Paul and His Dog, v.2 (Novels of Paul de Kock Volume XIV)

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Title: Paul and His Dog, v.2 (Novels of Paul de Kock Volume XIV)

Author: Paul de Kock

Release date: October 3, 2012 [eBook #40930]

Language: English

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Credits: Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PAUL AND HIS DOG, V.2 (NOVELS OF PAUL DE KOCK VOLUME XIV) ***

Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
produced from images available at The Internet Archive)

_PAUL AND THE CROSS IN THE RAVINE_

_They then saw the owner of the Tower on his knees beside a grassy mound
at one side of the road, in the centre of which stood a wooden cross._

NOVELS

Paul de Kock

VOLUME XIV

PAUL AND HIS DOG

VOL. II

PRINTED BY ARRANGEMENT WITH

[Illustration]

GEORGE BARRIE’S SONS

THE JEFFERSON PRESS

BOSTON NEW YORK

_Copyrighted, 1903-1904, by G. B. & Sons._

PAUL AND HIS DOG

PART II

THE CHAMOUREAUS

THE INSTINCT OF DOGS

“You have not told us yet, monsieur le docteur,” said Agathe, “how the
little fellow fell into the water. I fancy that he was not trying to
play a trick on himself?”

“Oh, no! mademoiselle; but still that accident happened to him as a
result of his evil disposition. In the first place, he did not fall into
the water--he went in himself. My young gentleman was pleased to bathe,
although it isn’t warm enough yet for bathing in the river; but he had
been forbidden to do it, and that was a sufficient reason for him to do
it. He had also been told, when he did bathe, not to go to that
particular part of the Marne, because, on account of the eddies and
currents, it was very dangerous and even the best swimmer might be
drowned.

“My little scamp, who is afraid of nothing, did not fail to go to that
spot to bathe, about three days ago. But when he tried to swim, he found
that he was being drawn under; his strength failed him and he shouted
for help. Ami happened to be passing--his master was not far away,
probably--and in two bounds the dog was in the water. He swam toward the
child, who was sinking, caught him by the hair and carried him to the
bank. The little fellow had nothing worse than a fright.”

“Of course he patted and fondled the dog, to thank him for the service
he had rendered him?”

“He? He called him a nasty beast and said: ‘You fool, to grab me by the
hair and make my head ache! you deserve to be licked!’ That was the
young gentleman’s gratitude!”

“Oh, dear! he certainly is a wicked little boy.”

“If my son had lived,” sighed Honorine, “I am sure he wouldn’t have been
naughty like that!”

“Probably not, madame; for children generally take after their father
and mother more or less, although there have been great criminals who
were born of most estimable parents. But you would have taken care of
your child, madame; you would have repressed his evil tendencies,
corrected his faults, early in life; and that is just what poor
Jacqueline could not do. The good woman, being obliged to work for her
living, could not keep her eye on the boy, who, no doubt, passed his
days in the village street with the other children, from the moment he
was able to walk. And here it is the same: Jacqueline works for her
sister, and little Emile does what he pleases, for there is no way of
keeping him in the house. Mère Tourniquoi undertook to make him go to
school,--but no; the rascal beat his schoolmates, laughed at his
teachers, played tricks on them, concealed or destroyed the
school-books--so that they turned him out of the school.”

“He’s a promising child!” cried Agathe; “still, I am curious to see
him.”

“And so am I,” said Honorine; “if only we might by gentle treatment and
reasoning bring him around to better sentiments!--for he will be a man
some day! There are too many people who enjoy doing evil; and it is
blameworthy to allow the number to increase!”

“What you say is very true, madame, but in truth I believe that you
would waste your time with the lost child; not that he is without
intelligence and doesn’t understand what is said to him;--oh! no,
indeed! On the contrary, the little rascal has plenty of wit, and he
often proves it by what he says; but it’s an evil kind of wit,
mischievous and wicked!”

“Oh! doctor, consider that he is not eight years old, so you told us!
One would think, to hear you talk, that you do not love children.”

“I do love them dearly until they are two years old; but very little
when they are growing up.”

“If this one has intelligence, there is still hope; only the
unintelligent are hopeless.”

“Ah! but what I love,” cried Agathe, “is that splendid dog, who throws
himself into the water as soon as he sees anyone in danger; that is
magnificent!”

“That is not at all extraordinary, mademoiselle, in a dog of that breed.
I do not mean to decry Ami’s merit, I acknowledge that it is very
great--although our acquaintance began in such strange fashion, as you
remember. I simply mean to say that history, both ancient and modern,
relates such astounding facts with respect to dogs that one would be
tempted to doubt them, if they did not come from authors deserving of
credit. Moreover, we ourselves constantly witness actions which do honor
to the canine race. I have read not a little--for one must do something
with one’s time, and in this small place my profession leaves me a great
deal of leisure. If I were not afraid of making myself a bore, I would
tell you some of these remarkable stories.”

“Far from boring us, it will interest us deeply; but you will allow us
to work while we listen.”

The doctor, having taken a pinch of snuff, bowed to the ladies, because
he thought that he was going to sneeze, and continued, with that
supremely happy expression which appears upon the faces of people who
are given to gossiping when they see that their listeners are profoundly
attentive:

“What I am about to tell you, mesdames, you know already, perhaps; for,
I say again, they are facts reported by historians or travellers; you
will please stop me if I tell what is familiar to you.

“In a history of the Indies, by Oviedo, I have read that a man who was
guilty of a heinous crime was abandoned to a dog who was accustomed to
eat the poor devils who were placed at his mercy. Well, the criminal
having thrown himself at the dog’s feet, praying for mercy, the beast
took pity on him and did him no injury. The authorities, believing that
they saw the hand of God in the incident, pardoned the culprit. To my
mind this is far more wonderful than the story of Androcles; for
Androcles had previously rendered the lion a service by removing a thorn
from his foot, and the king of beasts recognized his benefactor; whereas
the dog had never before seen the man who knelt at his feet. The learned
men of those days--who were men of merit too--declared that this miracle
was to be attributed to the power of the man’s eyes over those of the
dog; and this is the opinion of modern scholars as well; they attribute
to the human glance a mighty power of intimidation, let us rather say of
fascination, over all animals; and it is this power of the glance which
enables men to subdue the wildest horses; but I return to the dog.

“A tyrant of a small principality in Italy had a pack of hounds trained
to hunt men and regularly fed on human flesh. A child was tossed to this
pack and the dogs did not touch it. In this case it may have been that
the victim’s tender age awoke a secret compassion in their hearts. We
often have proofs that dogs are very fond of children; they display with
respect to them a gentleness and patience really extraordinary.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau saw a child bite a poodle until it yelped with
pain, and yet it did not manifest the slightest temper. The Genevan
philosopher, who claimed to be a friend of mankind, did not fail to draw
this conclusion: that dogs are superior to men.

“The dog displays unwavering attachment to his master; he understands
his wishes, knows his habits, always submits to his will: to serve him
is a necessity of his existence. In Siberia, during the summer, the dogs
are allowed to run wild, so that they may provide themselves with food.
No matter how much they may be overworked, brutally treated, beaten
even, they return to their masters none the less, at the approach of
winter, to be harnessed anew to the sledge and resume their laborious
service.

“In India there are the _pariah_ dogs, which have neither master, nor
friend, nor home. They try to attach themselves to strangers, they
exhaust every means of persuasion to induce them to adopt them. It often
happens that one of them will follow for a long distance the palanquin
of the traveller whose service he begs to enter, and he does not leave
it until he falls in his tracks, utterly exhausted.

“According to Cuvier, mankind made the most useful and complete of all
conquests when it domesticated the dog. ‘Without the dog,’ he says, ‘men
would have fallen victims to the wild beasts they have subdued.’ Other
animals surpass the dog in strength and beauty, but throughout the world
the dog alone is the ally of man, because his nature makes him
susceptible to man’s advances and obedient to his will. He is a
turncoat, who has deserted the ranks of our enemies and passed into our
camp, in order to aid us to become masters of the other animals.

“To obtain a just idea of the dog’s real worth, we must take note of the
value which savage races attach to him. In Australia, women have been
known to give the breast to puppies. I hasten to add that this has never
been seen in France, because the women here are not savages.

“Men in general are very fond of hunting; there are some men indeed who
cannot exist without it; hunting is the first instinct of the dog. In
unsettled countries they join in troops to hunt the buffalo, the wild
boar, and sometimes even the lion and the tiger.

“Pliny relates the anecdote of Alexander’s Albanian dog, who conquered a
lion and an elephant in succession, and whose tail, paws and ears were
cut off, one after another, without making him give the slightest
indication of pain.

“The terrier holds his own against beasts fifteen times as large as
himself; no matter how cruelly his adversary may tear him, he dies
without a groan. Few of the domesticated breeds possess courage and
contempt of pain in so high a degree.

“Nature develops in dogs faculties suited to the countries in which they
live. The dogs of the banks of the Nile drink while running, in order
not to fall into the jaws of the crocodile. The dogs of New Orleans,
when they wish to cross the Mississippi, stand barking on the bank to
attract the alligators; and when they feel sure that the reptiles have
all assembled at that point, they scamper away at the top of their speed
and jump into the stream half a mile farther up.

“Dogs have been known to resort to ingenious wiles to increase their
allowance of food; they scatter it all about, then pretend to sleep, in
order to attract birds and rats, which by this means they add to their
repast. As a proof of their intelligence, we are told of the setter who
went into partnership with a greyhound for the purpose of hunting; the
one having a keener scent, undertook to discover the game; the other,
fleeter of foot, to run it down. The owner of the setter conceived some
suspicion, and fastened a chain to his leg in order to make locomotion
difficult. As he continued his wandering life none the less, they
watched him, and soon discovered that his partner, the greyhound, in
order to make it easier for him to perform his part of the task, carried
the end of the chain in his mouth until it was time for himself to start
in chase of the game.

“One of the most difficult services which the dog is called upon to
perform is that of smuggler, in the contraband trade. In that dangerous
service, which is often fatal to him, he displays the most surprising
sagacity. He ordinarily sets out at night, laden with merchandise; he
scents the customs officer in the distance, and attacks him if he feels
that he can gain the victory; otherwise he hides behind a tree, a hedge,
a clump of bushes. And when he has reached his destination, he does not
show himself until he has made sure that he is in no danger of being
seen.

“Everybody is familiar with the intelligence and fidelity of the
shepherd dog; we see examples of it every day as we walk about the
country; but I cannot resist the temptation to mention one incident
related by James Hogg.

“Seven hundred lambs, in charge of a single shepherd, escaped one fine
summer night, divided into several bands, and scattered among the
valleys and fields and mountains. ‘Sirrah, my boy, my lambs have gone!’
said Hogg disconsolately to his dog, simply putting his thought into
words, with no idea of giving him an order. Then the shepherd went
hither and thither in search of his flock; while the dog disappeared,
without a sound, and without the knowledge of his master, who could see
nothing in the darkness. When the day broke, the poor shepherd,
exhausted by fatigue and distress, was preparing to return to the farm,
when he spied his faithful dog Sirrah, in a neighboring valley, guarding
not simply a few lambs that he had found, as one might have supposed at
first; but the whole flock, with not one missing. ‘That,’ says James
Hogg, ‘is the most amazing fact in my whole experience.’ --And, in truth,
how can we comprehend the patience, the sagacity and the labor which
enabled that dog, in the brief space of a summer night, to collect that
whole band of fugitives! It was more than several shepherds together
could have done.

“Hogg also relates how a sheep-stealer carried on his unlawful trade
with the help of his dog. The thief would pretend to want to buy some
sheep, and while he examined the flock, he would indicate to his dog, by
a sign which he never mistook, which ones he desired to appropriate.
During the night the dog would return alone, often from a considerable
distance, and would never fail to detach from the flock and drive to his
master the sheep he had designated, which were always the best and
fattest of the flock.

“If a sheepfold takes fire, the sheep refuse to go out, but the shepherd
dog saves a great part of them by rushing into the fold and barking and
snapping at them until he induces them to go out.

“In Turkey, where the dogs are very numerous, every person who meets one
at night is attacked unless he is provided with a lantern; for they look
upon him as a stranger with evil intentions.

“Petrarch had a dog that snatched a naked sword from the hand of a
cutthroat who attacked his master. We have many servants who would not
do as much!

“Plutarch relates an anecdote which proves that the dog never forgets
his master’s murderers and never forgives them: King Pyrrhus caused his
whole army to march past a dog who had watched for three months the body
of his murdered master, refusing to eat or drink; he seized the murderer
as he passed, and would not relax his hold until the man had confessed
his crime.

“You must surely have heard of the dog of Montargis, who pointed out the
place where his master had been buried, and jumped at the assassin
whenever he saw him; the result being that the king ordered a duel
between the man and the dog, in which the latter was the victor and slew
the murderer.

“In the memoirs of Benvenuto Cellini, we find this anecdote: A
malefactor had forced his way into the artist’s shop at night; the dog
that was on guard there tried at first to contend against him, although
he was armed with a dagger. Being wounded, and feeling that his strength
was failing him, he hastened to the apprentices’ room, found them
sleeping soundly, and, to rouse them, pulled off the bedclothes. As they
could not understand the dog’s persistence in uncovering them, they
drove him from the room and locked the door. Thereupon the poor dog,
wounded as he was, returned to the robber; but he, being young and
active, succeeded in making his escape. Some time after, Cellini
happened to be walking one day in Rome, when his faithful dog suddenly
darted at a fine gentleman who was passing, and clung savagely to him
despite the swords and staves of the bystanders. At last they succeeded
in forcing him to let go, but the fine gentleman, hurrying away, dropped
from beneath his cloak several valuable jewels, among which Benvenuto
recognized a ring belonging to him. He instantly cried out: ‘That is the
villain who broke into my house at night and robbed me; my dog
recognized him.’ --And he was about to set the animal on the robber
again, when he confessed his crime and begged for mercy.

“One of the most astounding and most mysterious faculties of the
dog--but not all dogs possess it--is that of divination. When the
regicide Jacques Clément appeared before Henri III, intending to
assassinate him, a favorite dog of the king flew into a perfect
paroxysm of rage, and only with the greatest difficulty could they
succeed in keeping him in an adjoining room; had they not done so, he
would have hurled himself upon the monk and the crime which the latter
meditated would not have been consummated.

“On September 10, 1419, the Duc de Bourgogne, Jean-sans-Peur, mounted
his horse in the courtyard of the house he occupied at Bray-sur-Seine,
to ride to the interview he was to have with the Dauphin of France at
the bridge of Montereau. His dog had howled piteously all night, and
when he saw that his master was about to start, he darted from the
kennel where he was fastened, with gleaming eyes and hair erect;
finally, when the duke, after a parting salutation to Madame de Gyac who
was looking on from her window, rode forth from the courtyard, the dog
made such a mighty effort that he broke his double iron chain, and as
the horse passed under the gateway, he threw himself at his chest and
bit him so cruelly that the beast reared and nearly unhorsed his rider.
The grooms tried to drive him away with whips, but the dog paid no heed
to the blows he received and threw himself again at the neck of the
duke’s horse. The duke, thinking that he was mad, seized a small battle
axe which he carried at his saddle-bow, and laid open his head; the dog
gave a yell and fell dying in the gateway, as if still forbidding his
master to go forth. The duke, with a sigh of regret, jumped his horse
over the faithful creature’s body and rode to the bridge of
Montereau--where he was assassinated.

“Lastly, they tell of an equally admirable and equally incomprehensible
act of an English bull dog, who followed his master to his bedroom one
night. The latter, who had never paid much attention to the dog, refused
to let him enter the bedroom; but the animal was so persistent in
begging to remain with him that he finally consented to allow him to
take up his quarters there. That same night, a servant stole into this
same bedroom, with the intention of killing his master and then robbing
him; but he was prevented by the faithful dog, who had insisted upon
doing sentry duty, and who saved his master’s life by seizing the
robber.

“These, mesdames, are a few of the anecdotes which I have collected
concerning the canine race and which show the exceptional claims of this
faithful animal. I will add that the fine dog belonging to the owner of
the Tower, for which mademoiselle feels such a strong liking, is,
according to his master,--he didn’t tell me so, but his old servant has
often heard him say it,--it seems, endowed with this faculty of divining
affection or hatred, of which I have just cited to you some
extraordinary proofs. Thus Ami, when in the presence of strangers,
divines their feeling for his master; he fawns on those who are inclined
to like him; he growls and grumbles at those who would rather do him an
injury than a good turn.

“You must agree, madame, that such a dog is exceedingly valuable; with
him it is impossible to be led astray by the manifestations of
affection we receive from a person; he unmasks false friends and
unfaithful or deceitful women. Many people would pay an exorbitant price
for such an animal, and in my opinion they would make a mistake, for it
would be very melancholy to know the truth always.”

Honorine and Agathe listened to the doctor with interest, so that he
went away well pleased with their society.

“Good!” exclaimed the girl when he had gone, “it isn’t a bore to listen
to him. Now I would like right well to meet the dog from the Tower and
see whether he will fawn on me as he did the other time.”

“For my part,” said Honorine, “I am curious to see this little boy, whom
they call the lost child.”

“And who is said to be so naughty.”

“Ah! my dear girl, we must forgive him much; his parents deserted him.”

A COW

Not long after this day of visits, on one of those lovely mornings which
invite one to wander about the country, the heat not being sufficient as
yet to make walking tiresome, the two friends, who had finished
breakfast at nine o’clock because they rose at six, took their straw
bonnets, threw light silk mantles over their shoulders, and having
instructed Poucette not to leave the house, started off in high spirits,
saying:

“We will walk in the direction of the Tower.”

Agathe remembered the road, which they had already taken once. On
leaving Chelles they crossed the railroad and followed the Gournay road
bordered by ditches full of water. That road was short; on turning to
the left they soon reached the bank of the Marne at the bridge where
there was a toll of one sou for each person. This charge, apparently
very trifling, made that part of the country very unfrequented; for the
peasant looks a long while before spending a sou--two, in fact, when one
is obliged to return; they preferred to take a route which was often
much longer, but which did not force them to put their hands into their
pockets.

The two friends crossed the bridge; since leaving Chelles they had not
met a living soul--not a peasant, not a carter, not an ass. The bridge,
which was long and solidly built, was also deserted. Nor was there a
sign of life on the Marne--not a boat, not a fisherman was to be seen.

But they had already observed that solitude the first time that they had
come in that direction; and now that the aspect of the country was
changed, the trees having renewed their foliage, the meadows their
verdure, the fields their grasses and flowers, the more solitary the
spot, the more inclined they were to admire all the majesty of nature,
all the beauties of creation.

“Why, we were misinformed as to having to pay to cross this bridge!”
said Agathe; “here we are at the end of it, and I see no one at all. Do
you suppose we are to toss the sou into the water; that would be
decidedly amusing.”

The words were hardly out of her mouth when a man suddenly appeared in
front of her. He came from a house at the left which belonged to a
beautiful estate called the Maison Blanche, of which this same man was
the concierge; to this function he added that of collector of tolls at
the bridge.

“Monsieur,” said Honorine, after paying her two sous, “which road must
we take to go to the estate called the Tower?”

“Pass through the village of Gournay, straight ahead, then turn to the
left.”

“Is it very far?”

“It’s close by. The village of Gournay’s so small that it don’t take
long to walk through it; then you take the road to Noisy-le-Grand.”

The two young women walked on, and soon found themselves in the village
square, where there was a pretty bourgeois house embellished with the
name of the Château Vert, probably because of the color of its blinds.

Next to it was a dealer in wines, the only one in the district; which
fact spoke well for the sobriety of the people.

Opposite was a little church and beside that a small cemetery. The
toll-gatherer was right: everything was diminutive in that place, which
had less than a hundred and thirty inhabitants.

The little square was shaded by noble trees which gave it a charm of its
own. Trees are not proud; they grow as well in a small village as on the
fashionable promenade of a city; ordinarily indeed they are finer in the
village; everything has its compensations.

Our travellers found some children on the square, who pointed out the
road to Noisy-le-Grand. As they walked in that direction the country
became more picturesque, less monotonous, and the ladies soon spied, on
a slight eminence, a very pretty house, flanked by a graceful turret
which overlooked the whole country.

“That is where Paul and his dog live!” cried Agathe.

“Hush, child!” said Honorine; “if that gentleman should happen to be
passing, and should hear you speak of him in that way, what would he
think of us?”

“Why, my dear love, I am simply repeating what they say at Chelles; how
do you want me to speak of him, since nobody knows him by any other
name? No matter, this estate of his makes a very fine appearance; it’s
like a château. Let us walk along this road--it will bring us nearer.”

As she spoke Agathe ran ahead. Honorine followed her, but more slowly.
They were then on rather a narrow road, shaded on one side by walnut
trees, and intersected by numerous paths.

Suddenly Agathe heard a shriek; recognizing her friend’s voice, she
turned and saw, about a hundred yards behind her, a cow coming from one
of the paths, at full speed, and rushing straight at Honorine, who had
an excessive fear of cows and dared not advance or retreat; she simply
stood where she was and shrieked.

Agathe instantly ran back, to try to protect her friend; but she was too
far away to reach her in advance of the cow, and the animal was within a
few feet of Honorine, when suddenly an enormous dog, rushing down from a
hill near by, arrived on the scene and jumped in front of the cow,
barking furiously as if to forbid her to take another step. Ami’s
frantic barking--for it was Ami who had come to their assistance--did in
fact terrify the cow; she stopped, turned tail and retreated by the path
by which she had come.

“Oh! thanks! thanks! good dog!” cried Agathe, who had been terribly
frightened for her friend, and who came up at that moment. But
Honorine’s fright had been so great that it had deprived her of
consciousness; she had fallen to the ground in a swoon.

“Oh! mon Dieu! she is unconscious! Honorine! dear love! come to
yourself! the danger is all over. She doesn’t hear me--she doesn’t open
her eyes! And no one near! How can I obtain help here?”

Ami walked about the unconscious woman, then gazed at Agathe, who was in
dire distress; he seemed to be trying to read in her eyes what she
wanted of him. Suddenly he bounded away and disappeared.

The girl knelt beside her companion, raised her head and rested it
against her breast, took her hands and called her name. But Honorine
did not recover consciousness, and Agathe, in despair, cast her eyes
over the deserted fields, crying:

“Mon Dieu! no one will come to our help!”

At that moment a small boy, poorly clad, with bare feet and hair waving
in the wind, appeared on a piece of rising ground from which he could
see the path.

Agathe saw him and called to him:

“Go and bring us some water, I beg you, my friend; call someone to come
and help me take care of my friend.”

The boy’s only reply was a sneering laugh; then he went away, leaping in
the air and crying:

“They’re afraid of the cow! that’s good! I’ll throw stones at the cow
again and make her run at folks.”

The small boy disappeared, but the girl’s wishes had been understood by
Ami; he ran where he knew that he would find his master, and by pulling
persistently at his jacket made him understand that it was urgently
necessary that he should go with him.

When Agathe was beginning to lose hope she saw the noble beast returning
toward her, while his eyes seemed to say:

“Help is coming!”

And his master was soon by his side.

“Oh! monsieur--I beg you--my dear friend has fainted!” cried Agathe.

Paul had already taken a phial from his pocket, and he held it to
Honorine’s nose, saying to the girl:

“It’s nothing; don’t be alarmed; your friend will come to herself in a
moment. What was the cause of this accident?”

“Fright; a cow came running straight toward my friend, who is terribly
afraid of them; and but for your good dog, who ran up and drove the cow
away, she would certainly have been wounded.”

“See, she is coming to herself.”

Honorine opened her eyes at that moment. The first person she saw was
Agathe, who was leaning over her and gazing anxiously into her face. The
young woman smiled as she muttered:

“I am an awful coward, am I not? But it isn’t my fault; I was so
frightened that----”

Honorine interrupted herself, for she had caught sight of Ami’s master,
who was standing a few steps away, regarding her attentively; he still
held in his hand the little phial he had used to restore her to
consciousness.

It was an easy matter for the two ladies to examine at their ease the
individual of whom they had heard so much; and the result of their
examination was not unfavorable to him; for although, when seen at a
distance, his bushy beard gave him a somewhat forbidding aspect, on
looking at him nearer at hand and at leisure, one saw that his features
were handsome and distinguished, that his eyes were not always fierce,
that his expression was neither threatening nor calculated to inspire
alarm.

Agathe, divining her friend’s amazement, made haste to say:

“This gentleman came to my assistance, for you didn’t come to
yourself--I did not know what to do--oh! I was very unhappy!”

“But that cow that was running at me--how did I escape being hurt?”

“Because this good old dog here ran up to defend you, threw himself in
front of her and barked and jumped at her nose! Oh! it was magnificent!
And then, after putting the cow to flight, he ran to fetch his master to
help me bring you to yourself.--Oh! how fine that was, Ami! Come, come
here and let me embrace you!”

The girl put her arms about the dog’s neck and patted and caressed him;
he submitted with a very good grace, wagging his tail, and looking at
his master from time to time, as if to inform him that he already knew
the two ladies.

Honorine rose and bowed gracefully to the owner of the Tower, saying:

“Pray accept all my thanks, monsieur, and excuse me for having disturbed
you in your walk.”

“You owe me no thanks, madame; it is a duty to make oneself of use when
one has the opportunity. You do not need this phial any more?”

“No, monsieur, I feel much better; but--this is very strange--I don’t
know whether it is the result of my fright, but I seem to have no legs,
they give way under me; I feel as if I were going to fall.”

“Well! that would be nice!” cried Agathe, doing her utmost to support
her companion. “What are we to do if you can’t walk? There are no cabs
or omnibuses here, and we are quite a long way from home.”

Ami’s master, who, after offering his flask, had started to walk away,
stopped when he discovered the embarrassment of the two friends. He
realized that they still needed him, but it was evident that he
hesitated, that it was hard for him not to be guided by his ordinary
instinct of aloofness. But Agathe, without speaking, looked at him with
an almost imploring expression, and her eyes expressed her thought so
fully that Paul walked back toward them, murmuring:

“If I can be of any further use to you--take my arm, madame; lean on it
without fear, and I will help you to walk.”

“Oh! you are too kind, monsieur! I am afraid of abusing----”

“No, no, take monsieur’s arm, since he is kind enough to offer it,”
cried Agathe; “for if you had only mine to support you, we might both
fall by the way; it is a long way from here to Chelles.”

Honorine decided to put her arm through the arm which their new
acquaintance offered her. Agathe supported her friend on the other side,
and they started.

“Where were you ladies going when the cow frightened you?”

“We will return to Chelles, monsieur, if you please. When we came out
this morning, we had no definite destination; we just set out for a
walk.--That is to say,” continued Agathe, “we came this way in order to
see the estate of the Tower, of which we have heard a great deal since
we came to Chelles.”

Honorine nudged her friend, to bid her keep silent, but Agathe paid no
heed.

“We had just caught sight of it as we turned into that road; and as it
seemed to us very pretty at a distance, we were going nearer in order to
see it at closer quarters. We did not expect to make the acquaintance of
its owner,--for monsieur is the owner of the Tower, I believe?”

“Yes, mademoiselle,” replied Ami’s master curtly, while Honorine nudged
her friend again to make her keep silent; but she continued to pay no
heed to the admonition.

“Oh! I recognized monsieur at once; we met him one day when we were
looking for a certain field. It was then that your dog came to me and
made advances. He doesn’t do that to everybody, does he, monsieur?”

“Assuredly not, mademoiselle. He is not lavish of his friendship! And he
has one great advantage over men, in that he never gives it except to
those who deserve it.”

“Then I ought to be proud of his friendship for me. Oh! you splendid
dog! you good old dog! Look, Honorine; see how he walks around us, and
how pleased he looks!”

It was a fact that Ami kept circling about the three persons who were
walking along arm-in-arm. Sometimes he darted ahead, but he very soon
returned, looked up in his master’s face with a joyous yelp or two,
then made the circuit of the little group anew, as if to make sure that
they had not separated.

This pantomime on Ami’s part did not escape his master, whose face,
which wore an expression of annoyance when he first offered his arm to
Honorine, began to be less severe.

Honorine, who still felt very weak, was forced to lean heavily on the
arm of her escort, and she apologized therefor:

“I beg pardon, monsieur,” she murmured; “I am tiring you, I am obliged
to lean so heavily on you. But I am not very strong, and the slightest
shock is enough to make me ill.”

“Lean on me, madame; it does not tire me in the least.”

“We have had bad luck for our first walk; do you often meet cows alone
in the fields?”

“Very rarely, madame; and I am much surprised that that cow, which
probably belongs to a good woman who lives near me, should have escaped
and attacked you, for I know that she is not vicious; she must herself
have been attacked or irritated by some one, to behave so.”

“Oh! wait, monsieur,” cried Agathe; “I remember now; while my dear
friend was unconscious, and I was looking all about and calling for
help, a little boy seven or eight years old appeared on a mound near by;
he stared at me and laughed, and when I asked him to go for help, he
laughed louder and sneered at me and made faces; then he ran away,
jumping about and crying:

“‘That’s good! I like that!’ ”

“All is explained then, madame; that little boy probably played some
cruel trick on the cow, which thereupon fled from the pasture where she
was peacefully grazing.”

“Oh! that was very naughty of the little fellow!”

“Mon Dieu!” said Honorine, “I wonder if it was the child whom they call
at Chelles the lost child?”

“Yes, madame, it was he undoubtedly. I saw him prowling about in the
direction of Noisy-le-Grand. I am not surprised to find that he has been
up to some mischief.”

“Why, in that case, the boy must be naturally perverse,” said Agathe;
“is there no way of reforming him?”

“I have tried, without success; he defies punishment, he is insensible
to entreaties; he has a most intractable disposition. If age and common
sense do not change him, he will be a detestable man.”

While conversing thus they had reached Chelles, and as they entered the
village they met Monsieur and Madame Droguet, accompanied by Monsieur
Luminot and Doctor Antoine, who were going for a walk in the country.
When she espied the new sojourners at Chelles arm-in-arm with the owner
of the Tower, Madame Droguet nearly fell backward; she stepped on the
feet of Monsieur Luminot, her escort, saying:

“Great heaven! just look! what does this mean?”

On his side the former dealer in wines dug his elbow into Monsieur
Droguet’s ribs.

“On my word!” he exclaimed; “will you look! this is surprising!”

Thereupon Monsieur Droguet, always ready to dance, made a pirouette
which brought him nose to nose with the doctor, crying:

“What is it that’s so surprising? what’s the matter? why did Luminot say
that?”

As for the doctor, having no one to attack, he contented himself with
bowing to Honorine and Agathe, although his face betrayed the surprise
he felt at meeting them in the company of Paul and his dog.

Monsieur Luminot also bowed. Père Droguet was on the point of following
their example, but his wife suddenly caught his arm.

“Well, monsieur, what are you going to do?” she demanded; “can you think
of such a thing as bowing to people who have never been to call on me
since they have lived in the neighborhood? It’s very uncivil of them! I
have a very poor opinion of those women; and they’re hardly settled here
before they go about with that ill-licked cub, that Monsieur Paul who
also has treated us all very rudely! That was all that was necessary to
confirm my opinion concerning those women. Let us go on, messieurs;
forward, march! You see, that wretched fellow didn’t even bow to us.”

“The ladies bowed,” said Monsieur Luminot.

“Because you bowed first; it would have been very pretty if they hadn’t
returned your bow! Come, Monsieur Luminot, let us go on, I beg; do you
propose to remain in admiring contemplation before the skirts of those
ladies?”

And Madame Droguet, having given her husband a push to make him go
forward, dragged Monsieur Luminot and the doctor away, and almost made
them run.

“Oh! what a strange woman!” cried Agathe with a laugh; “what eyes she
made at us! Did you see, Honorine? One would say she wanted to turn us
to stone.”

“Doubtless that is Madame Droguet, whom Doctor Antoine has often
mentioned to us.”

“And that little slim man who stands on one leg when he looks at you is
probably her husband.”

When the ladies reached their house, Honorine took her arm from her
escort’s, saying:

“This is our modest abode; would you not like to come in a moment and
rest, monsieur? I must have fatigued you terribly.”

“I thank you, madame,” Paul replied, bowing, “but I will continue my
walk.”

“Oh! do come in a moment, monsieur,” said Agathe; “see, your good dog
seems to invite you; he has already gone in.”

Paul’s only reply was to call his dog which quickly returned to his
side; then he hurried away, after saluting the ladies.

“What a strange man!” murmured Honorine.

“All the same, my dear love, we were very lucky to meet him; and he
doesn’t frighten me at all now. Do you still think that he has a
terrifying look?”

“No, oh, no! but he went away very abruptly.”

III

THE EFFECTS OF MUSIC AND OF A MATELOTE

It was a magnificent morning and the clock had just struck nine, when
Edmond Didier appeared, very carefully dressed, at his friend
Freluchon’s, who had just left his bed.

“What, you lazy fellow! not dressed yet! And it’s nine o’clock, and the
weather is superb, and the first days of June are the finest of the
whole year!”

“Bah! what do I care for all that? It matters little to me what time it
is. I rise late because I sat up very late. A little egg-supper, with
some very interesting ladies from the Folies-Dramatiques. Artistes, you
see--they are the only really agreeable women!”

“You exaggerate, Freluchon, my dear fellow! We have artistes also who
put on airs and are forever posing in company.”

“To them we say _zut!_--dramatic style.--But how fine you are this
morning! Have you something on hand for to-day?”

“Certainly; this is the day that we are going to Chelles, to see those
ladies I spoke to you about.”

“_We are going_ is very pretty! you are going, perhaps--that’s all
right. But why should I, who don’t know the ladies in question--why
should I go with you?”

“Because it’s somewhere to go; it will give you a chance to see that
part of the suburbs of Paris, which is very beautiful. We will dine
there; we will have a _matelote;_ Gournay is famous for them and it’s
close by.”

“That’s an inducement; I am passionately fond of _matelote._ In Parisian
restaurants it’s execrable, as a general rule; you can’t get a good one
unless you are right on the water.”

“While I go to call on the ladies, you can find out the best restaurant
and order the dinner.”

“The best place to get a _matelote_ is ordinarily the house of some
fisherman who sells wine.”

“Oh! Freluchon, if you knew with what pleasure I shall see the lovely
Agathe again! Her name is Agathe----”

“So you told me.”

“She has dark-blue eyes with such a sweet, amiable expression; a
slender, graceful figure; perfect grace in every movement----”

“Like a cat.”

“Come, dress quickly, and we will go to the Strasbourg station.”

“Are we going to Strasbourg first? That will be the longest way.”

“Pshaw! if you began to talk nonsense!----”

“I hope to continue.--Well, if it must be, I proceed to sacrifice
myself. After all, a day in the country will do me good, and I shall not
be sorry to form a little acquaintance with some rustic beauty. A woman
of nature--that will be a novelty; for the stage is very far from
nature.--Speaking of nature, do you know what has happened to
Chamoureau?”

“I have heard that he has made a fortune--or inherited one; twenty
thousand francs a year; is it true?”

“Quite true; and, what is even truer, since he became rich, he doesn’t
speak to his old friends. He hardly looks at me--at me, whom he never
used to quit! He puts on the airs of a great noble! As you can imagine,
it amuses me beyond words; and so, not long ago, I said to him in the
foyer at the Opéra, where he seemed to be in deadly terror that I would
take his arm:

“‘My poor Chamoureau, how is it that, in becoming rich, you have become
a bigger fool than you were? I assure you that wealth doesn’t require a
man to be insolent; I know that it often makes them so, but there’s no
obligation about it.’

“Chamoureau stood there like an utter idiot; he mumbled a lot of words
that had no sort of connection with one another, and ended by saying
that it was proper for him to adopt a different demeanor, as he was
going to be married.”

“Aha! he is going to be married! and to whom?”

“Can’t you guess?”

“Some wealthy retired groceress?”

“No, no! he would do much better to marry a groceress. The drivelling
idiot! he is going to marry the lovely brunette, Madame Sainte-Suzanne.”

“Thélénie! is it possible?”

“It’s a fact; he told me under the seal of secrecy; he tells
everybody--under the same seal.”

“But it was your duty to impress it upon him that he is doing an insane
thing, that this marriage will make him very unhappy, that all the men
with any good looks in Paris have known Madame Sainte-Suzanne
intimately.”

“I was careful to do nothing of the kind; he would have believed that I
said it from envy, from spite; and then, d’ye see, I am not sorry to see
him do this crazy thing. If Chamoureau were a good fellow, if he had
shown himself in prosperity a man of heart, devoted to his friends, then
I would have done my utmost to prevent him from tying himself to that
lady. But as he did nothing of the kind, as he is nothing better than an
ass, a selfish fool overflowing with vanity, who pretended to mourn for
his wife in order to make himself interesting, why, let him roll in the
muck, let him swallow with his eyes closed all the lies his lovely
Thélénie tells him; let him roll there till he falls into a ditch, into
which that lady will not fail to push him! it will be a good thing!
There’s no harm done if fools are punished from time to time. I never
pity the discomfiture of those people who are insolent in
prosperity.--Now I am ready; let us go; that is to say, let us go to the
Café Anglais to breakfast--just a cutlet; I shall save myself for the
_matelote_--and then to the station.”

The two friends breakfasted together. But Edmond gave Freluchon hardly
time to eat; he said to him every minute:

“Let us go; you have eaten enough; if you eat any more, you won’t do
honor to the _matelote_.”

“I assure you that I shall; the journey, you know, and the country air;
and then we shall not dine as soon as we arrive.--Garçon! a cup of
chocolate.”

“Great heaven! he is going to drink chocolate too! Why, it will make you
ill!”

“On the contrary, it will do me good; it’s a habit which I learned from
a little Spanish dancer, who danced the _yota_, _bolera_, et cetera, at
the Folies-Nouvelles, and who quivered so when she looked at her feet.
Ah! my dear fellow, such a quivering!”

“That is no reason for drinking chocolate! I have known English women,
but I don’t eat plum-pudding!”

“Well! you make a mistake; you should always adopt the tastes of your
lady friends; then you end by eating everything.”

At last Edmond succeeded in dragging Freluchon from the café; but the
little man, as a precautionary measure, put in his pocket the rolls that
he had not had time to eat. They arrived at the station, only to find
that they had three-quarters of an hour to wait for the train.

“You see, I should have had plenty of time to soak my rolls in my
chocolate!” cried Freluchon as they paced the floor of the waiting
room. “Oh! these lovers! how unpleasant they are at table!--I say! they
sell cake here; I am going to fill my pockets in case of accidents.--If
this fellow Edmond were only amiable! I do whatever he wants, I follow
him to a place where I don’t know a cat, and he doesn’t say a word, he
looks as dismal as a night cap! Are you going to be like this all the
way to Chelles?”

“Oh! Freluchon, if you knew what I feel when I think that I am going to
see that fascinating girl again! It seems to me that when I am with her,
I shall not dare to say a word.”

“Well! that will be lovely! You will give them a very pretty idea of
your intelligence!”

“A man ceases to have any when he is in love!”

“In that case, I have an excellent reason for never falling in love.
_Fichtre!_ I don’t propose to lose my intelligence; it’s a thing that
can’t be replaced.”

“Do you think she’ll be glad to see me?”

“What a question! It’s as if you should ask me if I know how many times
I blew my nose yesterday.”

“If they should receive me coldly--with that frigid courtesy that means:
‘Monsieur, you are welcome this once--it’s all right--but you will
gratify us by not coming again’ ----”

“Why, you would say to them: ‘Mesdames, you will be the losers; I
improve rapidly on acquaintance’ ----”

“Ah! there’s the bell, the signal for the train; let’s hurry.”

“Hurry! what an extraordinary man! What’s the use of hurrying? there’s
always room in the cars; as the saying goes: ‘When there’s no more room,
there is still some.’ ”

The two friends took their seats, and the train started. Freluchon
scrutinized their travelling companions. Two elderly women, a child, and
three men, two of whom instantly began to smoke, in the teeth of the
regulations, deeming it perfectly natural to gratify a brutish taste at
the risk of setting the carriage on fire and roasting a considerable
number of travellers. What vile cads such people are!

Freluchon admired the landscape, as much as one can admire it from a
railway train. The country was very pretty through Raincy; but Edmond
looked at nothing, saw nothing. Whenever the train stopped, he wanted to
alight, thinking that they had arrived; Freluchon was obliged to hold
him back by the coat, saying:

“We are not at Chelles; do you mean to go the rest of the way on foot?”

At last they reached the Chelles station. The two friends alighted and
Edmond asked a peasant woman:

“Which way to Chelles, if you please?”

“To your left, up the hill.”

“And the _matelote_ country, madame?” asked Freluchon.

“To your right, monsieur; follow the main road, take the first road to
the left, cross the bridge, and you’re in Gournay.”

“Infinitely obliged. I will go in that direction, Edmond, while you go
to Chelles; you will find me at the best restaurant, cabaret or
grill-room in Gournay. It is now one o’clock; I trust that I shall see
you again by four; three hours to pay your respects is a very generous
allowance. I am going to try to find a shepherdess of the Florian type;
if it come to the worst I will be content with a bather of the Courbet
type.--Bah! he isn’t listening; he’s already on his way; he continues to
be amiable!”

Agathe was at the piano, singing and accompanying herself. Honorine,
seated by the window, was working at embroidery, glancing frequently in
the direction of the Tower.

Several days had passed since the adventure of the cow; they had seen
neither Paul nor his dog, and Madame Dalmont had just observed:

“I am sure that that gentleman was sorely annoyed to be obliged to walk
home with us; that was why he ran away without listening, I think, to my
invitation to him to rest a moment.”

“Why, yes, he did listen, because he answered: ‘I must continue my
walk.’ --Ah! the dog is more agreeable than his master!”

And the two friends had relapsed into silence.

Poucette entered the salon.

“Mesdames, here’s a fine young man who wants to know if he can have the
honor of seeing you.”

“A young man--did he give his name?”

“Monsieur Edmond Didier.”

“Edmond Didier! Oh! my dear friend, that’s the young man, who--the young
man, who--you know--who took so much trouble to help you to buy this
house.”

“Yes, yes; I remember very well; but that’s no reason why you should
blush so. Why, you are all confused. Come, come, Agathe, control
yourself.--Show the gentleman in, Poucette.”

“Oh! my dear love, does my hair look nice? I didn’t have time to braid
it this morning.”

“You look very sweet. But do sit still, don’t jump about on your chair
like that; this young man will think that you have nervous spasms.”

“O Honorine! how unkind you are!”

Edmond’s appearance put an end to this conversation. He entered the room
very modestly, apologizing for his presumption. One is generally well
received when one displays some fear of coming inopportunely. The young
man’s courteous, gentlemanly demeanor and his reserved manners
prepossessed Honorine in his favor. As for Agathe, the flush that
overspread her cheeks, her confusion, her eyes, which she was afraid to
turn upon the new arrival, demonstrated clearly enough that his presence
caused her the most intense emotion; and her voice was almost inaudible
when she replied to Edmond’s greeting and inquiry for her health.

But when the first awkward moment had passed, the young man, reassured
by the cordial welcome he had received, became amiable and sprightly,
recovered his spirits, and his conversation soon afforded much
amusement to the ladies, to whom he gave all the news of Paris. Then he
spoke enthusiastically of the house, the situation, the outlook.

“We also have a very pretty garden,” murmured Agathe.

“If I were not afraid of being presumptuous, I would ask to see it.”

“With pleasure, monsieur; landed proprietors, you know, are always
flattered to exhibit their property; and it should be more excusable in
us than in others, we have been landed proprietors such a short time!”

They walked in the garden, which the young man found charming, as he did
the whole house. Agathe began to be less embarrassed, she recovered her
gayety, laughed at the slightest provocation, and, when she did so,
disclosed such fresh red lips and such pretty teeth that it would have
been a pity for her not to laugh, in very truth.

“It is very good of you, monsieur,” said Honorine, “to remember your
promise and to think of coming to see us. But perhaps you know someone
at Chelles?”

“No, madame, absolutely no one. The desire to present my respects to you
was quite sufficient to bring me here; furthermore, I was anxious to
know if you were satisfied with your purchase.”

“Yes, monsieur, very well satisfied. Agathe and I like this neighborhood
very much.”

“Have you plenty of society?”

“We might have, if we wanted it; but we do not seek it; society is often
a nuisance in the country. We have a call now and then from the local
doctor, an old man and rather pleasant. I think that we shall go no
farther; what we have seen has given us no desire to join in the
festivities of our neighbors, has it, Agathe?”

“Oh! no, indeed! tiresome eccentricities--perfectly intolerable with
their chatter, in which there is never an interesting word. It’s so
amusing to listen to that! What a difference when one is with people
who--whom we like! then the time passes so quickly!”

“Yes, indeed; too quickly, in fact; for I fear that I presume too far,
that I incommode you by prolonging my call.”

“Oh! no, monsieur, our time is entirely at our disposal; and if there is
no necessity for your hurrying back to Paris----”

“Not in the least, madame; I too am master of my time--too much so,
indeed.”

“Have you no business?”

“Pardon me, I trade on the Bourse. I am thinking seriously about earning
money.”

During this dialogue between Edmond and Honorine, Agathe frequently
glanced at her friend, and her eyes seemed to say:

“Well! do you propose to let this young man go away like this? Aren’t
you going to invite him to dine with us? He was so courteous to us in
Paris; he certainly deserves to have us pay him that compliment.”

Honorine understood Agathe’s pantomime perfectly, but she was amused by
her impatience. However, when Edmond again spoke of going, she said:

“If you are in no hurry to return to Paris, monsieur, stay and dine with
us; you will have a very simple dinner, but we shall enjoy your company
longer.”

“Really, madame,” stammered Edmond, bowing in acknowledgment of the
invitation, “your invitation causes me so much pleasure--it is very bold
of me to accept--and yet I haven’t courage enough to refuse.”

“Oh! then you will stay!” cried Agathe, jumping for joy; then, ashamed
of having allowed the pleasure she felt to appear, she ran away, saying:

“I am going to see if the hens have laid any eggs.”

Edmond was on the point of calling after her: “Oh! mademoiselle, don’t
make them lay for me!” for no one is so likely as a bright man to say
foolish things, when he is in love. However, he caught himself in time,
and Honorine said to him:

“You will permit us to forego ceremony, won’t you?”

“It is a sign of friendship, madame.”

“Very well; I will leave you and finish my toilet. Meanwhile, will you
walk, or will you go back to the salon? You are musical, I believe; you
can play on the piano; in short, make yourself quite at home.”

“Thanks, madame, thanks a thousand times.”

Honorine retired to the house; Edmond, left alone in the garden,
strolled about there for some time, then entered the summer-house and
sat down.

“She comes here to work,” he thought; “it is here she sits--she said so
just now. Sweet girl! she blushes when I glance at her; and then she
lowers her eyes; she seems moved, perturbed. Oh! if she might love me!”

And the young lover, absorbed by his thoughts, leaned against the window
and looked out into the country. But he looked without seeing, his mind
was busy with Agathe alone.

Suddenly he remembered Freluchon, whom he had almost forced to take the
trip with him; who must be waiting for him now, to eat _matelote_, and
who would be furious if he did not join him.

“Faith! I can’t help it,” thought Edmond; “he can be angry, if he
chooses, but I can’t decline the invitation of these ladies, and deprive
myself of the happiness of passing the day with the girl I adore. No,
indeed! and Freluchon, in my place, would do the same. Besides, between
friends there ought to be no formality.”

Agathe did not appear. Hoping to find her in the salon, Edmond went
there; but the ladies had not finished dressing. The young man took his
seat at the piano, turned over the leaves of several songs, then yielded
to the temptation to sing. Edmond sang very well; his voice was sweet
and well modulated, and he had in addition taste and expression, which
constitute the greatest charm of every person who sings; moreover, he
accentuated the words perfectly; when he sang you did not lose a
syllable; and it is so uninteresting to listen and not understand!

The lovely song called the _Val d’Andore_ was on the piano. Whether it
was that the thought that he was at Agathe’s piano, or his pleasure in
knowing that he was near her, had augmented his powers, certain it is
that the young man had never sung so well, that his voice had never been
so sweet and pure. And the two friends, who, after completing their
toilet, had returned to the salon, stood at the door to listen, and did
not move a muscle for fear of losing a word.

But Agathe flushed and turned pale alternately as she listened to that
melodious voice, which went to her very heart.

“Oh! how beautifully he sings!” she whispered; “oh! my dear! what a
voice!”

“Hush!”

Agathe was silent; but a moment later two great tears rolled down her
cheeks. Honorine saw them and touched the girl’s arm.

“Upon my word!” she whispered, “you are crying now. What does this
mean?”

“I don’t know, my dear friend! I don’t know what the matter is; but I am
very happy!”

“Will you be kind enough to wipe your eyes and not show how susceptible
you are to music. Really, I am almost sorry that we invited this young
man to dinner.”

“Oh! it’s all over, my dear; it’s all over; it won’t happen again.”

Edmond having ceased to sing, the two young women entered the salon.

“You sing very well, monsieur,” said Honorine; while Agathe, still all
a-quiver from the effect that Edmond’s voice had produced upon her,
stood apart and dared not trust herself to speak.

“What, mesdames, were you listening to me? If I had known that, I should
not have dared to sing.”

“You would have been very foolish, and we hope, on the contrary, that
you will continue, although you know that we are here.”

“If it will give you any pleasure, madame, I will do whatever you
command. But may I not hear you and mademoiselle, also?”

“Oh, yes! monsieur, we will both sing; and as I have not enough talent
to require urging, I will begin.”

Honorine seated herself at the piano. She had not much voice, but she
put so much expression into the words she sang that one never tired of
hearing her.

Next it was Agathe’s turn; she faltered, forgot words and air, confused
one song with another, and sang very badly because she longed to sing
better than usual.

“Do not judge her by this hearing,” said Honorine; “really, she is not
in voice to-day.”

“I am hoarse!” murmured Agathe with a pout, as she left the piano.

Edmond sang again, and his sympathetic voice delighted the two friends
so much that they listened too intently to hear Poucette, who stood in
the doorway shouting that dinner was served. However, the young
peasant’s loud voice succeeded at last in making itself heard. They
left the piano and went down into the garden, where the table was laid
under an arbor. To dine in the open air is one of the great joys of life
in the country; and to those sybarites who fear that they may not have
everything necessary to their comfort, who make a wry face if a leaf
falls on their plate, if a maybug buzzes about their ears, I would say:

You do not know that the sense of well-being which one feels on
breathing the pure country air always sharpens the appetite.

The dinner passed off very merrily.

Edmond was agreeable, Honorine witty, and Agathe happy. Everybody was
content.

From time to time Edmond exclaimed:

“How lovely it is to live in the country! I think I must hire a little
room in the neighborhood, for the summer; it would do me a great deal of
good.”

“Is your health poor, monsieur?” asked Honorine in a slightly sarcastic
tone, for the young man had done ample justice to the dinner.

“I am not ill as yet, madame; but my lungs are weak, very weak.”

“Why, that is strange; one would not think it, to hear you sing.”

“I assure you that a doctor, a friend of mine, tells me that the country
air would do me no end of good.”

“Indeed, I believe that it can never injure anyone.”

“If I could find a small furnished apartment in this vicinity--a
bachelor requires so little!”

“Oh! you can find that!” exclaimed Agathe; “it seems to me I have seen
signs on the main street. It would be very nice to have you for a
neighbor!”

“It is I, mademoiselle, whom it would make very happy.”

Honorine nudged her young friend with her knee, to urge her to be less
expansive; whereupon Agathe made a funny little face and held her peace
until some new outburst escaped her.

The girl was not as yet accustomed to society, and she said frankly just
what she thought; which people are very careful not to do in
society--and with good reason.

The music had delayed the dinner, and they were still talking around the
table in the garden long after it had grown dark. Suddenly Poucette ran
toward them with a terrified air, and said to the young man:

“Monsieur, your name’s Edmond Didier, isn’t it?”

“Yes--why?”

“Because there’s a young gentleman running all about the neighborhood,
shouting at the top of his lungs:

“‘Edmond Didier, where are you? if you are not killed or eaten, answer
me! I am waiting for you! I am waiting for you! I am waiting for you!’ ”

“What does this mean?” demanded Honorine, while Edmond hung his head and
stammered in dire confusion:

“Mon Dieu, mesdames, I beg your pardon most humbly; I remember now that
I came here with a friend of mine.”

“And you have not thought of him since morning! Oh! the poor fellow!”

“Do not pity him, madame; I arranged to meet him at Gournay, to eat a
_matelote_; but it gave me so much pleasure to remain with you----”

“That you left your friend to his own devices.”

“He will have eaten his _matelote_ without me--that’s all.”

“But you see that he is anxious about you, since he is rushing about the
country calling you.--Try to overtake this gentleman, Poucette, and
bring him back with you; tell him that the person he is looking for is
here.”

“Very well, madame. I’ll find him; he’s yelling loud enough, so that you
can hear him a long way.”

“Really, madame, I abuse your good nature. To compel you to receive my
friend----”

“Is he not presentable?”

“I beg pardon; he’s a very good fellow,--a little free-and-easy,--I
mean, a little eccentric; he is very well circumstanced, he has a
handsome fortune----”

“That is a matter of indifference to us; but it seems that he must be
very fond of you, to look for you so energetically.”

“Oh! that’s because he doesn’t want to go back alone.”

At that moment Poucette returned with Freluchon, who, as soon as he
caught sight of Edmond, exclaimed:

“Ah! so this is the way you treat your friends; and it was to make me
pass a day like Robinson Crusoe, in a horrible place where one doesn’t
see a living being, that you brought me into the country with you!”

“Freluchon!--don’t you see these ladies?”

“Oh! I beg pardon, mesdames; but really that is no way to act; I leave
it to these ladies--let them say whether I did wrong to cry
aloud.--Imagine, mesdames, that this gentleman, who dares to call me his
friend, brought me here almost by force this morning, saying: ‘We will
have a delightful day; I am going to call on some very charming ladies
who live at Chelles, but I shall not stay long; go to Gournay and wait
for me; order a _matelote_ and I’ll be with you at four o’clock.--Very
good; I turn to the right when he turns to the left. I find myself in a
country which is not unpleasant to look at, perhaps, but where you don’t
meet a living soul--not a peasant--not an ass--and ordinarily there are
asses everywhere!--Oh! by the way, I did meet some sheep, but no
shepherd--I saw only the dog--probably he acts as shepherd too. After
walking about for three mortal hours in this desert, somewhat anxious
concerning my plight and saying to myself from time to time: ‘Can it be
that a second Deluge has swept this region?’ I returned to the modest
cabaret where I had ordered a _matelote_, some fried fish, and even a
rabbit _sauté_, for I should not believe that I was dining in the
country unless I ate rabbit.

“The dinner was ready, but monsieur had not arrived. I waited one, two,
three-quarters of an hour, until the _cabaretier_ informed me that the
dinner was suffering from the delay. At that, I took my place at the
table, thinking that he would come in a moment. I swallowed several
pieces of eel--the _matelote_ was good, I must admit that--but he didn’t
come. I said to myself: ‘What’s the use of leaving the eel?’--I ate
eleven slices of it, mesdames, with fried fish and rabbit in proportion;
if I have indigestion, it will be his fault! Eleven slices! and the eel
was superb.

“After dinner I left Gournay and set out in quest of my gentleman; for I
was really uneasy. I thought that something must have happened to him,
that he had fallen into a hole--there are holes everywhere. I reached
this hamlet, and, not knowing where you lived, mesdames, I called my
friend--in a heartrending voice; no one answered. Faith! then I rang the
bell at rather a fine house, with pilasters topped by great balls
tapering to a point. I don’t know what style of architecture that is,
but I suspect that it’s the _Boulette_ style. I rang rather violently,
no doubt; and as I continued to call this blackguard--I beg pardon,
mesdames, I mean this--scamp--it seems that I alarmed the occupants of
the house, and four of them came in a body to open the door; there was
one gentleman who was armed, and I saw another dancing in the courtyard.
A tall woman, with the voice of a sapper and miner, said to me:

“‘What do you want, monsieur, and why are you making all this uproar at
my door?’

“Thereupon I assumed an affable manner and replied in honeyed tones:

“‘Do you happen to have here my friend Edmond Didier, with whom I would
like to return to Paris?’

“At that, the big man who was armed observed that I was a joker, that it
was probably a prearranged scene, and the tall woman said:

“‘I don’t like jokes of this kind; I call it downright impertinent.’

“And they immediately shut the door in my face, just as the little man
who was dancing posed as _Zéphir_.”

“Monsieur must have called at Madame Droguet’s!” said Agathe,
laughingly.

“Ah! that lady’s name is Droguet, is it? it is well suited to
her.--Appalled by my inhospitable reception, I walked on through the
streets, shouting exactly like a crier announcing the loss of some
object or the approach of the day when taxes must be paid; in villages
they never fail to make that announcement, in order to stimulate the
zeal of the taxpayers. But your servant came to my rescue, madame, and
guided me here.”

“And now, Freluchon, I will reply to your reproaches in very few words.
I certainly intended to join you, but these ladies had the extreme
kindness to invite me to dine with them. Tell me now, if you had been in
my place, would you not have done exactly as I did, and accepted?”

“It’s very likely; but I would have sent a messenger to Gournay to set
my friend’s mind at rest.”

“You? you never would have thought of such a thing! And besides, there
are no messengers in a village.”

“You won’t have so much difficulty in finding your friend when he has
lodgings here,” said Agathe.

“Ah! do you propose to hire a house here?”

“No, not a house, but a small apartment.”

“Monsieur’s lungs are delicate,” said Honorine, “and he thinks that the
country air will do him good.”

“Your lungs delicate! Well! that is a good one!”

And Freluchon threw himself back in his chair, laughing uproariously,
oblivious to the glances Edmond bestowed upon him.

Honorine put an end to the scene by saying to the newcomer:

“Will monsieur have something to eat?”

“Infinitely obliged, madame; but when one has eaten eleven slices of
eel, one needs nothing but exercise.--But the trains--what time does the
last train leave for Paris?”

“At ten o’clock.”

“In that case, it will be well for us to start.”

Edmond realized that his friend was right; he took leave of the ladies,
thanking them for their hospitable welcome; while Freluchon eyed
Poucette, whose robust figure aroused his admiration.

Then the two young men went to the station.

CHAMOUREAU MARRIED

Chamoureau, who was in such utter despair when he lost his Eléonore--or
who pretended to be, for genuine sorrow does not act a part and make a
public display of its tears; it seeks solitude and finds solace in its
memories--Chamoureau had contracted a second marriage; he had become the
husband of the woman whose charms had turned his head. At last he
possessed the fair Thélénie, if it is proper to say that one possesses a
woman when she gives herself to one without love. In my opinion one has
only the usufruct in such cases.

The newly-married pair had taken a handsome apartment on Rue
Saint-Lazare. Thélénie had informed her husband that she proposed to
have a carriage, and he had bowed to his wife’s wishes, saying:

“My dear love, we will have whatever you wish; I shall always consider
it a pleasure and a duty to gratify all your desires.”

“In that case, monsieur, you may begin by ceasing to call me _thou_;
there is nothing in worse form than to thee-and-thou one’s wife; and I
am a stickler for good form.”

“What, my dear love, after three days of married life, thou--you
want----”

“You have thee-and-thoued me three days already, and that’s too much; I
tell you again, monsieur, that in good society a man and wife don’t do
it. You seem desirous to appear like a petty government clerk.”

“I don’t agree to that--but I thought----”

“Enough--it’s decided: you are not to call me _thou_ any more.”

“What! not even in the blissful moments when my affection----”

“Hush! that’s enough.”

“The devil! that will embarrass me terribly.”

From that moment Chamoureau no longer ventured to use the familiar form
of address to his wife; in her presence he was like a scholar before his
teacher, or rather, like a soldier before his commanding officer. He
dared not speak unless he was questioned; he had no opinions, tastes,
desires; Madame Chamoureau took all that responsibility on her
shoulders.

As is frequently the case with women who have led very dissipated lives,
Thélénie, after her marriage, assumed a very severe demeanor and
bearing; she became a veritable prude, frowned if anyone made a ribald
remark before her, and scolded her husband if he presumed to laugh at
it. She refused to go to the Théâtre de Palais-Royal, and she could not
understand how women could have the effrontery to waltz.

Such was Madame de Belleville; for the newly-married pair answered to no
other name, and Thélénie had said to her husband more than once:

“Remember, monsieur, that your name is no longer Chamoureau; when anyone
calls you by that name, don’t answer, but turn a deaf ear and go your
way.”

“But, my dear love, there are people who have known me a long while, and
who know perfectly well that my name is Chamoureau.”

“Tell those people once for all that you answer to no name but
Belleville.”

“There are some who think that I live at Belleville, and that that’s
what I mean.”

“Bah! monsieur, what difference does all that make? Suppose you should
cease to be the friend of the pack of fools with whom you used to
associate, where would be the harm?”

“That’s true; in that case, I cease to know my former acquaintances; I
have a handsome fortune, and I ought not to frequent the same kind of
society.”

“Oh! by the way, monsieur, there are two persons to whom I give you
leave to speak, and even, if--if it will be agreeable to you to see
them--you may ask them to call on us; I shall not be sorry to let them
see the comfort and elegance of our home.”

“Very well, dear love; and who are these two persons whom you are kind
enough to be willing to receive?”

“Monsieur Edmond Didier and his friend Freluchon.”

“Oho! why, if I’m not mistaken, you demanded, before marrying me, that I
should break off all relations with those two gentlemen.”

“It is quite possible, monsieur; I may have desired it then; now I feel
differently. Am I not at liberty to change my mind?”

“Oh! yes, indeed! absolutely at liberty.”

“This Freluchon was your intimate friend, I know, and I do not wish to
deprive you of his company.”

“Oh! thanks a thousand times, my adored wife! I am deeply sensible
of----”

“Don’t talk to me like that any more! _Adored wife!_ Anyone would think
we were acting a melodrama! Call me madame, and stick to that.”

“Very well, I understand, madame--madame--and I will stick to that.”

Some days after this conversation, which will give an idea of the kind
of happiness which Chamoureau enjoyed since he had ceased to be a
widower, he came face to face with Freluchon one morning on the
boulevard.

The latter began by laughing in his former friend’s face.

“Good-day, Freluchon; what are you laughing at?”

“Parbleu! at your expression--your new rig--your new face--for you have
manufactured a new face for yourself with all the rest.”

“Freluchon, you see a very happy man.”

“No one would think it to see you walk.”

“Freluchon, I am married again; the lovely Thélénie has become my wife.”

“Aha! so that’s what gives you such an idiotic look, is it? I supposed
at first that it was the result of your new wealth; but you’re married,
so there’s a double explanation.”

“Yes, Freluchon, I am.”

“You have been married once already; but you were bent on doing it
again, and it was your right.”

“Ah! my friend, I am the most fortunate of men!”

“You say that as if you were reciting a fable: ‘A crow perched on a
tree----’”

“Tell me, Freluchon, why won’t you believe that I am happy?”

“Bless my soul! I ask nothing better than to believe it. If it is so, so
much the better; but as I know these women, as I know that when they
have once found a dupe to cover up their past misconduct, they acquire
such authority over him that he becomes a mere nobody--an utterly
ridiculous person--well, I didn’t know that that rôle would suit you.
But it does suit you, so it’s all right, it’s your business. March gayly
on, my poor Chamoureau, and may----”

“Oh! I beg your pardon--allow me to stop you right there. I must tell
you that my name is no longer Chamoureau, or, at least, I no longer
answer to that name.”

“The deuce! have you taken your wife’s name, pray? are you Monsieur
Thélénie?”

“No, my name is De Belleville now.”

“What does this new farce mean?”

“It means that my wife, my superb wife, cannot endure the name of
Chamoureau; it’s a weakness of hers, but to be agreeable to her, I have
taken the name of the place where I was born--Belleville--and we are
known by no other name now--Monsieur and Madame de Belleville.”

“Gad! that’s another good one! But after all, you may call yourself
Romulus if you choose; it’s all one to me, absolutely.”

“By the way, Freluchon, that isn’t all; my wife, who is very affable
with me, although----”

“Although it doesn’t appear?”

“No, I mean, although--although she doesn’t mean to be--has authorized
me to invite you and your friend Edmond Didier to come to see us.”

“Ha! ha! ha! worse and worse!”

“What’s the matter?”

“And it is you whom she selects for such errands?”

“Why not?”

“Poor Chamoureau!”

“De Belleville, I beg you, Freluchon; De Belleville! Don’t call me
anything else.”

“Very well, my dear Seigneur de Belleville--for if you are not yet a
seigneur, I am sure that you soon will be----”

“Do you think so?”

“You are well fitted to reach any height--with the help of your wife’s
_cotillon_.”

“What do you mean by her _cotillon_?”

“In other words, her influence. You will thank Madame de Belleville, in
my behalf; I do not expect to avail myself of her invitation.”

“Why not?”

“As I am very absent-minded, I fear that I might make a mistake, and
call her Madame Chamoureau; and I am sure that she would turn me out of
doors on the instant.”

“What a paltry reason!”

“As for Edmond Didier--oh! that’s a different matter. I hardly ever see
him now.”

“Indeed? have you had a falling out?”

“Not at all; but he is in love, yes, very seriously in love this time;
and as his passion lies in Chelles, he has hired a place in that region
and he never stirs from there.”

“Chelles? I wonder if this passion of his can be a lady for whom I
bought a little place at Chelles in the spring--Madame Dalmont?”

“Precisely; that is to say, it is not Madame Dalmont whom he’s in love
with, but her young friend, a very pretty girl who lives with
her--Mademoiselle Agathe.”

“Oh, yes! I remember--a very pretty blonde, that is true. I understand
now why he took so much trouble to have that purchase concluded so
quickly: Mademoiselle Agathe had already caught his eye.”

“Parbleu! when a young man becomes so obliging, so zealous, so eager to
make himself useful, you may be sure that love has something to do with
it.”

“So you don’t see Edmond now?”

“I see him when I go to Chelles, to his lodgings; but as I am not in
love, I don’t go very often. Still, there’s a very pretty peasant girl
there, Mademoiselle Poucette. But when you attempt to joke with her,
why! she cuffs you as if she’d pound you to a jelly.--So, my dear
fellow, you need not expect a call from Edmond. As I tell you, he is
hooked this time; he’s head over ears in love; but this young woman
cannot be his mistress--and then----”

“Then he will marry her.”

“That would do very well if he still had the sixty thousand francs that
he did have; one can live upon that amount. But he has very little of it
left; and as for the young lady, I fancy that she has nothing but her
lovely eyes, and they won’t do to make soup.”

“Oh, no! money before everything! That is my wife’s principle, too.”

“I don’t doubt it; she has famous principles, has your wife!--Adieu,
Chamoureau de Belleville, lord of the outskirts and of other places
which I will not mention. When you have a coat of arms, I advise you to
put in some stag’s horns; they look well against the background of the
shield.”

Freluchon walked away, still laughing.

“That devilish Freluchon!” said Chamoureau to himself as he looked after
him; “he’s always in high spirits; but I don’t believe he has thirty-two
thousand two hundred francs a year! After all, I am quite as well
pleased that he is not coming to our house; I am quite certain he would
call me Chamoureau; he would do it on purpose!”

When he reached home, the happy bridegroom lost no time in seeking
Thélénie, and telling her that he had met Freluchon. The name of
Edmond’s friend instantly fixed Thélénie’s attention.

“Well, did you invite him to come to see us, and to bring his friend
Monsieur Edmond?” she asked.

“Yes, to be sure, I did what you told me; but they won’t either of them
come.”

“What makes you think that?”

“Freluchon has contracted the habit of laughing in everybody’s face; he
joked me about my change of name, and declared that if he came to see us
he couldn’t help calling me Chamoureau. As you may imagine, I didn’t
insist.”

“But his friend, Monsieur Edmond Didier?”

“Oh! that’s a different matter! He has a love-affair on the brain; a
passion--oh! a grand passion--Look out, my dear, you’ll drop that book
you have in your hand.”

“Never mind, monsieur; what does the book matter? Go on; you say that
Monsieur Edmond is very much in love--as usual--some caprice for a
grisette, for that gentleman takes to that type of woman.”

“No, madame, this time it’s a respectable young woman with whom he is in
love.”

“How do you know that she is respectable?”

“Because I know her; she’s a fascinating blonde.”

“You know her, you say, monsieur; and you have never mentioned it to
me!”

“Never mentioned what to you?”

“Why, Monsieur Edmond’s love for this girl, whom you know, and whom you
consider so pretty.”

“Why, madame, I couldn’t mention it to you, because I knew nothing about
it myself; it was Freluchon who told me.”

“But you said that you knew this woman! You don’t seem to know what you
are saying, monsieur! Oh! how you irritate me!”

“My dear love, do be careful; you’re tearing the lace in your
sleeves--you will have it in rags.”

“Oh! don’t bother about my lace, monsieur; it suits me to tear it,
apparently. But for God’s sake, tell me exactly what Monsieur Freluchon
said to you about his friend Edmond. Speak, monsieur! why don’t you
speak? you see that I am waiting!”

At that moment Thélénie’s eyes emitted flames, and their expression was
so far from loving that Chamoureau found them less beautiful than usual.
He had never seen his superb wife’s face wear such a savage, threatening
expression; he felt ill at ease, he was frightened, and he stammered:

“Madame, you--you--dis--dis--distress me; what--what--what’s the
m--m--matter?”

Thélénie strove to calm herself as she replied:

“Why, nothing’s the matter, monsieur; only my nerves are on edge this
morning, and the slightest thing upsets me, irritates me. Go on, I am
listening.”

Chamoureau repeated to his wife all that Freluchon had told him
concerning Edmond’s new love-affair. Thélénie listened attentively; she
tried to remain calm; to avoid tearing her lace; and she rejoined with
apparent tranquillity:

“So these women who live at Chelles are known to you?”

“Yes, my dear love; it was through me that they bought Monsieur
Courtivaux’s house--for twenty thousand francs, as I remember.”

“What sort of women are they?”

“Madame Dalmont, the one who bought the house, is a widow, some
twenty-six or twenty-seven years old, with an interesting, but sad face;
of moderate means, she told me herself. Her young friend, the one
Monsieur Edmond is so much in love with, must be about sixteen or
seventeen--she’s an orphan, I believe--but such a pretty face! lovely
fair hair, blue eyes----”

“Enough, monsieur! you have extolled this surprising beauty too much
already! I shall end by thinking that you are in love with her too!”

“Ah! madame, you know very well that you alone, whose unapproachable
charms----”

“And Monsieur Edmond has hired a house at Chelles? he lives there now?”

“Yes, in order to be near those ladies.”

“At whose house he visits?”

“Naturally.”

After a few minutes of silence, Thélénie said:

“Monsieur, all _comme il faut_ people have a house in the country, a
villa to which they go for the summer. Of course you do not expect me
to stay cooped up in Paris all summer, like a shopkeeper on Rue
Saint-Denis.”

“Madame--I think--faith! I don’t know; I will do whatever you want.”

“I want a country house, monsieur; we will hire one.”

“Very well, my dear love; I will look about for one, I will read the
_Petites-Affiches_.”

“Don’t take all that trouble; just tell them to put the horses in the
carriage, and we will look for a house in the neighborhood that I like
best.”

Chamoureau executed his wife’s orders with alacrity, while she, left to
her reflections, said to herself:

“Ah! I will know this woman whom you love, ungrateful Edmond! and I will
find a way to put a spoke in your love-affairs!”

Mademoiselle Héloïse, who had retained her former footing of intimacy
with her old friend, because she was careful to call her nothing but
Madame de Belleville, suddenly appeared, in evident uneasiness, and
whispered to Thélénie:

“I say, my dear, I just saw--down in the street, standing in front of
the house, that horrid man who came to your old rooms one day, so
wretchedly dressed, all in rags, and who had such a strange
name--Croque, I think.”

“Ah! you recognized him?”

“Yes, although he is dressed a little better than he was the other time.
He has one of those faces that one doesn’t forget! he looks like a
night-owl!”

“So Croque has found my trail,” thought Thélénie, “and some day he will
present himself again. Oh, well! it matters little, after all; I have an
idea now that I may have occasion to make use of him.”

THE CHERRIES.--THE RAVINE

Edmond very soon put in execution the plan he had formed. On the day
after that on which he had dined at Madame Dalmont’s, he returned to
Chelles alone. He did not call upon the ladies, because a second visit
after so brief an interval would have been indiscreet; but he went all
about the neighborhood and succeeded in finding an attractive house to
let all furnished, a very short distance from Madame Dalmont’s. The
house was large enough for a good-sized family; it was much too large
for a single man; but the tenant could have possession at once, and it
was only five minutes’ walk from Madame Dalmont’s; so Edmond did not
hesitate; he hired it for the balance of the year for one thousand
francs, one-half of which he paid in cash to Monsieur Durand, the owner
of the property.

Two days later, the young man called at Madame Dalmont’s.

“It is a neighbor of yours,” he said, “who ventures to pay you a visit,
and who, if it is not too presumptuous, will ask your permission to
come now and then in the evening, to play and sing with you.”

“What! have you hired a house here?” cried Agathe, unable to restrain a
joyous movement.

“Yes, mademoiselle, a summer house, belonging to a Monsieur Durand, very
near that lady’s house where Freluchon was so coldly received when he
went there to ask for me a few days ago.”

“Oh! I know the place,” said Honorine, “but it seems to me to be very
large for a single man.”

“Oh! what difference does it make? Besides, Freluchon will come to see
me often, and pass the night.”

“I thought that he didn’t like this part of the country.”

“He will get used to it; for my part, the longer I am here, the better I
like it.”

As he said this, Edmond’s eyes were fixed on Agathe, and she understood
perfectly why the young man liked Chelles so much.

But it was not without considerable disquietude that Honorine saw Edmond
Didier take up his abode so near to them; and Agathe, who could read her
protectress’s face very easily, said to her after Edmond’s departure:

“How serious you look! Are you sorry that Monsieur Edmond has hired a
country house in this vicinity? You frown at me; is it my fault?”

“Your fault? yes, of course it’s your fault; and yet I can’t scold you!
Why, you know perfectly well that this young man is in love with you;
and that that was the only motive that led him to hire that house,
which is large enough for ten persons.”

“My dear friend, I swear to you that Monsieur Edmond has never said a
word to me which would lead me to suppose that--that he was thinking of
me.”

“I believe you; indeed, he has not been coming here long.”

“Do you mean that you think that that young man is capable of saying
unseemly things to me? Do you suppose that I would listen to them?”

“No. Monsieur Edmond seems an honorable man; he has no evil intentions,
I believe; but love is a sentiment that one cannot control. If you
should love this young man----”

“Well, where would be the harm, since you think that he loves me? He
would be my husband.”

“Your husband! My poor girl, before marrying, you must have at least
enough to live on. You have nothing, and I fancy that Monsieur Edmond
hasn’t very much, either!”

“But he is always very well and fashionably dressed; he hired Monsieur
Durand’s house for a thousand francs.”

“That proves that he knows how to spend money, but not that he knows how
to earn it.--Come, come, don’t you take your turn at making wry faces at
me. I am your second mother; I am thinking of your future, of your
welfare; you ought not to be angry with me for that.”

Agathe replied by throwing herself into Honorine’s arms, saying:

“Never fear! I shall not have any secrets from you.”

The two friends had hardly finished their conversation when Poucette’s
voice attracted their attention. The girl was talking to someone, in
what seemed to be a threatening tone. Her voice came from the garden;
the two ladies were there in a moment, and found Poucette clinging to
the leg of a small boy who had climbed into a cherry tree, and continued
to eat the cherries although she jerked at his leg, trying to pull him
down. But when Honorine and Agathe appeared, little Emile concluded to
come down from the tree.

“D’ye see, madame,” cried Poucette, “here’s the one that steals our
cherries; for some time past I’ve been noticing that the cherries kept
disappearing although you ladies don’t pick any; so I began to suspect
something; I hid and watched, and I saw this good-for-nothing scamp, the
lost child, climbing over the wall right here by the cherry tree, and in
a minute he was in the tree.”

“Oh! I recognize him,” said Agathe; “it’s the boy who chased the cow
that frightened you so.”

“Pardi! he don’t know to do anything but mischief, the wicked little
scamp.--But I’ll teach you!”

And the peasant made ready to strike the boy, who neither stirred nor
spoke, and seemed to care little whether he was beaten or not.

But Honorine stopped Poucette with a gesture; then she sat down on a
bench and beckoned the boy to her.

He hesitated, but at last decided to go to her, after casting a savage
glance at Poucette.

“Why do you come here to take my cherries?” inquired Honorine in a
gentle voice, and looking at the little thief with no trace of anger.

He seemed astonished to be spoken to otherwise than harshly; he lowered
his eyes and answered at last:

“Well! I like cherries, I do.”

“Even so, that is no reason for taking what doesn’t belong to you,--for
climbing a wall. Do you know what a risk you run? If the constable had
seen you he would have arrested you; he might have taken you to prison,
and they would have kept you a long time perhaps, as a vagrant, a bad
boy.”

“Oh! I’m too small; they don’t put little boys in prison!”

“You are mistaken! little boys are just the ones they do keep in the
houses of correction until they grow up, so that they can’t loiter along
the roads doing nothing.”

“Well, then, in prison I’d play with the other little boys, as you say
there’s little boys there.”

“No, you wouldn’t play, because they don’t keep little ne’er-do-wells in
prison to play and enjoy themselves; they make them work; and those who
refuse are punished, kept on bread and water, and not allowed to speak
to anyone.--Come now, think and tell me whether the few cherries you
have eaten are worth all the punishments that they might bring upon
you.”

Little Emile made no reply; he gazed at Honorine, furtively at first,
but at last made bold to look her in the face, as if to assure himself
that she was not laughing at him, and that she really meant what she had
said. Doubtless the young woman’s face inspired confidence, for he
seemed to reflect; and after a few moments he muttered:

“What am I to do to get cherries then? there ain’t any cherry tree at
our house; and they won’t give me any money to buy any.”

“Why, instead of stealing--which is very, very wrong, even if it’s only
cherries--you should just come and ask for some; and I would never
refuse to give them to you! Especially if I haven’t heard of your doing
any more naughty things, like throwing stones at a cow to make her run
through the fields at the risk of hurting people, especially poor little
children who might not have time to get out of the way. Oh! it is so
wicked to hurt those who are weak and can’t defend themselves; only
cowardly hearts do that.”

“Oh! I fight with big boys, I do!”

“Don’t fight at all; that will be much better.”

Then she made a sign to Agathe, who understood her and brought a little
basket filled with cherries. Honorine took out two handfuls and handed
them to the little boy.

“Here,” she said, “since you are so fond of cherries, take these.”

The child stared at her in surprise, and said in a faltering voice:

“What! are you going to give me some?”

“Yes, I will give you these, on condition that you won’t steal any more;
do you promise?”

“Well! as long as you give ‘em to me, I don’t need to climb over the
wall any more.”

And the boy, putting his hands together, received the cherries which she
gave him and hugged them to his breast. Then he looked all about and
asked:

“Can I go now?”

“To be sure--you are free. Go; but don’t be so naughty any more, and
instead of making everybody hate you, make them love you, and you will
see how much happier that will make you.”

“And will everybody give me cherries?”

“I don’t promise you that; but people will be kind to you when you are
kind to them.”

Little Emile said nothing more; but he made a pirouette and scampered
away, shouting at Poucette as he passed her:

“The lady’s better ‘n you!”

“Thanks!” said the young peasant; “if madame gives fruit to everybody
who comes to steal it, they won’t take the trouble to climb the wall!”

“Well! what would you have had me give the child?”

“It seems to me that he deserved a good licking instead of cherries!”

“He is said to be very naughty; but on the other hand everybody scolds
him and treats him harshly.”

“Sometimes they beat him, and hard too!”

“Well, I propose to try another method of reforming him.”

“You are right,” said Agathe; “_gentleness is better than violence_; I
have read that somewhere in La Fontaine’s fables.”

A few days later, Edmond having gone to Paris, the two friends knew that
he would not come to see them; and so, immediately after dinner, Agathe
proposed to Honorine that they should go for a long walk.

“I don’t want to go in the direction of the Tower,” said Honorine; “it
would seem as if we were trying to meet the owner again; and as that
gentleman has not thought fit to call to inquire whether my fright had
any serious consequences, I should be sorry to have him think that we
cared to see him again.”

There was a faint suggestion of irritation in Honorine’s manner as she
said this; but Agathe did not notice it.

“Mon Dieu! my dear,” she rejoined, “as the man doesn’t care for society,
but avoids it, why should you expect him to come to see us? It doesn’t
seem to me that that is any reason why we should deprive ourselves of
the pleasure of walking in the direction that is most agreeable to us.
For my part, I would like to go toward the Tower, and Noisy-le-Grand;
for that is where that ravine is, with the cross erected on the spot
where they found a young man dead. To tell the truth, I am very curious
to see the place; it will make my flesh creep, but no matter; I am very
desirous to see it; I have never forgotten that story that the doctor
told us.”

Honorine, whose resolution did not seem very firm, replied:

“Oh, well! if you want to see the ravine and the cross--after all, it
isn’t our fault that the gentleman’s estate lies in that direction; and
then it would be very strange if we should happen to meet him again.”

“It isn’t likely.”

“At all events, if we do meet him, we will not speak to him--do you
understand? we will simply bow to him, but we will not stop.”

“But suppose he speaks to us?”

“Oh! in that case--but he won’t speak to us, as he cares so little for
society.”

“Let us start; this time I trust that we shall not meet any cows to
frighten us.”

The two friends left the house. It was seven o’clock in the evening; the
weather was fine, but the atmosphere was somewhat heavy and seemed to
presage a storm. The young women did not allow themselves to be
frightened by some dark clouds which appeared above the horizon. They
strolled idly along the road to Gournay, stopping now and then to pluck
flowers; and after passing through the little village, Honorine said:

“We must not take the road we took the other time, which leads toward
that gentleman’s property. Let us take another road--this one, for
instance.”

“But suppose we lose our way?”

“We can always find it again by inquiring. Besides, Noisy-le-Grand is in
this direction.”

“But Noisy isn’t where we want to go; we want to find the ravine where
the cross is that was set up in memory of the young man who was murdered
there.”

“Well! that ravine, they say, is close by the road leading to Noisy.”

“No, it’s near the park belonging to the Tower, and this road takes us
away from it.”

“You don’t know any more about it than I. However, we will ask.”

The two friends walked along the road, which was unfamiliar to them; it
was shaded in spots by fine walnut trees and venerable acacias.

After having walked for some time, Honorine stopped.

“How dark it is!” she said; “has the night come already?”

“No, it’s the storm coming up! Oh! how black it is! What should we do if
the storm should surprise us here? I don’t see any house where we could
go for shelter.”

“We will stand under one of these magnificent walnuts.”

“Oh, no! when it lightens, we mustn’t stand under a walnut tree, it’s
one of the trees that attract lightning.”

“What! are you afraid, Agathe, you who are always so brave?”

“A storm isn’t very pleasant when you’re in the midst of the fields! Oh!
mon Dieu!”

“What is it?”

“I felt a drop of rain, a big drop.”

“Let’s walk faster.”

But they quickened their pace to no purpose: in a moment the storm
burst; the rain fell in torrents and forced them to seek shelter under a
huge tree whose dense foliage protected them almost entirely from the
downpour.

“We are not lucky in our walks!” said Honorine; “I shall not leave our
garden any more!”

“Nonsense! when it’s over we forget all about it.”

“Yes, but this one keeps on, and we are a long way from home! What an
idea of yours to want to go to a place that is said to be dangerous!”

“Oho! it’s your turn to be afraid now.”

“Not of the thunder, at all events!”

“But the thunder is more dangerous than a cross set up in a ravine.”

“Ah! what a flash! it was superb!”

“It was frightful!”

“I think the rain is subsiding a little.”

“Let us go on.”

“Mon Dieu! here comes the darkness now; suppose it should overtake us
before we have found our way!”

“Let us walk, let us walk; we shall certainly meet someone who will tell
us which way to go.”

“Oh! how slippery the rain has made the road! We shall fall in a moment;
that will be the last straw!”

“Let’s take each other’s arm, and hold on firmly.”

The two friends walked on, laughing when they almost fell, shrieking
with terror when the lightning flashes lighted up the surrounding
country. The rain had almost ceased, but the night was coming on, and
the farther they walked, the less familiar the road seemed to them.

At last they met a peasant woman driving an ass before her; at sight of
her they uttered a cry of delight.

“Madame! madame! which way to Chelles, if you please?”

“Why, bless me! you’re turning your backs to it!”

“Which way must we go, then?”

“See, take this path to the left; then turn to the left again and you’ll
come to Gournay; then----”

“Oh! we know the way after that, thanks!”

“And the cross in the ravine--are we far from that?”

“The cross in the ravine! Jesus, my Lord! you want to go to the cross in
the ravine! at night! What in the world do you want to go there for?”

“From curiosity.”

“The deuce! you must be mighty curious, then!”

“Is it dangerous to go by there?”

“Bless me! this much is sure, that nobody round here would want to go
through the ravine at night. As soon as you get near it, you hear groans
and complaints.--It’s the dead man come back, for sure.”

“I don’t believe in ghosts myself.”

“It’s plain you don’t belong round here. Well, if you take the road I
told you, you’re bound to pass, not through the ravine, but by one end
of it. Good-night, mesdames.”

“Will you let us take your ass to return to Chelles? we will pay
whatever you choose.”

“No, no; I don’t let my ass to folks who want to go to the dead man’s
cross! No, thank you! Besides, Julie wouldn’t go, either; she’d balk.
Come, away with you, my poor Julie!”

And the peasant who gave her jenny the name of Julie went her way,
driving the beast before her.

“We know our way now,” said Honorine; “let’s make haste, for it will
soon be entirely dark.”

“The thunder is still rumbling.”

“That isn’t what I am afraid of.”

“Do you mean to say that you believe in that peasant woman’s nonsense,
and the groans that are heard in the ravine?”

“I’ll tell you this, that when we pass the place, I shall run. Mon Dieu!
how dark it is!”

“Here we are on the main road, at all events. We must turn to the left
again.”

“I can hardly see, and I am beginning to be very tired.”

“Oh! look, my dear, this narrow path between those two little hills must
be the ravine.”

“Well! perhaps you would like to go in there, to delay us still more?”

“Oh! I entreat you, just a minute, to see the cross. I don’t know what
is taking place in me, but it seems to me that I must go there, and--and
pray for the unhappy man who met his death there.”

“Why, Agathe, you are positively foolish! I am not willing to stop.”

“Ah! listen! did you hear?”

“No, I heard nothing.”

“Nothing? listen again.”

This time a prolonged groan was heard by them very distinctly. Honorine
began to tremble. She tried to hasten on, but her legs gave way; she
could only cling to Agathe’s arm, saying:

“You see--the peasant did not deceive us. This is a ghastly place! Mon
Dieu! I should say that someone was running toward us now.”

“That is true; but it’s no man running so fast as that.”

Agathe had hardly finished speaking when Ami, the noble Newfoundland,
was beside her. After running around the two friends several times, as
if to see if they were alone, he went to the girl, rubbed his head
against her, wagged his tail, and stood on his hind legs, fixing his
intelligent eyes upon her as if to express the joy he felt at seeing
her.

“It’s Ami! it’s Ami!” cried Agathe, patting the dog. “Oh! now I am not
afraid any more; for, if we should be in any danger, he would defend
us.”

“It certainly is Monsieur Paul’s dog; if he is here, his master cannot
be far away.”

“At this moment, I should not be at all sorry to meet him. See,
Honorine, Ami is going into the ravine; now he stops and comes back to
us, and now he turns back again. He certainly is urging us to follow
him; come.”

“But we can’t see where we are going; and those groans that we
heard----”

“The dog is with us, and I am not afraid any more.”

Honorine allowed herself to be led into the ravine by Agathe, who had
taken her hand.

The dog trotted before them. It was very dark in that sunken road, but
they had taken scarcely twenty steps when a brilliant flash of lightning
furrowed the clouds and enabled them to see distinctly everything within
thirty yards. They then saw the owner of the Tower on his knees beside a
grassy mound at one side of the road, in the centre of which stood a
wooden cross.

At that strange apparition the two women halted, grasping each other by
the hand; then Agathe murmured very low:

“Do you see that?”

“Yes, it’s Monsieur Paul; and he is kneeling by the cross on that
grave.”

“Isn’t it very strange? What can he be doing by that cross?”

“One would think that he was weeping; listen, listen! I believe he is
speaking.”

It was true that Ami’s master, believing himself to be alone on that
spot which the people round about were careful to avoid, especially at
night, uttered these words:

“Forgive me, unfortunate victim of the most dastardly treachery. Ah, me!
if only I could have fulfilled your last wishes, it seems to me that you
might forgive me for your death. But it was impossible; all my efforts
were fruitless!”

“Did you hear?” murmured Honorine to her companion; “he said: ‘You might
forgive me for your death.’--So it must have been he who killed the
person who is under that cross! Why, this is frightful!”

“It isn’t possible,” said Agathe; “we couldn’t have heard right.”

At that moment, Ami, who had reached his master’s side, looked up in his
face and began to yelp, but softly, not angrily. It was his way of
informing his master that he was no longer alone.

“What! is there someone here?” cried Paul, springing hastily to his
feet; “where, Ami? where, I say?”

The dog ran back to the two friends who stood a short distance away,
trembling, afraid to go forward or to retreat, especially since they had
heard the words uttered by that mysterious man.

“What! ladies?” cried Paul, stopping in front of them. “Why, this is
strange; so far as the darkness permits me to distinguish your features,
I seem to recognize the ladies whom I escorted back to Chelles a few
weeks ago.”

“Yes, monsieur, it is we,” replied Agathe, who was the first to recover
her courage. “It is we again, and sorely embarrassed; for we were
surprised by the storm, then by the darkness; we lost our way, and I do
not know what would have become of us, but for your dog. He met us and
recognized us; and we followed him, having no idea where he was leading
us.”

“But you are a long way from Chelles; did you find no protection from
the storm?”

“Only some big trees. It is so deserted about here.”

“Is madame indisposed?”

This question was addressed to Honorine, who, pale as a statue, had not
yet uttered a word, because she recalled too distinctly those uttered by
their companion when he believed himself to be alone before the cross on
the grave.

But, feeling that her companion was nudging her, Madame Dalmont said in
a faltering tone:

“No, monsieur, no; I am not ill; but I had a fright, and----”

“She was afraid of the storm,” interposed Agathe hastily; “and just now
she admitted to me that she could not walk.”

“Oh! that’s all over, and I can walk very well now.”

“Since chance has placed me in your path again, mesdames, you will allow
me to act as your guide once more, and to take you home.”

“Oh! I thank you, monsieur, but if you will be kind enough to take us as
far as the bridge at Gournay, that will be sufficient. Really, you might
well conceive a strange idea of us, when you constantly find us
wandering about the country at night, and always obliged to call upon
you for assistance!”

“When I am able to render a trifling service, madame, my thoughts do not
go beyond it, and I do not try to guess by what circumstances the
occasion was brought about. I am simply doing my duty, and you owe me no
gratitude.”

“Oh, dear! I believe it is beginning to rain again!” cried Agathe; “for
my part, monsieur may think what he pleases, but I am very glad that we
met him, and I accept his arm with pleasure.”

And the girl took Monsieur Paul’s arm without more ado. He looked at
Honorine, who, after a moment’s indecision, decided at last to take his
other arm, and they started off at a rapid pace, escorted by the
faithful Ami.

But Honorine’s arm trembled so in her cavalier’s that he finally said:

“How you tremble, madame! is it with cold, or with fear of the storm? It
is passing over, and you will reach home safely.”

“Yes, monsieur, it’s the thunder; it has upset me completely.”

“Pray lean on me, madame; one would think that you were afraid of tiring
me, and I can hardly feel you.”

“Thanks, monsieur, thanks; I am leaning on you as much as I need.”

“We were altogether lost when we saw you, thanks to your dog,” said
Agathe; “that is a very lonely spot where you were, monsieur!”

“Yes, mademoiselle; yet it is quite near my house.”

“That road, monsieur, is the ravine where there is a cross, is it not?”

If Honorine had been next to Agathe, she would have pinched her
viciously, to make her regret her question, but their escort separated
them; so that she could only make a convulsive movement, which she
instantly checked, pretending that she had made a misstep.

“Yes, mademoiselle,” replied Paul curtly, “that is the ravine of the
cross.”

“We have been told a very sad story about that cross--that a young man
was found dead on that spot, nine or ten years ago, I believe. Is it
true, monsieur?”

Honorine would have beaten Agathe with the greatest satisfaction; she
began to cough as if she would tear her throat to tatters.

“I too have heard of that occurrence, mademoiselle,” replied their
companion in a gloomy tone.

“And the unfortunate man’s assassins have never been discovered?”

“Assassins!” exclaimed Paul in a loud voice, raising his head proudly.
“Who told you, mademoiselle, that the person found dead on that spot had
been assassinated?”

“Oh! mon Dieu! no one, monsieur, no one. I said that, because the people
who tell the story----”

“The world almost always judges falsely; it never knows the true
inwardness of things; and as it is more disposed to believe evil than
good, as soon as a stranger is found dead by the roadside, it says: ‘He
was murdered!’--You are still very young, mademoiselle! Distrust the
judgments of the world; you will often have occasion to realize their
injustice.”

“Here is Gournay bridge,” said Honorine; “will monsieur leave us now?”

“No, madame; unless you bid me to do so, I shall not leave you,
trembling as you are, out in the country, at night. I shall escort you
to your home.”

Honorine bowed and they walked on. But they were silent, for Agathe
dared not speak since their guide had almost lost his temper in
answering her last question.

They reached Honorine’s house, and Paul bowed to the ladies, saying:

“You are at home now, I believe?”

“Yes, monsieur. I do not know how to thank you----”

“For what, madame, pray? I have simply done my duty.”

“Adieu, Ami; adieu, my good dog!”

The dog and his master took their leave.

“Oh! I could have beaten you!” said Honorine, “when you questioned that
man about the story of the cross!”

“Why so? You heard him answer that the young man who was found there was
not murdered.”

“But since he was the one who killed him, could you expect him to admit
it?”

“That man an assassin! Nonsense! it’s impossible. Do you believe it, my
dear love?”

“I believe--Mon Dieu! I don’t know what to believe; but this much is
certain, that I will not walk in that direction again. Let’s go to bed;
what with the fright, excitement, fatigue and the storm, I am completely
exhausted; and you?”

“I? Oh! I regret that we didn’t go as far as the cross in the ravine. I
would have liked to pray for him who lies there!”

CALUMNY

Several days had passed since the memorable evening of the storm.
Honorine and Agathe had promised each other never to breathe a word of
what they had seen and heard that evening by the cross in the ravine.
There are some subjects with respect to which the slightest indiscretion
is a crime, in that it may have the most serious consequences; and the
words which the owner of the Tower had uttered when he was on his knees
beside the cross, were of those which one regrets having heard, and
which one tries to forget.

However, there was no reason why the two friends should not discuss the
subject between themselves, and in fact they often did.

Agathe, who always defended Paul, would exclaim:

“No, that man is not an assassin! I am absolutely convinced of it.
Indeed, the very emotion that he showed when I said that a stranger had
been murdered in the ravine, and the warmth with which he repelled that
suggestion prove that it is false.”

“It is a fact that he did seem keenly wounded by your words. But why,
then, did he ask the forgiveness of the man who is buried there?--When
one has fought a duel, loyally and honorably, it is no crime; the victor
may regret his victory, but he does not accuse himself of it as of a
criminal act.”

“But how can we tell how it happened--what brought it about?”

“Well, let us say no more about it; that will be the better way.”

“You are right; let us never mention it again.”

But it rarely happened that the following day passed without Honorine
herself leading the conversation to the subject of the owner of the
Tower. And after talking about him, the young woman would be thoughtful
and melancholy for a long while.

Agathe noticed this fact, but she was very careful not to mention it to
her friend; women very quickly understand the secrets of the heart, and
know when it is advisable not to seem to have divined them.

Edmond had returned to Chelles; he had passed several days in Paris,
because he had been led to hope for a very well-paid position in a
banking house; but it had been given to another and the young man was
not cast down. He still had about twenty thousand francs; with that
amount, with love in one’s heart, and with a great hope of its being
reciprocated, one has before one a whole future of happiness.

One morning the two ladies were working in the garden and Père Ledrux
was raking a path a short distance away, when Honorine suddenly said:

“It’s a long while since we have had a call from Doctor Antoine
Beaubichon; I wonder if he can be sick?--Père Ledrux, do you know
whether Doctor Antoine is well?”

“Oh, yes!” replied the gardener; “I saw him this very morning going to
Madame Droguet’s.--Tutu-turlututu.”

“It’s strange that he hasn’t been to see us for a fortnight.”

“Well! perhaps it’s because he agrees with the rest--that you have
enough company without him!”

“What’s that? enough company? I don’t understand. What do you mean by
that, Père Ledrux?”

“I--nothing at all; in the first place, you understand it don’t make any
difference to me, it ain’t any of my business; you can have whole
regiments come to see you for all me; you’re your own mistresses, and I
ain’t the one to find fault!--But you know, there’s some folks who do
nothing but meddle with what don’t concern ‘em, and talk--why, just for
the sake of talking!”

“Do you understand one word of all that he says, Agathe?”

“Not very well; but it seems that people think that we receive a great
deal of company. Isn’t that what they say, Père Ledrux?”

“Yes, they say that you receive a good many men; that you’ve had some
come from Paris, without counting those from this part of the country,
who go to walk with you in the evening.--Tutu--turlututu.”

“You hear, Agathe; what do you think of that?”

“Why, I think that it’s an outrage, and that people in the country are
even more unkind than they are in large cities.--Poucette, is it true
that many men come here?”

“Oh! my word, mamzelle, I haven’t ever seen anybody come but our
neighbor Monsieur Edmond, and then two or three times his friend,
Monsieur Freluchon, who’s so full of mischief.--Oh! what a scamp that
little man is!”

“Where did you hear all this about us, Père Ledrux?”

“Bless me! a word here and a word there; you hear people jabbering; you
may not listen, but you hear all the same. In the first place, when I’m
working in Madame Droguet’s garden, she’s always talking about her
neighbors, and I heard her say to Madame Jarnouillard the other day--or
Madame Remplumé, I don’t just know which; in fact, I think they was all
three there--and Madame Droguet, she says:

“‘You know Monsieur Durand has let that nice house of his close by,
almost opposite me; but what you don’t know perhaps is that he’s let it
to a young dandy from Paris, who’s come there to live all alone, without
any servants; Mère Lupot opposite does his housework.’

“‘And what can one man all alone do with that big house, where there’s
room enough for two families?’ says Madame Jarnouillard.

“‘Oh! you understand, mesdames, the young dandy has his reasons for
going to such an altogether useless expense. He’s settled here because
he’s on intimate terms with the two newcomers in the Courtivaux house.’

“When they talk about you, they always say: ‘the ladies in the
Courtivaux house,’ as a matter of habit, because, you see, Monsieur
Courtivaux lived here a long time.”

“Very well, Père Ledrux; go on.”

“‘Yes,’ says Mame Droguet, ‘he goes there night and morning; he’s always
prowling round there. Which of ‘em is he in love with? no one knows;
perhaps it’s both.’”

“Oh! my dear love!”

“Hush! let him go on.”

“‘And then,’ says Mame Droguet, ‘he’s got a friend who looks like a
regular good-for-nothing; it’s the same fellow who had the face to knock
at my door very late one night, to ask if we had seen his friend Edmond
Didier; and with such a sly, impertinent air! humming his tra la la!’

“‘Oh! what do such people amount to anyway!’ says La Remplumé; ‘this
gives me a very poor opinion of the women in the Courtivaux house.’

“‘But that ain’t all,’ says La Droguet; ‘guess who we saw walking home
with ‘em the other night--at quite a late hour?’

“‘The two young men from Paris?’

“‘No. Oh! they’ve made other acquaintances here. They came home
arm-in-arm with Monsieur Paul and his dog!’

“‘Is it possible?’

“‘Did they have the dog’s arm too?’

“‘I didn’t say they had the dog’s arm! I said the dog was in the party.
And it was very lately, the night of the storm--don’t you remember?’

“‘Perfectly! I’m afraid of the thunder, and I stuffed my head in a
butter crock so as not to see the flashes! I put it in so far that I
couldn’t get it out again, and I says to my husband: “Break the crock,
Jarnouillard, I can’t move my head;” and he replied, as calmly as you
please: “That would be a pity; it’s almost new!” So I was obliged to
break it myself by banging my head against a wall.’

“‘Never mind about your crock!’ says Mame Droguet impatiently; ‘we’re
talking about these newcomers. How does it happen that after living in
this part of the country such a short time, they’re already on intimate
terms with the owner of the Tower--that disgusting man, that ogre, who
won’t speak to anybody? It seems to me more than extraordinary.’

“‘It is very mysterious, that’s so.’

“‘I should say that it was suspicious even.’

“‘Well! birds of a feather flock together, as the proverb says. The bear
of the Tower must have found these ladies to his taste!’

“‘As for me,’ says Mame Droguet, ‘I have a very bad opinion of the
persons in the Courtivaux house.’

“‘It isn’t Monsieur Courtivaux’s, since he has sold it.’

“‘That don’t make any difference. Besides, we don’t know whether these
fine ladies have paid for the house; there’s so many people who buy and
then don’t pay.’

“At that, you see, I couldn’t help putting in my word.

“‘So far as that goes,’ says I, ‘I’m very sure that Madame Dalmont has
paid for the house. I had a letter from the notary telling me to give
’em the keys and everything.’”

“Thanks, Père Ledrux, thanks for defending us on that point; but pray
understand that the remarks, the insults of those ladies affect us very
little! When one knows that one has no reason for self-reproach, one
should hold oneself above the sneers of calumny! But we congratulate
ourselves now that we have not called on that woman, that we have not
made a friend of her.”

“It’s just that thing that’s vexed her most, I tell you! And she only
says all these nasty things about you from spite because you haven’t
been to see her. But what I can’t understand is how there’s anybody
who’ll allow himself to be taken in by all that tittle-tattle. It’s just
because Mame Droguet invites ‘em to dinner. She says to Monsieur
Luminot: ‘You must choose between the society at the Courtivaux house
and mine, monsieur. My husband and I are determined not to receive
people who go to see those ladies.’--She puts her husband forward, the
poor dear man! but he doesn’t meddle in such things; so long as he can
dance in the evening in front of a mirror, with himself for his
vis-à-vis, he’s satisfied! But Monsieur Luminot--you see, he thinks a
lot of Mame Droguet’s dinners.”

“And as we do not give dinners, the gentleman is very wise to choose her
society. But Madame Droguet has no suspicion that she gratifies us
exceedingly by ridding us of Monsieur Luminot’s visits--eh, Agathe?”

“Oh! yes, my dear; and we must hope that Monsieur Jarnouillard will
follow Monsieur Luminot’s example.”

“Oh! that won’t stop him! he ain’t pleasant very often, Monsieur
Jarnouillard; and then, I don’t like money-lenders, I don’t.--I’ll go
and take a look at the hens; I’m sure the black one beats the others; if
she does, we ought not to leave her in the coop.”

The gardener went away and Agathe looked at Honorine, with a sigh.

“Oh! my love! how cruel the world is!”

“Yes, even more so in small villages than in the large cities. That is
easy to understand: these people here have nothing to do most of the
time, and their principal occupation is to attend to their neighbors’
affairs. In a small place everybody is everybody else’s neighbor.”

“The idea of saying that we receive men!”

“Oh! I suspected that Monsieur Edmond’s appearance in this village, a
short time after we settled here, and his frequent visits to us, would
give occasion for gossip.”

“And I am the cause of it, my love! You are going to be angry with me.”

“No, indeed! That young man is honorable, his company is agreeable; and
we will not deprive ourselves of the only society we have here, just
because Madame Droguet is displeased.”

“Oh! how right you are! how good you are!”

“As for this gentleman--from the Tower, he is not an acquaintance. We
have met him twice, and both times his assistance was quite necessary to
us; he escorted us as far as our gate, but he has never entered the
house, and probably never will.”

“Ah! my dear friend, suppose Madame Droguet had heard that strange man’s
words in the ravine, beside the cross! what fine tales she would have to
tell!”

“Hush, Agathe, hush, for heaven’s sake! I shudder in spite of myself
when I think of that. I feel that it would distress me to be compelled
to have a bad opinion of that man.”

“Especially as he has very refined manners, and a very _comme il faut_
air, has this Monsieur Paul. I am sure that he would be very
fine-looking, if he hadn’t so much hair on his face.”

“Oh! I didn’t notice that; I hardly looked at him. He has black eyes,
hasn’t he?”

“Not exactly--brown; but very soft.”

“Do you think so? And a scornful mouth?”

“Oh, no! his smile is very agreeable.”

“What! did he smile while he was talking to us?”

“When I slipped and almost fell, I clung to him, and that made him
smile.”

“It’s strange; I remember nothing of all that.”

“Oh! the storm was so violent!--Well, I am sure, for my part, that it
makes Madame Droguet furious to see we already know that gentleman, who
has refused to have anything to do with anyone in the neighborhood!
Just for that reason, I am delighted that she saw him bringing us home.”

The conversation of the two friends was interrupted by sobs from
Poucette, who tried in vain to check them. They rose at once to inquire
the cause of their servant’s grief.

VII

A SALE BY AUTHORITY OF LAW

Little Claudine, Poucette’s cousin, had just arrived; her eyes were red,
and she too was crying; evidently it was something that she had told
Poucette which caused the young peasant to sob so bitterly.

“What is the matter, my child; what makes you so unhappy?” Madame
Dalmont asked her servant.

But she, according to the custom of country people, continued to sob and
made no reply.

“And you, my girl,” said Agathe to Claudine, “you are crying too; is it
something you have told your cousin that is making her cry?”

“Yes--yes--mamzelle.”

“What misfortune has come upon you? Come, speak.”

“Ye--Ye--yes, madame!”

“Come, Poucette, tell us about it; this child will never be able to, you
see.”

The young peasant succeeded at last in forcing back her sobs.

“Madame, Claudine has just told me that they’re very unhappy at home. My
poor uncle--poor aunt! what is going to become of them! They’re going to
sell everything in their home to-day, furniture and everything! Mon
Dieu! mon Dieu! and turn them out of their cottage, which won’t belong
to them any more! What is going to become of them! Here, Claudine, I’ve
got three francs left out of my wages, and I’ll give ‘em to you. Oh! if
I had more!”

“You can’t have any more, when you give us all you earn!”

“Poor people! why this is frightful!” cried Honorine. “Who on earth is
so hard-hearted as to despoil those unfortunate creatures, who have
hardly enough to provide their children with food and shelter?”

“Who? Alas! madame, it’s Monsieur Jarnouillard; he has lent small sums
to Uncle Guillot at different times. Well! it was a hard winter, and he
had four children to take care of, and me too with the rest. It seems
that Monsieur Jarnouillard made my uncle sign some bits of paper, so, if
he wasn’t paid just on the minute, he could take everything my poor
uncle owned!”

“And as papa couldn’t pay him, although he had given him some money on
account,” added Claudine, “a man all dressed in black came to-day and
told mamma that all she could do was to leave the house with the
children, but she didn’t have any right to take anything away.”

“Oh! what a wretch that Monsieur Jarnouillard is!” cried Agathe, “he
does well not to show his face here, for we would put him out of doors,
we wouldn’t have him in the house. And these are the people that say
unkind things about us, who would be so distressed to cause pain to
anyone! Madame Droguet’s society contains some most estimable people!”

While Agathe made these reflections, Honorine had gone up hastily to her
room; she returned with her bonnet on her head, and said to Agathe:

“Come with me.”

“Where are we going, my dear?”

“Mon Dieu! to Guillot’s cottage, to see if there is any way of assisting
those poor people, and at the very least to save some of their
furniture. I have a hundred francs I can give them; it’s very little,
but still it will help them.”

“Oh! my good Honorine, if it were possible, I would love you even more.”

The two friends left the house, followed by Poucette and Claudine, who
had ceased to weep because they hoped and divined that the ladies
proposed to assist their dear ones.

In due time they reached the farmer’s cottage, where a number of people
had already collected. For the announcement of a sale on execution
always brings together a multitude of bargain-hunters and idlers.

A melancholy spectacle was presented to that assemblage, which would
have touched their hearts, had there been any persons susceptible to
emotion among those who were disputing over the purchase of an old
chair.

Guillot’s wife sat at the foot of a tree, about forty yards from the
house, holding her last-born child at her breast, while the two others
stood at her side, hiding their faces against their mother’s skirts as
if terrified by the sight of all those people. The peasant gazed with
tear-dimmed eyes at her hovel and at all the poor furniture that was
brought from it, to be offered for sale; then she turned her eyes on her
children, and her glance said plainly:

“We have no roof to shelter us; where will they sleep to-night?”

A short distance away, the farmer himself, in despair but striving to
retain his courage, watched the officers of the law who had taken their
places at a table, and were preparing to begin the sale.

Monsieur Jarnouillard walked about, examining the different articles as
they were brought from the house, and muttering with a shrug:

“Mon Dieu! what wretched stuff! I shall never get my money back. The
wood is rotten; it will crumble to powder!”

Meanwhile Guillot approached his creditor, hat in hand, and said to him
in a suppliant tone:

“Oh! monsieur, are you going to sell my house, too?”

“His house! that’s a pretty name for it! He calls this a house--a
miserable hovel that will hardly hold together!”

“Such as it is, monsieur, it has sheltered me and my family; it came to
me from my father, too, and I was fond of it.”

“What difference does all that make to me? It would have been better for
me if it had come from the devil and had been built of hewn stone.
Nobody’ll give anything for your hut.”

“If you don’t think anybody’ll give anything for it, monsieur, why do
you have it sold?”

“Why? and what about the money you owe me? do you imagine I shall get it
back from the sale of your furniture? Nice stuff, that is! You have
taken me in, my good man; I am sold, trapped is the word.”

On hearing this accusation from the mouth of the man who was robbing
him, the farmer proudly raised his head and replied in a firm voice:

“I have never deceived anybody, monsieur! I am an honest man, and
everybody in the neighborhood knows it; and if either of us has cheated
the other I am not the one, do you understand?”

The usurer lowered his crest and his tone, as such men always do when
they are afraid of being unmasked.

“Bless my soul! Guillot,” he rejoined; “don’t lose your temper; I may
have said one word when I meant another; my tongue must have taken a
twist. I never intended to attack your honesty; but of course you
understand that I must get back what I have advanced.”

“I only owe you four hundred and eighty francs, monsieur.”

“Of principal, yes; but the interest, which never stops running--and
interest on interest--all that counts up; so that you owe me to-day
eight hundred and seventy-five francs, besides the costs of the
execution and sale; it will amount to a thousand francs.”

“My God!”

“That’s why I am obliged to sell your cottage, as well as your
furniture.”

“But suppose it should bring more, monsieur?”

“Oh! if it should bring more than your debt and the costs, the surplus
would go to you--that’s your right; but unluckily, instead of going
above a thousand francs, I’m afraid it will fall far short of it.”

“But, monsieur, if you’re going to sell a house you must have buyers;
and to bring them together it is necessary for them to know beforehand
that it’s to be sold.”

“Don’t be afraid, all the formalities have been attended to; the notices
were posted.”

“I didn’t see them.”

“That isn’t my fault.”

“Among all these people that I see here, there isn’t one who will buy my
house.”

“Pshaw! there’s sure to be someone; at a pinch, I’ll buy it myself.”

“You, monsieur!”

“Bless me! if no other purchaser comes forward, I shall have to take it;
it will embarrass me a good deal, but I shall be driven to it!”

As he said this, Monsieur Jarnouillard rubbed his hands, thinking:

“There won’t be any other purchaser and I shall get the house for almost
nothing. Then I can let it to Guillot, and it will add just so much to
my income.”

The farmer moved away from his creditor, with death in his heart and
despair on his face. But, before joining his family, he tried to
dissemble his suffering to some extent in order not to increase his
wife’s grief. Luckily for the poor people, little Claudine came running
toward them, followed by her cousin Poucette. And the child, pointing to
Honorine and Agathe, who had stopped a short distance away, said:

“Don’t cry any more, mamma; there’s Poucette’s two mistresses; they’ve
come with us and they’re very kind; they’re sorry for us.”

“Yes,” chimed in Poucette. “Don’t cry, aunt. My mistress told me to tell
you that everything she bought would be for you; and she’ll buy all she
can!”

The farmer’s wife felt as if she were coming to life again; she started
to rise, to go with her husband to thank the lady who was so kindly
disposed to them; but Poucette detained her.

“Madame don’t want you to say anything to her now,” she said; “for if
anyone should guess she was doing it for you, the dealers are so mean,
they’re quite capable of bidding against her and making her pay more for
everything; you mustn’t look as if you knew anything about it; you can
thank her afterward.”

Meanwhile the notables of the neighborhood, those who are commonly
called the _bourgeois_ in the country, began to arrive for the sale. The
slightest novelty is an event which one is careful not to miss when one
lives in a small village.

Moreover, Monsieur Jarnouillard, being interested in the success of the
sale, had not failed to say to all his acquaintances:

“It’s always well to go to a sale; you often find something you need and
that you had forgotten about; there are sure to be good opportunities;
and you should seize opportunities; they don’t come twice.”

The Droguet family soon appeared on the scene, in the person of its
tall, bulky mistress, who leaned familiarly on the arm of friend
Luminot, the jovial dealer in wines. Little Monsieur Droguet walked
behind his wife, taking measured steps, almost in rhythm.

Madame Jarnouillard came next, arm-in-arm with Madame Remplumé, a tall,
machine-like person, as long and thin as a bean-pole, who, you would
have sworn, was a man dressed as a woman. Behind them came a little man
with a limp, Monsieur Remplumé, who never spoke, but who coughed, spat,
took snuff, sneezed and blew his nose incessantly, which made him a very
unpleasant neighbor; so that there was soon a vacant space about him.
Lastly, Doctor Antoine Beaubichon appeared, some little distance behind
this party.

When Agathe saw them in the distance, she squeezed her friend’s arm,
saying:

“Look, my dear; here come all the people who speak ill of us. Really
they are all so hideous that I am no longer surprised that they are
spiteful!”

“Don’t seem to be looking toward them.”

“Why not, pray? Do you suppose I am going to give myself a crick in the
neck because of Madame Droguet? I am very sorry that Monsieur Edmond is
in Paris to-day; for he would have come with us, and that would have
made all those people all the more frantic.--Ah! my dear, the doctor
bows to us! Good for him! he is still polite, at all events.”

Honorine turned and bowed pleasantly to the doctor, thereby placing the
former wine merchant in a painfully embarrassing position; for he too
was facing the young woman and would have been glad to salute her; but
Madame Droguet held his arm and glared at him fixedly and with such a
determined expression that, in order to extricate himself adroitly from
his predicament, Monsieur Luminot simulated five or six sneezes in quick
succession; and everyone knows that in sneezing one usually makes a
movement of the head which resembles a bow.

“Well! what does this mean?” demanded Madame Droguet, with an angry
glance at her cavalier. “Why do you sneeze like that?”

“Why--I sneeze--Mon Dieu! because I had to sneeze. It takes you
suddenly, you know; I suppose I have a cold in my head.”

“This is the first I have heard of it.”

“Or I; but you never know you have one until it appears.”

“Really, one would have thought that you were bowing to those women.”

“Well, upon my word! I never thought of such a thing.”

“Why did you sneeze toward them?”

“Faith! I sneezed when it caught me. I didn’t do it purposely.”

“All right!”

“The doctor bowed to those ladies.”

“I saw him; he’ll pay me for that; he was to apply leeches to Droguet
to-morrow, but he shan’t do it.”

“Oh! but, consider--if your husband needs the leeches!”

“I tell you that not a leech shall be put on him. I propose to show the
doctor how much I care for his prescriptions.”

“But if your husband complains of pains in his head----”

“Let me alone; I am beginning to believe that Doctor Beaubichon is just
fit to take care of hens. Droguet is dancing on my dress at this moment;
does he look sick?”

“There are the people from the Courtivaux house,” said Madame Remplumé,
approaching Madame Droguet.

“Oh! we have seen them! they are noticeable enough. What rigs!”

“Their dresses are in wretched taste!”

“The materials are the very cheapest!”

“They look so to me.”

“Regular lorettes, aren’t they, Monsieur Luminot?”

“Dear me! mesdames, allow me first to ask you what you mean by
lorettes?”

“Oh! the little innocent! who doesn’t know the ladies who live in the
Bréda quarter in Paris!”

“I assure you that I don’t know that quarter! When I lived in Paris, I
never went out of Bercy.”

“Hush, you wicked monster!”

Madame Jarnouillard interrupted this dialogue.

“Come, mesdames, and look over the furniture and other things to be
sold,” she said; “sometimes one finds just the utensils one needs. Look
at what is on exhibition.”

“Mon Dieu! madame, what do you expect us to buy in all that wretched
trash?” cried Madame Droguet, with a disdainful glance at the farmer’s
furniture. “I see nothing but rubbish--dirty stuff! and I have no doubt
it’s all full of bugs!”

“That is what I was thinking!” muttered Madame Remplumé, while her
husband spat at random.

“But there’s a pair of candlesticks that might do to use in the kitchen,
eh, Droguet?--Bah! he doesn’t hear me; he’s whistling a polka.”

“Your husband is a zephyr!”

“He’s a wind, but not a zephyr!”

“Ah! that’s very good; I’ll remember that.--Did you hear that,
Remplumé?”

_“Ahtchi! crraho! furssscht!”_

“That isn’t a wind!” muttered Luminot; “it’s a continuous fusillade.”

“There are some very decent kettles.”

“Oh! oh! I wouldn’t want to boil artichokes in them!”

“And that bellows?”

“It’s a huge thing--like the bellows of a forge; but it’s the only thing
here that one could use.”

“Jarnouillard is signalling that the sale is about to begin. Let us go
nearer, mesdames.”

“Ah! look; the occupants of the Courtivaux house are approaching also.”

“Probably they mean to buy something.”

“Yes, yes; they intend to furnish their house with the peasant’s
furniture; it will be good enough for them!”

The sale began.

The first object offered for sale was a table, still in good condition.

“Three francs for the table!” cried the auctioneer; “three
fifty--fifty-five--sixty!”

The peasants bid five or ten centimes at a time. Honorine offered five
francs. The bystanders stared at her in amazement, the peasants were
stupefied, the second-hand dealers made wry faces.

The table was knocked down to Madame Dalmont.

“What did I tell you!” muttered Madame Droguet. “These lovely Parisians
come here for their furniture!”

After the table came a walnut buffet, very old and in bad condition; the
upset price was twelve francs, and there was no purchaser. Honorine took
it at that figure. Then there came a lot of dishes, glass and
earthenware, which also were knocked down to her.

The Droguet party laughed sneeringly, and the ladies said to one
another:

“What! do they want broken bowls and chipped plates, too! The commonest
sort of china, and old sauce-pans!”

“Really those ladies will have a pretty lot of housekeeping utensils!”

“For my part, I think it’s disgraceful--disgraceful is the word--to buy
such miserable stuff!”

“Oh! how glad I am that I came to see this! it will furnish us with
amusement for a long time to come.”

“Do you know, I propose to cheat her out of that big bellows.”

“You must force the bidding.”

“Oh! I am bound to have it! you shall see.”

While Madame Droguet’s party amused themselves by making sport of the
two young women, they exchanged pleasant smiles with the farmer’s
family; the poor creatures felt a thrill of joy at each article that was
adjudged to Honorine, for Poucette, who was standing near them, said:

“That’s for you; that will come back to you; madame is buying all these
things to give them to you.”

“How much for this great bellows?” suddenly cried Madame Droguet, with
an authoritative air; “it’s the only thing here worthy to go into my
house--into my kitchen.”

While Jarnouillard, who saw that the bellows was in demand, consulted
with the auctioneer as to the price they should set on it, Poucette ran
to her mistress and whispered:

“Don’t buy the bellows, madame; it ain’t good for anything; the clack’s
gone, and uncle always meant to burn it up.”

“Very well,” replied Honorine; “but, as Madame Droguet wants it, we must
try to make her pay a good price for it.”

“Three francs for the bellows!” cried the auctioneer; and Madame Droguet
said at once:

“Three francs ten sous!”

“Four francs!” said Honorine.

“Four francs ten sous!” rejoined the stout dame, who did not choose to
bid by centimes.

“Five francs!” said Honorine.

“Well! six francs, sacrebleu!” cried Madame Droguet, her voice trembling
with anger.

Honorine made no further bid; but she turned away to laugh with Agathe;
for the wretched bellows was not worth fifty centimes.

“I knew well enough that I should get what I wanted, and that I would
force that hussy to give way to me!” cried Madame Droguet, as she
returned to her friends armed with the bellows, which she handed to her
husband, saying:

“Put that under your arm, monsieur, and don’t hold it pointed at my
back, or you’ll blow on me.”

Several other pieces of furniture and some mattresses were purchased by
Honorine. But the bedding brought better prices, and the young widow was
nearing the end of her hundred francs, when a new arrival appeared on
the scene, walking among the dishes, leaping over the furniture,
heedless of the objurgations of Monsieur Jarnouillard, who exclaimed
again and again: “What in the devil is that dog doing here? For heaven’s
sake, drive the beast away; he’s disarranging the whole sale; he’ll
break something and the stuff is poor enough already!”

Ami, for it was he who had arrived, carried his lack of respect so far
as to jump over the heads of Monsieur Jarnouillard and the auctioneer,
who were seated at the table which served them for a desk.

The latter started back in alarm when the huge dog executed that
gymnastic feat; the former hurriedly put his hand to his head to ensure
the safety of his wig which came near being carried away by one of the
dog’s paws.

Ami had performed this spring-board leap in order to join Agathe and to
lavish tokens of affection upon her. The girl patted him on the neck;
she spoke softly and caressingly to him. Meanwhile Honorine looked all
about, for Ami’s presence ordinarily announced his master’s coming.

But was it to be presumed that that strange man, who shunned all
companionship, would come to a place where a large part of the village
had assembled?

Meanwhile Monsieur Jarnouillard, who had had barely time to catch his
wig, but had not been able to prevent its turning half round on his
head, was obliged to readjust it before the whole assemblage. That made
him very angry, and he shouted like a deaf man:

“Whose cursed dog is this that nearly put my eyes out, to say nothing of
jumping over the auctioneer’s head and knocking over two candlesticks
and a jug? I want to know to whom he belongs; I shall have a word to say
to his master!”

“And what will you say to his master, monsieur? Speak--he is before
you.”

The owner of the Tower had made his way through the crowd almost as
unceremoniously as his dog, and he stood in the midst of the sale before
anyone had even observed his approach.

Monsieur Jarnouillard was thunderstruck at the abrupt appearance of that
singular personage, whose aspect was stern and imposing.

Paul was dressed as simply as usual, but he carried neither gun nor
stick; his long-vizored cap was pulled down over his eyes, so that the
upper part of his face was in shadow.

“Ah! monsieur is the owner of this great dog, is he?” faltered the
usurer, resuming his sycophantic air. “Oh, yes--true--I think I
recognize monsieur and his dog.”

“Tell me if Ami has broken anything here?”

“No, monsieur, no; he just frightened us, and he disarranged my
wig--that’s all.”

Meanwhile Madame Jarnouillard was making innumerable signs to her
husband, and calling to him:

“To the right--that’s all wrong! turn it to the right! it’s on crooked!”

But the implacable creditor, engrossed by the sale, paid no heed to his
wife’s signs. He was about to put up an old walnut commode, the
peasant’s most valuable piece of furniture, when Paul caught him by the
arm, saying:

“One moment, monsieur! You are selling out this poor family’s house and
furniture, I believe? The grief of the poor mother sitting over yonder,
with her four children about her, does not touch you!”

“Monsieur, business is--business! they are in debt to me, I need my
money----”

“Enough, monsieur! How much does your claim amount to?”

“Nearly nine hundred francs; it will amount to a thousand with the
costs.”

“Very good; offer the house for sale at once.”

“The house? I beg pardon, but we haven’t finished with the furniture
yet, and I would like----”

“I tell you that I propose to buy the house; if it brings enough to pay
your debt, then you won’t need to sell the furniture.”

“Of course not; but I doubt very much whether this hovel----”

“Do you understand me, monsieur? I tell you that I mean to buy this
house; let us make an end of the business, I beg.”

These words were uttered in a tone which made Jarnouillard as flexible
as a glove. He leaned toward the auctioneer and said in a low tone:

“This man is very anxious to have the house; we must make him pay for
it! Suppose we should fix the upset price at--at five hundred francs?”

“It’s twice as much as it’s worth.”

“No matter, let’s try it!”

“Jarnouillard! Jarnouillard! turn it to the right! You’ve got it on
crooked!”

“For God’s sake, Madame Jarnouillard, let me alone! you tire me! no
matter about my wig now!”

The usurer’s wife had thrown away her efforts. She decided to return to
her friends, who had been so taken aback by the arrival of the owner of
the Tower that Madame Droguet had fallen against Monsieur Luminot, who
fell against Madame Remplumé, who fell against her husband, who fell
against Monsieur Droguet, who, having no one to fall against, contented
himself with dropping on the ground the big bellows that he had been
told to hold under his arm.

“What does this mean? that bear here!”

“And with his dog!”

“He never goes out without him!”

“I beg your pardon! I’ve seen him without his dog!”

“What has he come to this sale for? a man who avoids society as he
does!”

“It isn’t natural!”

“You might say that it’s most extraordinary!”

“What! you don’t understand why he has come here? It’s evident enough
however!” said Madame Droguet, smiling maliciously; “aren’t the sirens
from the Courtivaux house here?”

“Oh! to be sure! they are here, so he comes here! What penetration
Madame Droguet has!”

“Why, yes, rather, I venture to flatter myself.”

While the notables indulged in these commentaries upon the presence of
the owner of the Tower, the peasants, for their part, gazed with
interest at the man of whom they had heard so many things. They were,
for the most part, surprised to find that he was a man like other men,
who had the appearance neither of a wild beast nor of an ogre.

The farmer’s family did not know whether the appearance of Paul and his
dog was a subject of fear or hope to them; but the way in which the huge
animal fawned upon Agathe and her friend gave them some little hope. And
Ami, as if he realized that it was his duty to encourage them, ran to
the spot where Guillot and his family were assembled, and gambolled
about the mother and children, wagging his tail in such a meaning way
that the poor creatures soon ceased to be afraid of him.

Monsieur Jarnouillard, having finished his conference with the
auctioneer, shouted:

“We offer for sale this house, with the little enclosure of about
fifteen rods that goes with it--the whole for five hundred francs.--Who
will give five hundred francs?”

A murmur ran through his audience:

“Five hundred francs for that hovel! why, that’s ridiculous! no one will
buy it.”

“If there was any land with it! but fifteen rods! what does that amount
to?”

“Evidently Monsieur Jarnouillard means to keep it himself! but he might
have got it for less!”

While the bystanders made these reflections aloud, the auctioneer
repeated:

“Five hundred! Come, messieurs, who bids more?”

“Who bids less, you mean!” cried Monsieur Luminot, laughing heartily.
“Ha! ha! that’s a great joke, that upset price! I’ll give three hundred
francs for the house--on condition that it’s torn down at once!”

“And I,” said Paul, in a loud voice, “I will give two thousand
francs--on condition that when the creditor and the costs are paid,
whatever remains shall be immediately turned over to this poor family.”

A fairy’s wand could not have produced a more magical effect than was
produced by the words of the owner of the Tower.

“Two thousand francs!”

The words were echoed on all sides.

Agathe and Honorine alone did not seem surprised by the action of Ami’s
master; but, on the other hand, it was plain that they were made very
happy by it, and that they shared to the full the joy which the farmer
and his family manifested.

Paul walked to the desk and threw upon it two thousand-franc notes, to
which Monsieur Jarnouillard made a reverence that nearly caused him to
lose his wig altogether.

“To whom have we the honor of selling this house?” inquired the
auctioneer; “will you kindly give us your name?”

“It is unnecessary, monsieur, for the house has not changed owners. I
bought it simply to restore it to this poor farmer and his unfortunate
family, whom this gentleman proposed to drive into the fields to sleep.”

The words were no sooner out of his mouth than Guillot’s whole family
threw themselves at their benefactor’s feet, and, unable to find words
to express their gratitude, confined themselves to looking up into his
face and kissing his hand and the hem of his jacket.

The tableau was touching enough to move every feeling heart. Honorine
and Agathe did not try to conceal their tears.

But Madame Droguet’s party, sorely vexed at the turn affairs had taken,
still tried to sneer at what was taking place.

“Bless my soul! this is superb!” said one.

“It is truly magnificent!”

“This scene was all arranged beforehand, doubtless, with the two
ladies--that man’s friends. They wanted to produce a great effect.”

But these ebullitions of spite found no echo. Even Doctor Antoine
exclaimed:

“I don’t know whether the gentleman from the Tower intended to produce
an effect, but I regard as very noble what he has just done; it
reconciles me to him and his dog.”

To add to Madame Droguet’s ill humor, her husband persisted in holding
the big bellows under her nose, saying:

“No wind! I assure you, _bobonne_, that it doesn’t blow, it won’t work
at all.”

“Hold your tongue, Droguet!” she replied; “I will find a way to make it
work, I tell you.”

The sale came to an end with the purchase of the house for two thousand
francs. The auctioneer soon had the account made up; Monsieur
Jarnouillard being paid and the legal costs deducted, he called Guillot,
to whom he handed one thousand and fifteen francs, the residue.

The farmer exclaimed aloud in his amazement:

“What! that gentleman lets me keep my house and gives me all this money
too! Oh! this is too much! I don’t deserve all this!”

“Yes, for you have four children to bring up, and you took your niece
into your family too,” said Paul. “I know whom I am helping, you see.
Now you can afford to take a few moments’ rest, and spare yourself the
time to caress your children.”

Honorine meanwhile had told Poucette that her aunt could replace in the
house all the things that she had bought with the purpose of giving them
back to her.

But the peasant, who deemed herself rich now, ran after Madame Dalmont
and said:

“You too are very kind to us, madame, but now we’re not poor any more,
thanks to the kindness of the gentleman from the Tower, so please let us
pay back what you gave for all those things.”

“No, indeed,” said Honorine, “I too wish to have some share in your
happiness; and if I had not the power to do as much as monsieur, surely
you know that I had the inclination.”

Paul was within a few yards of Honorine, and the peasants speedily
informed him what that lady had done for them at the sale. Thereupon he
turned and bowed very low to her, saying:

“I am fortunate, madame, to have been able to imitate you in something!”

“You have done much more than I, monsieur,” Honorine replied, lowering
her eyes.

“The merit of a good deed, madame, consists not in its money value, but
in the way of doing it.”

And, after gazing earnestly for several seconds at the young woman, Paul
bowed again to her and Agathe, and walked away, calling his dog, who was
loath to leave Agathe and the farmer’s family, whom he seemed to look
upon as old acquaintances.

Then Honorine took her friend’s arm, saying to her in a voice trembling
with emotion:

“Let us return home; I am well satisfied with my day’s work!”

“And I trust that you will not think ill of Monsieur Paul any more now?”

“Hush! what are you talking about?”

“For my part, I am awfully sorry that Monsieur Edmond did not see all
that took place here; I am sure that he would have been pleased with the
happiness of that poor family. But we will tell him all about it.”

Madame Droguet also left the spot with her party.

“I didn’t expect to be paid in full!” said Monsieur Jarnouillard, who
was annoyed because the farmer’s house had not fallen to him.

“Madame Dalmont gave Guillot’s wife everything that she bought!” said
the doctor. “That was a very pretty idea!”

“Pray don’t tire us out with your pretty ideas, doctor! Those people
were acting a comedy--nothing else; they were all in concert, like
thieves at a fair! Don’t you think so, Monsieur Luminot?”

“I do; and I will say more; I am entirely of your opinion!”

“_Bobonne_, this bellows won’t work; I can’t get any wind!”

“Very good, monsieur, that will do; you say that just to annoy me!
Beware! there are other bellows than that!”[A]

[A] _Soufflet_--a bellows--means also a box on the ear.

VIII

HOW CHAMOUREAU HONORS HIS NEW PROPERTY

A short time after the sale on execution, the result of which was so
favorable to the Guillot family, an exciting piece of news gained
currency in the little village of Chelles, and set the tongues of all
the gossips of the locality in motion once more. For, you know, the
smaller a place is, the more pleasure the people take in meddling with
other people’s business.

It was the former dealer in wines, the facetious Luminot, who appeared
at Madame Droguet’s one morning, crying:

“Have you heard the news--the great news?”

“Dear me! no, we haven’t heard anything; how do you expect me to hear
anything, with Monsieur Droguet thinking of nothing but his horrid
Lancers quadrille, which he will never learn.--Tell me, Monsieur
Luminot, what is it about?”

“You know that delightful estate, located in the pleasantest spot in the
whole neighborhood--that lovely villa which was built for a former
artiste from the Vaudeville, who sold it to a Parisian confectioner, who
became insolvent?”

“The Goldfish Villa, you mean? so called because there’s a pond full of
them there.”

“I didn’t know that; that’s an additional advantage of the property.”

“Well, what about the house?”

“It was sold a few days ago--to some very distinguished people, so it
seems, and necessarily very rich, for nobody else could indulge in such
a country house.”

“Mon Dieu! it’s no château; I believe they wanted sixty thousand francs
for it; they probably sold it for fifty.”

“Well, fifty thousand francs for a country house, where you don’t live
all the time, is no trifle; and think of all you have to spend when you
buy a place! There’s a park of ten acres----”

“It isn’t a park, it’s a garden with a clump of trees.”

“I beg pardon--a garden of ten acres! that’s too big for a garden.”

“If you insist on calling it a park, I’ve no objection. Well, who are
these distinguished people who have bought the Goldfish Villa?”

“They have a carriage.”

“They have a carriage!--with horses?”

“Yes, indeed, with real horses! There are just the husband and wife--no
children. They live in great style, and they say the lady’s extremely
pretty--and so stylish!”

“All right; we shall see how that is. I doubt whether this person
dresses any better than I do. Did you see the dress I had on last
Tuesday, Luminot?”

“I must have seen it!”

“The man didn’t so much as notice it! a gray damask with green stripes.”

“Oh, yes! it was magnificent; you were at least twelve feet round.”

“I am not talking about how large round I was; I am talking about the
material of my dress, which cost twenty francs a yard; and it’s so stiff
that it stands alone! it’s superb!”

“You were simply gorgeous!”

“Bah! you men think of nothing but novelty; you go into ecstasies
beforehand over a woman you don’t know.”

“I am not going into ecstasies over her; I am simply repeating what I
have been told; and I am very glad to see nice people flocking to our
part of the country.”

“What are the names of these nice people?”

“Wait a moment--they told me the person’s name--it’s an odd name--that
of a place in the outskirts of Paris--a well-known place.”

“What! these distinguished people bear the name of a place?”

“Why not?--It isn’t Saint-Cloud.”

“Ha! ha! Monsieur and Madame Saint-Cloud! that would be amusing!”

“It isn’t Vaugirard--the devil! I did know the name. It isn’t La
Villette!”

Luminot was interrupted by the arrival of Madame Remplumé, who rushed
into the room as eagerly as he had done.

“Madame Droguet, I’ve heard some news----”

“My dear woman, I fancy that your news isn’t news to me. The Goldfish
Villa is sold, isn’t it?”

“Ah! you know it! but it’s just out.”

“I have only known it a minute; neighbor Luminot came to tell us.”

“How in the world does he make out to get all the news first?”

“Oh! I walk about here and there and everywhere, mesdames.”

“The new owners are to come to-day to take possession of their property,
where they mean to pass the whole summer.”

“Ah! that is something we didn’t know. And what is the name of these
people? Monsieur Luminot can’t remember.”

“Their name--wait a minute; I heard what it was; it’s near La
Courtille.”

“Their name is near La Courtille! Really, I don’t understand.--Well,
Droguet, have you finished your pirouetting? I have zigzags before my
eyes, it makes me see stars to watch him whirl round like that; when I
married him I didn’t get a husband, but a teetotum--nothing else!”

Madame Jarnouillard soon increased this amiable party by her presence.

“My compliments to the company,” she said; “I came to inform you that
the confectioner’s estate is sold at last; but I’ll wager that you all
know it.”

“Yes, yes--we know it.”

“But no one can remember the purchaser’s name.”

“Monsieur de Belleville.”

“That’s it, yes, that’s it; didn’t I tell you it was in the outskirts of
Paris?”

“Why, you didn’t tell us so at all; Monsieur Belleville; that’s a real
name.”

“_De_ Belleville!”

“Is there a _de_?”

“Yes, they are nobles.”

“It’s to be hoped that they will be decently polite; that they will call
on us, and not act like those minxes at the Courtivaux house.”

“Oh! there’s no danger! On the contrary, it seems that the lady intends
to give some gorgeous fêtes, and invite the whole neighborhood!”

“Really! How do you know that so soon, Madame Jarnouillard?”

“Oh! because the last time the purchasers came in their carriage to
inspect the property--that is to say, the lady came alone; no one has
seen the husband yet--Jarnouillard, who happened to be passing, led
their coachman into conversation, in order to get some information.”

“That was an excellent idea, very prudent; in that way one finds out who
people are. Did the coachman say anything more?”

“His masters are very rich; they live in the Chaussée d’Antin in
Paris.”

“Oh, well! if they live in the Chaussée d’Antin, I have the very highest
opinion of their morality!”

“And they are to take possession to-day?”

“So it is said.”

“Jarnouillard will take occasion to walk by the Goldfish Villa, and he
will find out whether the new owners are there.”

“Really, Monsieur Jarnouillard is a most invaluable man for obtaining
information!”

That same day, about two o’clock in the afternoon, a fine open calèche
rumbled noisily through the little village of Chelles. The coachman had
received orders to crack his whip constantly, and he acquitted himself
of that duty so zealously that the children shrieked and fled as he
passed, the hens had barely time to reach their dung-heaps, the dogs
barked, and everybody ran to see what was happening.

On the back seat of the calèche sat Monsieur and Madame de Belleville.

Thélénie, in a fascinating morning costume, assumed the careless air,
accompanied by disdainful movements of the head, which the belles of the
demi-monde always have at their command, to throw dust in the eyes of
fools. Chamoureau sat very straight and stiff; he might readily have
been taken for a man of wood placed there to do escort duty.

The front seat was occupied by the lady’s maid, Mademoiselle Mélie; and
the cook sat on the box beside the coachman.

Then there was a multitude of boxes, packages and trunks; Chamoureau
held four boxes on his knees, the maid three, and madame none.

Thélénie had wasted no time after the conversation with her husband, in
which he had told her that Edmond had a love-affair at Chelles and had
hired a house there; she had started at once for that quarter, and on
arriving had inquired concerning houses for sale or for rent in the
village. There was nothing for rent except some small apartments
unsuited to her new position. But the confectioner’s house was for sale,
and was pointed out to her as the most desirable estate in the place.

Thélénie went at once to inspect the Goldfish Villa. It had been built
for one of our fashionable actresses, so that it was certain to please
Thélénie, and on leaving it she went at once to the person in whose
hands the estate had been placed for sale; the bargain was soon struck
and an appointment made for the next day, at a notary’s in Paris.

Thélénie, who carried the key to the cash-box, paid cash for her
purchase; so that Chamoureau, when he brought the _Petites-Affiches_ to
his wife the next day, that she might make a selection among the estates
offered for sale in the suburbs, was greatly surprised to learn that
everything had been done, and that he was the owner of a fine country
house at Chelles.

“I say! at Chelles!” cried Chamoureau; “that’s funny enough.”

“What is there funny about it, monsieur?”

“Why, Chelles is the very place where Edmond Didier has hired a house,
in order to be near Madame Dalmont and her young friend.”

“Well, monsieur, what difference does that make to us? is it any of our
business? Because Monsieur Edmond is carrying on an intrigue in that
neighborhood, should that prevent me from buying a charming estate in a
lovely country which I like immensely?”

“Certainly not, my dear love; I didn’t mean anything of the kind; I
simply made the remark.”

“Another time keep your remarks to yourself; but make all your purchases
and preparations; in five days we will go down to take possession of our
new estate. I require that length of time to have the dresses made and
the bonnets that I want to take with me.”

The five days having passed, Chamoureau came to take possession of a
country house which he had never seen. When they drove through the
village, where many of the streets were narrow, dirty and ill-paved, he
did not fail to exclaim:

“Charming country! delightful country! It reminds me of Switzerland.”

“Have you been in Switzerland, monsieur?”

“No, but I had a client who used often to talk to me about it. How
delicious the country air is! what a pleasure to breathe it!”

At that moment Thélénie was holding her handkerchief to her face because
they were passing a heap of offal and muddy water which emitted a most
offensive odor.

“You are not happy in your observations, monsieur; there is a horrible
smell here.”

“That’s nothing, madame; a pond stirred up by the ducks--that’s all;
it’s gone already.--There are some very pretty houses. Ah! this one is
built in imitation of a chalet; that’s an original idea.”

“Have you ever seen any real chalets, monsieur?”

“No; but one of my clients drew a sketch of one for me.”

“Monsieur de Belleville, I trust that you will soon stop talking about
your clients; you must try not to say such things before company. Why
need you let people know that you were once in business? You are
stupid!”

“Why, madame, I might have been an advocate; that’s a fine profession!”

“Ha! ha! an advocate! you an advocate! Great heaven! who would believe
it?”

“Everybody is running to their doors and windows to see us pass,
madame.”

“Good! they are quite right!”

“Shall I bow, my dear?”

“I should say not! Why should you bow? Do you imagine yourself somebody
of importance--a prefect--a general?”

“I am not, but I might be! Well, then, I will content myself with
smiling at the people.”

“No, no, monsieur; don’t smile either, I beg you; it’s not necessary.”

“But I must do something.”

“Look out for what you have on your knees; that’s the best thing you can
do.”

“Ah! the landscape becomes positively enchanting. Are we approaching our
property?”

“Yes, monsieur; look--on the right--you can see it from here.”

“What! that magnificent house, with a terrace and jars of flowers?”

“Yes, monsieur.”

“And that beautiful avenue of lindens in front is ours too?”

“To be sure; it goes with the house.”

“And we are going to drive through that avenue?”

“Of course; would you prefer to fly over it?”

“Madame, I am dazzled--enchanted.”

“Don’t look so enchanted, monsieur; one would think that you never had
seen anything before.”

“But there’s a gate at the end of the avenue; ah! it’s open; is there
somebody at the house?”

“There is the gardener, who acts as concierge too, and whom I have
retained.”

“Very good. Yes, I see a man by the gate; he expects us, no doubt.”

“I sent him word that we should come to-day.”

The calèche arrived at the gate, at which stood an old peasant with a
rake over his shoulder, who bowed humbly to his new masters when their
carriage turned into the avenue.

Chamoureau, bewildered by all that he saw, exclaimed:

“Why didn’t he fire?”

“Fire what, monsieur?”

“His gun.”

“In order to do that, he would have to have one.”

“Wasn’t that a gun over his shoulder?”

“No, monsieur, it was a rake.”

“Oh! I thought it was a gun; a gun would have been better, for he could
have fired it on our arrival.”

“Once more, monsieur, remember that you are not the lord of the manor,
that you should be received with a salvo of musketry!”

“That makes no difference, madame; a servant always has the right to
discharge his gun when his masters come home.”

“If all servants did that every time that their masters came home there
would be an incessant fusillade everywhere.”

At last the carriage drew up in front of a pretty stoop. The maid
alighted; Chamoureau, who was in a hurry to inspect his property,
attempted to do the same and dropped on the ground all the boxes and
packages that he had on his knees.

Thereupon Thélénie made a great outcry and applied some far from
complimentary epithets to her husband. To escape that deluge of abuse,
the new proprietor darted up the steps, through the vestibule, up a
flight of stairs, and disappeared.

Thélénie bade the maid pick up the boxes, which contained elaborately
trimmed bonnets and caps--hence her wrath against her husband. They
were all taken up to the apartment which madame had chosen for her own.

Mademoiselle Mélie went into ecstasies over the elegance and convenient
arrangement of the rooms, and the beauty of the view, while she dressed
her mistress, who began operations by changing her costume; then the
maid went to her own room.

Thélénie, alone in a dainty boudoir adjoining her bedroom, opened a
window from which several of the houses in the village were visible, and
glanced at them a moment, saying to herself:

“I shall soon know where Edmond lives, and those women whom he goes to
see. Why should I not find out now?--Mélie!”

The maid answered the call at once.

“Go and bring the concierge to me; if he is not downstairs, you will
find him in the garden.”

The concierge speedily obeyed his new mistress’s summons.

“First of all, what is your name? I have forgotten it.”

“Thomasseau, madame, at your service.”

“Tell me, Thomasseau, do you know this country well?”

“Like my pocket, madame.”

“There was a house, belonging to one Monsieur Courtivaux, which was
purchased by a lady a few months ago?”

“Yes, yes--by Madame Dalmont; she took Poucette, Guillot’s niece, into
her service.”

“That’s the very one; and she has a young woman with her----”

“Mamzelle Agathe--a fine slip of a girl!”

“Well, tell me, Thomasseau, in which direction is that lady’s house?”

“Oh! it’s at the other side of the village, in sight of the railroad.”

“And I can’t see it from this window?”

“No, madame, there’s too many houses in between.”

“Do you know also where a young man from Paris lives--a very fashionable
young man, who has hired a large house just for himself alone?”

“A nice-looking, dandified young gentleman? that must be the one who’s
hired Monsieur Durand’s house.”

“His name is Edmond Didier.”

“That’s it, Monsieur Edmond; well, he lives not far from Madame
Droguet’s, on the main street.”

“Can I see his house from here?”

“No better than the other; it’s on the other side, where the land slopes
off a little; the village ain’t as even as a mirror.”

“Very well; thanks.--I cannot see their houses,” thought the beautiful
brunette, “but that won’t prevent my knowing what they do on the other
side of the village. I will go out and walk about my garden; it’s quite
extensive and there must be other points of view.”

Thélénie wandered through the garden and through the little wood, which
might have passed muster as a park. She ascended several low hills on
which were built pretty summer-houses, whence one could overlook the
surrounding country; but as she was not familiar with it, she made no
progress.

After a long stroll the lady with the great black eyes returned to her
apartment, which she examined more in detail; then she gave orders for
the dinner to be hurried forward, the change of air having sharpened her
appetite.

All this had taken time, and Thélénie suddenly remembered that she had
not seen her husband since their arrival. She concluded that he was
sulky because she had abused him so on the subject of her bandboxes, and
she gave no further thought to him.

Meanwhile time passed, and madame was informed that dinner was served.

“Very well,” said Thélénie; “tell monsieur that I am going to dine.”

“But where shall I find monsieur, madame?”

“Where will you find him? why, in his apartment, I presume.”

“Where is his apartment, madame?”

“Just opposite mine--in the right wing, on the first floor.”

Mademoiselle went in search of her master; but she soon returned and
said:

“I have been to all the rooms you mentioned, madame, and I haven’t been
able to find monsieur.”

“Then he must be in the garden; that man is intolerable--to make us hunt
for him like this! he must know that it’s dinner-time. Tell Thomasseau
to look for monsieur in the park, and let Lapierre help him; I am dying
of hunger, and I am going to dine.”

Madame seated herself at the table and ate her soup. She came to the
_hors d’œuvre_ and still Chamoureau did not appear; but the gardener
and the coachman reported that they had looked everywhere and that
monsieur was certainly not in the garden or in the wood.

“This is very strange! Where has he hidden himself? Can he have fallen
into some hole?”

“Oh! madame, there ain’t a single hole on your whole estate just now.”

“But the pond?”

“The pond’s only two feet and a half deep; you’d have to work pretty
hard to drown yourself in it!--Besides, Monsieur de Belleville ain’t a
child.”

“Madame,” said the maid, “monsieur was the first one to enter the house,
and we haven’t seen or heard him since. It’s a very strange thing! He
didn’t know the house, for it’s the first time he ever came here; he
must have got lost in the cellar.”

“It is hardly probable that Monsieur de Belleville began by rushing down
to inspect the cellar as soon as he got here. But no matter, let someone
go and look.”

The servants went down into the cellars, which were quite extensive;
they went through every part of them, calling their master, but they
found no one.

“Now let’s go up under the eaves,” said Mademoiselle Mélie; “for I am
convinced monsieur is in the house.”

They visited the attics, then the loft, but they did not find
Chamoureau.

“It must be that monsieur’s fallen into one of the wells,” cried the
gardener; “there’s two in the garden!”

And they were going down to inspect the wells, when, as they reached the
second floor, Mademoiselle Mélie thought that she heard a voice coming
from the end of a corridor which led to the toilet rooms.

“Wait a minute!” she said; “I heard something that sounded like a voice
calling; it came from this direction.”

They walked along the corridor, and soon they heard Chamoureau’s voice
distinctly, crying:

“Holà! help! this way! come and let me out! Sapristi! I’ve been shut up
here since morning, and I can’t get out!”

“Oh! mon Dieu! monsieur is shut up there! let’s hurry!”

The little _cabinet_ was at the very end of the corridor, and was
lighted from above only; to open the door, one had simply to push it,
then it closed automatically. But there was nothing inside to take hold
of--neither knob nor latch--so that the person who entered the place, if
he allowed the door to close, could not get out until someone came to
set him free.

The new proprietor, on entering his house, with which he was entirely
unacquainted, had begun by going over the first floor, then had gone up
to the second, and, unluckily for him, had noticed the corridor first of
all, and walked to the end of it to find out where it led. He had
opened the door and found himself in the little toilet-room, and, as
owner of the house, had deemed it proper to see if it was comfortably
arranged. But the infernal door had closed, and, in his struggles to get
out, Chamoureau had tried in vain to open it with his fingers and even
with his nails. Then he had begun to call and shout, thinking that they
would notice that he was missing and would search for him.

But Thélénie had something else in her head, and not until the dinner
hour arrived did she remember her husband. So that the new owner of the
house had passed more than six hours in the little toilet-room--from
half-past twelve until a quarter to seven; for his voice, stifled by the
thick door, was not strong enough to reach the end of the long corridor,
upon which several rooms opened, but all were unoccupied.

“_Credié_; this is very lucky!” cried Chamoureau, as yellow as a quince
after his prolonged stay in the little room; and he rushed out into the
corridor so quickly that Mademoiselle Mélie fell back on the coachman,
who fell back on the gardener, who, having no one to support him, fell
on his centre of gravity, saying:

“What! the bourgeois has been in that closet since morning! He must be
feeling pretty bad!”

“What animal, what ass, what brute, ever had the idea of putting on a
door that closes of itself, without a knob or a latch to open it on the
inside?” cried Chamoureau. “Sapristi! I shan’t forget that sitting very
soon! To-morrow I will have three knobs put on that door and have it
fixed so that it can’t close itself.--Didn’t you people hear me shout?”

“No, monsieur, of course not; if we had heard you, we shouldn’t have had
to look for you very long.”

“Well! this has been rather an unpleasant apprenticeship; it’s been a
terribly long day to me. If I have got to pass my time in the country
this way, I’ll go back to Paris at once!”

“Dinner was served long ago, and madame is waiting for monsieur at
table.”

“She’s waiting for me at table! She doesn’t seem to have been very
anxious about me! Well, I’ll go to dinner; I need refreshment.”

“Poor dear man!” muttered the gardener; “I should think so!”

“Here you are at last, monsieur! Where on earth were you hiding? what
pretty behavior now! to make us scour the whole place for you!” said
Thélénie when her husband appeared in the dining-room.

“I did not hide for my own amusement, madame. I have been a prisoner in
a place which I certainly should not have selected for a prison.”

“A prisoner! what do you mean by that?”

Chamoureau explained to his wife what had happened to him. When she
learned where her husband had passed the day, she laughed so loud and
long that it seemed as if she would never stop. This outburst of
hilarity seemed decidedly unseasonable to Chamoureau; but he wreaked
his vengeance on the dinner; he ate enough for four, so that Thélénie
said to him:

“For heaven’s sake, monsieur, do you want to give yourself an attack of
indigestion?”

“I have a right to, madame! When a man has passed six hours in that
place, he owes himself some compensation.”

THE GOLDFISH

On the following day Thélénie said to her husband:

“Monsieur, you will be dressed at two o’clock, when we will have the
horses put in the calèche and go to pay some visits.”

“Visits! to whom, pray, madame? we don’t know anyone here.”

“That is the very reason why we must make acquaintances. We do not
propose to live like bears, I presume?”

“My dear love, I never pretended to pass for a bear; in the first place,
I haven’t that animal’s hairy coat.--We will go then; and where shall we
go?”

“Don’t worry about that; I have obtained through Mélie a list of the
principal people of the village.”

“Does your maid know them?”

“You don’t understand, monsieur, that servants go to the fruit-shops and
the butchers, and in ten minutes learn all they want to know.”

“That is true; I am a donkey.--Shall I dress in black?”

“Why not?”

“White cravat?”

“To be sure; don’t you know that it is the dress which commands
consideration, before all else?”

“I shall be most imposing, madame.”

“Do your utmost, monsieur.”

At two o’clock, Thélénie was arrayed in a lovely gown, made in the best
possible taste; the carriage was ready and waiting in the courtyard.
Madame came down and looked about for her husband.

“Where is monsieur, pray?”

“We do not know, madame.”

“What on earth does this mean? I told him to be ready at two o’clock,
and it’s after two. Probably he hasn’t finished dressing. Go and tell
him to hurry. I am waiting.”

The maid went up to monsieur’s apartment. In a moment she returned and
said:

“Monsieur is not in his room, madame, but he must be dressed, for I saw
on the chairs the clothes he had on this morning.”

“He is dressed, and yet he is not here! Really Monsieur de Belleville is
becoming insufferable; always having to be hunted for! Can it be that he
is a prisoner again in--you know, the place where he was yesterday? Let
someone visit all the toilet-rooms in the house; then, if monsieur is
there again, we shall find him.”

The servants executed their mistress’s orders; meanwhile Thélénie
stepped into the calèche, murmuring impatiently:

“Mon Dieu! what an idiot I have married! but after all, he is just what
I needed.”

The servants returned, having visited all the most secret corners of the
house and failed to find their master. This time it was certain that he
was not in the house. They were about to look for him in the garden,
when he suddenly appeared in the distance, drenched to the skin, with
his hair glued to his face, and covered with mud from head to foot.

“Oh! monsieur! what a sight you are!” cried Thélénie; “where have you
been, then? Don’t come near me; you are disgusting.”

“I am dripping wet, it’s true. I fell into the pond, my dear love. You
know, we have a fine pond on our place.”

“Yes, monsieur, I do know it; but I should say that it was visible to
the naked eye, and that it can hardly be mistaken for a lawn in broad
daylight.”

“And so, madame, I saw perfectly well that it was a pond.--I was dressed
before the time, for I did not want to keep you waiting; and, seeing
that I had a few minutes to spare, I walked about our magnificent
gardens. I spied the pond--I didn’t see it yesterday; I went close to
it and looked in. What did I see? red, cherry-colored, orange fishes! It
was a fascinating sight; I was dazzled. I saw one that gleamed so that
its scales seemed to be gold! Faith, in my curiosity to see him nearer,
I leaned over to catch him; he slipped through my fingers; I leaned over
farther, and _pouf!_ I fell in among the fish and came near drowning;
there’s a lot of water there!”

“Oh, no! monsieur--only two feet and a half.”

“Three feet, madame; and then, the fish blinded me; I couldn’t find the
bank. However, I succeeded in getting out.”

“And in a pretty state! You don’t expect to come with me in that
condition, I take it?”

“No, madame; I am going to change.”

“Make haste. What an idea, to try to catch one of those fish! Really,
monsieur, you are worse than a child!”

“Ah! I have no luck in this place.”

“Go, quickly, and change your clothes.”

Chamoureau went up to his room. He was obliged to make an entire change.
However, as he had but one black coat and his wife had told him to dress
in black, he had no choice but to put that one on again; but he wiped it
so carefully and rubbed it with so many towels, that it was soon in
condition to be worn, and indeed was as glossy and shining as a new one.

Chamoureau entered the calèche, but, although he was well cleansed,
madame required him to sit opposite her, not by her side. She found
that he retained from his bath an odor of goldfish which made her sick.

They drove first to Madame Droguet’s; she was at the head of the list
which Thélénie consulted.

When the calèche stopped at Madame Droguet’s door, it caused a general
turmoil in the house. Everybody ran upstairs or downstairs, crying:

“A carriage for us!”

“The new owners of Goldfish Villa!”

“Monsieur and Madame de Belleville coming here!”

“Joséphine, my cap with bunches of jasmine.”

“Yes, madame.”

“Monsieur Droguet, run and put on a black coat.”

“Yes, wife. Must I change my waistcoat too?”

“Yes, if you have time. Mon Dieu! here they are! and I haven’t my
jasmine cap! Joséphine, let them wait a moment in the salon. Say that
I--that I----”

“I will say that madame is washing her hands.”

“No, indeed! that would be nice! You will say that I am taking a foot
bath; that is much more _comme il faut_.”

Meanwhile Monsieur and Madame de Belleville had entered the house and
given their names to the concierge, who performed the duties of footman
as well.

Joséphine came to say that her mistress was taking a foot bath, and
requested them to have the kindness to wait a moment in the salon into
which she ushered them.

Thélénie proceeded at once to take a survey of the room, while
Chamoureau gazed at the two full-length portraits, life size,
representing the master and the mistress of the house.

“It’s very fine here,” he murmured; “handsome furniture, rich paper, and
a superb clock!”

“Hush, monsieur! all this is in execrable taste, and the portraits alone
are enough to tell us what sort of people they represent--rich grocers,
I fancy. Never mind; let us be very agreeable; we must dazzle all these
people, and it ought not to be very difficult.”

Madame Droguet soon arrived, with her cap a little too much over one
ear; but that gave the ex-vivandière a martial look which was not
unbecoming to her.

Monsieur Droguet came at his wife’s heels, in a very short coat and a
too long waistcoat, which lacked several buttons; but he had not had
time to notice it.

They bestowed a most affable welcome on their new neighbors; it was easy
to see that Thélénie’s genuine refinement produced a deep impression on
Madame Droguet, who confounded herself in compliments and courtesies, at
the same time saying to her husband in an undertone:

“Button yourself up!”

And he, thinking that his wife referred to his waistcoat, murmured with
a contrite expression:

“The buttons are missing.”

Thélénie informed Madame Droguet that she proposed to give dinners,
receptions, festivities of all sorts, and that she should hope for her
company as well as her husband’s.

The corpulent dame was beside herself with joy, and Monsieur Droguet
wrenched off one of the two remaining buttons of his waistcoat.

They then proceeded to discuss the question of the other persons to be
invited. Madame Droguet named her own particular friends, and Thélénie
asked with an indifferent air:

“Haven’t you a certain Madame Dalmont here--a so-called widow, who has a
young woman living with her?”

“Yes, we have,” replied Madame Droguet with a sneering smile. “But,
between us, dear Madame de Belleville, I don’t think that they are
people worthy to be received at your house. In the first place, they are
not polite. When they came here to live they did not call upon us as is
customary.”

“That indicates at once a lack of _savoir-vivre_.”

“Does it not, madame? Then they have struck up a friendship with a very
low-lived person, a sort of wolf, whom nobody in the neighborhood cared
to know, and who seems to be on the best of terms with them already. He
walks home with them at night. And then----”

“What! isn’t that all?”

“A young man from Paris, named Edmond Didier, hired a house here in
Chelles, soon after those strangers came here. And since he’s been here,
he passes almost all his time at their house, until it’s got to be a
perfect scandal. I am not evil-minded certainly, but there are things
one can’t help seeing.--Let your waistcoat alone, Droguet, and button
yourself up!”

“What you tell me on the subject of these women, madame, does not
surprise me in the least,” cried Thélénie, delighted by what she had
heard. “We have known Monsieur Edmond Didier a long while; my husband
was once very intimate with him----”

At this point, Chamoureau, who had not been able as yet to put in a word
and had confined himself to watching Monsieur Droguet as he felt for the
missing buttons or wrenched off the others,--Chamoureau thought that he
saw an opportunity to speak.

“Yes,” he said, “I used to know Monsieur Edmond Didier--that is to say,
through Freluchon, who used--at the time when----”

Thélénie made haste to cut him short:

“In fact, madame, we heard in Paris that Monsieur Edmond had formed a
liaison unworthy of him, which distressed his family; for what you have
told me of this Dalmont woman corresponds perfectly with what people
think of her in Paris, where she is looked upon as a scheming
adventuress; and doubtless her young friend is little better; birds of a
feather flock together.”

Madame de Belleville, who was doing her best to play the _grande dame_,
forgot that it was not good form to quote proverbs; but it was as right
as possible in the eyes of Madame Droguet, who was radiant with delight
and exclaimed:

“You hear, Droguet; they’re adventuresses, nobodies! I was sure of it,
myself; I am never mistaken in my conjectures; didn’t I say so, only
last night, to Doctor Antoine, who undertook to stand up for
them!--Just be sick, Droguet, be sick, my dear man; I tell you
beforehand that I won’t send for the doctor.”

Monsieur Droguet, who had finally found one button of his waistcoat
firmly attached, had just buttoned it with an air of proud satisfaction,
and seemed to pay little heed to what his wife said.

At that moment Chamoureau was seized with a paroxysm of sneezing, which
ended in a shower and spattered his neighbors; he hurriedly drew his
handkerchief, to make his nose presentable; but in his haste to unfold
it, he threw into Madame Droguet’s face an object which slid down that
lady’s cheek into her bosom, where it disappeared. She uttered a shriek,
her husband jumped backward, and Thélénie glared sternly at Chamoureau,
as she demanded:

“What was that you threw at madame?”

“I, threw something at madame! why I had nothing to throw.”

Meanwhile Madame Droguet had thrown herself back in her chair, shrieking
frantically:

“Oh! take it away! oh! the horrid beast! what kind of a creature is it?
It’s still there; it’s slipped down inside my corsets! Take it away!
take it away! or I’ll scratch someone!”

Chamoureau stared at her with a terrified expression, but he did not
move. Monsieur Droguet let his wife shriek, while he tried obstinately
to put another button through its buttonhole.

“Well! does neither of you propose to assist madame?” Thélénie asked
them.

“It seems to me,” muttered Chamoureau, “that it isn’t for me to go
fumbling in that lady’s corsets; that’s her husband’s business.”

Madame Droguet, seeing that no one came to her assistance, concluded to
put her right hand inside her dress. She brought to light a small
goldfish which its enforced sojourn in a warm pocket had deprived of a
great part of its activity.

“A goldfish!” murmured Madame Droguet in amazement. “What! monsieur,”
she added, somewhat reassured when she found that it was not a frog
which she had been warming in her bosom, “do you carry goldfish in your
handkerchief?”

Chamoureau, as the explanation of the incident began to dawn upon him,
turned as red as his fish, and did not know what to say. But Thélénie at
once spoke up and told the story of the accident which had happened to
her husband, and which explained the presence of an inhabitant of the
pond in his coat pocket, unsuspected by him. Thereupon they ended by
laughing at the episode, and to obtain full forgiveness for the fish,
Thélénie invited the Droguet family to dinner on the Thursday following.

The invitation was accepted with profuse thanks and compliments, and
Monsieur and Madame de Belleville took their leave; the Droguets
escorted them to their calèche, and they parted well pleased with one
another.

“Please examine your pockets, monsieur,” said Thélénie, “and make sure
that there are no more goldfish in them, for I have no desire that you
should throw any more of them in the faces of the people we are going to
call upon.”

“I have no more in my pockets, madame.”

“I am not surprised that you have such a horrible smell of fish about
you; why didn’t you change your coat?”

“Because I haven’t any other black one that fits me, madame.”

“Then you must have another one made, monsieur; I believe that you are
rich enough to have more than one coat.”

On leaving Madame Droguet’s, Thélénie drove to the Remplumés, then to
the Jarnouillards, then to the mayor’s, and to all the leading people of
the place, who were extremely flattered by the courtesies and the
invitations they received from Monsieur and Madame de Belleville.
Thélénie overlooked neither Monsieur Luminot nor the doctor; she left at
their houses invitations to dine with her on the Thursday following.

Then they returned to Goldfish Villa, and Chamoureau said to himself:

“I propose to stay quietly in my room, for fear some other unpleasant
accident may happen to me.”

Thélénie, for her part, was well content with her day. She had begun a
campaign of calumny against the persons whom Edmond visited, and she was
persuaded that her spiteful words would soon be repeated and
exaggerated, for calumny is the most agreeable pastime of fools. They
would be of so little account in the world, if they did not speak ill of
their neighbors.

AMI BRINGS CERTAIN PERSONS TOGETHER

When the lovelorn Edmond returned from Paris, his first thought always
was to go to Madame Dalmont’s to pay his respects to the two friends and
to indulge himself in the pleasure of reading Agathe’s thoughts in her
eyes.

They did not fail to tell him the story of the sale, although Honorine
attempted to pass over in silence the circumstances that redounded to
her credit; but Agathe told everything.

“Why shouldn’t you tell of your own good deeds?” she said; “as they say
so much ill of us in the neighborhood, that will be some little
compensation.”

“Say ill of you! who has the presumption to do anything of the sort,
when you deserve nothing but praise?” exclaimed Edmond with great heat.
“I have known you only a short time, mesdames, but, thank heaven! I soon
learned to appreciate you! You are not of those persons whose hearts are
a mystery; yours are so kind, so humane!--What Madame Dalmont did for
those people doesn’t surprise me in the least; if she were wealthy, I am
sure that there would be no unfortunates in her neighborhood! I confess,
too, that I feel strongly drawn toward that strange man, the owner of
the Tower, concerning whom the people hereabout spread such absurd
reports. When calumny is rife concerning a person whom I do not know, it
always serves to commend that person to me. What he did for the farmer’s
family was grand, noble, touching! it was like a gust of wind which
swept away in an instant all the petty slanders that were current
concerning him!--But I beg you to answer my question: who has spoken ill
of you?”

The two friends were silent for some time; Agathe blushed and looked at
the floor. At last Honorine decided to speak.

“Agathe thinks that we ought to tell you everything, bad as well as
good; so we will speak frankly, once and for all; I believe, in truth,
that that is the best course to follow.

“First of all, Monsieur Edmond, I must begin by reassuring you, by
begging you to believe that the remarks which are made about us do not
affect us in the least. You have heard of a certain Madame Droguet----”

“That inquisitive woman, who hid a whole day in the bushes, watching for
Monsieur Paul to pass,” added Agathe.

“And who received Freluchon so ill because he called at her house to ask
for me?”

“That is the woman; the specimens of her social circle who came to see
us gave us no desire to know it in its entirety, so we have not called
on Madame Droguet, or her friends Mesdames Jarnouillard and Remplumé.
That was our first offence, but it was a very grave one! to fail to show
to those ladies the consideration that was their due, and thereby to
announce that we did not care for their society--that was an insult
which they could not forgive. They began thereupon to discover that we
were suspicious characters. Then, as you know, chance willed that we
should, on two occasions, accept the escort of the proprietor of the
Tower; he walked home with us one evening when a cow had frightened me
almost to death, and another time when we were surprised by a violent
storm in the country. In a small place like this, it rarely happens that
one returns home without being seen by someone. We were noticed in the
company of that gentleman, who has shown no desire for their
company,--indeed, I believe that I was leaning on his arm, which
necessarily intensified the wrath of those ladies,--and he who, during
the nine years, more or less, that he has lived in this part of the
country, has steadfastly refused all relations with the local
notabilities, actually offers his arm to us--the newest of newcomers!
That incident was the source of a thousand and one absurd remarks. I
come now to another fact which has furnished a subject of calumny to all
these people: you hired a house at Chelles shortly after we came here to
live; you hired a whole house for your single self.”

“What business is that of theirs? I paid six months’ rent in advance.”

“What business is it of theirs? why, monsieur, everything is the
business of those who have nothing to do but to try to find out what is
going on among their neighbors. Well, you come to see us--often; you
call upon no one else in the place; therefore people are bound to think
that you--that you take pleasure in our society.”

“Ah! madame, do you tell me this to make me come less often? Would you
forbid my coming to see you?”

“I do not say that; but----”

Honorine seemed embarrassed; Agathe was trembling from head to foot; and
Edmond hesitated no longer.

“Madame!” he said, “I like to believe that, seeing me come to your house
so persistently, you have never supposed that I was led to come by a
blameworthy desire, a frivolous sentiment. But I realize, nevertheless,
that it is better that I should explain myself, that I should speak to
you frankly, that I should follow your example in everything. I must not
leave any basis for hateful suspicions. Madame, if I tell you that I
love, that I adore Mademoiselle Agathe, I shall tell you nothing that
you do not know; for you must have divined that love, which it would
have been very difficult for me to conceal! But, when I avow my passion
for her, is not that equivalent to saying that my sole desire is to call
her my wife, and that that will be my greatest joy? If I have not told
you earlier, it was because I wanted to know--I wanted to be sure if
Mademoiselle----”

“He wanted to be sure that I loved him, you see, my dear!” cried Agathe,
unable longer to restrain her joy. “And now he is very sure of it; that
is what he was waiting for before speaking.”

“Why, Agathe! what are you saying?” exclaimed Honorine; while the girl,
confused by what had escaped her lips, relapsed into speechless
agitation.

But Edmond impetuously threw himself at Honorine’s feet, saying:

“In pity’s name, madame, do not reprove her, and do not force her to
unsay those words which have made me so happy!”

Honorine gazed at the lovers for a few moments, then smiled and took a
hand of each.

“Be calm, my children!” said she; “I do not look very stern, I imagine.
Come, sit here beside me, and let us talk.--You love Agathe--yes, I do
not doubt it; I had guessed as much; and it is because I have faith in
your honor that I have allowed your visits. She loves you, too; why
should I blame her for it, if this exchange of sentiments is to result
in your happiness? You wish to be her husband, but first of all it is
essential that you should know the whole story of her to whom you wish
to give your name.

“Agathe bears only her mother’s name--Montoni. Julia, her unfortunate
mother, was loved by a young man of noble birth, Comte Adhémar de
Hautmont. He did not abandon the woman who had given herself to him; he
loved her dearly and intended to make her his wife; but, in order to
avoid a rupture with his family, he was waiting until circumstances
should favor his projected marriage. Alas! the young man suddenly
disappeared; Julia never saw him again, never heard from him in any way;
and when he left her, it was with a promise to see her soon, and he
covered his daughter, then six years old, with kisses.”

“Why, that is most extraordinary! Did he not return to his family?”

“No; Julia caused inquiries to be made; she was unable to learn anything
concerning her child’s father, and six years later the poor mother
placed her daughter in my care, saying:

“‘I am dying; take care of my Agathe, who has no one but you to love
her.’

“That, monsieur, is all that there is to tell concerning her whom you
desire to call your wife; and that it was absolutely necessary to tell
you.”

“Oh! madame, you do not think, I trust, that that can in any degree
lessen my love for her or my desire to make her the companion of my
life.”

“You see, my dear, it doesn’t change his sentiments at all; I was sure
that it would not!”

“Dear Agathe, your mother’s misfortunes can but make you the more
interesting in my eyes. But your father’s sudden disappearance seems to
me most extraordinary; it must be connected with some mysterious
occurrence--with some crime, perhaps; who knows?”

“Ah! we have very often thought that.”

“And there has never been any clue, any circumstance to put you on the
track of what happened to him?”

“Nothing; so long as my poor mother lived, she never ceased to seek
information and make inquiries; but she could never discover a trace of
the man who had sworn to love her forever! When she died, I was twelve
years old; I could do nothing but weep for my dear mother, and love her
who consented to take charge of the unfortunate orphan.”

Agathe threw herself into Honorine’s arms; the latter hastily wiped away
the tears that were gathering in her eyes and said:

“Now, my young fiancés, for from this day I regard you as such, let us
talk of serious matters. Let us for a moment forget love, which is a
very pleasant thing, but insufficient to keep house upon. I am talking
now like an aged guardian, am I not? But the old people are almost
always right, for they hav

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