasantly. 
 
 " I think it is the only way," said Dodo. 
 " Eh bien, I am infinitely surprised, madame ; 
 first, to see my sister's name in connection with 
 yours at all, and, second, to find that you have 
 been lying to me." 
 
 " She came to ask me to rescue you from 
 the toils of Thais de Tre'monceau." 
 
 Despite his elaborate self-control, Dodo 
 flushed crimson. 
 
 " I think we had best drop the discussion 
 here," he said, rising. " There can be no pos- 
 sible profit in continuing it. If my sister was 
 here at all " 
 
 "Her card is there on the table," put in 
 Gabrielle, pointing with her fan. 
 
 " Pardon. I should not have permitted my- 
 self the insinuation. I accept your statement, 
 and simply say that it was an unwarrantable 
 intrusion on her part. For you, madame, I have 
 only admiration. Your compliance " 
 
 "It was not that," said Gabrielle, shortly. 
 " I can conceive of nothing less important to 
 
134 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 
 
 me than your sister's wishes. But I dislike 
 Mademoiselle de Tremonceau." 
 
 " That," said Dodo, with exaggerated cour- 
 tesy, " can only be a matter of opinion. / 
 admire Mademoiselle de Tremonceau enor- 
 mously." 
 
 " The force of admiration is undoubtedly 
 strong," snapped Gabrielle, " to reconcile you 
 to riding in another man's carriage, drinking 
 another man's wine, dawdling with another 
 man's " 
 
 " Assez ! " said Dodo. 
 
 Gabrielle shrugged her shoulders. 
 
 "Quite right," she said. "You are old 
 enough to see for yourself. I presume you 
 will not return to her." 
 
 " On the contrary, I shall be with her in 
 fifteen minutes." 
 
 In the distance an electric bell whirred. 
 
 "Sooner than that, I think," smiled Ga- 
 brielle, and then La Belle Thai's was standing 
 at the salon door. She was gowned in scarlet, 
 with a poppy flaring in her hair, and, if she had 
 but lent to her dance at the Folies but half the 
 fury of that entrance, the manager would, no 
 doubt, have tripled her already ample salary. 
 
THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 135 
 
 And, at the instant of her appearance, as if 
 by signal, which indeed it was, Louis 
 flung wide the opposite door, with a stately 
 " Monsieur et madame sont servis," and there, 
 gleaming with spotless napery, silver shaded 
 candlesticks, and shimmering cut glass, was the 
 daintiest of tables, set for two ! 
 
 What Thai's did and what she said, this is 
 not the time or place to detail. She was not 
 wanting in vocabulary, the de Tremonceau, nor 
 sparing thereof in an emergency. A decade of 
 careful training fell from her like a discarded 
 mantle, and she became in an instant the vul- 
 gar-tongued fleuriste of the boulevards. From 
 her chaise-longue Gabrielle smiled calmly, the 
 picture of a new Circe, rejoicing in the success 
 of her spells. And, between the two, Dodo, 
 his hands clenched until the knuckles shone 
 white, turned sick with contempt and loathing. 
 At the end Thai's flung him an unspeakable 
 taunt, and there was a pause. Then, 
 
 " Do you play the black or the red, mon- 
 sieur ? " asked Gabrielle, sweetly, with a glance 
 at her own gown and another at the de Tre- 
 monceau's. 
 
 Dodo let his eyes run slowly, contemptu- 
 
136 THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 
 
 ously, from the topmost ripple of her bronze 
 hair to the point of her satin slipper, with the 
 felicitous inspiration of seeming to take stock 
 of her charms and to be not over-pleased there- 
 with. Then, 
 
 " I continue my game, madame ! " he said. 
 " I play the red." 
 
 It was the last, faint cry of youthful chivalry, 
 disillusioned, blotted out, and it was wasted on 
 Thai's de Tremonceau. 
 
 " Tu penses, salaud ! " she broke in, with a 
 laugh. "Well, then, thou art well mistaken. 
 Rien ne va plus ! " 
 
 " He will come back to me ! " she cried to 
 her rival, as the door closed behind him. 
 
 "Perhaps," agreed Gabrielle, "but only to 
 leave you again, in a fashion more mortifying 
 for him and more calamitous for you. I sent 
 a cable to Buenos Ayres this afternoon." 
 
 She was deliberately flinging away the afore- 
 mentioned source of income, for the sake of 
 seeing a certain expression on the face of La 
 Belle Thai's. But when she saw it, she was 
 well content. For the honors were no longer 
 even. 
 
 On the avenue Kleber, Dodo hailed the first 
 
THE TUITION OF DODO CHAPUIS 137 
 
 cab that passed, and flinging a curt " Hotel de 
 Choiseuil au galop ! " to the cocher, blotted 
 himself into one corner, and covered his face 
 with his hands. 
 
 " It was my first, but it shall be my last con- 
 fidence in woman," he said. It was neither 
 strictly original nor strictly true, this, but it 
 showed progress. 
 
 For there is such a thing as diplomacy and 
 there is such a thing as luck, and the fact that 
 his sister had not an atom of the former made 
 no difference whatever in the tuition of Dodo 
 Chapuis. 
 
Le Pochard 
 
 HIS applicability was evident to the mind 
 of Jean Fraissigne from the moment 
 when the camelot placed Le Pochard 
 on a table in front of the Taverne, and he pro- 
 ceeded to go through his ridiculous pretense 
 of drinking from the cup in his left hand which 
 he filled from the bottle in his right. Jean, 
 who was dawdling over a demi, and watching 
 the familiar ebb and flow of life on the Boul' 
 Miche', was at first passively pleased at the 
 distraction provided by the appearance of the 
 toy, and then, of a sudden, consumedly ab- 
 sorbed in the progress of his operations. For 
 
LE POCHARD 139 
 
 what was plain to any but a blind man was the 
 fact that Le Pochard was the precise counter- 
 feit of Jean's friend and comrade, Gre'goire 
 Gregoire, with his flat-brimmed hat, and his 
 loose working blouse, and his loud checked 
 trousers Gregoire, helas ! with his flushed 
 face, and his tremulous hands, and his un- 
 steady walk, as Jean had seen him a hundred 
 times ! 
 
 Le Pochard staggered to and fro upon the 
 marble-topped table, nodding maudlinly, and 
 alternately filling his cup and raising it uncer- 
 tainly to his expressionless face. At last, weak- 
 ened by his exertions, he passed one arm 
 through the handle of Jean's demi, hesitated, 
 and then leaned heavily against the glass and 
 stood motionless, with his topheavy head bent 
 forward, and his eyes fixed on the price-mark 
 upon the saucer below. This eloquent manoeu- 
 vre, so unspeakably appealing, determined the 
 future ownership of Le Pochard. Jean pur- 
 chased him upon the spot, and bore him off 
 in triumph to the rue de Seine, as an object 
 lesson for Gregoire Caubert. 
 
 The two students shared a little sous-toit 
 within a stone's throw of the Beaux-Arts, 
 
140 LE POCHARD 
 
 neither luxuriously nor yet insufficiently fur- 
 nished. It was Jean's good fortune to have 
 a father who believed in him not a usual 
 condition of mind in a provincial merchant 
 whose son displays an unaccountable partiality 
 for architecture and, what was more to the 
 point, who could afford to demonstrate his con- 
 fidence by remittances, which were inspiring, 
 if not on the score of magnitude, at least on 
 that of regularity. And, since freedom from 
 pecuniary solicitude is the surest guarantee of 
 a cheerful spirit, there was no more diligent 
 pupil at the Boite, no blither comrade in idle 
 hours, above all, no more loyal friend, in sun 
 or shadow, throughout the length and breadth 
 of the Quartier, than little Jean le Gai, as he 
 was called by those who loved him, and whom 
 he loved. 
 
 That was why the comrades were at a loss 
 to understand his friendship for Gregoire Cau- 
 bert. Had the latter been one of themselves, 
 a type of the schools, in that fact alone, what- 
 ever his peculiarities, would have lain a reason 
 for the association. But, to all intents and 
 purposes, he was of another world. His simi- 
 larity to Jean and to themselves began and 
 
LE POCHARD 141 
 
 ended with his costume. For the rest he was 
 silent and reserved, courting no confidence and 
 giving none, unknowing and unknown to the 
 haunts they frequented, the Deux Magots, 
 the Escholiers, the Taverne, the Bullier, and 
 Madame Roupiquet's in the rue de Beaune, 
 and the Rouge on Thursday nights. Jean le 
 Gai, when questioned as to the doings of 
 Gre'goire, seemed to reflect something of his 
 friend's reserve. He admitted that the other 
 wrote : he even went so far as to prophesy that 
 some day Gregoire would be famous. Further, 
 he made no admissions. 
 
 " Diable ! " he said. " What does it matter ? 
 He goes his way I go mine. And if we 
 choose to live together, whose concern is it 
 then, I ask you ? Fichez-moi la paix, vous 
 autres ! " 
 
 So popular curiosity went unsatisfied, so far 
 as Gregoire was concerned, and the apparently 
 uncongenial menage came, in time, to be looked 
 upon as one of the unexplained mysteries of 
 the Quartier, one, for the rest, which made 
 no particular difference to any one save the two 
 immediately concerned. 
 
 But if Jean made no admissions as to 
 
142 LE POCHARD 
 
 Gregoire, it was not for lack of sufficient 
 knowledge. They had met, as men meet in 
 the Quartier, as bubbles meet in a stream, 
 and, for reasons not apparent, are drawn to- 
 gether by an irresistible attraction, and fuse 
 into one larger, brighter bubble than either has 
 been before. For little Jean Fraissigne, whose 
 exquisses were the wonder of the School, and 
 whose projets had already come to be photo- 
 graphed and sold in the shops of the rue 
 Bonaparte and the quai Conti, believed in his 
 heart that architecture was as nothing com- 
 pared to literature, and Gregoire, whose long, 
 uphill struggle had been unaccompanied by 
 comradely admiration or even encouragement, 
 found indescribable comfort, in the hour of his 
 success, in the faith and approbation of the 
 friend who alone, of all men, knew his secret, 
 knew that the Rend de Lys of the " Chan- 
 sons de Danad " and the " Voyage de Tristan " 
 of which all Paris was talking, was none other 
 than himself Gregoire Caubert, on whose 
 wrist the siren of absinthe had laid a hand that 
 was not to be shaken off, and whom she was 
 leading, if by the paths of subtlest fancy and 
 almost miraculous creative faculty, yet toward 
 
LE POCHARD 143 
 
 an end inevitable on which he did not dare to 
 dwell. 
 
 To Jean, healthy, rational, and cheerful as 
 a young terrier, much that Gregoire said and 
 did was totally incomprehensible, but what he 
 did not understand he set down, with convic- 
 tion, to the eccentricity of genius. The long 
 nights which he spent alone, sleeping sanely 
 in their bedroom in the rue de Seine, while 
 Gregoire's cot stood empty beside him, and 
 Gre'goire himself was tramping the streets of 
 Paris ; the return of his friend in the first faint 
 light of dawn, pale-faced and swaying ; the 
 succeeding hours which, despite his exhaus- 
 tion, he spent at his desk, feverishly writing, 
 and tossing the pages from him, one by one, 
 until the floor was strewn with them on all 
 sides ; finally, his heavy slumber far into the 
 afternoon, all this, to Jean, was but part and 
 parcel of that marvelous thing called literature. 
 He returned at seven to find that Gregoire had 
 prepared a wonderful little meal, and was walk- 
 ing up and down the floor, unevenly, absinthe 
 in hand, awaiting his arrival. 
 
 In the two hours which followed lay the 
 keynote of their sympathy. It was then that 
 
144 LE POCHARD 
 
 Gregoire would read his work of the early 
 morning hour, to Jean, curled up on the divan, 
 with his hands clasped behind his head and 
 his eyes round and wide with delight and ad- 
 miration. What things they were, those fan- 
 cies that Gregoire had pursued and caught, 
 like night-moths, in the streets of Paris, while 
 stupid folk were sleeping ! And how he read 
 them, Gregoire, with his flushed face lit with 
 inspiration, and his eyes flaming with enthusi- 
 asm ! If only he would not drink absinthe, 
 thought little Jean, and said so, timidly at first, 
 and then more earnestly, as, little by little, the 
 marks of excess grew more plain in his friend. 
 But Gregoire made a joke of this he who 
 always joked and in time, Jean came to ac- 
 quiesce. For he never wholly understood 
 until afterwards. 
 
 So, when nine struck, it was understood that 
 they parted company till the following evening. 
 Jean brought out his drawing board, his T 
 square, and all their attendant paraphernalia, 
 and toiled at his caiques with infinite patience 
 and unerring accuracy, until midnight ; and 
 Gregoire, having corrected his manuscript here 
 and there, gnawing savagely at his pencil the 
 
LE POCHARD 145 
 
 while, inclosed it in one of his long envelopes, 
 scrawled " Redaction du Journal " upon it, 
 stamped it, and went out into the night to mail 
 the old, and seek new moths. And this was 
 all there was to the comradeship which mysti- 
 fied the Quartier, save that the love of Jean for 
 Gregoire and of Gregoire for Jean was as deep 
 and unfaltering as the current of the eternal 
 Seine and, if anything, more silent ! 
 
 Jean wound up Le Pochard stealthily, on the 
 landing outside the apartment door, and, enter- 
 ing, placed it suddenly upon the table under 
 the very nose of Gregoire, who stood, sipping 
 his absinthe, in the centre of the room. Le 
 Pochard rocked and swayed, ticking like a little 
 clock, and drinking cup after cup of his imagi- 
 nary beverage, as if his life depended upon the 
 quantity consumed. Convulsed with merri- 
 ment at the performance of the preposterous 
 creature, Jean le Gai lay prone upon the divan, 
 kneading the cushions with his fists and kick- 
 ing his heels against the floor, and Gregoire, 
 a slow smile curling his thin, sensitive lips, 
 seemed to forget even his absinthe until the 
 toy's energy slackened and he paused, with 
 the bottle shaking in his hand, and his eyes, as 
 
146 LE POCHARD 
 
 usual, bent upon the ground. Then " Eh 
 b'en quoi ? " said Gregoire, looking up at his 
 friend. 
 
 " Mais c'est toi ! " burst out the little archi- 
 tect in an ecstasy. " It is thou to the life, 
 my Gregoire ! Remark the blouse what ? 
 and the hat, sale pompier! and the checked 
 grimpant, name of a pipe ! But it is thy 
 brother, Le Pochard ! thy twin thou, thy- 
 self ! " 
 
 And seizing the glass from Gregoire's hand, 
 he carefully filled Le Pochard's cup with ab- 
 sinthe, and set him reeling and swaggering 
 again, so that the immoral little animal spilled 
 the liquid on his blouse, and presently fell head- 
 long, totally overcome, with his nose pressed 
 flat against the table. 
 
 Thereafter, it was a comradeship of three 
 instead of two. It was quite in accord with 
 the whimsically fanciful nature of Gregoire 
 that he should take Le Pochard into his affec- 
 tions, and even call him " brother " and " cher 
 confrere." He treated him, did Gregoire, with 
 marked deference and studied non-observance 
 of his besetting weakness, and he expected 
 and received from Le Pochard a like respect 
 
LE POCHARD 147 
 
 and indulgence in return. That, at least, was 
 how he described their relations to Jean, and 
 Jean, curled up upon the divan, was never tired 
 of the droll pretense, but would laugh night 
 after night till the tears came, at the common 
 tact and the mutual courtesy of Gregoire and 
 Le Pochard. 
 
 Linked by this new, if unstable, bond of 
 sympathy, neither of the friends understood, 
 during the months that followed, that their 
 paths, which had so long lain parallel, were 
 gradually but inevitably diverging. Jean was 
 now wrapped heart and soul in the competi- 
 tion for the Prix de Rome, and, as he said him- 
 self, en charrette eternally. Even the work of 
 his comrade, which formerly had held him 
 spell-bound, lost for him, little by little, much 
 of its compellant charm. His nimble mind, 
 busy with the stern, symmetrical lines of col- 
 umns and the intricate proportioning of capi- 
 tals, drifted imperceptibly away from its one- 
 time appreciation of pure imagery. He returned 
 later at night from the atelier, consumed the 
 meal they ate in common with growing im- 
 patience, and was busy with his caiques again 
 before Gregoire had fairly finished his coffee. 
 
148 LE POCHARD 
 
 The evening readings, grown shorter and 
 shorter, were finally abandoned altogether, 
 and, oftener than not, Jean was totally oblivi- 
 ous to the presence of Gregoire, correcting his 
 manuscript at the little desk, or his noiseless 
 departure with the stamped envelope under 
 his arm. Had he been told, he would have 
 denied his defection with the scorn bred by 
 conviction. It was not that he loved his com- 
 rade less, but only that the growing promise 
 of the Prix de Rome lay, like the marvel of 
 dawn, on the horizon of the immediate future, 
 blinding his eyes to all beside. For Jean le 
 Gai was finding himself, and in the crescent 
 light of that new and wonderful discovery what- 
 ever had been bright before grew tawdry. 
 
 Only one evidence remained of what had 
 been. Le Pochard, with his absurd inanity, 
 was yet a feature of every dinner in the rue de 
 Seine, and because Gregoire invented daily 
 some new drollery in connection with their 
 senseless toy, Jean was unaware that things 
 were no longer the same, that his friend 
 was thinner and more nervous, that the circles 
 had deepened under his eyes, that he said 
 no word of his work. They laughed together 
 
LE POCHARD 149 
 
 at Le Pochard, and laughed again at their own 
 amusement. So the days went by and still 
 their paths diverged, Jean's toward the sun- 
 gilt hills of promise and prosperity, Gregoire's 
 toward the valley of shadow that a man must 
 tread alone. 
 
 Despite his proclivities, neither foresaw the 
 end of Le Pochard. So gradual was his de- 
 cline toward utter degradation that the varnish 
 was gone from his narrow boots and his round, 
 weak face, and his simple attire was frayed and 
 worn, before they had remarked the change. 
 Then, one night, as Gregoire wound him, the 
 key turned futilely in the spring. Placed in his 
 accustomed position on the table, Le Pochard 
 made one feeble gesture of surrender with his 
 bottle, one unavailing effort to raise his absinthe 
 to his lips, and, reeling dizzily, crashed down 
 upon the floor, his debauches done with for- 
 ever. 
 
 It was a curious thing that, in the face of 
 this absurdity, neither of the comrades smiled. 
 In some unaccountable fashion Le Pochard 
 had come to be so much a part of their asso- 
 ciation that in his passing there was less of 
 farce than tragedy. And Jean, looking across 
 
150 LE POCHARD 
 
 at Gre'goire, saw for the first time the pitiful 
 change that had crept into the face of his 
 friend, the utter weariness where restless 
 energy had been, the dullness of the eyes 
 wherein had played imagination, like a will- 
 o'-the-wisp above the slough of destiny. And 
 Gre'goire, looking across at Jean, knew that 
 the moment had come, and dropped his glance, 
 ashamed, fingering the tattered clothes of Le 
 Pochard. 
 
 " One might have expected it," said Jean, 
 with a smile that was not a smile. " I suppose 
 we must forgive him his faults, now that he is 
 gone. De mortuis nil nisi bonum ! " 
 
 Then, as Gregoire made no reply, he added, 
 
 " I shall not work to-night. I am tired. Que 
 veux-tu ? I have been doing too much. So we 
 will sit by the fire, n'est ce pas, vieux ? And 
 thou shalt read to me as before. Dieu ! It is 
 a long time since the moths have shown their 
 wings ! " 
 
 In the tiny grate the cannel coal snapped 
 and spat fretfully, and Jean, buried in the 
 largest chair, winked at the sparks, and, fur- 
 tively, from the corners of his brown eyes, 
 watched Gre'goire reading, half-heartedly, with 
 
LE POCHARD . 151 
 
 the lamp-light cutting sharply across his thin 
 cheek and his temples, on which the veins stood 
 singularly out. 
 
 He was no critic, little Jean le Gai, yet even 
 he knew that something had touched and 
 bruised the wings of this latest moth that Grd- 
 goire had pursued and caught while stupid folk 
 were sleeping, so that it was not, as had been 
 the others, downed with the shifting brilliance 
 of many unimagined hues, but dull and som- 
 bre, like the look he had surprised in the face 
 of his friend. And so subtly keyed were the 
 strings of their unspoken sympathy that night, 
 that a sense of the other's feeling stole in upon 
 Gregoire long before the manuscript was fin- 
 ished, and suddenly he cast it from him into 
 the grate, where the little flames caught at it, 
 and wrapped it round, and sucked out its life, 
 exulting, until it lay blackened and dying, 
 writhing on the coals. 
 
 " Why ? " said Jean. But he knew. 
 
 " Because," answered Gregoire slowly, with 
 his eyes upon the shrunken, faintly whispering 
 ashes of his pages, whereat the sparks gnawed 
 with insatiable greed, " because, my little one, 
 it is finished. What I have done I shall never 
 
152 LE POCHARD 
 
 do again. Never didst thou wholly understand 
 
 least of all in these last days when thy work 
 absorbed thee. If one is to catch night-moths 
 with such a tender touch, and preserve them 
 for other men to see so carefully, that no one 
 little glint of radiance may be missing from 
 their wings, one has need of a clear eye and 
 of a steady hand. Neither is mine. My fa- 
 ther, of whom I have never spoken to thee, 
 my father, who left me this gift of trapping the 
 thoughts that others see not as they fly, yet 
 love and prize when they are caught and pinned 
 upon the page, yet left me a companion curse, 
 
 the curse of absinthe, little Jean, that is not 
 to be gainsaid. For as the gift was beautiful, 
 so was it also frail, and as the curse was sub- 
 tle, so was it also strong. I have seen the 
 end long, long. Now it is here. My work 
 is finished. The curse has knocked at the 
 door of my body, and, at the signal, the gift 
 has flown forth from the window of my soul." 
 
 He paused, and pausing, smiled. 
 
 "Thou didst most nearly understand me, 
 Jean," he continued, " in buying Le Pochard. 
 For in truth, he was my brother my twin 
 my soul, in the semblance of a toy ! How we 
 
LE POCHARD 153 
 
 have laughed at him ! Yet all along I have 
 seen myself in that senseless little man of tin. 
 Is it fanciful ? Peut-etre bien ! But, now that 
 he is gone, I see that I must go, too, and in 
 the same way, my Jean, in the same way, with 
 my absinthe in my hand and the key of inspi- 
 ration turning uselessly in the broken spring 
 of my heart ! " 
 
 He rose suddenly, with a shiver, and looked 
 down at Jean le Gai. For an instant he 
 touched him on the hair, and then he was gone 
 into the night, leaving the little architect gaz- 
 ing, wide-eyed and mute, at the crinkling ashes 
 of the last, unworthiest moth of all. 
 
 During the days that followed, Le Pochard 
 stood upon the mantel-corner. They no longer 
 touched him, but left him, as it were, a monu- 
 ment to his own folly. 
 
 There was no further trace in Gregoire's 
 manner of the mood which had loosed his 
 tongue on the night of his last reading. To 
 Jean, who, in his simplicity stood ready with 
 comfort and encouragement, he seemed to be 
 in need of neither. Plainly, what he had said 
 was but a phase of that strange imagination 
 which had dictated the exquisite pathos of his 
 
154 LE POCHARD 
 
 * Danae " and his " Tristan ; " and this one 
 thing little Jean had learned, that his friend 
 lived the moods he wrote, and that oftentimes, 
 when what he said was seemingly most per- 
 sonal, he was posing for his own pen a 
 painter in speech, drawing from his reflection 
 in a mirror opposite. So the vague alarm 
 aroused by Gregoire's words died down, and 
 Jean plunged once more into his work. 
 
 In those last days of the competition his 
 projtt, laboriously builded, detail by detail, 
 leaped into completion with a suddenness start- 
 ling even to himself. He knew that it was 
 good, knew so without the surprising enthu- 
 siasm of his comrades at the atelier, and the 
 still more surprising commendation of his pa- 
 tron, the great Laloux himself, whose policy 
 was nil admirari, whose frown a habit, and 
 whose " Bon ! " a miracle. But even Jean le 
 Gai, with all his buoyant optimism, was unpre- 
 pared in conviction for those words which re- 
 verberated, to his ears like thunder, beneath 
 the dome of the Institut. 
 
 " Prix de Rome Jean Fraissigne Atelier 
 Laloux ! " 
 
 Would Gregoire never come ? He asked 
 
LE POCHARD 155 
 
 himself the question a hundred times as he 
 paced the floor of their living-room an hour* 
 before dinner, exulting in the cold roast chicken 
 and the champagne, and the huge Marechale 
 Niel rose which he had purchased for the oc- 
 casion. For he was determined, was Jean le 
 Gai, that Gregoire should be the first to know. 
 Was it not Gregoire who had encouraged him 
 all along, who had prophesied success when as 
 yet the projet was no more than an exquisse ex- 
 quisse, who had laughed down Jean's forebod- 
 ings, and magnified Jean's hopes a hundred- 
 fold ? Yes, evidently Gregoire must be the 
 first to know, before even a bleu should be sent 
 to Avignon to gladden the heart of Fraissigne 
 pere! 
 
 But when Gregoire came, there was no need 
 to tell him after all. For it was the chicken 
 that shouted Jean's news the chicken, and 
 the champagne, and the great yellow rose, and, 
 most of all, the face of Jean himself. So it 
 was that Gregoire held out his long, thin arms, 
 wide-spread, and that into them rushed Jean, 
 to be hugged and patted, as he gabbled some 
 things that there was such a thing as under- 
 standing and many more that there was not. 
 
156 LE POCHARD 
 
 " Rome Rome, think of it ! And the pa- 
 ternel but he will die of joy ! Ah, mon vieux, 
 Rome ! The dreams the hopes all I 
 have wished for and now and now Ah, 
 mon vieux, mon vieux ! " 
 
 And so again and again, clamoring incohe- 
 rently, while Gre'goire, holding him tight, could 
 only pat and pat, and say, over and over, 
 
 " It is well, my little brother ! My little bro- 
 ther, it is very, very well ! " 
 
 They dined like princes, these two, pledging 
 each other, laughing, singing, shouting. Never 
 had Jean le Gai so well deserved his name, 
 never had Gregoire been so whimsically droll. 
 Even Le Pochard was restored to his old posi- 
 tion and coaxed to repeat his former antics. 
 But it was all in vain. The key refused to 
 catch the spring, and, replaced upon the table, 
 Le Pochard only nodded once or twice with 
 profound melancholy, and stared at little Jean 
 out of his round eyes. Once, Jean thought he 
 caught in the face of his friend a hint of the 
 sadness of that other night, but when he looked 
 again the sadness, if sadness it were, was gone. 
 Gregoire filled his glass, and pledged him anew 
 with a laugh. 
 
LE POCHARD 157 
 
 " Rome, mon petit frere Rome ! " 
 
 At nine, they went out together, Jean to dis- 
 patch his bleu and join the comrades at the 
 Taverne for this was a night to be cele- 
 brated with songs and many drained demis 
 and Gregoire, who knew where ? 
 
 Who knew where ? Only the Seine, perhaps, 
 sulking past the rampart on which he leaned, 
 thinking, thinking, until the gaunt dawn crept 
 up, like a sick man from his bed, behind the 
 towers of Notre Dame; and the shutters of 
 the shops on the quai Conti came rattling 
 down, and the street cries went shrilly through 
 the thin morning air : " Rac'modeur d'fai'ence 
 et d'por-or-celaine ! " or " 'Archand de robinets ! 
 Tureetutu, tureetututututu ! " Then Gre'goire 
 went slowly back to the rue de Seine. 
 
 Jean spent the succeeding days in a whirl 
 of excitement. There were calls to be made, 
 farewell suppers to be eaten, and all the pre- 
 paration for departure to be superintended. 
 Fraissigne pere sent a joyful letter, and in the 
 letter a substantial draft, so that Jean had two 
 new complets, and shirts, and socks, and shoes, 
 and a brilliantly varnished trunk with his name 
 and address painted in black letters on the end, 
 
158 LE POCHARD 
 
 " J. Fraissigne, Villa Medici, Rome." It was 
 magnificent ! In this and a packing case he 
 stowed his clothes and his household gods, 
 though when the latter had been collected, the 
 little apartment in the rue de Seine looked piti- 
 fully bare. There were dark squares on the 
 faded red wall-paper, and clean circles in the 
 dust of the shelves, where his pictures and casts 
 and little ornaments had been, but Gregoire 
 only laughed and said that the place had been 
 too crowded before, and that the long-needed 
 house-cleaning was no longer an impossibility. 
 So, before they realized the fact, the moment 
 of parting was upon them, and the sapin, with 
 Jean's luggage on top, stood waiting at the 
 door. The concierge, wiping her hands upon 
 her blue-checked apron, came out to bid her 
 favorite lodger good-by. A little throng of 
 curious idlers paused on the narrow sidewalk, 
 gaping at the new trunk with the glaring letter- 
 ing. The cocher was already untying the nose- 
 bag in which his lean brown horse had been 
 nuzzling for fifteen minutes. And, on the curb, 
 arm linked in arm, the two comrades stood 
 watching him, with no courage to meet each 
 other's eyes. For each had a thousand things 
 
LE POCHARD 159 
 
 to say and never a word in which to say so 
 much as one. 
 
 At the end, as their hands met, it was only 
 a commonplace that came to Jean's tongue. 
 
 " Thou wilt write me, vieux ? And in four 
 years ce qui va vite, du reste ! we shall be 
 together once more ! " 
 
 In four years in four years in four years ! 
 The words beat dully at Gre'goire's temples, as 
 he watched the cab swing round the corner 
 of the Institut toward the quai Malaquais, with 
 Jean's handkerchief fluttering at the window of 
 the portiere. Four years four years four 
 years ! How easy it was to say for one who 
 did not know that the end had come, that 
 the moths of fancy that fly by night must be 
 caught by others now, that the siren of absinthe 
 was standing ready to claim her own ! 
 
 Gregoire mounted the stairs slowly, unlocked 
 the door, and stepped into the familiar room, 
 dim now in the last faint light of day. His 
 absinthe stood upon the table, and he took it 
 up, and paused, looking about him. Presently 
 he went forward to the mantel, and, laying one 
 hand upon it, bent forward, peering at a little 
 photograph of Jean which leaned against the 
 
160 LE POCHARD 
 
 mirror. The woodwork jarred under his touch, 
 and Le Pochard in his corner stirred, ticked 
 feebly, and strove to raise his cup to his lips. 
 Wheeling at the sound, Gregoire met the eyes 
 of the dissipated little toy for a full minute, 
 motionless and silent. Then with a sob, he 
 hurled his glass into the grate, where it was 
 shivered into a hundred fragments, and flung 
 himself on his knees by the divan, with his face 
 buried in his hands. 
 
 " Mon frerot ! " he murmured, " my little 
 brother help me help me to be strong." 
 
 On the mantle, Le Pochard bent his head 
 and gazed shamefacedly upon the ground. 
 
 For his reign was at an end. 
 
A Latter-Day 
 Lucifer 
 
 THE distance between them is far less 
 than is commonly supposed. In fact, 
 they are separated only by a parti-wall. 
 But there is a vast difference in their exteriors, 
 Heaven being gay with silver paint and stucco 
 cherubs, and illuminated by a huge arc-light 
 with a white globe, and Hell all red, with a 
 monster's grinning mouth for entrance, and 
 a ruby lamp. 
 
 The two cabarets stand on the boulevard de 
 Clichy, side by side, and, when one is passing 
 through Paris on a Cook ticket, good for a two 
 
162 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 
 
 weeks' stay, one is taken by an obliging friend 
 of the Colony to see them, and so is enabled 
 to return to the States with the pleasing con- 
 viction of having had a glimpse of the true life 
 of Montmartre, the which is so artistic, and 
 Bohemian, and all that. 
 
 It is something, as every one knows, to be 
 an angel in Le Ciel; but it is also something, 
 as every one does not know, to be a demon 
 in L'Enfer. Aside from the sentiment of the 
 thing, it is all the same, harps and halos or 
 horns and hoofs. The clientele of both places 
 is, for the most part, etrangere, and what is cer- 
 tain is that an American never counts the little 
 money one gives him in change, and that an 
 Englishman disputes it anyway, so that, in the 
 beginning, one might as well be wrong as right, 
 and that a German is unable to tell a louis from 
 a new sou. And a pourboire is a pourboire, 
 whether intentional or otherwise. That is why 
 Maxime Perrot felt himself to be a remarkably 
 fortunate person when, one evening in June, 
 he was suddenly transformed into an angel, as 
 a result of his intimacy with Gustave Robine. 
 
 Gustave was two metres twelve in height, 
 which is something so astonishing in itself that 
 
A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 163 
 
 it is not to be wondered at that, for more than 
 a year, he had filled the eminent position of 
 guardian of the gate of Le Ciel, and was much 
 in favor with the management, because of the 
 attention he attracted from the clients. Also, 
 he kept his eyes open, and, moreover, he owed 
 Maxime fifty francs. So, when one of the 
 angels abruptly married a rich widow, and 
 departed for Maisons-LafHtte, to live on her 
 ample rentes, Gustave mentioned the name of 
 his friend and creditor for the vacancy, and, 
 the next day, Maxime became one of the per- 
 sonnel of Heaven, with a fresh pair of wings 
 and new pink fleshings. 
 
 Maxime was short and slender, in all except 
 his feet, which were long and large, so long 
 and large, indeed, that he was called P L Ma- 
 juscule the Capital L by his intimates, 
 arid fully merited the nickname when viewed 
 in profile, standing. His experiences in life 
 had been diverse, for, as he himself was wont 
 to say, he cared less for an existence without 
 variety than does a fish for an apple. He had 
 driven a voiture de remise, gorgeous in a green 
 cockade and doeskin breeches : he had been 
 collector for the Banque de France, dismissed, 
 
164 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 
 
 let charity say not why : and gargon de restau- 
 rant, racing to and fro, with a mammoth tray 
 balanced on one upright arm, like a human 
 umbrella : and camelot, hoarsely crying " La 
 Patrie ! " in front of the boulevard cafes : and, 
 finally, valet de chambre to Captain the Honor- 
 able Michael Douglas, military attache to the 
 British Embassy. It was in the last capacity 
 that he had learned English, which now he 
 spoke, said Gustave, like a veritable Goddem. 
 That was not the* least of the new angel's quali- 
 fications. To be sure, it was against all reason 
 that the sales anglais should, under any circum- 
 stances, achieve an entree into Heaven, but then 
 there were many incongruities in connection 
 with Le Ciel, and the fact remained that three 
 out of five. of the clients spoke Angliche, and 
 an angel who could reply to them in their own 
 ignoble argot was, without doubt, an invaluable 
 acquisition. 
 
 It cannot be denied that Maxime made a 
 good beginning in Heaven. He entered upon 
 his new duties modestly, and spent a full half- 
 hour of the early evening cleaning the long 
 table in the main hall, dusting the surrounding 
 stools of gold, upon which the chosen were to 
 
A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 165 
 
 sit, and assisting his fellow angels in polishing 
 the liqueur glasses. And it so happened that 
 the first to enter that night was Major Amos 
 E. Cogswell, of the United States Army, who 
 had spent three weeks in Paris at the age of 
 twenty-two, and distinguished himself by de- 
 manding, on his second arrival, the way to the 
 Jardin Mabille. With the Major were his two 
 nieces, and their attendant swains, John Self- 
 ridge Appleby and P. Hamilton Beck, the 
 latter in narrow-brimmed straw hats, which 
 resembled lids of Japanese tea-pots, and dog- 
 skin walking gloves, turned back at the wrists. 
 The party entered with an air of bravado, and 
 were heard to remark that this was IT, what- 
 ever that might mean. It was Maxime's oppor- 
 tunity, and he improved it to the utmost, seat- 
 ing the newcomers around the head of the table, 
 and demanding, " Ces messieurs desirent ? " as 
 if completely oblivious to the fact that they 
 were anything but bred-in-the-bone boulevar- 
 diers. For there was need of precaution. It 
 is an inexplicable thing about these English 
 that one is charmed to be addressed in his 
 own tongue, and the next is insulted. It pays 
 to feel one's way. 
 
166 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 
 
 "What does he say? " said Major Cogswell, 
 turning, helplessly, to P. Hamilton Beck, who 
 had taken French II. at Columbia. 
 
 " Wants us to name the drinks," responded 
 that accomplished young gentleman. 
 
 " Spik Ingliss ? " put in 1'L Majuscule, de- 
 ploying the skirmishers of his vocabulary. 
 
 " Tchure ! " said Mr. Beck. 
 
 " Ah ! " replied Maxime, much gratified, 
 " zen v'at eest ? Vat veel de zaintlemans 
 aff ?" 
 
 " Cream de mint," said the Major, promptly, 
 and, his companions agreeing with alacrity, 
 Mr. Beck again undertook the role of interpre- 
 ter. 
 
 " Sank cream de mint," he commanded, hold- 
 ing up his left hand, wide-spread, " et toute 
 suite." 
 
 And, in a surprisingly brief space of time, 
 five infinitesimal glasses of the green liqueur 
 stood before them. 
 
 "Mais avec du glace," remonstrated Mr 
 Beck. 
 
 " What 's that ; what 's that ? " inquired the 
 Major anxiously, as the glasses were as sud- 
 denly removed by the abashed Maxime. 
 
A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 167 
 
 " Oh, ice, that 's all," replied the other. 
 " These chaps don't know what 's what. Leave 
 'em to me. One has to know how to handle 
 'em." 
 
 Following the entrance of the Americans, 
 the cabaret had gradually filled. The majority 
 of the places at the long table were occupied 
 now by a curious assemblage of sensation- 
 seekers, Germans in little cloth hats of dark 
 green, with a curled feather cropping up be- 
 hind, Englishmen in tweeds and traveling- 
 caps, with visors fore and aft, American archi- 
 tects from the Quartier, so well disguised by 
 slouch felts, pointed beards, and baggy trou- 
 sers, that only a nasal tang in their slangy 
 French betrayed their nationality, and a sprin- 
 kling of Frenchmen, each clasping the hand of 
 a grisette. Already the high-priest of Le Ciel 
 was in his gilded pulpit, delivering an oration 
 thickly sown with " mes sceurs " and " mes 
 freres " and " chers benis," at which strangers 
 and Parisians alike laughed uproariously, and 
 all for one good reason because the French- 
 men understood ! Maxime returned, bringing 
 the five liqueurs in larger glasses with chopped 
 ice. The head angel made the round of the 
 
168 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 
 
 table, carrying, on a pole, the gilded image of 
 a pig, and a pseudo-sexton stood leaning on 
 the rail of a celestial stairway leading to the 
 second floor, sprinkling the assemblage with 
 so-called holy water from a colored brush. It 
 was all very French, very conventional, or 
 unconventional, according to the point of view 
 of the spectator, very sacrilegious from any 
 point of view. 
 
 With that curious instinct of womanhood 
 which seems to recognize the indelicate, even 
 in unfamiliar surroundings, even in an un- 
 known tongue, the younger Miss Cogswell 
 leaned forward suddenly and touched the Ma- 
 jor on the hand. 
 
 "Let us go," she said. 
 
 " Yes ! " agreed Appleby, buttoning his coat, 
 " let 's be moving. What do you say ? Let 's 
 go to Hell I mean," he added, with a blush, 
 " let 's try the other cabaret." 
 
 The Major agreed with a sigh of relief. He 
 had understood nothing of the mummery going 
 on about him, but he was possessed by the con- 
 viction that in some way his party was the butt 
 of the occasion, and had kept looking around 
 abruptly, in hope of catching the angels gig- 
 gling behind his back. 
 
A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 169 
 
 " Will you ask the waiter how much I owe ? " 
 He appealed to Beck. 
 
 How much ! 
 
 Maxime picked these two essential words 
 out of the rapid phrase like a squirrel snap- 
 ping a peanut from its shell. He had not 
 been gargon at the Cafe Americain for nothing, 
 Maxime. His countenance assumed an ex- 
 pression of beatific innocence as he looked 
 over the Major's head, at the high-priest in the 
 gilded pulpit. 
 
 " Tain francs," he observed, mildly. 
 
 This was a tide in the affairs of P. Hamilton 
 Beck which, plainly, must be taken at the 
 flood. The elder Miss Cogswell was looking 
 at him expectantly, and Heaven had, of a sud- 
 den, grown very still. He leaped into the 
 breach with all the eloquence accumulated 
 during eight months of French II. 
 
 " Mon foi, non ! cream de mint coute seule- 
 ment un franc la verre dans les etablissements 
 plus chers. II ne faut pas nous voler, parceque 
 nous sont etrangeres ! " 
 
 " What 's that ; what 's that ? " said the Ma- 
 jor. 
 
 "He's trying to rob us," explained Beck, 
 
170 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 
 
 much excited. " Says it 's ten francs. It can't 
 possibly be more than five, and it ought to be 
 two francs fifty." 
 
 The Major immediately became purple with 
 indignation. 
 
 " But, God bless my soul ! " he exclaimed, 
 " the rascal understands English as well as 
 any one of us. What 's the use of wasting 
 your French on him ? " 
 
 He swung round upon his stool, and fixed 
 an eye, which was celebrated in the 3 ad Reg- 
 ular Infantry, upon 1'L Majuscule. That worthy 
 surveyed with unfeigned astonishment this very 
 angry, red-faced foreigner, who looked as if he 
 was about to devour him, body and bones. He 
 had not the most remote conception of the ef- 
 fect which his flaxen wig, and his ridiculous 
 wings, and his short pleated tunic, and his 
 pink tights, and his huge feet in their gilded 
 sandals, produced upon the Major ; and his at- 
 tempt at extortion was strictly in line with the 
 traditions of the place. Certainly, it was all 
 very puzzling. 
 
 " You ape ! " said the Major furiously, find- 
 ing his breath. " You pinky-panky little scoun- 
 drel ! You an angel ? Why you 're not even 
 
A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 171 
 
 shaved ! You get two francs fifty, that 's what 
 you get, and not a red cent of porbwure either, 
 you Christmas-tree image ! " 
 
 The exact phrasing of these remarks was 
 somewhat lost upon Maxime, but the general 
 trend of the Major's meaning was quite unmis- 
 takable. Nevertheless, when one had been 
 valet de chambre to Captain the Honorable Mi-, 
 chael Douglas, one was not routed by a few em- 
 phatic words. So Maxime shrugged his shoul- 
 ders apologetically, and reiterated his "Tain 
 francs." 
 
 "Damn it, sir, no!" thundered the Major. 
 " And don't pretend you can't understand me. 
 I 'm a short-tempered man, sir, and and " 
 
 He pounded with his fist upon the table, 
 seeking a fitting expression of his rage, until 
 the little liqueur glasses danced like kernels 
 of popping corn. But young Appleby leaned 
 toward him and laid a hand on his arm. He 
 was big and square-shouldered, was Appleby, 
 and, only the yeaV before, he had performed 
 prodigies with the hammer and the shot in the 
 Intercollegiate Games ; but his eyes were very 
 blue and gentle, and he spoke with extreme 
 mildness. 
 
172 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 
 
 " Don't let us have any trouble here, sir," 
 he said. " It is n't as if we were alone. We 
 have the girls with us, you know. Leave the 
 beggar two francs fifty, and we '11 go on to the 
 next place." 
 
 Now the Major, with all his fiery temper, 
 was an ardent lover of discipline, and he re- 
 cognized reason in Appleby's words. So, after 
 an instant, he deposited the amount upon the 
 table, rose to his full height, with his eye still 
 riveted on Maxime, and then, followed by the 
 others, stalked majestically toward the door. 
 
 But for one circumstance, the Americans 
 had never gone unmolested past Maxime's fel- 
 low-angels, and, in particular, the towering form 
 of Gustave Robine. Maxime himself was as- 
 tounded that no celestial hand was stretched 
 out to bar their progress. What he did not 
 understand was that, while one may enter Le 
 Ciel on the strength of an accomplishment not 
 possessed by the other immortals, the achieve- 
 ment does not necessarily imply that one is 
 persona grata in their eyes, or, in the least de- 
 gree, sure of their support. The management 
 was responsible for Maxime, and the edict had 
 gone forth that the Angliches were to be turned 
 
A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 173 
 
 over to him. But obedience to this command 
 did not go hand in hand with approval thereof. 
 The high-priest and the sexton and all the 
 angels had looked on sourly, as he appropri- 
 ated the Major's party, for it is the Americans 
 who give the largest pourboires ; and, although 
 they did not wholly comprehend the dispute 
 which had arisen, it was evident that the lin- 
 guistic angel had met with disaster at the very 
 outset, and they were proportionately gratified. 
 So, when Maxime glanced about in search 
 of succor, he found himself abandoned in his 
 discomfiture. The other angels were smiling 
 broadly, and nudging each other with their 
 pink elbows ; the high-priest, with his fat hands 
 on the pulpit's edge, was looking down at him 
 with a grin ; the sexton above his head waved 
 his brush to and fro and chanted, " Ora pro 
 nobis ! " in a high, whining voice. A French 
 student at the further end of the table said 
 " Roule ! " and his companion laughed shrilly. 
 Even Gustave, at the door, was leaning on his 
 halberd and chuckling, for he had not forgot- 
 ten that Maxime, once sure of his position, 
 had demanded repayment of the fifty francs. 
 All this was sufficiently intolerable, but a 
 
174 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 
 
 real disaster, more terrible than mere ridicule, 
 confronted Maxime. The creme de menthe 
 was, as a matter of fact, one franc a glass, and 
 it was out of his pocket that the deficit would 
 have to be made good. As this tragic thought 
 smote him full and fair, he bounded forward 
 past the other angels, dodged nimbly under 
 Gustave's outstretched arm, charged through 
 the swinging doors, and emerged with a shout 
 upon the boulevard de Clichy. 
 
 The Major's party had paused before the 
 entrance of L'Enfer, while Beck parleyed with 
 the courteous demon in scarlet tights who kept 
 the door, and the others stood by, sublimely 
 unconscious of the none too complimentary 
 comments of a half score of cochers and boule- 
 vard loungers who surrounded them. Into the 
 midst of this assemblage swooped PL Majus- 
 cule, his flaxen wig awry, his wings bobbing 
 wildly on his shoulders, and his white tunic 
 fluttering in the wind. Blind to consequences, 
 he darted upon the unsuspecting Major, and 
 seized him furiously by the coat. 
 
 " Eh ! vieille saucisse ! " he exclaimed. " Tu 
 te fiches de moi quoi ? " 
 
 Now John Appleby had never enjoyed the 
 
A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 175 
 
 advantages of French II., which shed such 
 effulgence upon his classmate, but he knew 
 the answer to this question, none the less. It 
 had been taught him in the boxing-room of his 
 athletic club, and it was surprisingly conclusive 
 when applied to the under jaw of an infuriated 
 angel. The ruby and white arc-lights before 
 the cabarets suddenly joined in a mad waltz, 
 the cabarets themselves turned upside down, 
 the cochers and loungers swooped into the air 
 like pigeons, a passing tram leaped into the 
 trees on the further side of the driveway and 
 disappeared, and, from somewhere, a factory 
 whistle came close up to Maxime's side and 
 said, " Oo-oo-ooo-oooo /" in his ear. 
 
 He came to himself slowly. There was an 
 acrid taste in his mouth, and this, upon inves- 
 tigation, proved to be boulevard mud. There 
 was something fuzzy gripped tightly in his right 
 hand, and this presently resolved itself into his 
 wings. Then he saw his feet, which were ele- 
 vated above the level of his head, by reason of 
 being on the curb, while the rest of his person 
 was in the gutter. Then the mammoth red 
 face of a cocher bulged out of the night, close 
 to his own, and a voice said, 
 
176 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 
 
 " Have you harm, angel ? " 
 
 Then he remembered, sat up, and looked 
 around. 
 
 On the boulevard de Clichy, spectators 
 grow out of the ground, spontaneously, when 
 there is an excuse for their presence. A hun- 
 dred or more now surrounded Maxime, with 
 open mouths, and staring eyes that slid to and 
 fro from his prostrate form to the faces of an 
 agent and a vehement gentleman in a frock 
 coat and a flat-brimmed huit reflets, who were 
 disputing violently. In the crowd were all the 
 other angels, and the better part of those who 
 had been seated at the table of Heaven. The 
 sexton, brush in hand, was gaping over the 
 agent's shoulder, the high-priest was explaining 
 the affair, with much elaboration, to all who 
 would listen to him, and above the rest tow- 
 ered the face of Gustave Robine, still smiling 
 blandly. The only unconcerned figure in sight 
 was that of a courteous demon in scarlet tights, 
 who was staring up at the sky from the door- 
 way of L'Enfer. For Beck had slipped a gold 
 piece into his hand, as the Major and his 
 party hurried inside, dragging the protesting 
 Appleby by the arm, and he knew how to 
 
A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 177 
 
 keep his counsel. After all, the sanctity of hos- 
 pitality must be respected, even in Hell. 
 
 " But no, I tell you, but no ! " exclaimed the 
 gentleman of the huit reflets, who was none 
 other than the manager of Heaven. 
 
 " It is equal to me ! It is equal to me ! " 
 stormed the agent. " I saw it, do you hear ? 
 He was struck, and the law does not allow 
 They went in there " 
 
 He made a motion, as if to thrust the other 
 aside and plunge toward the entrance of L'En- 
 fer. But the manager of Heaven was not to 
 be thus outdone. He was determined that the 
 incident should be considered closed ; and for 
 this there were reasons. It was but the begin- 
 ning of the tourist season, and the foreign cli- 
 entele must not be antagonized. A paragraph 
 in the "Matin," a sensational article in the 
 " Herald " of to-morrow, and the Angliches 
 would believe that the Cabaret du Ciel was no 
 safe place for foreigners to enter. In agonized 
 imagination he saw the gate receipts of Hea- 
 ven dwindling, disappearing. It were better, 
 far better, to sacrifice Maxime. He grasped 
 the agent by the arm, and pointed to the fal- 
 len angel, who was still seated in the gutter, 
 
178 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 
 
 collecting his scattered wits, with a vacant 
 stare. 
 
 "Look you," he said, persuasively, "this 
 tripe, this species of onion, this example of an 
 eel, is the cause of all. It is I who know, n'est 
 ce pas ? being his patron. Eh b'en, I assure 
 you that it is a drunkard of the most aban- 
 doned. Thirteen times in the dozen, one finds 
 him in the fog, rigid as the Obelisk, bon Dieu ! 
 not merely lit, voyons, but flaming, as full as 
 Robespierre's donkey, asphyxiated ! It is 
 not a man, sac a papier ! It is a sponge but 
 a sponge, do you understand ? a pompier ! 
 He dries glasses poof! like that! II lave 
 sa gueule la-dedans, nothing less ! " 
 
 " Bravo ! " said Gustave Robine, and all the 
 angels applauded. The agent paused, doubt- 
 ful of what course to pursue, overwhelmed by 
 this burst of eloquence, and Top-Hat, perceiv- 
 ing the impression he had made, addressed 
 himself to Maxime. 
 
 " Waffle ! " he cried, contemptuously. 
 " Cream of a tart ! Thou wast there, then, the 
 day of the distribution, O stupid as thy feet ! 
 And who art thou, let us hear, to find thyself 
 in a position to apply kicks to the clients ? If 
 
A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 179 
 
 thou wert employed at La Villette, where they 
 slaughter pigs, sacred stove, thy first blow 
 would be suicide ! " 
 
 He rose, in a majestic sweep, to the pinnacle 
 of supreme courtesy. 
 
 " Monsieur le marquis has, perhaps, hurt 
 himself, stumbling by accident ? Is it per- 
 mitted to the obedient servitor of monsieur le 
 marquis to inquire if monsieur le marquis has 
 sustained any damage by reason of his deplor- 
 able mischance ? " 
 
 He descended, in a graceful curve, to the 
 depths of utter scorn. 
 
 " Animal low of ceiling ! Camel ! Gourd ! 
 Ancient senator ! Gas-jet ! Shut thy mouth, 
 or I jump within ! " 
 
 And he paused, breathless, but triumph- 
 ant. 
 
 It was magnificent ! In the annals of Heaven 
 there was record of no such climax of vituper- 
 ation. The angels surveyed their patron with 
 undisguised admiration. Even the agent 
 touched the visor of his cap. 
 
 "Monsieur," he said, "I yield the field to 
 you. Your vocabulary is unrivaled unless 
 by General Cambronne ! " 
 
180 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 
 
 " Monsieur, you flatter me," replied the other, 
 with a bow. 
 
 Some one had helped 1'L Majuscule to his 
 feet, and he stood there, a preposterous figure, 
 in soiled pink tights, holding out his wings, 
 with his huge feet turned in like a pigeon's. 
 
 " Monsieur le directeur " he began. 
 
 " He speaks ! " cried Huit Reflets, whirling 
 around and addressing the throng. " He dares 
 to speak, this bad sou, this oyster ! He does 
 not comprehend that he is discharged. He 
 counts that I am about to resign in his favor ! 
 Ah, non, it is too much ! " 
 
 He flung himself about again, facing Max- 
 ime. 
 
 "Well, then," he added with forced calm, 
 " thou art put at the door, is it clear ? Take 
 thy rags from yonder, and begone ! " 
 
 " Mais, monsieur " 
 
 " Oh ! " cried the director, flinging his arms 
 upward ; and immediately vanished within the 
 silver gates of Heaven, followed by his person- 
 nel, with the fallen angel bringing up the rear. 
 
 Half an hour later, having exchanged his 
 celestial raiment for his former earthly garb, 
 Monsieur Perrot sat in solitary state at a table 
 
A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 181 
 
 in the cafe Cyrano, and pondered the details 
 of a project of revenge. The idea had come 
 to him suddenly, like an inspiration, on see- 
 ing the nonchalant demon at the portals of 
 L'Enfer, but it required arranging, elaboration. 
 A man who made one blunder was but human, 
 but a man who made two in succession that 
 was a mere root of celery ! So 1'L Majuscule 
 thought hard. And when the will is so ear- 
 nest, it is strange if the way be not forthcoming. 
 At midnight he arose with a sigh of satisfac- 
 tion, and took his way homeward, smiling. 
 
 It was barely eight o'clock, the following 
 evening, when Maxime entered L'Enfer. He 
 was tastefully dressed in an excessively checked 
 suit and a silk hat, and he wore a full black 
 beard and spectacles, and rolled his r's in 
 speaking, in the fashion of the South. The 
 demon at the door, unsuspecting, greeted him 
 effusively as " cher damne," and piloted him to 
 a table at the further end of the cabaret. The 
 table had a ground-glass top, through which 
 shone electric lights which kept changing mys- 
 teriously from green to red and back again, and 
 the whole interior of L'Enfer was of imitation 
 rock, diversified by grinning faces. It was very 
 
182 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 
 
 artistic, and, what was better, very dark. Max- 
 ime was unnecessarily mistrustful of his false 
 beard. 
 
 At this early hour, he was the only visitor. 
 An obliging demon supplied him with a green 
 chartreuse, and, upon invitation, procured an- 
 other for himself, and took the opposite seat. 
 
 The conversation, which began with com- 
 monplaces, soon assumed a more intimate tone. 
 Monsieur, it appeared, was from Toulouse, but 
 this was not his first visit to L'Enfer. In fact, 
 a place so amusing what ? He never missed 
 it when he came to Paris. 
 
 Oh, but monsieur was too good ! 
 
 No, on the contrary, it was for his own plea- 
 sure. It suited him to a marvel, blague k part ! 
 And often, he had had a curious fancy to be 
 a demon himself, imagine ! To serve in the 
 cabaret for just one evening, by way of variety 
 for, as for himself, he gave less for a life 
 without variety than did a fish for an apple. 
 That was the reason he had sometimes thought 
 of applying to the management for permission 
 to but then, of course, the idea was fantas- 
 tic, and, without doubt, quite impossible. 
 
 Oh, quite impossible, monsieur ! 
 
A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 183 
 
 But, after all, why not? Not the manage- 
 ment, naturally. That was out of the ques- 
 tion, it went without saying. But an obliging 
 demon, perhaps a bon type, who understood 
 these eccentricities, as a man of the world 
 one who would consent to a brief illness for 
 one night only and who would provide a 
 substitute, in the person of monsieur ! Fantas- 
 tic what ? rigolo, mon Dieu ! very rig- 
 olo, and, of course, quite impossible. 
 
 In some mysterious fashion a louis suddenly 
 made its appearance on the illuminated table. 
 
 Oh, quite impossible, monsieur ! Evidently, 
 affairs did not arrange themselves like that. 
 Monsieur must understand that the pourboires 
 which one gained in Hell were enormous but 
 enormous ! It would be to throw away a for- 
 tune, to give up one's place for an entire even- 
 ing. For forty francs, perhaps but then it 
 was certain that monsieur would not care 
 
 There was a tiny click upon the table-top, 
 and the one louis had become two. A most 
 surprising place, L'Enfer ! 
 
 Ah ! But in addition, there were details to 
 be arranged, and one could not talk with frank- 
 ness in the cabaret. 
 
184 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 
 
 The doors at the further end swung open, 
 and the demon of the gate made his appear- 
 ance, ushering in a group of tourists. Max- 
 ime substituted two francs for the two louis, 
 and rose. 
 
 " That for the liqueurs, my friend," he said, 
 " and what you say is true. The cafe Cyrano 
 is a better place for talking. At midnight." 
 
 Fifty-seven francs. The project had cost 
 him fifty-seven francs, said the fallen angel to 
 himself, as, twenty-four hours later, he dusted 
 an illuminated table. What with his beard, and 
 his spectacles, and two chartreuses in L'Enfer, 
 and six demis at the cafe' Cyrano for the con- 
 ference had been long and, finally, the bribe 
 to the obliging demon, revenge had cost him 
 fifty-seven francs and it was not yet complete ! 
 But the prospects therefor were fair. He 
 chuckled silently, with his eyes on the parti- 
 wall which divided Hell from Heaven. It was 
 eleven o'clock. 
 
 Suddenly there was a stir in the cabaret. A 
 voice was calling, " This way, chers damned, to 
 the Hall of the Infernal Visions ! " and the 
 clients were rising from their tables, and crowd- 
 ing out like sheep through a narrow door to 
 
A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 185 
 
 the right. Almost immediately the place was 
 empty, save for the fallen angel and two other 
 demons, clearing away the liqueur glasses, and 
 setting the stools in place. It was the dreamt- 
 of moment. Maxime walked carelessly toward 
 the door. 
 
 In Le Ciel, the long table was full from end 
 to end. The high-priest in his pulpit was de- 
 livering his accustomed discourse with extreme 
 satisfaction, and the head angel making the 
 round of the room, bearing the golden pig upon 
 the pole. The angels, each in his place, abode 
 the moment of the clients' exodus into the Hall 
 of the Celestial Visions, which was coincident 
 with the semi-hourly harvest of pourboires. In 
 particular, their eyes were fixed upon a party 
 of American tourists, under direction of a uni- 
 formed guide. These were worthy of com- 
 ment, and received it. It appeared that the 
 thin lady with the loose cloth costume was 
 an empty bed ticking. There were other re- 
 marks, but this, from Gustave Robine, was the 
 most successful. However, there were the 
 pourboires to be considered, so the angels spoke 
 in whispers. 
 
 Of a sudden, the calm of Heaven was broken 
 
186 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 
 
 by an appalling sound, something midway be- 
 tween a shriek and a bark, and on the end of 
 the table nearest the door appeared a terrible 
 form, black-bearded and all in scarlet, with two 
 long feathers nodding from his cap, and a pol- 
 ished two-pronged pitchfork brandished in one 
 upraised hand. An instant he paused, superbly 
 statuesque, his eyes blazing, an incarnation of 
 demoniac fury. And, as if the sensation pro- 
 duced by his dramatic entrance were not suffi- 
 cient, the newcomer received unexpected sup- 
 port from the thin lady in loose cloth costume, 
 who, upon his appearance, promptly exclaimed 
 " Good land ! " and fell backward off her stool 
 upon the floor. 
 
 Then Bedlam broke loose. The doorway of 
 Le Ciel is less than a metre in width, and when 
 a score of affrighted tourists, and seven angels, 
 and six French students with their grisettes, 
 and a high-priest, and two corpulent Germans, 
 and a sexton, and Gustave Robine are sud- 
 denly and simultaneously imbued with a desire 
 to sample the air of the boulevard de Clichy, 
 confusion is apt to result. There were shrieks 
 and groans, protestations, oaths in three lan- 
 guages, a wild chaos of legs and arms, wings, 
 
A LATTER-D.AY LUCIFER 187 
 
 white tunics, traveling caps, tweed suits, and 
 golden stools, and over all pranced the crim- 
 son form of the invader, whirling up and down 
 the table with unearthly cries, and kicking the 
 liqueur glasses and little saucers in every di- 
 rection. They were all agreed, both mortals 
 and celestials, in believing him a madman, and 
 agreed, also, in thinking the pavement of the 
 boulevard a thing greatly to be desired. The 
 demon paused presently, and watched them 
 struggling in a frenzied mass about the door, 
 and then he vanished as abruptly as he had 
 appeared. 
 
 For PL Majuscule had not wasted the early 
 hours of the evening in L'Enfer, and he knew 
 now that the rear entrances of Heaven and 
 Hell gave upon a common court, full of barrels, 
 and empty bottles, and discarded properties, 
 and even as the panic he had created was at its 
 height, he had made the circuit, and was bus- 
 tling into his original disguise. 
 
 The doorkeeper of L'Enfer, on the outlook 
 for clients, had stared in stupefaction as Max- 
 ime, in his demon's garb, darted past him and 
 plunged into the entrance of Le Ciel, and when, 
 a moment later, his ears were startled by the 
 
188 A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 
 
 pandemonium inside the rival cabaret, he had 
 first, with commendable presence of mind, 
 shouted " Au feu ! A 1'assassin ! Au secours ! " 
 to his fellows in L'Enfer, and then repeated 
 the cry at the top of his lungs on the curb of 
 the boulevard. So it was that the clients and 
 personnel of Heaven and Hell reached the side- 
 walk almost simultaneously. Gustave, halberd 
 in hand, came full upon a demon barring his 
 path, and, mistaking him for the original in- 
 truder, fell upon him furiously. Other demons 
 came to their companion's aid, other angels to 
 Gustave's, and immediately fourscore individ- 
 uals were battling desperately, without know- 
 ing or caring why. Agents appeared as if by 
 magic, screaming for reinforcement, and pull- 
 ing fainting women out of the melee by their 
 heads and heels. Spectators ran up by hun- 
 dreds, and formed a rampart around the fray. 
 And, to add chaos to confusion, a detachment 
 of sapeurs-pompiers presently drove up in a red 
 wagon, their horn hee-hawing like an impatient 
 donkey. Last of all, a thin gentleman with 
 preposterously large feet, black-bearded, spec- 
 tacled, and wearing an excessively checked 
 suit, came calmly out of L'Enfer, shouldered 
 
A LATTER-DAY LUCIFER 189 
 
 his way to a position of vantage in the throng, 
 and stood, smiling down upon the havoc. 
 
 Peace was restored. But a half dozen 'of 
 the combatants were already in the hands of 
 the police, and were hurried away to the poste, 
 protesting volubly. Among these were Gus- 
 tave Robine, in a pitiful state of demoraliza- 
 tion, and the doorkeeper of L'Enfer, and the 
 director of Le Ciel, with his huits reflets, crushed 
 to an unrecognizable mass, clutched despe- 
 rately in his hand. 
 
 Then every second person in the crowd ex- 
 plained to his neighbor how it all occurred, 
 and, among others, a stalwart workingman pro- 
 ceeded to enlighten the spectacled gentleman 
 at his side. 
 
 " It appears there was a madman," he said. 
 " Bon sang ! What places, these cabarets 
 what infected boxes, name of a dog ! " 
 
 " Ah, c.a ! " replied the other, rolling his r's 
 in speaking, in the fashion of the South, and 
 leering at the back of the struggling director. 
 " But then such an affair is in the chapter of 
 variety, and as for me, I care less for a life 
 without variety than does a fish for an apple ! " 
 
Poire! 
 
 LIEUTENANT EUGENE DROUIN 
 slid from his saddle with a little grunt, 
 slipped his arm through the bridle-rein, 
 and then, with his riding crop, rapped smartly 
 on the round, tin-topped table nearest to him. 
 At the summons, a small square door on the 
 left of the archway snapped open, and a 
 stumpy waiter, shaped like a domino, appeared 
 abruptly on the sill. 
 
 " Froid ! " shouted the officer. 
 The domino waiter made a vague gesture in 
 the air with one fat hand, and then vanished 
 as suddenly as he had appeared, closing the 
 
POIRE! 191 
 
 door behind him with a slam. If he had but 
 seen fit to observe " Cuckoo ! " the whole af- 
 fair the sort of chalet from which he emerged, 
 the small square door, and his own perform- 
 ance would have borne a remarkable resem- 
 blance to a Swiss clock striking one. 
 
 Lieutenant Drouin detached an end of the 
 rein from the snaffle-bar, knotted it about the 
 back of one chair and flung himself into an- 
 other. 
 
 " Poof ! " he said, and lit a cigarette. 
 
 It was exactly one o'clock, and the Pre Cat- 
 alan was deserted, save for a half dozen cats 
 of various breeds and colors, chasing each 
 other about under the chairs and tables, and 
 two brilliant macaws sitting on wooden perches 
 in an apparent state of coma, broken only by 
 an occasional reflective " Wawk ! " Once, a 
 high cart flashed in an opening of the trees to 
 the left, and then disappeared with a rattle of 
 harness chains, in the direction of the porte 
 Dauphine. For the rest, there was nothing to 
 suggest that Paris might not be fifty kilometres 
 distant. All the world was at breakfast. 
 
 Eugene stretched his legs, squinted at the 
 toes of his narrow riding boots, and swore 
 
192 POIRE! 
 
 tenderly at himself for having refused the in- 
 vitation of the Marquise de Baucheron. Ex- 
 perience might have taught him that Rosa de 
 Mirecourt would not be in the Bois that morn- 
 ing. It was a peculiarity of Rosa's to be in evi- 
 dence on every occasion when her presence was 
 not to be desired, and never to turn up when one 
 was in the mood to chat or breakfast with her. 
 Eugene had measured the Acacias bridle-path 
 at a canter eight times since noon, scanning 
 the driveway for a glimpse of the blue and 
 scarlet victoria with the cream-colored mares, 
 and all in vain. Rosa was nowhere to be seen. 
 By this time, no doubt, some other lieutenant 
 of chasseurs was thrashing out the latest gos- 
 sip of the demi-monde over her breakfast table 
 in the rue de Bassano, and still another was, 
 in all probability, filling his place at Madame 
 de Baucheron's, and eating the Friday break- 
 fast sole cardinale and ceufs brouilles aux 
 crevettes for which her chef was famous. 
 Baste ! what a world ! 
 
 The domino waiter reappeared presently in 
 the doorway, came quickly across to Eugene's 
 table with a curious, tottering shuffle born of his 
 swaddling apron, and served a small white mug 
 
POIRE! 193 
 
 of cold milk as if it had been Chateau Latour- 
 Blanche. 
 
 " Beautiful weather, my lieutenant," he ven- 
 tured cheerfully, for he had done his service, 
 and knew the meaning of the single epaulette. 
 
 But Eugene was in no mood for light con- 
 versation. For sole reply, he paid his score, 
 and then drank the milk slowly, looking out 
 toward the lower lake, across the wide stretch 
 of fresh grass mottled with flecks of sunlight 
 sifted through the foliage above. At his side 
 Vivandiere nuzzled the turf along the border 
 of the graveled terrasse, the lithe muscles rip- 
 pling in her polished neck, and her deep eye 
 shifting now and again in its socket as she 
 looked doubtfully, almost pleadingly, toward 
 her master. They were well known on the Al- 
 lee and the bridle-path of the avenue du Bois, 
 these two, the young chasseur, tall, clean- 
 cut, and slender, with a complexion like a girl's, 
 and the gayety of Polichinelle himself, in full 
 red breeches and tunic of black and light blue ; 
 and the chestnut mare, nervous and alert, with 
 her racing lines, and her long, leisurely gallop, 
 superb in its suggestion of reserve speed and 
 unflagging endurance. 
 
194 POIRE! 
 
 The fates were kind to Lieutenant Eugene 
 Drouin. Paris, spring, youth, an ample for- 
 tune, a commission in the chasseurs, good 
 looks, a thoroughbred Arab, and a half dozen 
 women frankly in love with him, surely there 
 was nothing lacking ; and yet he knew that 
 something was lacking, though he could not 
 have said what, as he sat sprawling in his little 
 iron chair at the Pre Catalan that morning. 
 
 He straightened himself suddenly, as she 
 came up the driveway from the left, and then 
 rose with a stiff salute, for, a pace or so behind, 
 walked Vieux Cesar, so-called by an irreverent 
 garrison, leading two horses, one limping badly. 
 Eugene had seen him but once, at the review 
 of the Quatorze Juillet, but, though he was 
 not in uniform now, the fierce gray mustache 
 and keen black eyes of General Tournadour 
 were too familiar to Parisians to pass unrecog- 
 nized in a throng, much less under circum- 
 stances such as these. When one has been 
 Military Governor of Paris, and held the port- 
 folio of war, one does not achieve incognito 
 merely by donning a black civile. So Eugene 
 saluted the general but with his eyes on the 
 girl. 
 
POIRE! 195 
 
 She was not beautiful, he told himself, in 
 that first moment of surprise and swift obser- 
 vation, but about her, as she barely glanced at 
 him in passing, there was an indefinably com- 
 pellant charm which arrested his attention and 
 held it, like an unrecognized but strangely 
 sweet perfume, suddenly met with in a familiar 
 spot where there is no apparent reason for its 
 presence. Without doubt, it was a very little 
 thing. He knew enough of such matters to be 
 aware that an un analyzed attraction of the kind 
 which, at first glance, makes a woman appear 
 utterly irresistible, is apt, on closer acquaint- 
 ance, to resolve itself into the merest trifle of 
 dissimilarity from other women, a tilt of a 
 lip-corner, a dimple in an unlikely spot, a trick 
 with the hands or the head, a rebellious wisp of 
 hair. For he was very philosophical, and very 
 wise, was Eugene, and twenty-six years of age, 
 into the bargain. So there was nothing one 
 could tell him about women. But, in any 
 event, there was no time to define the partic- 
 ular charm in question. He felt rather than 
 saw it, as she went by him, with the faintest 
 possible whiff of orris, and the gleam of a 
 patent-leather boot at the edge of her habit. 
 
196 POIRE! 
 
 No, she was certainly not beautiful, but she 
 was something dangerously, deliciously akin, 
 said Lieutenant Drouin to himself ; and that, 
 in the unloveliest costume that can be worn by 
 womankind, a deep-green habit of extreme 
 severity, and a squat derby, like a boy's, with 
 an elastic strap brutally grooving her ruddy 
 hair. 
 
 General Tournadour did not follow the girl 
 beyond the spot where Eugene was standing, 
 but drew up abruptly, and indicated the lamed 
 horse with a gesture of irritation. 
 
 " A beautiful affair, my word, lieutenant ! " 
 he said. " This animal stumbled, back there, 
 and has received some injury, I know not 
 what. We have walked from the Alice, in 
 hope of finding a sapin here, and all without 
 result." 
 
 The young officer was already feeling the 
 animal's hocks with a practiced hand. There 
 was a swelling just above the right fore fet- 
 lock, and as he touched it, the horse winced 
 and kicked out sharply. 
 
 " A bad wrench, I fear, my general," said 
 Eugene. " He should have an hour's rest, at 
 least." Then, looking quickly at the saddle, 
 
POIRE! 197 
 
 "It is evident that madame cannot ride him 
 home. No doubt they will give him a stall in 
 the farm stable. You can send a groom out 
 for him this afternoon." 
 
 " Dieu ! That is very well, monsieur," an- 
 swered the former minister of war, with an air 
 of perplexity amusingly in contrast with his 
 fierce moustache. " But my daughter" 
 
 Now Lieutenant Drouin, in matters where 
 a woman was concerned, was nothing if not 
 adroit. He sent a flying glance in the direc- 
 tion of the girl. She had aroused one of the 
 comatose macaws from his lethargy, and now 
 stood watching him as he munched the biscuit 
 she had taken from a neighboring table. And 
 again Eugene was conscious of an inexplicable 
 but very decided little thrill. 
 
 " If Mademoiselle Tournadour if you, my 
 general, will consider me at your service, I 
 shall be glad to have you make use of my mare 
 Vivandiere, here. She is as gentle as a lamb 
 but, perhaps, not unworthy of being seen in 
 company with your own horse." 
 
 The General's eyes twinkled at the boyish- 
 ness of the remark. He knew a horse as well 
 as another, Vieux Cesar, and to describe the 
 
198 POIRE! 
 
 superb Arab before him as being, perhaps, not 
 unworthy of being seen in company with his 
 own sturdy charger was a bit of satire much to 
 his relish. 
 
 " Merci ! " he answered. " It is the pro- 
 posal of an officer and a gentleman. But my 
 daughter must decide if it is possible for us to 
 accept it. In the matter of names, monsieur, 
 you have me at an advantage." 
 
 " Pardon ! " said the other. " I should have 
 realized that. I am Eugene Drouin, lieutenant 
 of the 29th Chasseurs." 
 
 " Natalie ! " cried the General, beckoning 
 with his crop. 
 
 As Mademoiselle Tournadour came forward, 
 the young chasseur again made a confidant of 
 himself, this time for the satisfaction of observ- 
 ing that he was an imbecile, and that a man 
 who could not tell at the first glance whether 
 or not a woman was entirely beautiful, deserved 
 not to have an opportunity of discovering the 
 fact at all. Their eyes met fairly, his glowing 
 with delighted surprise, hers touched with that 
 expression of negative inquiry and polite inter- 
 est which immediately precedes an introduc- 
 tion. 
 
POIRE! 199 
 
 " My daughter," said the General, prodding 
 the air with his crop in her direction. ''Lieu- 
 tenant Drouin, of the 29th Chasseurs," he 
 added, prodding again, in the direction of 
 Eugene. " Monsieur le lieutenant has been so 
 kind as to offer thee the use of his own horse, 
 and suggests that we leave Le Cid here to be 
 cared for until I can send Victor for him. I 
 tell him thou art the one to decide." 
 
 " Monsieur, you are truly kind," said the girl 
 easily too easily, thought Eugene ! " but it 
 would be to presume upon your generosity." 
 
 " But it is nothing," protested the officer. 
 " Voyons ! It is but a step to La Muette, and 
 there I have the Ceinture ! " 
 
 " You are stationed at the quartier de cava- 
 lerie?" asked Tournadour. 
 
 " Rue Desaix, yes, mon general," answered 
 Eugene. Then, turning again to the girl, 
 " Surely you must consent, mademoiselle. It is 
 the simplest way. And this afternoon, if you 
 will permit me " 
 
 " Yes," put in the General, " and this after- 
 noon Victor can leave your horse at the caserne 
 as he is coming to take Le Cid. 
 
 " Eh, dis-donc, Natalie," he added, fretfully, 
 
200 POIREI 
 
 observing that the girl still hesitated. " Don't 
 make difficulties, my dear. There is breakfast 
 yes, breakfast to be considered, and it is one, 
 and past. Since the lieutenant is so kind " 
 
 " Since the lieutenant is so kind," said his 
 daughter with a smile, "eh bien, I accept." 
 
 It was the work of a moment for Eugene to 
 shift the side-saddle from Le Cid to Vivan- 
 diere. The general had already mounted, and 
 was gazing off toward the porte Dauphine, 
 with his nose in the air, as if he scented break- 
 fast from afar. 
 
 ** She is very beautiful, monsieur, your Vivan- 
 diere, and you are very good," said Mademoi- 
 selle Tournadour, as the chasseur tightened the 
 girth, after her boot had touched his hand, and 
 she was in the saddle. 
 
 " She is very fortunate, mademoiselle," an- 
 swered Eugene, curiously embarrassed for one 
 so skilled in compliment. " If she wins, I 
 shall feel that she owes the race to this good 
 omen." 
 
 " The race ? " said the girl. 
 
 " The Officers' Steeple Chase at Auteuil, on 
 Sunday." 
 
 " You ride her yourself ? " 
 
POIRE! 201 
 
 There was a strange little note of more than 
 casual interest in the question, and Eugene 
 looked up suddenly. For the second time 
 their eyes met. 
 
 " Yes," he answered. " Why ? " 
 
 " Why ? But nothing, monsieur, except, per- 
 haps, to wish you bonne chance." 
 
 She touched Vivandiere with her heel. 
 
 " Adieu, monsieur," she added, " and a thou- 
 sand thanks ! " 
 
 Eugene bowed. 
 
 " For nothing," he said, " and au revoir, ma- 
 demoiselle ! " 
 
 Then he watched them out of sight, with his 
 arm through Le Cid's bridle-rein, and his trim 
 English saddle sprawling at his feet. 
 
 There was something delightfully ingenuous, 
 to Eugene's way of thinking, in Vieux Cesar's 
 method of unloading the burden of his embar- 
 rassment on the shoulders of the first young 
 lieutenant who crossed his path/ and then 
 riding off serenely to breakfast, leaving the 
 other, as it were, to gather up and disentangle 
 the loose ends of the situation. He was half 
 amused, half annoyed that his offer of Vivan- 
 diere had not been taken less as a matter of 
 
202 POIREI 
 
 course ; but, in view of the circumstances, he 
 attended with fairly good grace to the details 
 of stabling Le Cid, and arranging to send for 
 his saddle, and then struck out at a swinging 
 gait for the footpath to La Muette. For all of 
 which there was a sufficient reason in the per- 
 son of Mademoiselle Tournadour. 
 
 Now, as he revolved the meeting in his 
 mind, he found that it was not in the least de- 
 gree a surprise. Somehow, he had always ex- 
 pected that this girl would step suddenly into 
 his life, with her ruddy hair and her gray eyes. 
 It seemed to him to be something which the 
 natural evolution of that life demanded. He 
 had sounded every note in the gamut of emo- 
 tions appropriate to a man in his position. He 
 had had his serious, almost ascetic moods, 
 his despondencies, his flights of folly, his im- 
 pulses of stern ambition, his hours of morbid 
 brooding and of reckless gayety. He could 
 no longer number his love-affairs with any 
 approach to accuracy. They were hopelessly 
 jumbled in his memory, by very reason of their 
 number and their triviality. Here and there, 
 a face stood out from its fellows the Baronne 
 de Banis, Lady Mary Kaswellyn, Rosa de 
 
POIRE! 203 
 
 Mirecourt, or the Marquise de Baucheron 
 but none of these impelled him to regret. 
 There were no entanglements, no uncomfort- 
 able circumstances to recall. Not a stone lay 
 in the way of the gate of the future, as, in his 
 imagination, it swung open before him. As 
 we have said, the fates were kind to Lieuten- 
 ant Eugene Drouin. The current of experi- 
 ence had borne his individual shallop over 
 deeps and shallows safely and with a song, 
 and, now that a sudden turn of the stream had 
 shown him Natalie Tournadour waiting on the 
 bank, it seemed to him to be the most natural 
 thing imaginable, something which intuition 
 had taught him was inevitable, and, what was 
 better, which experience told him was desira- 
 ble. The event had found him ready and will- 
 ing to make room for her beside him in the 
 boat, and, so, continue the journey in her com- 
 pany, well content. He bowed to fate politely, 
 with a graceful merci ! 
 
 For forty-eight hours he watched, almost as 
 if he had been a disinterested outsider, this 
 pleasant fancy moulding the details of his fu- 
 ture life. He reckoned his rentes anew, assign- 
 ing a due proportion to a little hotel in the 
 
204 POIRE 
 
 Monceau quarter, to a villa at Houlgate, to 
 horses, household expenses, his wife's allow- 
 ance, servants, entertainment, a month at Aix, 
 another at Nice, a third at Hombourg. He 
 saw himself retired, and in the Chambre. And 
 over all hovered, like a luminous presiding an- 
 gel, the presence of Mademoiselle Tournadour 
 Madame Drouin ! 
 
 So Sunday came, and, with it, breakfast at 
 Armenonville with two fellow officers, and the 
 growing exhilaration of the approaching race. 
 Eugene was in his gayest mood for was not 
 Vivandiere not only the winner of last year's 
 Steeple Chase, but to-day in better form than 
 she had ever been ? But he allowed his good 
 spirits to be touched, now and again, with a 
 gentle, pleasurable melancholy, as the violins 
 of the tziganes glided into the long, languorous 
 swell of the Valse Bleue, and his handsome 
 eyes clouded thoughtfully, and his fine mouth 
 drooped, so that Gaston Cavaignac rallied him 
 joyously upon the new affair, which alone could 
 account for such tristesse. It lent an added 
 zest, this. Eugene smiled, and was glad that 
 in his denial of the charge rang so little of con- 
 viction. 
 
POIRE! 205 
 
 The first race had been already run, as the 
 three officers slipped through the main en- 
 trance of Auteuil, and made their way across 
 the pesage, and past the betting booths, to the 
 grass oval around which the horses, in charge 
 of stable lads, were slowly circling. It was 
 one of May's clearest and most brilliant after- 
 noons. The gravel pathways and stretches of 
 vivid turf were thronged with the best known 
 men and women of the two great Parisian 
 worlds of sport and fashion, and the air rang 
 with gay gossip and spirited discussion. But 
 Eugene had ears for none of this, and eyes but 
 for two things, Vivandiere, blanketed, and 
 swinging around the oval with her long, sure 
 stride, and Natalie Tournadour, in a delicious 
 gown of soft blue, standing at the side of Vieux 
 Cesar. Life, at that moment, was good to live. 
 The chasseur drew a quick breath of pleased 
 surprise. She was there, then, to see him win. 
 He might have known ! 
 
 A mixture of sudden, unfamiliar embarrass- 
 ment and boyish vanity caused him to avoid 
 her eye as he made a turn of the oval, consult- 
 ing with his stable lad about the mare's con- 
 dition ; but he held himself very straight, and 
 
206 POIRE! 
 
 was pleasantly conscious that his tunic was 
 new, and his boots a veritable triumph of Co- 
 quillot's. When he went back to his compan- 
 ions his eyes were glowing. 
 
 " Content ? " asked Cavaignac. 
 
 " Je te crois, mon vieux ! " he answered. 
 " One never can say, but it is certain that no 
 one has a better chance. She is perfection ! " 
 
 " There is the white," put in Lieutenant 
 Mors, dubiously. 
 
 Eugene vouchsafed the rival racer a brief, 
 contemptuous glance. It was a lean, powerfully 
 built brute, with an astonishing reach to even 
 the leisurely stride with which he paced the 
 oval. A trainer would have had something to 
 say of those lithe shoulders, and that long bar- 
 rel, dwindling along the flanks, and that easy 
 swing of haunch and swathed hock. But Eu- 
 gene was not a trainer. 
 
 "A fine animal," he observed, carelessly, 
 " but there is no comparison. One has only 
 to look at Vivandiere." 
 
 " Tiens ! " cried Gaston, " the saddling-bell ! 
 I am off to put five louis on you gagnant, and 
 five place. Bonne chance, vieux ! " 
 
 In truth, the saddling-bell was jangling from 
 
POIREI 207 
 
 the little pavilion to the left, and the officers 
 hurrying forward to weigh in. As he passed 
 into the enclosure, Eugene glanced over his 
 shoulder. General Tournadour and his daugh- 
 ter were still standing at the oval-side, and he 
 had a glimpse of Natalie clapping her hands 
 and pointing, as the stable lad slipped the 
 blanket off Vivandiere. But he made no sign, 
 even when, three minutes later, he mounted, 
 within five metres of where they stood. Time 
 enough, when the victory was won, to claim his 
 reward in the gray eyes of which he had been 
 dreaming. His heart leaped, nevertheless, as 
 he gave Vivandiere the rein. It was the voice 
 of Vieux Cesar, almost at his side : 
 
 " Be not afraid, ma petite. There is no doubt 
 that he is going to win." 
 
 No doubt, indeed, with her eyes upon him, 
 and her heart praying for his success ! 
 
 Once upon the course, he swept the vast en- 
 closure with a glance, and his blood danced 
 with the excitement of the moment, and the 
 brilliancy of the scene. To the right the great 
 tribunes of the pesage, and the chair-dotted turf 
 in front, glowed with a shifting rainbow of 
 spring gowns and vivid parasols, and sparkled 
 
208 POIRE! 
 
 with a myriad white waistcoats, drifting, like 
 large, lazy snowflakes, to and fro ; to the left 
 lay the vast enclosure of the pelouse, flooded 
 with dazzling sunlight, its thousands circling 
 here and there like ants. Beyond, the race- 
 course swept away, smooth and green, to the 
 long rows of trees in their new foliage, banked 
 along the route de Boulogne and the allee 
 des Fortifications. It was a day of days, whe- 
 ther one stood inside the rail, straining for a 
 glimpse of the horses, or swept slowly to the 
 left, on the course itself, toward the starting 
 point, with a thoroughbred's flanks quivering 
 between one's knees ! 
 
 As the horses circled about the start, getting 
 into position, Eugene's keen, handsome eyes 
 were busy with trivial details, dwindled by dis- 
 tance to mere specks, two men, leaning far 
 over the rails, signaling bets to each other 
 across the track, a gleam of orange from the 
 finish flag, the starter rocking toward him on a 
 ridiculously fat pony. Then, in an instant, 
 every faculty came taut like a stretched string, 
 and they were off, in a thunder of hoofs and a 
 whirl of flying sod. He saw a red flag flutter- 
 ing stiffly in the breeze as he swept past, and 
 
POIRE! 209 
 
 heard, in the distance, the whirr of the signal 
 gong from the judge's stand. It was a fair 
 start. He touched Vivandiere lightly with his 
 hand, and, at the signal, felt her lengthen un- 
 der him into her long, magnificent gallop. The 
 tribunes and the crowded pelouse rushed down 
 upon him with a murmur of many voices. The 
 long double line of faces at the rail slid past 
 like white dots, and the dark green hedge of 
 the water-jump sprang out of the track at his 
 feet. Houp, ma belle ! A whish of brushed 
 twigs, a gleam of silver water passing under, 
 a thud of hoofs on the soft turf beyond, and 
 they were over, and away into the southern 
 loop to the left ! 
 
 As he swung to the north again, he saw the 
 ants of the pelouse scurrying across to the rail 
 along the transverse cut. Let them run, les 
 droles ! They had need to if they would see 
 the passing of Vivandiere ! Past the high hur- 
 dle so much the better that one did not have 
 to take it ! and down the transverse to the 
 second water-jump. It was easy, that. The 
 mare crossed it like a bird, and Eugene saw 
 the tribunes again from the corner of his eye. 
 and laughed at the shrill " Bravo ! " of a little 
 
210 POIRE! 
 
 grisette in a red hat, who flew past him, leaning 
 on the rail. 
 
 Vivandiere was well into the left reach of the 
 northern loop before Eugene fairly realized 
 what that smooth, empty width of turf be- 
 fore him meant. He was leading, had been 
 leading from the very start ! And somewhere, 
 back there in the gay throng of the pesage, two 
 gray eyes were watching him, straining to catch 
 each movement of the blue tunic, each bound 
 of the gallant mare. He threw back his head 
 and laughed at the clear, wide sky. It was 
 very good to be alive ! 
 
 So, with a broad sweep to the right, into the 
 home stretch, the last curve of the giant "8" 
 he had described. It lay ahead, full and fair, 
 cut by one low hedge. And then 
 
 Thud ! Thud ! Thud ! 
 
 The sound battered its way into the chas- 
 seur's understanding, and hurt as if it had been, 
 in verity, that of blow on blow. He leaned 
 forward, spurring the mare to her utmost en- 
 deavor. And she responded, but still the beat 
 of following hoofs grew louder. For Vivan- 
 diere was thoroughbred, and she had kept her 
 maddest pace from the start. It was reserved 
 
POIRE! 211 
 
 for racers of ignobler spirit to hold their great- 
 est effort for the end. 
 
 Thud ! Thud ! Thud ! 
 
 Once more pesage and pelouse rushed down 
 upon him, not now with a murmur of voices, 
 but with a mighty roar, that swelled, deafening, 
 into his ears. 
 
 " Flambeau ! Flambeau ! C'est Flambeau 
 qui gagne ! " 
 
 There was a gasp of short-coming breath at 
 his elbow, a gleam of white, tense neck, a flash 
 of red breeches and of polished boots, and the 
 Steeple Chase Militaire was run, with Vivan- 
 diere second, and the lean, white Flambeau 
 winner by a length. 
 
 The officers rode back slowly, past the ap- 
 plauding tribunes. Eugene saw dimly that it 
 was a colonel of infantry who rode Flambeau, 
 a metre ahead of him, but his thoughts were 
 more for Natalie than for himself or his suc- 
 cessful competitor. Poor little girl ! She had 
 been so anxious for his victory, and no doubt 
 so confident, after the brave words of Vieux 
 Cesar. But, after all, second ! It was not 
 so bad in a field of twelve. But he had been 
 wrong not to speak to her before he mounted. 
 
212 POIRE! 
 
 Well, he would atone for that, never fear ! 
 Moreover, when once they were married, he 
 would give her Vivandiere the cause of their 
 first meeting the reason of their present sym- 
 pathy ! It was a good thought. 
 
 Eugene did not find the general and his 
 daughter readily in the vast throng in the pe- 
 sage. Three times he made the circuit of the 
 tribunes, scanning the tiers of seats, and thread- 
 ing his way through the little wooden chairs 
 upon the turf in front. Once he passed Ca- 
 vaignac and Mors, walking arm in arm, who 
 swore at him picturesquely for his defeat. Vi- 
 vandiere had paid but seventeen francs fifty 
 plac<f, and so they had only seventy-five to 
 show for the five louis they had placed upon 
 her gagnant. The privilege of calling her mas- 
 ter tete de laitue was but trifling recompense, 
 and they strolled on, surprised that one noted 
 for his eloquence in this variety of obloquy did 
 not deign to reply. 
 
 Finally, at the doors of the little refreshment 
 pavilion, and talking with a colonel of infantry, 
 he found the objects of his quest, and went up 
 eagerly, saluting. Vieux Ce'sar greeted him 
 with heartiness. 
 
POIRE! 213 
 
 " Ah, lieutenant ! Our preserver of Friday 
 quoi ? Natalie, see who is here our pre- 
 server of Friday ! " 
 
 The girl was radiant. Her cheeks were 
 flushed, and the gray eyes shone with a bright- 
 ness that set Eugene's heart pounding so hard 
 that he felt its throbbing must be dimpling the 
 breast of his tunic. 
 
 " What a magnificent race ! " she said, giving 
 him her hand. " You have cause to be proud of 
 Vivandiere. It is something to have ridden 
 such a horse." 
 
 "It is always something to ride a good 
 horse," said Eugene, looking into her eyes, 
 " and it is something, also, to be second in a 
 good race, but it is more to be first. And I 
 had my reasons for wishing to be that, made- 
 moiselle." 
 
 Natalie smiled. 
 
 " Ah, sans doute ! " she answered. " But 
 you must not call me mademoiselle, monsieur. 
 You must know that since yesterday I am a 
 serious married woman. And what is more, my 
 husband rode Flambeau ! Am I not a verita- 
 ble mascotte ? " 
 
 She laid her hand on the arm of the officer 
 at her side. 
 
2i4 POIRE! 
 
 "My husband, Colonel Montre'sor," she 
 added. " Paul, this is the officer of whom I 
 spoke to you who was so kind Lieuten- 
 ant" 
 
 She turned to Eugene, blushing divinely, 
 with an embarrassed little laugh. 
 
 " Oh, pray forgive me ! " she said. " I am 
 so stupid but but I have forgotten your 
 name ! " 
 
Papa Labesse 
 
 UP on the Butte Montmartre life is a 
 matter of first principles, and conven- 
 tionality an undiscovered affliction. A 
 spade is a spade, and the blacker it happens 
 to be, the more apt it is to receive its proper 
 appellation, and the less likely to be confused 
 with the hearts and diamonds. That is why 
 Papa Labesse had no hesitation in referring to 
 Bombiste Fremier as a good-for-nothing, a 
 vaurien. 
 
 Just off the boulevard de Rochechouart, in 
 the rue Veron, Papa Labesse kept a tiny join- 
 
216 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 er's shop, in which, in his velvet cap with a 
 long tassel and his ample apron of blue denim, 
 he might be seen daily, toiling upon various 
 small orders for the quartier. But daily, also, 
 when the light began to fail, he would discard 
 his apron, and, locking his shop door, walk 
 slowly up the long curving incline of the rue 
 Lepic, and through the appropriately rural- 
 looking rue St. Rustique, until he emerged 
 upon the broad summit of the Butte. Here he 
 would light his pipe, and, with his legs spread 
 wide, stand motionless by the low wattled fence 
 at the brink of the bluff, looking off across the 
 city. In appearance Papa Labesse was not 
 the type of man in whom one would be apt to 
 look for sentimentality. He was short and 
 very thin, with a hooked nose and a gray mous- 
 tache turned up fiercely at the ends, and his 
 skin was brown and deeply wrinkled, as if he 
 had somehow shrunk or warped ; but then, as 
 Marcelle said of him, it is the rough and crin- 
 kled Brazil-nut that is as full as possible of 
 sweet white meat. 
 
 Between these two there had always existed 
 a firm bond of camaraderie. Marcelle was the 
 daughter of Madame Clapot, who presided 
 
PAPA LABESSE 217 
 
 over a little dairy directly opposite the joiner's 
 shop, and on the day when she first made the 
 astounding discovery that small girls can stand 
 upright and walk alone, as if by instinct she 
 had made a bee-line for the doorway of Papa 
 Labesse, and, staggering in, triumphant, had 
 fallen headlong, with a gurgle of satisfaction, 
 into a great pile of shavings. Thenceforward 
 she came often and tarried long, and Papa La- 
 besse built houses for her out of odds and 
 ends of wood, and fashioned miniature articles 
 of furniture in his spare moments, and had 
 always a bit of sucre-candi or a little ginger- 
 bread figure tucked away in a certain drawer of 
 his table, which she soon learned to find for 
 herself. 
 
 It seemed to Papa Labesse but the week fol- 
 lowing her first plunge among his shavings 
 when Marcelle came in, all in white, and with 
 a veil like a little bride's, to parade her splen- 
 dor under his delighted eyes, before going to 
 her first communion. But when he put into her 
 hand the small white prayerbook he had bought 
 for this great occasion, she had forgotten all 
 else, and thrown her arms about his neck, en- 
 tirely regardless of her finery. 
 
218 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 " After maman, thou knowest, Papa Labesse, 
 I love thee best of all the world ! " 
 
 And Papa Labesse was properly shocked at 
 this recklessness and said, bon Dieu ! that was 
 a fine veil, then, made to be crushed against an 
 odious apron covered with chips and sawdust 
 what? And, as Marcelle ran off to join 
 Madame Clapot, who was waiting, consumed 
 with mingled pride and impatience, across the 
 way, the old man wiped his spectacles vigor- 
 ously, shook his head several times, and then, 
 suddenly abandoning his work, three hours be- 
 fore the accustomed time, betook himself to 
 the Butte, and smoked three pipefuls of to- 
 bacco, looking off across the city. 
 
 It was at this time that two radical changes 
 came into the life of Papa Labesse. First, on 
 the very summit of the Butte they began to lay 
 the foundations for the great church of Sacre- 
 Cceur ; and, second, Mai^elle took it into her 
 pretty little head to accompany him on his daily 
 climb. At first he was disturbed by both these 
 innovations. This curious afternoon commu- 
 nion of his with the wonderful wide city, which 
 lay spread out before him like a great gray 
 map, was akin to a religion. He loved Paris 
 
PAPA LABESSE 219 
 
 with a love so great that perhaps he himself 
 was barely able to comprehend its proportions. 
 He was never tired of standing there and 
 watching her breathing at his feet, of picking 
 out, in the gathering twilight, the faint white 
 speck to the west that was the arc de 1'Etoile, 
 the domes of the Invalides and the Pantheon, 
 Notre Dame, to the eastward, and the towers 
 and spires of half a hundred minor temples 
 and public buildings. He passed from one to 
 the other in a kind of visual pilgrimage, saying 
 the names over slowly to himself, and occa- 
 sionally affecting an air of surprise, as if some 
 one of the familiar piles had suddenly and un- 
 accountably appeared in a new locality. 
 
 " La Trinite ; Notre Dame de Lorette ; La 
 Bourse. Tiens ! St. Eustache!" 
 
 At the outset, the'serenity of this contempla- 
 tive hour was seriously impaired by the creak- 
 ing of derrick-pulleys and the loud chatter of 
 wagon-drivers, and hardly less so by the eager 
 questions of Marcelle, clinging to his hand, 
 her eyes bright with excitement, as she looked 
 out with him across Paris, or peered down into 
 the vast pit when the masons were laying the 
 foundations of the big church. But, bit by bit, 
 
220 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 Papa Labesse became accustomed to the new 
 conditions ; and every night, an hour before 
 sunset, his high, dry voice summoned Marcelle 
 from the dairy across the way, and the two set 
 forth together up the long curving incline of 
 the rue Lepic, and the old man would smoke 
 his pipe by the low wattled fence at the brink 
 of the bluff, while the child babbled of her lit- 
 tle affairs. Papa Labesse no longer named the 
 domes and spires now. His eyes rested alter- 
 nately on the city and on the girl beside him, 
 and often, when Marcelle was silent, looking 
 off to where the thin, silver line of the Seine 
 gleamed briefly between distant buildings, he 
 shook his head several times, tapping the side 
 of his inverted pipe-bowl against the palm of 
 his hand, long after the ashes had fallen out. 
 
 When Marcelle was seventeen, Madame Cla- 
 pot died suddenly, and the girl moved from the 
 rue Veron to the home of her aunt, near by, in 
 the rue Seveste. But the change made no dif- 
 ference in her friendship for Papa Labesse. 
 All through the ensuing spring she called reg- 
 ularly for him each afternoon, and they climbed 
 the Butte in company, as before. The old man 
 would have been completely happy had it not 
 been for Bombiste Fremier. 
 
PAPA LABESSE 221 
 
 Bombiste was an employe of the state, an 
 humble one, to be sure, but, nevertheless, part 
 and parcel of the great Administration which 
 includes every one, from the President of the 
 Republic to the street-sweeper on the rue 
 Royale. In Premier's case the employment 
 was brief and not over-lucrative. He was en- 
 gaged, for two months only in the twelve, to 
 mow the grass on the fortifications and in parts 
 of the Bois and the smaller parks of Paris. 
 For the remainder of the year he lived none 
 knew how, but he had always a few white 
 pieces in his pocket, and was ready to treat a 
 comrade at Le Cheval Blanc, the little wine- 
 shop kept by Bonhomme Pirou at the corner 
 of the boulevard and the rue Seveste. As re- 
 gards the source of his income, it is probable 
 that Amelie Chouert, called La Trompette, by 
 reason of her loud voice, might have divulged 
 some remarkable particulars. In any event, 
 she was his constant companion, a sharp-fea- 
 tured, angular woman with snapping black eyes 
 and a great mop of hair that came down to 
 within an inch of her continuous line of eye- 
 brow. 
 
 Premier himself was as handsome as a bru- 
 
222 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 tal picture, a giant in stature, with square 
 shoulders, a thick neck, in which the muscles 
 stood out like ropes, and the face of an Italian 
 brigand. It is a type of masculine beauty 
 which goes far in Montmartre, and to it was 
 added a deep, melodious voice, that, whether 
 in the heat of political argument or the more 
 complicated phraseology of love, carried com- 
 plete conviction. No one blamed La Trom- 
 pette for her infatuation. As we have said, 
 life on the Butte is a matter of first princi- 
 ples, and, in view of the manifest attraction, her 
 position was entirely conceivable. Except to 
 Papa Labesse. 
 
 He was a singularly rigid old man, who took 
 no account of the remarkable beauty and the 
 irresistible tongue of Premier, but only of the 
 fact that he was called Bombiste because he 
 talked against the government at Le Cheval 
 Blanc, advocating the use of dynamite, and 
 only the bon Dieu knew what else beside. 
 And if, as La Trompette alleged, he swung 
 his scythe on the fortifications like a veritable 
 demon, what of that ? No, evidently he was a 
 vaurien ! 
 
 So it was, that when, one fine May after- 
 
PAPA LABESSE 223 
 
 noon, Papa Labesse, emerging from his little 
 shop at the summons of Marcelle, caught a 
 glimpse of Bombiste slipping around the fur- 
 ther corner into the rue Lepic, his heart gave 
 a sudden great bound and then seemed to 
 stand still. He was very silent on the way to 
 the Butte, for, moment by moment, the black- 
 ness of untoward premonition was settling 
 upon him. He glanced, covertly, but again 
 and again, at Marcelle, observing, with a 
 strange, suddenly acquired power of percep- 
 tion, that she was already a woman. He had 
 not seemed to notice, day by day, the change 
 in her. Now it dawned upon him in a flash. 
 No, it was no longer the baby who had fallen 
 headlong among his shavings, nor yet the child 
 going to her first communion, all in white and 
 with a veil like a little bride's, nor even the 
 slender girl who had peered down with him 
 into the vast pit where the masons were laying 
 the foundations of the big church. It was a 
 woman who walked beside him, a woman very 
 beautiful, with dark hair, coiled above a pale, 
 pure face, and great eyes, like crushed violets 
 swimming in their dew. Papa Labesse caught 
 his breath : Bombiste Fremier ! 
 
224 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 But Marcelle saw nothing of her compan- 
 ion's preoccupation. She almost danced be- 
 side him up the long curving incline of the rue 
 Lepic, chaffing, as she passed, the children 
 playing in the gutters, and pausing continually 
 to sniff at some flower-vender's fragrant wares, 
 or peer into the window of a tiny shop. She 
 was glowing with health and happiness : her 
 cheeks dappled with color, her eyes shining. 
 When, finally, they emerged upon the Butte, 
 she ran to the little wattled fence, and with 
 her hands clasped behind her head, looked out 
 across the city. Even when Papa Labesse had 
 come up to her side, she said no word for sev- 
 eral minutes. 
 
 They had started later than was usual, and 
 already the daylight had begun to dim, and the 
 west to turn from red to saffron, and from saf- 
 fron to fawn. Directly below them lay a maze 
 of steep and narrow streets, shelving toward 
 the boulevard de Rochechouart ; and far fur- 
 ther, to the southwest, the place de I'OpeVa was 
 breaking into the alternate deep red and glaring 
 white of electric advertising signs, the letter- 
 ing of which could not be distinguished from 
 where they stood, but which painted the faint 
 
PAPA LABESSE 225 
 
 haze of evening with swiftly changing contrasts 
 of color. 
 
 Suddenly Marcelle began to speak, her voice 
 eloquent with a strange, new music. 
 
 " Papa Labesse, dost thou comprehend what 
 all this says to us, this wonderful city upon 
 which we look each night, thou and I ? From 
 here what ? A bewilderment of lights, a sea 
 of roofs, a murmur of faintly heard cries. But 
 what does it mean ? Surely, it is the voice 
 of the mother of us all, of Paris, the great, 
 the beautiful of a woman, Papa Labesse : 
 that finally, which thou canst never compre- 
 hend, pauvre Papa Labesse ! a woman who 
 says but one word love ! Papa Labesse 
 L'amour, Tamour, 1'amour ! again, and again, 
 and again, 1'amour ! " 
 
 There was a long silence. Then, almost 
 timidly, Papa Labesse laid his hand on hers. 
 
 " But thou dost not love, my little one, 
 thou ? " he said. 
 
 Marcelle turned suddenly. 
 -" Si, I love! " she answered. 
 
 Above the tapering, distant shaft of the 
 Tour Eiffel a tiny cloud caught the last ray of 
 the departed sun, blazed crimson for an in- 
 
226 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 stant, and then, as suddenly, gloomed to slate- 
 gray. 
 
 " Que Dieu te be'nisse ! " said Papa Labesse, 
 solemnly. 
 
 " It is all so wonderful," continued Marcelle 
 after a moment, " and yet I have never seemed 
 to understand it till to-day, this great, sweet 
 voice of Paris. It is indeed as if she was the 
 mother of us all, Papa Labesse, and was 
 spreading out her arms, and calling us all to 
 come to her heart. And for each of us she 
 has something good something better than 
 ever we have imagined for ourselves, or wished 
 to have ; and yet, in whatever form, it is really 
 the same thing always 1'amour, Papa La- 
 besse, Pamour ! " 
 
 Out of the strain of the past half hour a 
 great sob was suddenly wrung from Papa La- 
 besse. He took the girl's radiant face between 
 his knotted hands and looked long into her 
 eyes without speaking. 
 
 " Tell me, my pigeon," he said, finally, " is 
 it is it the young Fremier ? " 
 
 Marcelle flung both arms about his neck, as 
 she had done on the day when he had given her 
 the little white prayerbook. He felt her lips, 
 
PAPA LABESSE 227 
 
 warm and moist, against his wrinkled ear, and 
 when she spoke, her voice was like the sound 
 of two leaves grazing each other at the touch 
 of a light breeze. 
 
 " Oui ! " she said. 
 
 When Marcelle went away with Bombiste 
 Fremier, all the quartier babbled. Fat fish- 
 wives and dairywomen stopped at each others' 
 doors, and said, wisely, with their heads to- 
 gether and hands on hips, that they had always 
 known how it would be. Since the first, what- 
 ever Bombiste wanted, that Bombiste was sure 
 to have what ? Did not Madame Rollin re- 
 member how, when a mere baby, he had cried 
 for the little brass dish which hung in front of 
 his father's salle de coiffure, until, actually, 
 Fremier pere had taken it down and given it 
 to him to cut his first tooth on ? Assuredly, 
 Madame Rollin recalled this astounding inci- 
 dent, and not only that, but the fact that she 
 herself had spoken to Madame Fremier, warn- 
 ing her that the result of such folly would be 
 the unhappiness of some one. But they were 
 all alike, the Fremier. They made no excuses 
 and took no advice. 
 
 There were others who recalled the days 
 
228 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 when La Trompette was the belle of the quar- 
 tier, and as respectable as the best of them. 
 But there, what wouldst thou ? Bombiste had 
 wanted her, so there was nothing to be done. 
 And the debate invariably ended with a bit of 
 flattery for Bombiste. It was a beau garc.cn, 
 after all, name of a good name, with such eyes ! 
 And a tongue, bon Dieu, to draw the cork from 
 a bottle ! For there are many mysteries of 
 human society, but the greatest of these is the 
 good word of the other women for the man. 
 
 Curiously enough, Bombiste's most eloquent 
 partisan was La Trompette herself. Her first 
 appearance at Le Cheval Blanc, after Premier's 
 desertion of her, was the signal for the out" 
 burst of ironic condolence. 
 
 " Eh ! La Trompette, he has planted thee 
 yes ? So the cord is cut, little one hein ? 
 Did he give thee a reference, at least ? " 
 
 To these, and many similar compliments, 
 La Trompette returned nothing beyond a tole- 
 rant smile, or 
 
 " One shall see, my children ! " she cried, 
 in her shrill voice. " It is not the first time, 
 you know. Variety, one has need of that in 
 iife. Perhaps we do not know each other, that 
 
PAPA LABESSE 229 
 
 story and I ! Wait a little. In six weeks we 
 shall be here in company as before, and the 
 little one it will be who is planted. But I re- 
 main. And she who laughs last what ? But, 
 above all, not a word against Bombiste, unless 
 you have need of the wherewithal to make 
 broken heads. It is a brave gars, do you un- 
 derstand, and one who has often enough paid 
 your drinks, types of good-for-nothings ! " 
 
 And she planted herself at a table amidst a 
 burst of laughter and applause (for loyalty is 
 greatly esteemed on the boulevard Rochechou- 
 art), and proceeded to collect interest, in the 
 form of repeated glasses of cognac, on the 
 past generosities of Bombiste Premier. 
 
 But the eternal feminine had its part in the 
 make-up of La Trompette, and so it was that 
 one evening, just at nightfall, she presented 
 herself at the door of Papa Labesse's little 
 shop. He was always at home now, poor Papa 
 Labesse, for the growing church of Sacre'-Cceur 
 had never once seen him emerging, breathless 
 but smiling, from the little rue St. Rustique, 
 since the day when Marcelle disappeared. He 
 stopped his simple toil at the same hour still, 
 but, instead of stepping out briskly upon the 
 
230 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 long, curving incline of the rue Lepic, he would 
 seat himself in his doorway, and, oftentimes 
 forgetting to light the pipe which he had filled, 
 stare out wistfully across the street, to where a 
 trim little laundress stood, busily ironing shirts, 
 in the window of the shop that had formerly 
 been the dairy of Madame Clapot. 
 
 He looked up as La Trompette drew up be- 
 fore his door, and a slight frown wrinkled for 
 an instant above his patient blue eyes, from 
 which all the singular intensity seemed gone. 
 
 " Thou hast a strange air of solitude, Papa 
 Labesse," began La Trompette, affecting a tone 
 of solicitude. 
 
 Papa Labesse made no reply. 
 
 "And Marcelle," said the woman, "she is 
 always with Bombiste ? Poor little one ! The 
 end is so sure ! Is there one who "knows him 
 better than I ? Ah, non ! It is always the 
 same story, a pair of bright eyes, a good 
 figure, and v'la ! But, without fail, he comes 
 back to me, ce sacre coureur ! " 
 
 She glanced up and down the street with an 
 air of complete unconcern, and then her eyes 
 came back to Papa Labesse with a vindictive 
 snap. 
 
PAPA LABESSE 231 
 
 " Happily," she added, " he will have taught 
 her a way of earning white pieces in abun- 
 dance. She is not the first, thy Marcelle. 
 They are sprinkled from here to La Villette, 
 the gonzesses who know the name of Bombiste 
 Premier. Wouldst thou prove it? Walk, then, 
 from the place Pigalle to the place de la Ro- 
 tonde to-night at twelve ! " And La Trompette 
 laughed. 
 
 Papa Labesse rose suddenly to his full 
 height. 
 
 " God damn you ! " he said. And this was 
 no oath, but rather a prayer. 
 
 Toward the end of July Papa Labesse re- 
 sumed his pilgrimages to the summit of the 
 Butte. He had aged visibly in six weeks, and 
 he walked no longer with the brisk and cheer- 
 ful step which had bespoken his youthfulness 
 of spirit, but shuffled his feet, and often stum- 
 bled over trifling obstacles. He looked neither 
 to the right nor to the left, and if he heard the 
 greetings of those along his way, for whom 
 formerly he had always had a hearty word, he 
 made no reply. It is doubtful whether, had he 
 been suddenly asked, he could have told his 
 exact whereabouts : it was rather instinct than 
 
232 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 absolute intention which sent him shuffling up 
 to his old coign of vantage. His eyes took no 
 note of his immediate surroundings, but looked 
 far beyond, with an expression that was half 
 question, half entreaty. It was only when he 
 had come to the edge of the bluff that he 
 seemed to awaken into something resembling 
 the man he had been. Then, his lean, gnarled 
 hands gripped the wattles with a kind of con- 
 vulsive eagerness, and, for a little, the old blue 
 spark gleamed under his lids, and his eyes 
 swept the great city feverishly, as if they would 
 pluck out her secret from her by mere force of 
 will. He no longer dwelt upon the churches 
 and the public buildings, but traced with his 
 glance the line of the great boulevards, des 
 Batignolles, de Clichy, and de Rochechouart, 
 and their tributary streets ; and often he re- 
 mained at his post until nearly midnight, mo- 
 tionless, silent, watching, watching, watching, 
 with his eyes fixed upon the distant red glare 
 from the giant revolving wings of the brilliantly 
 lighted Moulin Rouge. 
 
 What he saw, what he heard, during those 
 long hours of vigil no one ever knew : what 
 he thought he barely knew himself. The en- 
 
PAPA LABESSE 233 
 
 tire intensity of his failing strength was con- 
 centrated upon one endeavor. Hour after 
 hour he sent a voice without sound out, over, 
 and down into the labyrinth of streets beneath 
 him, into the dance-halls, the wine-shops, the 
 cafe-concerts, wooing, pleading, beseeching. 
 It was as if, minute by minute, he wove a great 
 net of tenderest entreaty and persuasion, fit- 
 ting it cunningly into each nook and cranny of 
 the city below, and then, at the end, with one 
 mighty effort of his will, drew the whole fabric 
 up and into his heart, hoping against hope that, 
 mysteriously, some one pleading thought of his 
 might have caught her and swept her back to 
 his arms. It was a struggle, silent but to the 
 death, between Papa Labesse and the great 
 siren city, for the possession of a soul. 
 
 And, as if, indeed, that eager voice without 
 words of his entreaty had, somehow, been able 
 to reach and win her, Marcelle came back. It 
 was at the hour just following sunset, the hour 
 they had loved to pass together, and superbly 
 still and clear. To the west, over the wide, 
 green sweep of the Bois de Boulogne, a great 
 multitude of little puffs of cloud lay piled up 
 against a turquoise sky, and these were con- 
 
234 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 stantly changing from tint to opalescent tint, as 
 shafts of crimson and saffron sunlight moved 
 among them from below the horizon. Above, 
 where the turquoise dulled to steel, the stars 
 were already nicking the sky, one by one ; 
 and, one by one, the lights of the boulevard, 
 red, white, and yellow, flashed into being in 
 reply. 
 
 As it was the dinner hour, the summit of the 
 Butte was deserted save for the figure of Papa 
 Labesse, silhouetted against the sky, as Mar- 
 celle emerged from the rue St. Rustique, came 
 slowly across the open space before the church, 
 and stood at his side. She was very pale, with 
 the transparent, leaden pallor which comes only 
 at the end, and her face seemed little more than 
 two great, stunned eyes. Her clothes, in the 
 last stage of what had been tawdry finery, were 
 unspeakably more slovenly than mere rags. It 
 was but eight weeks since they had stood on 
 the same spot together, but this so brief period 
 had wrought in each the havoc of a decade. 
 
 For a time neither spoke. Papa Labesse 
 had looked up briefly as she reached his side, 
 and then, as she swayed and seemed about to 
 fall, had put an arm about her and drawn her 
 
PAPA LABESSE 235 
 
 close to him. So they stood watching, while 
 Paris winked and sparkled into the starry splen- 
 dor of her summer night. Finally, 
 
 " I knew thou wouldst come, my pigeon," 
 said Papa Labesse. " For a time I was deso- 
 late, is it not so ? and sat alone in the shop 
 below there, and thought of nothing. But then 
 I remembered how that thou didst love this 
 place, and so I have come each night to wait 
 for thee, because I knew thou wouldst return. 
 And now thou art here. It is well, my little 
 white pigeon, it is very well." 
 
 A keener ear than his would have caught 
 the unmistakable warning that underlay her 
 voice when she replied. It lacked not only 
 hope, but life itself. It was the voice of one 
 long dead. 
 
 " I did not think to. find thee here, Papa La- 
 besse it has been so long since then. I 
 came to see it all once again to hear the 
 voice of the great city that sings of love. And 
 then, when at last comes the night, I would 
 throw myself down from here, even into the 
 very heart of her, for I am hers, and she has 
 made me like herself." 
 
 She seemed to feel the unvoiced question 
 
236 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 which quivered on the lips of Papa Labesse, 
 and continued, presently, 
 
 " He never married me. Not that I cared 
 for that. I loved him, thou seest, and when 
 one loves one thinks not of little things. No, 
 I was happy so. But now last week he left 
 me. He has gone back to La Trompette. He 
 gave me a hundred sous. I think he was sorry 
 to go." 
 
 A faint smile touched the corners of her 
 lips. 
 
 "Pauvre Bombiste ! " she added. "It is 
 one who does not know his own heart ! " 
 
 And this again is unknowable mystery, 
 the gentle word of the woman for the man ! 
 
 "He is mowing on the fortifs this week," 
 went on Marcelle, wistfully echoing her lover's 
 slang, " and La Trompette is with him. I saw 
 them but to-day, from the porte de Clichy. So, 
 since they are together, for me it is finished. 
 I have come back to the Butte, Papa Labesse 
 come back to die. For now there is none to 
 receive me, save Paris. She will take me, thou 
 knowest, she who has made me like herself." 
 
 That was all. There was no word, now at 
 the end, of Bombiste Fremier, except that he 
 
PAPA LABESSE 237 
 
 ......... 
 
 did not know his own heart, no word of the 
 days without food, the long nights of following 
 him from wineshop to wineshop, perhaps to be 
 refused at last the wretched shelter of his little 
 room j no word of curses, blows, and insults 
 worse than either. 
 
 When she was silent again Papa Labesse 
 drew her gently away from the brink of the 
 bluff. 
 
 " My pigeon," he said, " there is one to re- 
 ceive thee. Thou wilt come to the little shop 
 pas ? and rest there upon my bed. For I 
 have no need of sleep, I. And in the morning 
 thou wilt be strong again, and well. Come, 
 my pigeon ! " 
 
 And silently, hand in hand, they retraced the 
 familiar way, down the long, curving incline of 
 the rue Lepic, and the door of the little join- 
 er's shop closed behind them. 
 
 Marcelle died at daybreak, going out softly 
 like a lamp that dims and dims, and then flares 
 once into brilliance before all is dark. Papa 
 Labesse was on his knees beside the narrow 
 bed, when she woke from the stupor into which 
 she had fallen, and raised herself upright, her 
 face shining with a great light. The old man, 
 
238 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 himself unconscious that the end had come, 
 lifted his eyes eagerly to hers. 
 
 " My little white pigeon," he said tremu- 
 lously, " thou findest thyself better, is it not 
 so?" 
 
 But the knowledge of him had passed utterly 
 from Marcelle. For a moment she was silent, 
 looking at the wall of the tiny room, as she 
 had looked in the old days at the great city, 
 spread like a map at the foot of the Butte 
 Montmartre. Then she sank back upon the 
 pillow and crossed her hands upon her breast. 
 
 " Paris ! " she said. " Paris, toi qui chantes 
 de 1'amour ! " 
 
 And then, very faintly, " Bombi ! " 
 
 It was her pet name for Fremier, but Papa 
 Labesse did not understand. 
 
 Half an hour later, he came out into the 
 growing light of the dawn, and looked vacantly 
 up and down the short stretch of the rue Veron 
 as if uncertain what direction he desired to 
 take. It was not yet five o'clock, but already 
 the quartier was astir. As Papa Labesse hesi- 
 tated in the doorway, a band of laborers passed 
 the corner, laughing, on their way to their work 
 in the Rochechouart section of the Metropoli- 
 
PAPA LABESSE 239 
 
 tain. The little assistant was taking down the 
 shutters of the laundry across the way, and on 
 every side was the sound of opening doors and 
 windows, and voices suddenly raised in greet- 
 ing or comment upon the weather. Madame 
 Rollin lumbered by, carrying a bundle of 
 clothes on her way to the public lavoir. 
 
 " He ! bonjour, Papa Labesse ! " she cried 
 in passing. " A fine morning what ? " 
 
 Papa Labesse turned suddenly, clamped the 
 padlock on his door, and was presently shuf- 
 fling along the avenue de Clichy. As he went, 
 the city awoke around him to full activity, but 
 he noted his surroundings even less than he had 
 been wont to do of late, on his climbs to the 
 Butte. The return of Marcelle had quickened 
 him, but for a moment only. Now he was 
 again, as it were, a mere automaton, going for- 
 ward without volition, or purpose, or percep- 
 tion, on, on, on, whither and why he knew not. 
 
 After a time he was conscious of a great 
 weariness. The noisy clamor of the crowds on 
 the avenue, marketing and bargaining in the 
 new sunlight, seemed unaccountably to have 
 given place to quiet; and looking about him, 
 Papa Labesse learned from a little signboard 
 
240 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 that he was passing through the porte de Cli- 
 chy. The octroi officials looked curiously at 
 the shuffling, stooping figure as he went by, 
 and one of them laughed. 
 
 " As full as an egg, the grandfather ! " he 
 said. 
 
 Turning to the left, Papa Labesse toiled up 
 upon the slope of the fortifications, stumbled 
 on for a little, and, finally, as his exhaustion 
 gained upon him, flung himself, face down, 
 upon the grass. He had passed the need of 
 sleep long since, but he lay quite motionless 
 for a long time, with his chin on his hands. 
 Directly before him, seen more clearly from 
 the elevation upon which he lay, was the dingy 
 suburb of Clichy, and, to the left, its still din- 
 gier neighbor, Levallois-Perret, studded, both 
 of them, with gaunt sheds of blackened wood, 
 and ghastly factories and storehouses of cheap 
 brick, their endless windows, in close-set rows, 
 giving them the appearance of rusted waffle- 
 irons, and their tall chimneys slabbering slow 
 coils of smoke. In the immediate foreground, 
 a man with a scythe was lazily cutting the long 
 grass on the outward slope of the fortifica- 
 tions. 
 
PAPA LABESSE 241 
 
 Presently Papa Labesse began to talk to 
 himself. His eyes were very bright, and as he 
 spoke they jumped nimbly from shed to shed, 
 from factory to factory, of the dispiriting scene 
 before him. 
 
 " But what are those ? " he began, scowling 
 at two high chimneys standing side by side. 
 " Tiens ! Sainte Clotilde ! But the evening is 
 clear then, par exemple, that one sees so far 
 and so well. It is all so wonderful but I 
 have never understood it till now. Ah ! Saint 
 Etienne-du-Mont! That I know, since the 
 dome of the Pantheon is quite near. Sapristi ! 
 What is that ? L'amour, Papa Labesse, 1'amour, 
 
 that which, finally, thou canst never under- 
 stand, poor Papa Labesse ! Tiens ! Notre 
 Dame ! Ah, ga ! A woman like herself, what ? 
 
 like Paris that sings of love ! My pigeon ! " 
 So, for an hour, the thin stream of jumbled 
 
 phrases slipped from his dry lips. He talked 
 softly, no one could have heard him at two 
 paces, but the babble never ceased. 
 
 At seven o'clock a woman carrying a basket 
 appeared upon the fortifications from the direc- 
 tion of the gate, and, pausing at the top of the 
 slope, looked down upon the mower. 
 
242 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 "He! A116 labago! Bom-biste !" she 
 cried. The man turned. There was no such 
 thing as not being able to hear La Trompette. 
 
 And suddenly Papa Labesse held his peace. 
 
 Bombiste came up the slope with a long lei- 
 surely stride, flung his scythe upon the grass, 
 and placing his arm around La Trompette's 
 neck, kissed her loudly on both cheeks. 
 
 " Name of God ! " he said. " But I have 
 thirst ! " 
 
 They seated themselves side by side and 
 close together, with their backs to Papa La- 
 besse, some fifty metres distant, and La Trom- 
 pette opened her basket. Presently Bombiste 
 lowered his left elbow and raised his right in 
 the act of drawing a cork, and then raised his 
 left again and took a long draught from the 
 bottle. At the same moment Papa Labesse 
 swung round a quarter circle to the right, as if 
 upon a pivot, and began to crawl very slowly 
 forward. 
 
 " Chouette ! " said Bombiste to La Trom- 
 pette, biting a great mouthful from a slice of 
 rye bread and cheese, " c'est du suisse ! " 
 
 "Thou deservest water and a raw turnip I " 
 replied the woman, assuming a tone of angry 
 
PAPA LABESSE 243 
 
 reproach. " If it were not I, thou knowest, 
 long since thou wouldst have been put ashore, 
 heart of an artichoke va ! " 
 
 " I am like that," observed Bombiste, with 
 regret. " But what wouldst thou, name of God ! 
 They come, they go : but at the end it is al- 
 ways thou." 
 
 The woman made no reply, and Papa La- 
 besse, two metres away, laid his gnarled brown 
 fingers on the handle of Bombiste's discarded 
 scythe. 
 
 Bombiste capped his philosophy with a sec- 
 ond long draught of wine, and then, taking a 
 stupendous bite of bread and cheese, glanced 
 slyly at his companion out of the corners of 
 his eyes. She was gazing straight before her, 
 her teeth nicking the edge of her lower lip. 
 
 " What hast thou ? " mumbled the man, with 
 his mouth full. 
 
 " She was very pretty," answered La Trom- 
 pette, " and she loved thee, that garce. But 
 thou art going to tell me that it is finished 
 forever ! That never, never," she went on, 
 clenching her hands, " wilt thou see her again ! 
 Else I plant thee, and thou canst earn thine 
 own white pieces, mackerel ! " 
 
244 PAPA LABESSE 
 
 Bombiste leaned over and placed his face 
 beside hers. 
 
 " Is it not enough ? " he said in his softest 
 voice. " Voyons bien ! What is she to me, 
 this Marcelle ? Fichtre ! I planted her last 
 week, thou knowest. B'en, quoi ? Thou know- 
 est the blue gown ? It is that which sweeps 
 the Boul' Roch' at present ! But that is not 
 for long. Perhaps the Morgue more likely 
 St. Lazare. Art thou not content ? " And he 
 pressed his cheek to the woman's and moved 
 his head up and down slowly, caressing her. 
 
 Papa Labesse rose slowly to his feet, and 
 stretched his lean arms to their full length. 
 The sun winked for the fraction of a second 
 on the downward swirling scythe, and then all 
 was still, save for the dull thud, thudding of 
 two round objects rolling down the uneven 
 slope of sod. In a moment even this sound 
 ceased. 
 
 Papa Labesse revolved slowly upon his heels, 
 pausing as his blue eyes, wide and vacant, fell 
 upon the distant walls of Sacre-Cceur, swim- 
 ming, cream-white and high in air, between 
 him and the sun. Then he pitched softly for- 
 ward upon the grass. 
 
In the Absence 
 of Monsieur 
 
 MONSIEUR ARMAND MICHEL 
 seated before his newly installed Ti- 
 tian was in the act of saying to 
 himself that if its acquisition could not, with 
 entire accuracy, be viewed as an unqualified 
 bargain, it had been, at least, an indisputable 
 stroke of diplomacy, when his complacent 
 meditation was interrupted by the entrance of 
 Arsene. It was the first time that Monsieur 
 Michel had seen his new servant in his official 
 capacity, and he was not ill-pleased. Arsene 
 was in flawless evening dress, in marked con- 
 
246 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 trast to the objectionably flamboyant costume 
 in which, on the preceding evening, he had 
 made application for the position of valet- 
 maitre d'hotel, left vacant by the fall from 
 grace of Monsieur Michel's former factotum. 
 That costume had come near to being his un- 
 doing. The fastidious Armand had regarded 
 with an offended eye the brilliant green cravat, 
 the unspeakable checked suit, and the pain- 
 fully pointed chrome-yellow shoes in which the 
 applicant for his approval was arrayed, and 
 more than once, in the course of conversation, 
 was on the point of putting a peremptory end 
 to the negotiations by a crushing comment on 
 would-be servants who dressed like cafe chan- 
 tant comedians. But the reference had out- 
 weighed the costume. Monsieur Michel did 
 not remember ever to have read more unquali- 
 fied commendation. Arsene Sigard had been 
 for two years in the service of the Comte de 
 Chambour, whose square pink marble hotel on 
 the avenue de Malakoff is accounted, in this 
 degenerate age, one of the sights of Paris ; 
 and this of itself, was more than a little. The 
 Comte did not keep his eyes in his pockets, 
 by any manner of means, when it came to the 
 
IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 24? 
 
 affairs of his household, and apparently there 
 was nothing too good for him to say about 
 Arsene. Here, on pale blue note-paper, and 
 surmounted by the de Chambour crest, it was 
 set forth that the bearer was sober, honest, 
 clean, willing, capable, quiet, intelligent, and 
 respectful. And discreet. When the Comte 
 de Chambour gave his testimony on this last 
 point it meant that you were getting the opin- 
 ion of an expert. Monsieur Michel refolded 
 the reference, tapped it three times upon the 
 palm of his left hand, and engaged the bearer 
 without further ado. 
 
 Now, as Arsene went quietly about the sa- 
 lon, drawing the curtains and clearing away 
 the card table, which remained as mute witness 
 to Monsieur Michel's ruling passion, he was 
 the beau ideal of a gentleman's manservant, 
 unobtrusive in manner and movement, clean- 
 shaven and clear-eyed, adapting himself with- 
 out need of instruction to the details of his 
 new surroundings. A less complacent person 
 than Armand might have been aware that, 
 while he was taking stock of Arsene, Arsene 
 was taking stock, with equal particularity, of 
 him. And there was an unpleasant slyness 
 
248 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 in his black eyes, a something akin to alertness 
 in his thin nostrils, which moved like those 
 of a rabbit, and seemed to accomplish more 
 than their normal share of conveying to their 
 owner's intelligence an impression of exterior 
 things. Also, had Monsieur Michel but ob- 
 served it, his new servant walked just a trifle 
 too softly, and his hands were just a trifle too 
 white and slender. Moreover, he had a habit 
 of smiling to himself when his back was turned, 
 which is an undesirable thing in anybody, and 
 approaches the ominous in a valet-maitre d'ho- 
 tel. But Monsieur Michel was far too much 
 of an aristocrat to have any doubt of his power 
 to overawe and impress his inferiors, or to 
 see in the newcomer's excessive inconspicuity 
 anything more than a commendable recogni- 
 tion of monsieur's commanding presence. So, 
 when Arsene completed his work and had shut 
 the door noiselessly behind him, his master 
 rubbed his hands and said " Ter-res bien ! " 
 in a low voice, this being his superlative ex- 
 pression of satisfaction. Had his glance been 
 able to penetrate his salon door, it would have 
 met, in the antichambre, with the astounding 
 spectacle of his new servant in the act of toss- 
 
IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 249 
 
 ing monsieur's silk hat into the air, and catch- 
 ing it, with extreme dexterity, on the bridge of 
 his nose. Unfortunately, the other side of the 
 door is something which, like the future and 
 the bank-accounts of our debtors, it is not 
 given us to see. So Monsieur Michel repeated 
 his " Ter-res bien ! " and fell again to contem- 
 plating his Titian. 
 
 Yes, undoubtedly, it had been a great stroke 
 of diplomacy. The young Marchese degli Ab- 
 braccioli was not conspicuous for his command 
 of ready money, but his father had left him the 
 finest private collection of paintings in Rome, 
 and this, in consequence of chronic financial 
 stress, was gradually passing from the walls of 
 his palazzo in the via Cavour into the posses- 
 sion of an appreciative but none too extrava- 
 gant government. It had been an inspiration, 
 this proposal of Monsieur Michel's to settle 
 his claim upon the Marchese for his over- 
 whelming losses at baccarat by taking over 
 one of the two Titians which flanked the chim- 
 ney-piece in his study. The young Italian had 
 assented eagerly, and had supplemented his 
 acquiescence with a proposal to dispose of the 
 pendant for somewhat more material remuner- 
 
250 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 ation than canceled reconnaissances. But Ar- 
 mand Michel had undertaken it before, this 
 delicate task of getting objets d'art over the 
 Italian frontier yes, and been caught in the 
 act, too, and forced to disgorge. For the mo- 
 ment, it was enough to charge himself with one 
 picture, on the given conditions, without risking 
 hard cash in the experiment. Later well, 
 later, one would see. And so, a rivederla, mio 
 caro marchese. 
 
 Monsieur Michel fairly hugged himself as 
 he thought of his success. Mon Dieu, quelle 
 ge'nie, that false bottom to his trunk ! He had 
 come safely through them all, the imbecile in- 
 spectors, and now his treasure hung fairly and 
 finally upon his wall, smiling at him out of its 
 tapestry surroundings. It was epatant, truly, 
 and moreover, all there was of the most cale. 
 Only one small cloud of regret hung upon the 
 broad blue firmament -of his satisfaction the 
 other picture ! It had been so easy. He 
 might as well have had two as one. And now, 
 without doubt, the imbecile Marchese would 
 sell the pendant to the imbecile government, 
 and that would be the end of it so far as pri- 
 vate purchase was concerned. Monsieur Mi 
 
IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 251 
 
 chel rose from his chair with a gesture of im- 
 patience, and, drawing the curtain back from 
 the window, looked out lugubriously upon the 
 March cheerlessness of the place Vendome. 
 Little by little, a most seductive plan formed 
 itself in his mind. After all, why not ? A 
 couple of weeks at Monte Carlo, a week at 
 Sorrento, and a fortnight at Rome, in which to 
 win the Titian from the Marchese degli Ab- 
 braccioli, by baccarat if possible, or by bank- 
 notes should fortune prove unkind. It was 
 the simplest thing in the world, and he would 
 avoid the remainder of the wet weather -and 
 be back for the opening of Longchamp. And 
 Monsieur Michel rubbed his hands and said 
 "Ter-res bien ! " again, with much emphasis. 
 
 When, a week later, Arsene was informed of 
 Monsieur's intention to leave him in sole 
 charge of his apartment for a time, he received 
 the intelligence with the dignified composure 
 of one who feels himself worthy of the confi- 
 dence reposed in him. The cook was to have 
 the vacation for which she had been clamoring, 
 that she might display to her relatives in Lille 
 the elaborate wardrobe which was the result 
 of her savings during three years in Monsieur 
 
252 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 Michel's employ. Perfectly. And the apart- 
 ment was to be aired and dusted daily, as if 
 monsieur himself were there. And visitors to 
 be told that monsieur was returning in a month. 
 And letters to be made to follow monsieur, to 
 Monte Carlo at first, and then to Rome. But 
 perfectly ; it was completely understood. Ar- 
 sene bowed a number of times in succession, 
 and outwardly was as calm as a tall, candid- 
 faced clock, being wound up to run for a speci- 
 fied time independent of supervision. But be- 
 neath that smooth and carefully oiled expanse 
 of jet-black hair a whole colony of the most 
 fantastic ideas suddenly aroused themselves 
 and began to elbow each other about in a ver- 
 itable tumult. 
 
 Monsieur Michel took his departure in a 
 whirl of confusion, losing a quantity of indis- 
 pensable articles with exclamations of despair, 
 and finding them the next moment with cries 
 of satisfaction. Eugenie, the cook, compactly 
 laced into a traveling dress of blue silk, stood 
 at the doorway to bid her master good-by, and 
 was run into at each instant by the cabman or 
 the concierge or Monsieur Michel himself, each 
 of whom covered, at top speed, several kilo- 
 
IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 253 
 
 metres of stair and hallway, in the stupendous 
 task of transferring a trunk, a valise, a hat- 
 box, a shawl-strap, and an umbrella from the 
 apartment to the carnage below. On the sur- 
 face of this uproar, the presence of Arsene 
 swam as serenely as a swan on a maelstrom. 
 He accompanied his master to the gare de 
 Lyon, and the last object which met the anx- 
 ious eyes of Monsieur Michel, peering out 
 from one of the first-class carriages of the de- 
 parting express, was his new servant, standing 
 upon the platform, as unmoved by the events 
 of the morning as if monsieur had been pass- 
 ing from the dining room to take coffee in the 
 salon instead of from Paris to take breakfast 
 in Marseille. The sight of him was intensely 
 soothing to the fevered spirit of Monsieur Mi- 
 chel, on whom the details of such a departure 
 produced much the same effect as do cakes of 
 soap when tossed into the mouth of an active 
 geyser. 
 
 " He is calm," he said to himself, rubbing 
 his hands. " He is very calm, and he will not 
 lose his head while I am gone. Ter-res 
 bien ! " 
 
 But the calm of Arsene was the calm of thin 
 
254 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 ice over swiftly rushing waters. As the pol- 
 ished buffers of the last carriage swung out of 
 sight around the curve with a curiously furtive 
 effect, like the eyes of an alarmed animal, slip- 
 ping backward into its burrow, he clenched the 
 fingers of his right hand, and slipping his 
 thumb nail under the edge of his upper teeth, 
 drew it forward with a sharp click. At the 
 same time he said something to his vanished 
 master in the second person singular, which is 
 far from being the address of affection on the 
 lips of a valet-maitre d'hotel. 
 
 Wheeling suddenly after this singular mani- 
 festation, Monsieur Sigard found himself the 
 object of close and seemingly amused scrutiny 
 on the part of an individual standing directly 
 behind him. There was something so ex- 
 tremely disconcerting in this gentleman's un- 
 expected proximity, and in his very evident 
 enjoyment of the situation, that Arsene was 
 upon the point of turning abruptly away, when 
 the other addressed him, speaking the collo- 
 quial French of their class, with the slightest 
 possible hint of foreign accent. 
 
 " Bah, vieux ! Is it that I do not know what 
 they are, the patrons ? Oh, lala ! " 
 
IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 255 
 
 " Avec a ! There are some who have it, an 
 astounding audacity-! " said Arsene to the air 
 over the stranger's head. 
 
 " Farceur ! " replied the stranger, to the air 
 over Arsene's. And then 
 
 " There are two parrakeets that have need 
 of plucking across the way," he added, reflec- 
 tively. 
 
 " There are two empty sacks here to put the 
 feathers in," answered Arsene, with alacrity ; 
 and ten minutes later, oblivious to the chill 
 damp of the March morning, Monsieur Sigard 
 and his new-found acquaintance, seated at a 
 little table in front of a near-by wine-shop, 
 were preparing in company the smoky-green 
 mixture of absinthe and water which Paris 
 slang has dubbed a parrakeet. On the part of 
 Arsene the operation was performed with elab- 
 orate solicitude, and as he poured a tiny stream 
 of water over the lump of sugar on the flat 
 spoon balanced deftly across the glass, he held 
 his head tipped sidewise and his left eye closed, 
 in the manner of a contemplative fowl, and was 
 oblivious to all but the delectable business of 
 the moment. 
 
 But his companion, while apparently deeply 
 
256 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 engaged in the preparation of his own bever- 
 age, was far from being wholly preoccupied 
 thereby. He was a man shorter by an inch or 
 two than Monsieur Michel's maitre d'hotel, 
 dressed in the most inconspicuous fashion, and 
 with an air of avoiding any emphasis of voice 
 or gesture which would be apt to attract more 
 than casual attention to the circumstance of 
 his existence. There was something about him 
 vaguely suggestive of a chameleon, an instant 
 harmonizing of his appearance and manner 
 with any background whatsoever against which 
 he chanced to find himself placed, and a curi- 
 ous clouding of his eyes when unexpectedly 
 they were met by those of another, which lent 
 him an immediate air of profound stupidity. 
 No doubt his long practice in this habit of 
 self-obliteration made him doubly appreciative 
 of Arsene's little outburst of ill-feeling on the 
 platform of the gare de Lyon. A man who 
 would do that in public well, he had much 
 to learn ! 
 
 Just now, however, this gentleman's eyes 
 were very bright, though they -had dwindled to 
 mere slits j and he followed every movement of 
 the unconscious Arsene with short, swift glances 
 
IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 257 
 
 from beneath his drooping lids, as, bit by bit, 
 the lumps of sugar melted under the steady 
 drip of the trickling water, and the opalescent 
 mixture mounted toward the brims. He knew 
 but two varieties of absinthe drinker, this ob- 
 servant individual, the one who progressed, 
 under its influence, from cheerful candor to 
 shrewdest insight into the motives of others, 
 and most skilful evasion of their toils ; the 
 other whom, by easy stages, it led from obsti- 
 nate reserve to the extreme of careless garrul- 
 ity. At this moment he was on the alert for 
 symptoms. 
 
 Arsene looked up suddenly as the last mor- 
 sel of his sugar melted, and, lifting his glass, 
 dipped it before the eyes of his new friend. 
 
 " To your health, Monsieur ? " he said, 
 in courteous interrogation. 
 
 " Fresque," said the other. 
 
 " Bon ! And I, Monsieur Fresque, am Si- 
 gard, Arsene Sigard, maitre d'hotel, at your 
 service, of the type who has just taken himself 
 off, down there." 
 
 And he indicated the imposing pile of the 
 gare de Lyon with his thumb, and then, clos- 
 ing his eyes, took a long sip of his absinthe, 
 
258 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 and replacing the glass upon the table, plunged 
 his hands into his pockets and stared off gloom- 
 ily toward the Seine. 
 
 " Poof ! " he ,said, " but I am content that 
 he is gone. What a filthiness, a rich man 
 what ? " 
 
 " Not to be denied," agreed Monsieur 
 Fresque. " There is not a foreign sou's worth 
 of delicacy in the whole lot ! " 
 
 " Mazette ! I believe thee," answered the 
 other, much pleased. Fresque's thin lips re- 
 laxed the veriest trifle at the familiarity, and 
 he lit a cigarette and gazed vacantly into 
 space. 
 
 " But what dost thou expect ?" he observed, 
 with calm philosophy. 
 
 It appeared that what Arsene expected was 
 that honest folk should not work from seven to 
 ten, in an ignoble box of a pantry, on boots, 
 and silver, and what not, he demanded of him, 
 name* of a pipe ! and dust, and sweep, and 
 serve at table, good heaven ! and practice a 
 species of disgusting politeness to a type of 
 old engraving like Monsieur Armand Michel. 
 And all, oh, mon Dieu ! for the crushing sum 
 of twenty dollars a month, did he compre- 
 
IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 259 
 
 hend ? while the animal in question was sow- 
 ing his yellow buttons by fistfuls. Mazette ! 
 Evidently, he himself was not an eagle. He 
 did not demand the Louvre to live in, for 
 example, nor the existence lalala of Emile 
 Loubet what ? but it was not amusing, he 
 assured him, to be in the employ of the great 
 revolting one in question. Ah, non ! 
 
 " Eiffelesque ! " succinctly commented Mon- 
 sieur Fresque. 
 
 But, said Arsene, there was another side to 
 the question, and he himself, it went without 
 saying, was no waffle-iron, speaking of stupid- 
 ity. He had not been present the day fools 
 were distributed. Oh, far from that ! In con- 
 sequence, it was to become hump-backed with 
 mirth, that part of his life passed behind the 
 back of the example of an old Sophie whom 
 he had the honor to serve. He had not for- 
 gotten how to juggle since he traveled with a 
 band of mountebanks. And there were the 
 patron's plates, at one hundred francs the 
 piece, good blood ! Also he smoked the an- 
 cient cantaloupe's cigarettes, and as for the 
 wines tchutt ! Arsene kissed his finger-tips 
 and took a long sip of absinthe. 
 
260 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 " He is gone for long ? " inquired Fresque. 
 
 Ah, that ! Who knew ? Six weeks at least. 
 And meanwhile might not a brave lad amuse 
 himself in the empty apartment eh ? Oh, it 
 would be life in a gondola, name of a name of 
 a name ! 
 
 The conversation was prolonged for an hour, 
 Arsene growing more and more confidential 
 under the seductive influence of his parrakeet, 
 and his companion showing himself so heartily 
 in accord with his spirit of license, that, by de- 
 grees, he captured completely the fancy of the 
 volatile valet, and was permitted to take his 
 departure only on the condition of presenting 
 himself in the place Vendome that evening 
 for the purpose of smoking the cantaloupe's 
 cigarettes and seeing Arsene juggle with the 
 hundred-franc plates. 
 
 Monsieur Fresque was as good as his word. 
 He put in an appearance promptly at eight 
 o'clock, hung his hat and coat, at his host's 
 invitation, on a Louis Quinze applique, and 
 made himself comfortable in a chaise longue 
 which on the guarantee of Duveen had 
 once belonged to the Pompadour. Arsene out- 
 did himself in juggling, and afterwards they 
 
IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 261 
 
 cracked a bottle of Chateau Laffitte and drank 
 it with great satisfaction out of Salviati glasses, 
 topping off the entertainment with Russian 
 kiimmel and two of Monsieur Michel's cigars. 
 Arsene, in his picturesque idiom, expressed 
 himself as being tapped in the eye with his 
 new friend to the extent of being able to quit 
 him no longer, and forthwith Monsieur Hercule 
 Fresque took up his quarters in the bedroom 
 of the cantaloupe, his host established himself 
 in Monsieur Michel's Empire guest chamber, 
 and the " life in a gondola " went forward for 
 five weeks to the supreme contentment of both 
 parties. 
 
 Now it is a peculiarity of life in a gondola, as 
 is known to all who have sampled its delights, 
 that, while it lasts, consideration of past and 
 future alike becomes dulled, and one loses all 
 sense of responsibility in the lethal torpor of 
 the present. So it was not until Arsene re- 
 ceived a letter from Monsieur Michel, announ- 
 cing his return, that he began to figure up the 
 possible consequences of his experiment. They 
 were, as he gloomily announced to Hercule, 
 stupefying to the extent of dashing out one's 
 brains against the wall. But one bottle of 
 
262 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 CMteau Laffitte remained, and none whatever 
 of Russian kiimmel. Moreover, the brocade 
 of the chaise longue was hopelessly ruined by 
 the boots of the conspirators, and the enthusi- 
 asm of Arsene's juggling had reduced by fifty 
 per cent, the set of Sevres plates. What was 
 to be done, bon Dieu, what was to be done ? 
 
 Monsieur Fresque, having carefully perused 
 a letter with an Italian stamp, which had come 
 by the evening mail, revolved the situation in 
 his mind, slowly smoking the last, of the can- 
 taloupe's cigars, and glancing from time to 
 time at the despondent figure of his host, with 
 his eyes narrowed to mere slits. Had the fish 
 been sufficiently played ? He reeled in a foot 
 or so of line by way of experiment. 
 
 "What, after all, is a situation?" he said. 
 "Thou wilt be discharged, yes. But after- 
 wards ? Pah ! thou wilt find another. And 
 thou hast thy rigolade." 
 
 " Ah, that ! " replied Arsene with a shrug. 
 " I believe thee ! But thinkest thou my old 
 melon will find himself in the way of glueing 
 the ribbon of the Le'gion on me for what I 
 have done ? I see myself from here, playing 
 the harp on the bars of La Maz ! " 
 
IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 263 
 
 " La vie a Mazas, c'est pas la vie en gon- 
 dole," observed Hercule philosophically. 
 
 " Tu paries ! " 
 
 Hercule appeared to take a sudden resolve. 
 He swung his feet to the floor, and bending 
 forward in the chaise longue, began to speak 
 rapidly and with extreme earnestness. 
 
 " Voyons, done, mon gars, thou hast been 
 foolish, but one must not despair. What is 
 done in France is never known in Italy. And 
 here thou art surrounded by such treasures as 
 the imbeciles of foreigners pay fortunes for, 
 below there. Take what thou hast need of, 
 a trunk of the patron's, some silver, what 
 thou canst lay hands on of gold and brass 
 and enamel, whatever will not break and 
 get away before he returns. In Milan thou 
 canst sell it all, and get another place. I 
 have friends there, and thou shalt have letters. 
 Voila ! " 
 
 " But one must have money," replied Arsene, 
 brightening, nevertheless. " And that is lack- 
 ing me." 
 
 Hercule seemed to ponder this objection 
 deeply. Finally, with a sigh of resignation, he 
 spoke again. 
 
264 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 " B'en, voila ! Thou hast been my friend, is 
 it not so ? Hercule Fresque is not the man to 
 be ungrateful. I am poor, and have need of 
 my little savings But, there ! it is for a 
 friend pas ? Let us say no more ! " And he 
 thrust a roll of banknotes into the hands of 
 the stupefied Arsene. 
 
 The evening was spent in arranging the de- 
 tails of the flight. Arsene produced a service- 
 able trunk from the storeroom, and in this the 
 two men placed a great variety of the trea- 
 sures which Monsieur Michel had accumulated 
 during twenty years of patient search and ex- 
 orbitant purchase. Squares of priceless tapes- 
 try, jeweled watches and snuff boxes, figurines 
 of old Sevres, ivories cunningly carved and 
 yellow with age, madonnas of box-wood, and 
 wax, and ebony, all were carefully wrapped 
 in newspapers and stowed away ; and to these 
 Arsene added a dozen of his master's shirts, 
 two suits of clothes, and a box of cigarettes, 
 But when all the available material had been 
 appropriated there yet remained an empty 
 space below the tray. It would never do to 
 have the treasures knocking about on the 
 way. Arsene proposed a blanket or, better 
 
IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 265 
 
 yet, one of Monsieur Michel's overcoats. But 
 Hercule, after rearranging the trunk so as to 
 make the empty space of different form, turned 
 suddenly to his companion, who was picking 
 nervously at his fingers and watching the so 
 fruitful source of suggestion with a pathetic 
 air of entreaty, and clapped him gleefully upon 
 the chest. 
 
 " A painting ! " he exclaimed. 
 
 Complete demoralization seemed to have 
 taken possession of Arsene. He was very 
 pale, and his eyes constantly sought the salon 
 door as if he expected the object of his ingen- 
 ious epithets to burst in at any moment, with 
 the prefect and all his legions at his heels. 
 
 "A painting?" he repeated blankly ; "but 
 how, a painting ? " 
 
 But Monsieur Fresque had already mounted 
 nimbly on a chair and lifted the cherished Ti- 
 tian of Monsieur Michel from its place against 
 the tapestry. There was no further need of 
 persuasion. The moment had come for ac- 
 tion ; and, seizing a hammer, he began to 
 wrench off the frame, talking rapidly between 
 short gasps of exertion. 
 
 "But certainly, a painting. This one is 
 
266 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 small ugh ! but who can say how valuable ? 
 They sell readily down there, these black 
 daubs. Ah ! By rolling, it will fill the empty 
 space, seest thou, and later it may mean a 
 thousand francs. One does not do things by 
 umph ! by halves in such a case. Sacred 
 nails ! One would say they had been driven 
 in for eternity ! Oof ! Thou art fortunate to 
 have me to advise thee, great imbecile. May- 
 hap this is worth all the rest. Pig of a frame, 
 va ! It is of iron. Ugh I He will be furious, 
 thy patron, but what of that ? In Italy thou 
 wilt hear no more of it. Still one nail. Come 
 away, then, type of a cow ! Enfin ! " 
 
 With one final effort he tore off the last 
 fragment of frame, peeled the canvas from the 
 back-board, and, rolling it carefully, tucked it 
 into the empty space, replaced the tray, and 
 closed the trunk with a snap. 
 
 " Voila ! " he said, straightening himself and 
 turning a red but triumphant face to the as- 
 tounded maitre d'hotel. 
 
 " Now for the letters," he added, seating 
 himself at Monsieur Michel's desk and begin- 
 ning to scribble busily. " Do thou go for a 
 cab, and at a gallop. It has struck half past 
 
IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 26? 
 
 ten and the Bale rapide leaves the gare de 1'Est 
 at midnight." 
 
 Hardly had the door of the apartment 
 closed upon the demoralized valet when Mon- 
 sieur Fresque hastily shoved to one side the 
 note he had begun, and, writing a sentence or 
 two upon another slip of paper, wrapped the 
 latter about a two-sou piece, and went quietly 
 to the salon window. Opening this cautiously, 
 he found a fine rain falling outside, and the 
 eastern half of the square deserted save for 
 two figures, one the flying form of Arsene, 
 cutting across a corner into the rue Castigli- 
 one in search of a cab, and the other that of 
 a man muffled in a heavy overcoat and with 
 a slouch hat pulled well over his eyes, who was 
 lounging against the railing of the Column, 
 and who, as Fresque opened the window, shook 
 himself into activity and stepped nimbly out 
 across the wide driveway. Hercule placed the 
 paper containing the two-sou piece upon the 
 window sill and with a sharp flick of his fore- 
 finger sent it spinning down into the square. 
 The man in the slouch hat stooped for an in- 
 stant in passing the spot where it lay, and 
 Monsieur Fresque, softly closing the window, 
 
268 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 stretched his arms upward into a semblance 
 of a gigantic letter Y, and indulged in a prodi- 
 gious yawn. 
 
 " Qa y est ! " said he. 
 
 Papa Briguette had long since climbed into 
 his high bedstead, in the loge de concierge, 
 when, for the second time in fifteen minutes, 
 he was aroused by the voice of Arsene calling, 
 " Cordon, s'il vous plait ! " in the main hall- 
 way, and, reaching from under his feather cov- 
 erlid, pressed the bulb which unlocked the 
 street-door. 
 
 " Quel coureur, que ce gars ! " grumbled 
 the worthy man to his fat spouse, snoring com- 
 placently at his side. " I deceive myself if, 
 when Monsieur Michel returns, thou dost not 
 hear a different story." 
 
 " Awr-r-r-r ! " replied Maman Briguette. 
 
 On the way to the gare de 1'Est Arsene re- 
 covered the better part of his lost composure, 
 and listened with something akin to cheerful- 
 ness to the optimistic prognostications of his 
 companion. By the time the precious trunk 
 was registered and he had secured his seat in 
 a second-class compartment of the Bale rapide, 
 he was once more in high feather and profuse 
 
IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 269 
 
 in expressions of gratitude, as he smoked a 
 farewell cigarette with Fresque while waiting 
 for the train to start. 
 
 "Thou canst believe me, mon vieux," he 
 protested. " It is not a little thing that thou 
 hast done, name of a name. Ah, non ! It 
 was the act of a brave comrade, that I assure 
 thee. Et voyons ! When I have sold the ef- 
 fects down there, thou shalt have back thy lit- 
 tle paper mattress, word of honor ! Yes, and 
 more thy share of the gain, mon zig ! " 
 
 He grasped the other's hand fervently as a 
 passing guard threw them a curt " En voiture, 
 messieurs ! " and seemed on the point of kiss- 
 ing him farewell. There was some confusion 
 attendant upon his entering the compartment, 
 owing to the excessive haste of a man muffled in 
 a heavy overcoat and with a slouch hat pulled 
 well over his eyes, who arrived at the last mo- 
 ment and persisted in scrambling in, at the very 
 instant chosen by Monsieur Sigard. The latter 
 immediately reappeared at the window, and, as 
 the train began to move, shouted a few final 
 acknowledgments at his benefactor. 
 
 " B'en, au r'voir, vieux ! And I will write 
 thee from below there, thou knowest. A thou- 
 
270 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 sand thanks. Fear not for thy blue paper 
 what ? Thou shalt have it back, sou for sou, 
 name of a name ! " 
 
 He was almost out of hearing now, his face 
 a cream-colored splotch against the deep ma- 
 roon of the railway carriage, and, drawing out 
 a gaudy handkerchief, he waved it several 
 times in token of farewell. 
 
 " I shall never forget thee, never ! " he cried, 
 as a kind of afterthought and valedictory in 
 one. 
 
 " Ah, a ! " said Monsieur Fresque to him- 
 self, as Arsene's face went out of sight, "that 
 I well believe ! " 
 
 Yet, so inconstant is man, the promised let- 
 ter from "below there" never reached him. 
 Another did, however, and it was this which 
 he might have been observed reading to a 
 friend, with every evidence of the liveliest sat- 
 isfaction, one week later, at a rear table before 
 the Taverne Royale. One would hardly have 
 recognized the plainly, almost shabbily dressed 
 comrade of Arsene, with his retiring manners 
 and his furtive eyes, in this extremely prosper- 
 ous individual, in polished top hat, white waist- 
 coat and gaiters, and gloves of lemon yellow. 
 
IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 271 
 
 His companion was equally imposing in ap- 
 pearance, and it was apparent that he derived 
 as much amusement from listening to Mon- 
 sieur Fresque's epistle as did the latter from 
 reading it aloud, which he did with the most 
 elaborate emphasis, calling the other's atten- 
 tion to certain sentences by tapping him lightly 
 upon the arm and repeating them more slowly. 
 The letter was in Italian, and ran as fol- 
 lows : 
 
 MILAN, April 20, 1901. 
 
 MY GOOD ERCOLE, I am leaving here to- 
 day for Rome, where the case of the govern- 
 ment against the Marchese degli Abbraccioli 
 is to come on next week, but before I do so I 
 must write you of the last act in the little com- 
 edy of Arsene Sigard. I never lost sight of 
 him from the moment we left Paris, and when 
 he found I was also on my way to Italy, he 
 became confidential, and, in exchange for cer- 
 tain information which I was able to give him 
 about Milan, etc., told me a long story about 
 himself and his affairs, which I found none the 
 less amusing for knowing it to be a tissue of 
 lies. The time passed readily enough, but I 
 was relieved when we started over the St. Go- 
 
272 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 thard, because I knew then that the game was 
 as good as played. We arrived at Chiasso on 
 time (two o'clock) and I found Sassevero on the 
 platform when I jumped out. He had come 
 on from Rome the night before, and was in 
 a positive panic because Palmi, who had been 
 watching old Michel there, had lost him some- 
 how and nobody knew where he 'd gone. He 
 might have come through on any train, of 
 course, and Sassevero did n't even know him 
 by sight. 
 
 Naturally, our little business with Sigard 
 was soon done. Cagliacci is still chief of cus- 
 toms at Chiasso, and he simply confiscated the 
 trunk and everything in it, though, of course, 
 the government was n't after anything but the 
 picture. There were two hours of argument 
 over the disposition of Sigard, but it seemed 
 best to let him go and nothing further said, 
 which he was only too glad to do. The Old 
 Man is shy of diplomatic complications, it ap- 
 pears, and he had told Sassevero to frighten 
 the chap thoroughly and then let him slip off. 
 
 Here comes in the most remarkable part of 
 all. Just as Sigard was marching out of the 
 room, in came the Lucerne express, and our 
 
IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 273 
 
 friend walks almost into the arms of an oldish 
 gentleman who had jumped out of a carriage 
 and was hurrying into the customs room. 
 
 " Bon Dieu ! " said this individual, " what 
 does this mean ? " 
 
 " What does what mean ? " put in Sassevero 
 like a flash, and the other was so taken by sur- 
 prise that, before he had time to think what he 
 was saying, the secret was out. 
 
 " That 's my valet de chambre ! " he said. 
 
 " Really ? " said Sassevero. " Bravo ! Then 
 you 're the gentleman with the Marchese degli 
 Abbraccioli's second Titian in the false bottom 
 of his trunk ! " 
 
 Could anything have been more exquisite ? 
 The old chap is out some hundred thousand 
 lire on the transaction, because, of course, 
 Cagliacci confiscated it like the other. It was 
 a sight to remember, the two pictures side 
 by side in his room, and Michel and Sigard 
 cursing each other above them ! We all went 
 on to Milan by the next train, except Sigard, 
 who did the prudent thing on the appearance 
 of his padrone, and disappeared, but Michel's 
 appeal to the French consulate was of no 
 effect. The consul told him flat that he was 
 
274 IN THE ABSENCE OF MONSIEUR 
 
 going directly against the law in trying to get 
 old works of art over the frontier, and that he 
 could n't plead ignorance after the detail of 
 the false bottom. 
 
 Sassevero says the Old Man is immensely 
 pleased with the way you handled your end of 
 the affair. The funny part of it is that Sigard 
 apparently had n't the most remote suspicion 
 of your being in any way involved in his catas- 
 trophe. 
 
 Your most devoted,. 
 
 CAVALETTO. 
 
Little Tapin 
 
 HIS name was Jean-Marie-Michel Ju- 
 miere, and the first eighteen years of his 
 life were spent near the little Breton vil- 
 lage of Plougastel. They were years of which 
 each was, in every respect, like that which went 
 before, and, in every respect, like that which 
 followed after : years, that is to say, devoid of 
 incident, beyond the annual pardon, when the 
 peasants came from far and near to the quaint 
 little church, to offer their prayers at the cem- 
 etery Calvary, and display their holiday cos- 
 tumes, and make love, and exchange gossip on 
 
276 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 the turf round about. It is a land of wide 
 and wind-swept hillsides, this, imbued with the 
 strange melancholy of a wild and merciless 
 sea, and wherein there are no barriers of con- 
 vention or artificiality between earth and sky, 
 man and his Maker ; but Jean-Marie loved it 
 for its very bleakness. From the doorway of 
 his mother's cottage, standing, primly white, in 
 the midst of great rocks and strawberry fields, 
 with its thatched roof drawn down, like a hood, 
 about its ears, as if in protection against the 
 western gales, he could look out across the 
 broad harbor of Brest to the Goulet, the gate- 
 way to that great Atlantic whose mighty voice 
 came to his ears in stormy weather, muttering 
 against the barrier of the shore. And this 
 voice of the sea spoke to Jean-Marie of many 
 things, but, most of all, of the navies of France, 
 of the mighty battleships which went out from 
 Brest to unimagined lands, far distant, China, 
 America, and the southern islands, whence 
 comrades, older than himself, brought back 
 curious treasures, coral, and shells, and coins, 
 and even parrots, to surprise the good people 
 of Plougastel. He looked at them enviously, as 
 they gathered about the door of Pere Yvetot's 
 
LITTLE TAPIN 277 
 
 wine-shop, when they were home on leave, and 
 spun sailor yarns for his delighted ears. How 
 wonderful they were, these men who had seen 
 the world, Toulon, and Marseille, and Ton- 
 kin, ' how wonderful, with their wide, flapping 
 trousers, and their jaunty caps, with a white 
 strap and a red pompon, and their throats and 
 breasts, showing ruddy bronze at the necks of 
 their shirts ! 
 
 At such times Jean-Marie would join timidly 
 in the talk, and, perhaps, speak of the time 
 when he, too, should be marin franc.ais, and 
 see the world. And the big Breton sailors 
 would laugh good-naturedly, and slap him on 
 the shoulder, and say : " Tiens ! And how 
 then shall the cruisers find their way into Brest 
 harbor, when the little phare is gone ? " For 
 it was a famous joke in Plougastel to pretend 
 that Jean-Marie, with his flaming red hair, was 
 a lighthouse, which could be seen through the 
 Goulet, far, far out at sea. 
 
 But Jean-Marie only smiled quietly in reply, 
 for he knew that his day would come. At 
 night, the west wind, sweeping in from the At- 
 lantic, and rattling his little casement, seemed 
 to be calling him, and it was a fancy of his to 
 
278 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 answer its summons in a whisper, turning his 
 face toward the window. 
 
 " All in good time, my friend. All in good 
 time ! " 
 
 Again, when he was working in the straw- 
 berry fields, he would strain his eyes to catch 
 the outline of some big green battleship, an- 
 chored off Brest, or, during one of his rare 
 visits to the town, lean upon the railing of the 
 pont tournant, to watch the sailors and marines 
 moving about the barracks and magazines on 
 the quais of the porte militaire. All in good 
 time, my friends ; all in good time ! 
 
 Only, there were two to whom one did not 
 speak of these things, the Little Mother, 
 and Rosalie Vivieu. Already the sea had 
 taken three from Madame Jumiere Baptiste, 
 her husband, and Philippe and Yves, the older 
 boys, who went out together, with the fishing 
 fleet, seven years before, in the staunch little 
 smack La Belle Fortune. She had been cheer- 
 ful, even merry, during the long weeks of wait- 
 ing for the fleet's return, and, when it came in 
 one evening, with news of La Belle Fortune 
 cut down in the fog by a North Cape German 
 Lloyd, and all hands lost, she had taken the 
 
LITTLE TAPIN 279 
 
 news as only a Breton woman can. Jean- 
 Marie was but twelve at the time, but there is 
 an intuition, beyond all reckoning in years, in 
 the heart of a fisher's son, and never should 
 he forget how the Little Mother had caught 
 him to her heart that night, at the doorway of 
 their cottage, crying, " Holy Saviour ! Holy 
 Saviour ! " with her patient blue eyes upturned 
 to the cold, grey sky of Finistere ! As for 
 Rosalie, Jean-Marie could not remember when 
 they two had not been sweethearts, since the 
 day when, as a round-eyed boy of six, he had 
 watched Madame Vivieu crowding morsels of 
 blessed bread into her baby mouth at the par- 
 don of Plougastel, since all the world knows 
 that in such manner only can backwardness of 
 speech be cured. Rosalie was sixteen now, as 
 round, and pink, and sweet as one of her own 
 late peaches, and she had promised to marry 
 Jean-Marie some day. For the time being, he 
 was allowed to kiss her only on the great occa- 
 sion of the pardon, but that was once more 
 each year than any other gars in Plougastel 
 could do, so Jean-Marie was content. No, evi- 
 dently, to these two there must be no mention 
 of his dreamings of the wide and wonderful 
 
280 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 sea, of the summons of the impatient western 
 wind, of those long reveries upon the pont 
 tournant. 
 
 So Jean-Marie hugged his visions to his 
 heart for another year, working in the straw- 
 berry fields, gazing out with longing eyes to- 
 ward the warships in the harbor, and whisper- 
 ing, when the fingers of the wind tapped upon 
 his little casement : " All in good time, my 
 friend. All in good time ! " 
 
 And his day came at last, as he. had known 
 it would. But with what a difference ! For 
 there were many for the navy that spring. 
 Plougastel had nine, and Daoulas fifteen ready, 
 and Hanvec seven, and Crozon twenty-one, 
 and from Landerneau, and Chateaulin, and 
 Lambezellec, and le Folgoet came fifty more, 
 and from Brest itself, a hundred ; and all of 
 these, with few exceptions, were great, broad- 
 shouldered lads, strong of arm and deep of 
 chest, and so the few who were slender and 
 fragile, like Jean-Marie, were assigned to the 
 infantry, and sent, as is the custom, far from 
 Finistere, because, says the code, change of 
 scene prevents homesickness, and what the 
 code says must, of course, be true. 
 
LITTLE TAPIN 281 
 
 When Madame Jumiere heard this she smiled 
 as she was seldom known to smile. The Holy 
 Virgin, then, had listened to her prayers. The 
 gars was to be a piou-piou instead of a col bleu, 
 after all ! The great sea should not rob her 
 again, as it had robbed her in the time. It 
 was very well, oh, grace au saint Sauveur, it 
 was very well ! And, all that night, the Little 
 Mother prayed, and watched a tiny taper, flick- 
 ering before her porcelain image of Notre 
 Dame de la Recouvrance, while Jean-Marie 
 tossed and turned upon his little garret bed, 
 and made no reply, even in a whisper, to the 
 west wind, rattling his casement with insistent 
 ringers. 
 
 But it was all far worse than he had pictured 
 it to himself, even in those first few hours of 
 disappointment and despair. The last Sunday 
 afternoon which he and Rosalie passed, hand 
 in hand, seated by the Calvary in Plougastel 
 cemetery, striving dumbly to realize that they 
 should see each other no more for three long 
 years ; the following morning, chill and bleak 
 for that time of year, when he and the Little 
 Mother, standing on the platform of the sta- 
 tion at Brest, could barely see each others' 
 
282 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 faces, for the sea-fog and their own hot tears ; 
 the shouts and laughter and noisy farewells 
 of the classe, crowding out of the windows of 
 their third-class carriages ; and, finally, the in- 
 terminable journey to Paris, all of these 
 were to Jean-Marie like the successive stages 
 of a feverish, uneasy dream. He knew none 
 of the noisy Breton peasant lads about him, 
 but sat by himself in the centre of the com- 
 partment, too far from either window to catch 
 more than fleeting glimpses of the fog-wrapped 
 landscape through which the train crept at 
 thirty kilometres the hour. At long intervals, 
 they stopped in great stations, of which little 
 Jean-Marie remembered to have heard, Mor- 
 laix, St. Brieuc, Rennes, and Laval, where the 
 recruits bought cakes and bottles of cheap 
 wine, and joked with white-capped peasant 
 women on the platforms ; and twice during the 
 long night he was roused from a fitful, troubled 
 sleep to a consciousness of raucous voices cry- 
 ing " Le Mans ! " and " Chartres ! " and gasped 
 in sudden terror before he could remember 
 where he was at the faces of his slumber- 
 ing companions, ghastly and distorted in the 
 wretched light of the compartment lamp. So, 
 
LITTLE TAPIN 283 
 
 as the dawn was breaking over Paris, they 
 came into the gare Montparnasse, and, too 
 drowsy to realize what was demanded of them, 
 were herded together by the drill sergeants in 
 charge, and marched away across the city to 
 the barracks of La Pe'piniere. 
 
 The weeks that followed were to Jean-Marie 
 hideous beyond any means of expression. 
 From the first he had been assigned to the 
 drum-corps, and spent hours daily, under com- 
 mand of a corporal expert in the art, labori- 
 ously learning double rolls and ruffles in the 
 fosse of the fortifications. For they are not in 
 the way of enduring martyrdom, the Parisians, 
 and even while they cry " Vive 1'armee ! " with 
 their hats off, and their eyes blazing, the drum- 
 mers and buglers are sent out of hearing, to 
 practice the music that later, when the regi- 
 ments parade, will stir the patriotism of the 
 throng. 
 
 But this part of his new life was no hardship 
 to Jean-Marie, or Little Tapin, as his comrades 
 soon learned to call him, because he was the 
 smallest drummer in the corps. On the con- 
 trary, it was something to be in the open air, 
 even though that air was tainted with sluggish 
 
284 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 smoke from the factory chimneys of Levallois- 
 Perret, instead of being swept and refreshed by 
 the west wind from beyond the Goulet. And he 
 was very earnest, very anxious to please, was 
 Little Tapin. First of all the new drummers, he 
 learned the intricacies of the roll, and so dili- 
 gently did he improve the hours of practice 
 that he was first, as well, to be regularly as- 
 signed to a place in the regimental band. No, 
 this was no hardship. What cramped and 
 crushed his kindly little heart, what clouded 
 his queer, quizzical eyes, was nothing less than 
 Paris, beautiful, careless Paris, that laughed, 
 and danced, and sang about him, and had 
 never a thought for Little Tapin, with his 
 funny, freckled face, and his ill-fitting uniform 
 of red and blue, and his coarse boots, and his 
 ineradicable Breton stare. 
 
 In Plougastel he had been wont to greet and 
 to be greeted, to hear cheery words from those 
 who passed him on the wide, white roads. He 
 was part of it all, one who was called by his 
 honest name, instead of by a ridiculous sobri- 
 quet, and who had his share in all that went 
 forward, from the strawberry harvest to the 
 procession of the pardon. And if all this was 
 
LITTLE TAPIN 285 
 
 but neighborly interest, at least there were two 
 to whom Jean-Marie meant more, and who 
 meant more to him. 
 
 But Paris, Paris, with her throngs of 
 strange faces hurrying past, her brilliantly 
 lighted boulevards, her crowded cafes, her 
 swirl of traffic along avenues that one crossed 
 only at peril of one's life, he was lost 
 amid her clamor and confusion as utterly as 
 a bubble in a whirlpool ! The bitterest hours 
 of his new life were those of his leave, in 
 which, with a band of his fellows, he went 
 out of the great green gates of the caserne to 
 seek amusement. Amusement! .They soon 
 lost Little Tapin, the others, for he was one 
 who did not drink, and who walked straight on 
 when they turned to speak to passing grisettes, 
 who clung to each others' arms, and looked 
 back, laughing at the sallies of the piou-pious. 
 He was not bon camarade. He seemed to 
 disapprove. So, presently, while he was staring 
 into a shop window, they would slip down a 
 side street, or into a tiny cafe, and Little Tapin 
 would find himself alone in the great city which 
 he dreaded. 
 
 He came to spending long hours of his leave 
 
286 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 in the galleries of the Louvre, hastening past 
 row upon row of nude statues with startled 
 eyes, or making his way wearily from picture 
 to picture of the old Dutch masters, striving, 
 striving to understand. Then, footsore and 
 heartsick, he would creep out upon .the pont 
 du Carrousel, and stand for half an afternoon, 
 with his elbows on the railing. Behind him, the 
 human tide swung back and forward from bank 
 to bank, the big omnibuses making the bridge 
 throb and sway under his feet. It was good, 
 that, like the rise and fall of his little boat on 
 the swells of the bras de Landerneau, when he 
 rowed up with a comrade to fish at the mouth 
 of the Elorn. And there was always the Seine, 
 whirling, brown and angry, under the arches of 
 the pont Royal beyond, on its way to the sea, 
 where were the great, green battleships. Little 
 Tapin strained his eyes in an attempt to follow 
 the river's long sweep to the left, toward the 
 distant towers of the Trocadero, and then pic- 
 tured to himself how it would go on and on, 
 out into the good, green country, past hillsides 
 crowded with vineyards, and broad, flat mea- 
 dows, where the poplars stood, aligned like 
 soldiers, against the sky, until it broadened 
 
LITTLE TAPIN 287 
 
 toward its end, running swifter and more joy- 
 ously, for now the wind had met it and was 
 crying, "Come! Come! The Sea! The Sea!" 
 as it was used to cry, rattling the casement of 
 his little room at Plougastel. Then two great 
 tears ran slowly down his freckled cheeks, and 
 dropped, unnoted, into the flying river, wherein 
 so many fall. Ah, what a baby he was, to be 
 sure, Little Tapin ! 
 
 So three months went by, and then one 
 morning the news ran through La Pepiniere 
 that the regiment was going to move. There 
 is no telling how such tidings get abroad, for 
 the pawns are not supposed to know what part 
 in the game they are to play. A loose-tongued 
 lieutenant, perhaps, and a sharp-eared ordon- 
 nance, or a word between two commandants 
 overheard by the sentry in his box at the gates 
 of the caserne. Whatever the source of infor- 
 mation, certain it was that, six hours after the 
 colonel of the loyth of the line had received 
 his orders, his newest recruit could have told 
 you as much of them as was known to General 
 de Galliffet himself, in his office on the boule- 
 vard St. Germain. 
 
 A more than usually friendly comrade con- 
 
288 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 fided the news to Little Tapin, exulting. The 
 regiment was to move in three days, name 
 of God! Epatant what? And, what was 
 more, they were to go to the south, to Greno- 
 ble, whence one saw the Alpes Maritimes, with 
 snow upon them snow upon them, did Tapin 
 comprehend ? and always ! No matter whe- 
 ther it was a Tuesday, or a Friday, yes, or 
 even a Sunday ! There was always snow ! 
 
 No, Little Tapin could hardly comprehend. 
 He pondered dully upon this new development 
 of his fate all that afternoon, and then, sud- 
 denly, while he was beating the staccato roll of 
 the retraite in the court of the caserne that 
 night, he understood ! Why, it was to go fur- 
 ther away, this, further away from Plouga- 
 stel, and the Little Mother, and Rosalie, to be 
 stationed in God knew w T hat great town, cruel- 
 ler, more crowded than even Paris herself ! 
 
 All that night Little Tapin lay staring at the 
 ceiling of the big dortoir, while the comrades 
 breathed heavily around him. And, little by 
 little, the spirit of rebellion roused and stirred 
 in his simple Breton heart. For he hated 
 it all, this army, this dreary, rigid routine, 
 this contemptuous comment of trim, sneering 
 
LITTLE TAPIN 289 
 
 young lieutenants, with waxed mustaches, and 
 baggy red riding breeches, and immaculately 
 varnished boots. He hated his own uniform, 
 which another tapin had worn before him, and 
 which, in consequence, had never even had the 
 charm of freshness. He hated the bugles, 
 and the drums, yes, and, more than all, the 
 tricolor, the flag of the great, cruel Republic 
 which had cooped him up in these desolate 
 barracks of La Pe'piniere, instead of sending 
 him with other Bretons out to the arms of the 
 blue sea ! And, when gray morning crept 
 through the windows of the dortoir, there lay 
 upon the pallet of Little Tapin a deserter, in 
 spirit, at least, from the loyth of the line ! 
 
 That day, for the third time since joining 
 the regiment, Little Tapin was detailed as 
 drummer to the guard at the Palais du Louvre. 
 He knew what that meant, a long, insuffer- 
 ably tiresome day, with nothing to do save to 
 idle about a doorway of the palace, opposite 
 the place du Palais Royal, watching the throng 
 of shoppers scurrying to and fro, and passing 
 in and out of the big magasins du Louvre. It 
 was only as sunset approached that the drum- 
 mer of the guard detail had any duty to per- 
 
290 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 form. Then he marched, all alone, with his 
 drum slung on his hip, across the place du Car- 
 rousel, and down the wide central promenade 
 of the Tuileries gardens, to the circular basin 
 at their western end, where, on pleasant after- 
 noons, the little Parisians and some, too, 
 of larger growth manoeuvred their miniature 
 yachts, to the extreme vexation of the sluggish 
 gold-fish. There, standing motionless, like a 
 sketch by Edouard Detaille, he watched the 
 sun creerp lower, lower, behind the arc de 
 1'Etoile, until it went out of sight,* and then, 
 turning, he marched back, drumming sturdily, 
 to warn all who lingered in the gardens that 
 the gates were about to close. 
 
 But they were not good for Little Tapin, those 
 hours of idleness at the portals of the palace. 
 It is the second busiest and most densely 
 thronged spot in Paris, this : first the place de 
 I'Opera, and then the place du Palais Royal. 
 And to Little Tapin's eyes, as he glanced up 
 and down the rue de Rivoli, the great city 
 seemed more careless, more cruel than ever, 
 and bit by bit the rebellious impulse born in 
 the dortoir grew stronger, more irresistible. 
 His Breton mind was slow to action, but, once 
 
LITTLE TAPIN 291 
 
 set in a direction, it was obstinacy itself. He 
 took no heed of consequences. If he realized 
 at any stage of his meditation what the out- 
 come of desertion must inevitably be, it was 
 only to put the thought resolutely from him. 
 Capture, court-martial, imprisonment, they 
 were only names to him. What was real was 
 that he should see Plougastel again, sit hand 
 in hand with Rosalie, and refind his comrades, 
 the wide, sunlit harbor, and the impatient 
 western wind, for which his heart was aching. 
 What was false 'and unbearable was longer ser- 
 vice in an army that he loathed. 
 
 He arranged the details of escape in his 
 mind, as he sat apart from his comrades of the 
 guard, fingering the drum-cords. An hour's 
 leave upon the morrow certainly the tam- 
 bour-major would grant him so much, if he 
 said it was to bid his sister good-by ; then, a 
 change from his detested uniform to a cheap 
 civile in the shop of some second-hand dealer 
 in the Gobelins quarter ; and, finally, a quick 
 dash to the gare Montparnasse, when he should 
 have learned the hour of his train, and so, 
 away to Finistere. It sounded extremely sim- 
 ple, as all such plans do, when the wish is fa- 
 
292 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 ther to the thought, and in his calculations he 
 went no further than Plougastel. After that, 
 one would see. So the long afternoon stole 
 past. 
 
 At seven o'clock the lieutenant of the guard 
 touched Little Tapin upon the shoulder, and, 
 more by instinct than actual perception, he 
 sprang to his feet and saluted. 
 
 "Voyons, mon petit," said the officer, not 
 unkindly. " It is time thou wast off. Thou 
 knowest thy duty eh ? There is no need of 
 instructions ? " 
 
 " Oh, ga me connait, mon lieutenant," an- 
 swered Little Tapin quaintly, and, presently, 
 he was striding away to his post, under the arc 
 de Triomphe, past the statues, and the flower- 
 beds, and the dancing fountains, across the 
 rue des Tuileries, and so into the wide, central 
 promenade of the gardens beyond. 
 
 The old woman who sold cakes, and reglisse, 
 and balloons to the children, was putting up 
 the shutters of her little booth as he passed, 
 and two others were piling wooden chairs in 
 ungainly pyramids under the trees, though the 
 gardens were still full of people, hurrying north 
 and south on the transverse paths leading to 
 
LITTLE TAPIN 293 
 
 the rue de Rivoli or to the quai and the pont 
 de Solfe'rino. But, curiously enough, the open 
 space around the western basin was almost de- 
 serted as Little Tapin took his position, facing 
 the great grille. 
 
 The mid-August afternoon had been oppres- 
 sively warm, and now a thin haze had risen 
 from the wet wood pavement of the place de 
 la Concorde, and hovered low, pink in the 
 light of the setting sun. Directly before Lit- 
 tle Tapin the obelisk raised its warning fin- 
 ger, and beyond, the Champs Elysees, thickly 
 dotted with carriages, and half veiled by great 
 splotches of ruddy-yellow dust, swept away in 
 a long, upward curve toward the distant arc de 
 TEtoile. 
 
 But of all this Little Tapin saw nothing. 
 He stood very still, with his back to the basin, 
 where the fat goldfish went to and fro like lazy 
 sentinels, on the watch for a possible belated 
 little boy, with a pocket full of crumbs. He 
 was still deep in his dream of Plougastel, so 
 deep that he could almost smell the salt breeze 
 rollicking in from the Goulet, and hear the 
 chapel bell sending the Angelus out over the 
 strawberry fields and the rock-dotted hillside. 
 
294 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 After a minute, something a teamster's 
 shout, or the snap of a cocher's whip roused 
 him, and he glanced around with the same half- 
 sensation of terror with which he had wakened 
 in the night to hear the guards shouting " Le 
 Mans ! " and " Chartres ! " Then the reality 
 came back to him with a rush, and he grumbled 
 to himself. Oh, it was all very well, the wonder- 
 ful French army, all very well if one could have 
 been a marshal or a general, or even a soldier 
 of the line in time of war. There was a chance 
 for glory, bon sang ! But to be a drummer 
 a drummer one metre seventy in height, with 
 flaming red hair and a freckled face a drum- 
 mer who was called Little Tapin ; and to have, 
 for one's most important duty, to drum the 
 loungers out of a public garden ! No, evi- 
 dently he would desert. 
 
 " But why ? " said a grave voice beside him. 
 
 Little Tapin was greatly startled. He had 
 not thought he was saying the words aloud. 
 And his fear increased when, on turning to see 
 who had spoken, he found himself looking into 
 the eyes of one who was evidently an officer, 
 though his uniform was unfamiliar. He was 
 plain-shaven and very short, almost as short, 
 
LITTLE TAPIN 295 
 
 indeed, as Little Tapin himself, but about him 
 there was a something of dignity and command 
 which could not fail of its effect. He wore a 
 great black hat like a gendarme's, but without 
 trimming, and a blue coat with a white plastron, 
 the tails lined with scarlet, and the sleeves 
 ending in red and white cuffs. White breeches, 
 and knee-boots carefully polished, completed 
 the uniform, and from over his right shoulder 
 a broad band of crimson silk was drawn 
 tightly across his breast. A short sword hung 
 straight at his hip, and on his left breast were 
 three orders on red ribbons, a great star, 
 with an eagle in the centre, backed by a sun- 
 burst studded with brilliants ; another eagle, 
 this one of white enamel, pendant from a jew- 
 eled crown, and a smaller star of enameled 
 white and green, similar to the large one. 
 
 Little Tapin had barely mastered these de- 
 tails when the other spoke again. 
 
 " Why art thou thinking to desert ? " he said. 
 
 " Monsieur is an officer ? " faltered the drum- 
 mer, "a general, perhaps. Pardon, but I do 
 not know the uniform." 
 
 " A corporal, simply a soldier of France, 
 like thyself. Be not afraid, my little one. All 
 
296 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 thou sayest shall be held in confidence. Tell 
 me thy difficulties." 
 
 His voice was very kind, the kindest Little 
 Tapin had heard in three long months, and 
 suddenly the barrier of his Breton reserve gave 
 and broke. The nervous strain had been too 
 great. He must have sympathy and advice 
 yes, even though it meant confiding in a stran- 
 ger and the possible discovery and failure of 
 his dearly cherished plans. 
 
 " A soldier of France ! " he exclaimed, im- 
 pulsively. " Ah, monsieur, there you have all 
 my difficulty. What a thing it is to be a sol- 
 dier of France ! And not even that, but a 
 drummer, a drummer who is called Little Ta- 
 pin because he is the smallest and weakest in 
 the corps. To be taken from home, from the 
 country he loves, from Brittany, and made to 
 serve among men who despise him, who laugh 
 at him, who avoid him in the hours of leave, 
 because he is not bon camarade. To wear a 
 uniform that has been already worn. To sleep 
 in a dormitory where there are betes funestes. 
 To have no friends. To know that he is not 
 to see Plougastel, and the sweetheart, and the 
 Little Mother for three years. Never to fight, 
 
LITTLE TAPIN 297 
 
 but, at best, to drum voyous out of a garden ! 
 That, monsieur, is what it is to be a soldier of 
 France ! " 
 
 There were tears in Little Tapin's eyes now, 
 but he was more angry than sad. The silence 
 of months was broken, and the hoarded re- 
 sentment and despair of his long martyrdom, 
 once given rein, were not to be checked a sec- 
 ond time. He threw back his narrow shoul- 
 ders defiantly, and said a hideous thing : 
 
 " Conspuez 1'armee franchise ! " 
 
 There was an instant's pause, and then the 
 other leaned forward, and with one white- 
 gloved hand touched Little Tapin on the eyes. 
 
 Before them a great plain, sloping very grad- 
 ually upward in all directions, like a vast, shal- 
 low amphitheatre, spread away in a long series 
 of low terraces to where, in the dim distance, 
 the peaks of a range of purple hills nicked and 
 notched a sky of palest turquoise. From where 
 they stood, upon a slight elevation, the details 
 of even the farthest slopes seemed singularly 
 clean-cut and distinct, the groups of grey 
 willows ; the poplars, standing stiffly in twos 
 and threes ; the short silver reaches of a little 
 
298 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 river, lying in the hollows where the land occa- 
 sionally dipped ; at long intervals, a white- 
 washed cottage, gleaming like a sail against 
 this sea of green ; even, on the most distant 
 swell of all, a herd of ruddy cattle, moving 
 slowly up toward the crest, each and all of 
 these, although in merest miniature, as clear 
 and vivid in form and color as if they had been 
 the careful creations of a Claude Lorrain. 
 
 Directly before the knoll upon which they 
 were stationed, a wide road, dazzling white in 
 the sunlight, swept in a superb full curve from 
 left to right, and on its further side the ground 
 was covered with close-cropped turf, and com- 
 pletely empty for a distance of two hundred 
 metres. But beyond ! Beyond, every hectare 
 of the great semicircle was occupied by dense 
 masses of cavalry, infantry, and artillery, regi- 
 ment upon regiment, division upon division, 
 corps upon corps, an innumerable multitude, 
 motionless, as if carved out of many-colored 
 marbles ! 
 
 In some curious, unaccountable fashion, Lit- 
 tle Tapin seemed to know all these by name. 
 There, to the left, were the chasseurs a pied, 
 their huge bearskins flecked with red and green 
 
LITTLE TAPIN 299 
 
 pompons, and their white cross-belts slashed 
 like capital X's against the blue of their tunics ; 
 there, beside them, the foot artillery, a long 
 row of metal collar plates, like dots of gold, 
 and gold trappings against dark blue ; to the 
 right, the Garde Royale Hollandaise, in bril- 
 liant crimson and white ; in the centre, the 
 infantry of the Guard, with tall, straight pom- 
 pons, red above white, and square black sha- 
 kos, trimmed with scarlet cord. 
 
 Close at hand, surrounding Little Tapin 
 and his companion, were the most brilliant 
 figures of the scene, and these, too, he seemed 
 to know by name. None was missing. Prince 
 Murat, in a cream-white uniform blazing with 
 gold embroidery, and with a scarlet ribbon 
 across his breast; a group of marshals, Ney, 
 Oudinot, Duroc, Macdonald, Augereau, and 
 Soult, with their yellow sashes, and cocked 
 hats laced with gold ; a score of generals, La- 
 rouche, Durosnel, Marmont, Letort, Henrion, 
 Chasteller, and the rest, with white instead of 
 gold upon their hats, clean-shaven, severe 
 of brow and lip-line, they stood without move- 
 ment, their gauntleted hands upon their sword- 
 hilts, gazing straight before them. 
 
300 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 Little Tapin drew a deep breath. 
 
 Suddenly from somewhere came a short, 
 sharp bugle" note, and instantly the air was full 
 of the sound of hoofs, and the ring of scab- 
 bards and stirrup-irons, and the wide white road 
 before them alive with flying cavalry. Squadron 
 after squadron, they thundered by : mounted 
 chasseurs, with pendants of orange-colored 
 cloth fluttering from their shakos, and plaits of 
 powdered hair bobbing at their cheeks ; Polish 
 light horse, with metal sunbursts gleaming on 
 their square-topped helmets, and crimson and 
 white pennons snapping in the wind at the 
 points of their lances ; Old Guard cavalry, 
 with curving helmets like Roman legionaries ; 
 Mamelukes, with full red trousers, white and 
 scarlet turbans, strange standards of horsehair 
 surmounted by the imperial eagle, brazen stir- 
 rups singularly fashioned, and horse trappings 
 of silver with flying crimson tassels ; Horse 
 Chasseurs of the Guard, in hussar tunics and 
 yellow breeches, their sabretaches swinging as 
 they rode : and Red Lancers, in gay uniforms 
 of green and scarlet. Like a whirlwind they 
 went past, each squadron, in turn, wheeling 
 to the left, and coming to a halt in the open 
 
LITTLE TAPIN 301 
 
 space beyond the road, until the last lancer 
 swept by. 
 
 A thick cloud of white dust, stirred into be- 
 ing by the flying horses, now hung between the 
 army and the knoll, and through this one saw 
 dimly the mounted band of the 2oth Chas- 
 seurs, on gray stallions, occupying the centre 
 of the line, and heard, what before had been 
 drowned by the thunder of hoofs, the strains 
 of " Partant pour la Syrie." 
 
 Slowly, slowly, the dust cloud thinned and 
 lifted, so slowly that it seemed as if it would 
 never wholly clear. But, on a sudden, a sharp 
 puff of wind sent it whirling off in arabesques 
 to the left, and the whole plain lay revealed. 
 
 " Bon Dieu ! " said Little Tapin. 
 
 The first rank of cavalry was stationed within 
 a metre of the further border of the road, the 
 line sweeping off to the left and right until de- 
 tails became indistinguishable. And beyond, 
 reaching away in a solid mass, the vast host 
 dwindled and dwindled, back to where the 
 ascending slopes were broken by the distant 
 willows and the reaches of the silver stream. 
 With snowy white of breeches and plastrons, 
 with lustre of scarlet velvet and gold lace, with 
 
302 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 sparkle of helmet and cuirass, and dull black 
 of bearskin and smoothly groomed flanks, the 
 army blazed and glowed in the golden sunlight 
 like a mosaic of a hundred thousand jewels. 
 Silent, expectant, the legions flashed crimson, 
 emerald, and sapphire, rolling away in broad 
 swells of light and color, motionless save for a 
 long, slow heave, as of the ocean, lying, vividly 
 iridescent, under the last rays of the setting 
 sun. Then, without warning, as if the touch 
 of a magician's wand had roused the multitude 
 to life, a myriad sabres swept twinkling from 
 their scabbards, and, by tens of thousands, the 
 guns of the infantry snapped with a sharp click 
 to a present arms. The bugles sounded all 
 along the line, the tricolors dipped until their 
 golden fringes almost swept the ground, the 
 troopers stood upright in their stirrups, their 
 heads thrown back, their bronzed faces turned 
 toward the knoll, their eyes blazing. And from 
 the farthest slopes inward, like thunder that 
 growls afar, and, coming nearer, swells into 
 unbearable volume, a hoarse cry ran down the 
 massed battalions and broke in a stupendous 
 roar upon the shuddering air, 
 " Vive 1'empereur ! " 
 
LITTLE TAPIN 303 
 
 Little Tapin rubbed his eyes. 
 
 " I am ill," he murmured. " I have been 
 faint. I seemed to see " 
 
 " Thou hast seen," said the voice of his 
 companion, very softly, very solemnly, " thou 
 hast seen simply what it is to be a soldier of 
 France ! " 
 
 His hand rested an instant on the drum- 
 mer's shoulder, with the ghost of a caress. 
 
 " My little one," he added, tenderly, " forget 
 not this. It matters nothing whether one is 
 Emperor of the French or the smallest drum- 
 mer of the corps, whom men call ' Little Ta- 
 pin.' I, too, was called * little J in the time 
 ' The Little Corporal ' they called me, from 
 Moscow to the Loire. But it is all the same. 
 Chief of the army, drummer of the corps, on 
 the field of battle, in the gardens of the Tuile- 
 ries, routing the Prussians, or drumming out 
 the voyous, it is all the same, my little one, 
 it is all the same. All that is necessary is to 
 understand to understand that it is all and 
 always for la belle France. Empire or repub- 
 lic, in peace or war what difference ? It is 
 still France, still the tricolor, still 1'armee fran- 
 
304 LITTLE TAPIN 
 
 He lifted his hat, and looked steadily up at 
 the sky, where the first stars were shouldering 
 their way into view. 
 
 "Vive la France ! " he added. And on his 
 lips the phrase was like a prayer. 
 
 Through the arc de PEtoile the fading sun- 
 set looked back, as upon something it was 
 loath to leave. Then Little Tapin flung back 
 his head. There was a strange, new light in 
 his eyes, and his breath came quickly, between 
 parted lips. Without a word he swung upon 
 his heels, slipped his drum into place, and 
 marched steadily away, beating the long roll. 
 Once, when he had gone a hundred metres, he 
 looked back. The figure of the Little Corpo- 
 ral was still standing beside the basin, but now 
 it was very thin and faint, like the dust clouds 
 on the Champs Elyse'es. But, as the little 
 drummer turned, it raised one hand to its fore- 
 head in salute. 
 
 Little Tapin stood motionless for an instant, 
 and then he smiled, and, through the deepen- 
 ing twilight 
 
 " Vive I'arme'e ! " he shouted, shrilly. " Vive 
 la France !"