THE INK STAIN

(Tache d'Encre)

By RENE BAZIN

Preface by E. LAVISSE

RENE BAZIN

RENE-NICHOLAS-MARIE BAZIN was born at Angers, December 26, 1853. Hestudied for the bar, became a lawyer and professor of jurisprudence atthe Catholic University in his native city, and early contributed to'Le Correspondant, L'Illustration, Journal des Debats, Revue du DeuxMondes, ' etc. Although quietly writing fiction for the last fifteenyears or so, he was not well known until the dawn of the twentiethcentury, when his moral studies of provincial life under the form ofnovels and romances became appreciated. He is a profound psychologist, a force in literature, and his style is very pure and attractive. He advocates resignation and the domestic virtues, yet his books areneither dull, nor tiresome, nor priggish; and as he has advanced inyears and experience M. Bazin has shown an increasing ambition to dealwith larger problems than are involved for instance, in the innocentlove-affairs of 'Ma Tante Giron' (1886), a book which enraptured LudovicHalevy. His novel, 'Une Tache d'Encre' (1888), a romance of scholarlylife, was crowned by the French Academy, to which he was elected in1903. 

It is safe to say that Bazin will never develop into an author dangerousto morals. His works may be put into the hands of cloistered virgins, and there are not, to my knowledge, many other contemporary Frenchimaginative writers who could endure this stringent test. Some critics, indeed, while praising him, scoff at his chaste and surprising optimism;but it is refreshing to recommend to English readers, in these days ofRealism and Naturalism, the works of a recent French writer which do notrequire maturity of years in the reader. 'Une Tache d'Encre', as I havesaid, was crowned by the French Academy; and Bazin received from thesame exalted body the "Prix Vitet" for the ensemble of his writings in1896, being finally admitted a member of the Academy in June, 1903. Heoccupies the chair of Ernest Legouve. 

Bazin's first romance, 'Stephanette', was published under the pseudonym"Bernard Seigny, " in 1884; then followed 'Victor Pavie (1887); Noellet(1890); A l'Aventure (1891) and Sicile (1892)', two books on Italy, ofwhich the last mentioned was likewise crowned by the French Academy;'La Legende de Sainte-Bega (1892); La Sarcelle Bleue (1892); MadameCorentine (1893); Les Italiens d'aujourd'hui (1894); Humble Amour(1894); En Province (1896); De toute son Ame (1897)', a realistic butmoderate romance of a workingman's life; 'Les Contes de Perrette (1898);La Terre qui Meurt (1899); Le Guide de l'Empereur (1901); Les Oberle(1902), a tale from Alsace of to-day, sketching the political situation, approximately correct, and lately adapted for the stage; 'Donatienne'(1903). 

With Bazin literary life does not become a mirage obscuring the visionof real life. Before being an author Rene Bazin is a man, with a familyattached to the country, rooted in the soil; a guaranty of the dignityof his work as well as of the writer, and a safeguard against manyextravagances. He has remained faithful to his province. He lives in theattractive city of Angers. When he leaves it, it is for a little tourthrough France, or a rare journey-once to Sicily and once to Spain. He is seldom to be met on the Parisian boulevards. Not that he has anyprejudice against Paris, or fails to appreciate the tone of its society, or the quality of its diversions; but he is conscious that he hasnothing to gain from a residence in the capital, but, on the contrary, would run a risk of losing his intense originality and the freshness ofhis genius. 

 E. LAVISSE de l'Academie Francaise. 

THE INK-STAIN

BOOK 1. 

CHAPTER I. THE ACCIDENT

All I have to record of the first twenty-three years of my life is theenumeration of them. A simple bead-roll is enough; it represents theirfamily likeness and family monotony. 

I lost my parents when I was very young. I can hardly recall theirfaces; and I should keep no memories of La Chatre, our home, had I notbeen brought up quite close to it. It was sold, however, and lost tome, like all the rest. Yes, fate is hard, sometimes. I was born at LaChatre; the college of La Chatre absorbed eighteen years of my life. Ourhead master used to remark that college is a second home; whereby I havealways fancied he did some injustice to the first. 

My school-days were hardly over when my uncle and guardian, M. BrutusMouillard, solicitor, of Bourges, packed me off to Paris to go throughmy law course. I took three years over it: At the end of that time, just eighteen months ago, I became a licentiate, and "in the saidcapacity"--as my uncle would say took an oath that transformed me intoa probationary barrister. Every Monday, regularly, I go to sign my nameamong many others on an attendance list, and thereby, it appears, I amestablishing a claim upon the confidence of the widow and the orphan. 

In the intervals of my legal studies I have succeeded in taking my ArtsDegree. At present I am seeking that of Doctor of Law. My examinationshave been passed meritoriously, but without brilliance; my tastes runtoo much after letters. My professor, M. Flamaran, once told me thetruth of the matter: "Law, young man, is a jealous mistress; she allowsno divided affection. " Are my affections divided? I think not, and Icertainly do not confess any such thing to M. Mouillard, who has not yetforgotten what he calls "that freak" of a Degree in Arts. He builds somehopes upon me, and, in return, it is natural that I should build a fewupon him. 

Really, that sums up all my past: two certificates! A third diplomain prospect and an uncle to leave me his money--that is my future. Cananything more commonplace be imagined?

I may add that I never felt any temptation at all to put these thingson record until to-day, the tenth of December, 1884. Nothing had everhappened to me; my history was a blank. I might have died thus. But whocan foresee life's sudden transformations? Who can foretell that theskein, hitherto so tranquilly unwound, will not suddenly become tangled?This afternoon a serious adventure befell me. It agitated me at thetime, and it agitates me still more upon reflection. A voice within mewhispers that this cause will have a series of effects, that I am onthe threshold of an epoch, or, as the novelists say, a crisis in myexistence. It has struck me that I owe it to myself to write myMemoirs, and that is the reason why I have just purchased this brownmemorandum-book in the Odeon Arcade. I intend to make a detailedand particular entry of the event, and, as time goes on, of itsconsequences, if any should happen to flow from it. 

"Flow from it" is just the phrase; for it has to do with a blot of ink. 

My blot of ink is hardly dry. It is a large one, too; of abnormal shape, and altogether monstrous, whether one considers it from the physicalside or studies it in its moral bearings. It is very much more than anaccident; it has something of the nature of an outrage. It was atthe National Library that I perpetrated it, and upon--But I must notanticipate. 

I often work in the National Library; not in the main hall, but in thatreserved for literary men who have a claim, and are provided with aticket, to use it. I never enter it without a gentle thrill, in whichrespect is mingled with satisfied vanity. For not every one who choosesmay walk in. I must pass before the office of the porter, who retains myumbrella, before I make my way to the solemn beadle who sits just insidethe doorway--a double precaution, attesting to the majesty of the place. The beadle knows me. He no longer demands my ticket. To be sure, I amnot yet one of those old acquaintances on whom he smiles; but I amno longer reckoned among those novices whose passport he exacts. Aninclination of his head makes me free of the temple, and says, asplainly as words, "You are one of us, albeit a trifle young. Walk in, sir. "

And in I walk, and admire on each occasion the vast proportions of theinterior, the severe decoration of the walls, traced with broad foliatedpattern and wainscoted with books of reference as high as hand canreach; the dread tribunal of librarians and keepers in session downyonder, on a kind of judgment-seat, at the end of the avenue whosecarpet deadens all footsteps; and behind again, that holy of holieswhere work the doubly privileged--the men, I imagine, who are membersof two or three academies. To right and left of this avenue are rows oftables and armchairs, where scatters, as caprice has chosen and habitconsecrated, the learned population of the library. Men form the largemajority. Viewed from the rear, as they bend over their work, theysuggest reflections on the ravages wrought by study upon hair-cladcuticles. For every hirsute Southerner whose locks turn gray withoutdropping off, heavens, what a regiment of bald heads! Visitors who lookin through the glass doors see only this aspect of devastation. It givesa wrong impression. Here and there, at haphazard, you may find a fewwomen among these men. George Sand used to come here. I don't know thenames of these successors of hers, nor their business; I have merelyobserved that they dress in sober colors, and that each carries anumber of shawls and a thick veil. You feel that love is far from theirthoughts. They have left it outside, perhaps--with the porter. 

Several of these learned folk lift their heads as I pass, and followme with the dulled eye of the student, an eye still occupied with thewritten thought and inattentive to what it looks on. Then, suddenly, remorse seizes them for their distraction, they are annoyed with me, agloomy impatience kindles in their look, and each plunges anew into hisopen volume. But I have had time to guess their secret ejaculations:"I am studying the Origin of Trade Guilds!" "I, the Reign of Louis theTwelfth!" "I, the Latin Dialects!" "I, the Civil Status of Womenunder Tiberius!" "I am elaborating a new translation of Horace!" "I amfulminating a seventh article, for the Gazette of Atheism and Anarchy, on the Russian Serfs!" And each one seems to add, "But what is thybusiness here, stripling? What canst thou write at thy age? Whytroublest thou the peace of these hallowed precincts?" My business, sirs? Alas! it is the thesis for my doctor's degree. My uncle andvenerated guardian, M. Brutus Mouillard, solicitor, of Bourges, is urging me to finish it, demands my return to the country, growsimpatient over the slow toil of composition. "Have done with theories, "he writes, "and get to business! If you must strive for this degree, well and good; but what possessed you to choose such a subject?"

I must own that the subject of my thesis in Roman law has beenartistically chosen with a view to prolonging my stay in Paris: "On the'Latini Juniani. '" Yes, gentle reader, a new subject, almost incapableof elucidation, having no connection--not the remotest--with theexercise of any profession whatsoever, entirely devoid of practicalutility. The trouble it gives me is beyond conception. 

It is true that I intersperse my researches with some more attractivestudies, and one or two visits to the picture-galleries, and more thanan occasional evening at the theatre. My uncle knows nothing of this. To keep him soothed I am careful to get my reader's ticket renewed everymonth, and every month to send him the ticket just out of date, signedby M. Leopold Delisle. He has a box full of them; and in the simplicityof his heart Monsieur Mouillard has a lurking respect for this nephew, this modern young anchorite, who spends his days at the NationalLibrary, his nights with Gaius, wholly absorbed in the Junian Latins, and indifferent to whatsoever does not concern the Junian Latins in thisParis which my uncle still calls the Modern Babylon. 

I came down this morning in the most industrious mood, when themisfortune befell. Close by the sanctum where the librarians sit are twodesks where you write down the list of the books you want. I was doingso at the right-hand desk, on which abuts the first row of tables. Henceall the mischief. Had I written at the left-hand desk, nothing wouldhave happened. But no; I had just set down as legibly as possible thetitle, author, and size of a certain work on Roman Antiquities, when, inreplacing the penholder, which is attached there by a small brass chain, some inattentiveness, some want of care, my ill-luck, in short, ledme to set it down in unstable equilibrium on the edge of the desk. Ittumbled-I heard the little chain rattle-it tumbled farther-then stoppedshort. The mischief was done. The sudden jerk, as it pulled up, haddetached an enormous drop of ink from the point of the pen, and thatdrop--Ah! I can see him yet, as he rose from the shadow of the desk, that small, white-haired man, so thin and so very angry!

"Clumsy idiot! To blot an Early Text!"

I leaned over and looked. Upon the page of folio, close to anilluminated capital, the black drop had flattened itself. Around theoriginal sphere had been shed splashes of all conceivable shapes-rays, rockets, dotted lines, arrowheads, all the freakish impromptu of chaos. Next, the slope lending its aid, the channels had drained into one, andby this time a black rivulet was crawling downward to the margin. One ortwo readers near had risen, and now eyed me like examining magistrates. I waited for an outbreak, motionless, dazed, muttering words that didnot mend the case at all. "What a pity! Oh, I'm so sorry! If I had onlyknown--" The student of the Early Text stood motionless as I. Togetherwe watched the ink trickle. Suddenly, summoning his wits together, heburrowed with feverish haste in his morocco writing-case, pulled outa sheet of blotting-paper, and began to soak up the ink with thecarefulness of a Sister of Mercy stanching a wound. I seized theopportunity to withdraw discreetly to the third row of tables, wherethe attendant had just deposited my books. Fear is so unreasoning. Verylikely by saying no more about it, by making off and hiding my headin my hands, like a man crushed by the weight of his remorse, I mightdisarm this wrath. I tried to think so. But I knew well enough thatthere was more to come. I had hardly taken my seat when, looking up, I could see between my fingers the little man standing up andgesticulating beside one of the keepers. At one moment he rapped thedamning page with his forefinger; the next, he turned sidewise and flungout a hand toward me; and I divined, without hearing a word, all thebitterness of his invective. The keeper appeared to take it seriously. I felt myself blushing. "There must be, " thought I, "some law againstink-stains, some decree, some regulation, something drawn up for theprotection of Early Texts. And the penalty is bound to be terrible, since it has been enacted by the learned; expulsion, no doubt, besides afine--an enormous fine. They are getting ready over there to fleece me. That book of reference they are consulting is of course the catalogue ofthe sale where this treasure was purchased. I shall have to replace theEarly Text! O Uncle Mouillard!"

I sat there, abandoned to my sad reflections, when one of theattendants, whom I had not seen approaching, touched me on the shoulder. 

"The keeper wishes to speak to you. "

I rose up and went. The terrible reader had gone back to his seat. 

"It was you, sir, I believe, who blotted the folio just now?"

"It was, sir. "

"You did not do so on purpose?"

"Most certainly not, sir! I am indeed sorry for he accident. "

"You ought to be. The volume is almost unique; and the blot, too, forthat matter. I never saw such a blot! Will you, please, leave me yourChristian name, surname, profession, and address?"

I wrote down, "Fabien Jean Jacques Mouillard, barrister, 91 Rue deRennes. "

"Is that all?" I asked. 

"Yes, sir, that is all for the present. But I warn you that MonsieurCharnot is exceedingly annoyed. It might be as well to offer him someapology. "

"Monsieur Charnot?"

"Yes. It is Monsieur Charnot, of the Institute, who was reading theEarly Text. "

"Merciful Heavens!" I ejaculated, as I went back to my seat; "this mustbe the man of whom my tutor spoke, the other day! Monsieur Flamaranbelongs to the Academy of Moral and Political Science, the other to theInstitute of Inscriptions and the Belles-Lettres. Charnot? Yes, Ihave those two syllables in my ear. The very last time I sawMonsieur Flamaran he let fall 'my very good friend Charnot, of the'Inscriptions. ' They are friends. And I am in a pretty situation;threatened with I don't know what by the Library--for the keeper told mepositively that this was all 'for the present'--but not for the future;threatened to be disgraced in my tutor's eyes; and all because thislearned man's temper is upset. 

"I must apologize. Let me see, what could I say to Monsieur Charnot? Asa matter of fact, it's to the Early Text that I ought to apologize. Ihave spilled no ink over Monsieur Charnot. He is spotless, collar andcuffs; the blot, the splashes, all fell on the Text. I will say to him, 'Sir, I am exceedingly sorry to have interrupted you so unfortunatelyin your learned studies! 'Learned studies' will tickle his vanity, andshould go far to appease him. "

I was on the point of rising. M. Charnot anticipated me. 

Grief is not always keenest when most recent. As he approached I saw hewas more irritated and upset than at the moment of the accident. Abovehis pinched, cleanshaven chin his lips shot out with an angry twitch. The portfolio shook under his arm. He flung me a look full of tragedyand went on his way. 

Well, well; go your way, M. Charnot! One doesn't offer apologies to aman in his wrath. You shall have them by-and-bye, when we meet again. 

CHAPTER II. THE JUNIAN LATINS

 December 28, 1884. 

This afternoon I paid M. Flamaran a visit. I had been thinking aboutit for the last week, as I wanted him to help my Junian Latins out of amess. I am acquiring a passion for that interesting class of freedmen. And really it is only natural. These Junian Latins were poor slaves, whose liberation was not recognized by the strict and ancient laws ofRome, because their masters chose to liberate them otherwise than by'vindicta, census, or testamentum'. On this account they lost theirprivileges, poor victims of the legislative intolerance of the haughtycity. You see, it begins to be touching, already. Then came on the sceneJunius Norbanus, consul by rank, and a true democrat, who brought in alaw, carried it, and gave them their freedom. In exchange, they gave himimmortality. Henceforward, did a slave obtain a few kind words from hismaster over his wine? he was a Junian Latin. Was he described as'filius meus' in a public document? Junian Latin. Did he wear the capof liberty, the pileus, at his master's funeral? Junian Latin. Didhe disembowel his master's corpse? Junian Latin, once more, for histrouble. 

What a fine fellow this Norbanus must have been! What an eye foreverything, down to the details of a funeral procession, in which hecould find an excuse for emancipation! And that, too, in the midst ofthe wars of Marius and Sylla in which he took part. I can picturehim seated before his tent, the evening after the battle. Pensive, hereclines upon his shield as he watches the slave who is grinding notchesout of his sword. His eyes fill with tears, and he murmurs, "When peaceis made, my faithful Stychus, I shall have a pleasant surprise for you. You shall hear talk of the Lex Junia Norband, I promise you!"

Is not this a worthy subject for picture or statue in a competition forthe Prix de Rome?

A man so careful of details must have assigned a special dress to thesespecial freedmen of his creation; for at Rome even freedom had itslivery. What was this dress? Was there one at all? No authority thatI know of throws any light on the subject. Still one hope remains: M. Flamaran. He knows so many things, he might even know this. 

M. Flamaran comes from the south-Marseilles, I think. He is not aspecialist in Roman law; but he is encyclopedic, which comes to the samething. He became known while still young, and deservedly; few lawyersare so clear, so safe, so lucid. He is an excellent lecturer, and hisopinions are in demand. Yet he owes much of his fame to the works whichhe has not written. Our fathers, in their day, used to whisper to oneanother in the passages of the Law School, "Have you heard the news?Flamaran is going to bring out the second volume of his great work. Hemeans to publish his lectures. He has in the press a treatise which willrevolutionize the law of mortgages; he has been working twenty years atit; a masterpiece, I assure you. " Day follows day; no book appears, no treatise is published, and all the while M. Flamaran grows inreputation. Strange phenomenon! like the aloe in the Botanical Gardens. The blossoming of the aloe is an event. "Only think!" says the gapingpublic, "a flower which has taken twenty springs, twenty summers, twentyautumns, and twenty winters to make up its mind to open!" And meanwhilethe roses bloom unnoticed by the town. But M. Flamaran's case is stillmore strange. Every year it is whispered that he is about to bloomafresh; he never does bloom; and his reputation flourishes none theless. People make lists of the books he might have written. Luckyauthor!

M. Flamaran is a professor of the old school, stern, and at examinationa terror to the candidates. Clad in cap and gown, he would reject hisown son. Nothing will serve. Recommendations defeat their object. Anunquestioned Roumanian ancestry, an extraction indisputably Japanese, find no more favor in his eyes than an assumed stammer, a sham deafness, or a convalescent pallor put on for the occasion. East and west arealike in his sight. The retired registrar, the pensioned usher aspiringlate in life to some petty magistrature, are powerless to touch hisheart. For him in vain does the youthful volunteer allow his uniform topeep out beneath his student's gown: he will not profit by the patrioticindulgence he counted on inspiring. His sayings in the examination-roomare famous, and among them are some ghastly pleasantries. Here is one, addressed to a victim: "And you, sir, are a law student, while ourfarmers are in want of hands!"

For my own part I won his favor under circumstances that I never shallforget. I was in for my first examination. We were discussing, or ratherI was allowing him to lecture on, the law of wardship, and nodding myassent to his learned elucidations. Suddenly he broke off and asked, "How many opinions have been formulated upon this subject?"

"Two, sir. "

"One is absurd. Which? Beware how you give the wrong answer!"

I considered for three agonizing seconds, and hazarded a guess. "Thefirst, sir. " I had guessed right. We were friends. At bottom theprofessor is a capital fellow; kindly, so long as the dignity ofthe Code is not in question, or the extent of one's legal knowledge;proverbially upright and honorable in his private life. 

At home he may be seen at his window tending his canaries, which, hesays, is no change of occupation. To get to his house I have only to goby my favorite road through the Luxembourg. I am soon at his door. 

"Is Monsieur Flamaran at home?"

The old servant who opened the door eyed me solemnly. So many youngfreshmen come and pester her master under the pretext of paying theirrespects. Their respects, indeed! They would bore him to death if hehad to see them all. The old woman inferred, probably from my moustache, that I had taken at least my bachelor's degree. 

"I think he is. "

He was very much at home in his overheated study, where he sat wrappedup in a dressing-gown and keeping one eye shut to strengthen the other. 

After a moment's hesitation he recognized me, and held out his hand. 

"Ah! my Junian Latin. How are you getting on?"

"I am all right, sir; it's my Junian Latins who are not getting on. "

"You don't say so. We must look into that. But before we begin--I forgetwhere you come from. I like to know where people come from. "

"From La Chatre. But I spend my vacations at Bourges with my UncleMouillard. "

"Yes, yes, Mouillart with a t, isn't it?"

"No, with a d. "

"I asked, you know, because I once knew a General Mouillart who had beenthrough the Crimea, a charming man. But he can not have been a relative, for his name ended with a t. "

My good tutor spoke with a delightful simplicity, evidently wishing tobe pleasant and to show some interest in me. 

"Are you married, young man?"

"No, sir; but I have no conscientious objections. "

"Marry young. Marriage is the salvation of young men. There must beplenty of pretty heiresses in Bourges. "

"Heiresses, yes. As to their looks, at this distance--"

"Yes, I understand, at this distance of course you can't tell. Youshould do as I did; make inquiries, go and see. I went all the way toForez myself to look for my wife. "

"Madame Flamaran comes from Forez?"

"Just so; I stayed there a fortnight, fourteen days exactly, in themiddle of term-time, and brought back Sidonie. Bourges is a nice town. "

"Yes, in summer. "

"Plenty of trees. I remember a grand action I won there. One of mylearned colleagues was against me. We had both written opinions, diametrically opposed, of course. But I beat him--my word, yes!"

"I dare say. "

"My boy, there was nothing left of him. Do you know the case?"

"No. "

"A magnificent case! My notes must be somewhere about; I will get themout for you. "

The good man beamed. Evidently he had not had a talk all day, and felthe must expand and let himself out to somebody. I appeared in the nickof time, and came in for all his honey. He rose, went to a bookcase, ran his eye along a shelf, took down a volume, and began, in a low tone:"'Cooperation is the mighty lever upon which an effete society relies toextricate itself from its swaddling-clothes and take a loftier flight. 'Tut, tut! What stuff is this? I beg your pardon. I was reading from awork on moral philosophy. Where the deuce is my opinion?"

He found it and, text in hand, began a long account of the action, withnames, dates, moments of excitement, and many quotations in extenso. 

"Yes, my young friend, two hundred and eighteen thousand francs did Iwin in that action for Monsieur Prebois, of Bourges; you know Prebois, the manufacturer?"

"By name. "

At last he put the note-book back on its shelf, and deigned to rememberthat I had come about the Junian Latins. 

"In which of the authorities do you find a difficulty?"

"My difficulty lies in the want of authorities, sir, I wish to find outwhether the Junian Latins had not a special dress. "

"To be sure. " He scratched his head. "Gaius says nothing on the point?"

"No. "

"Papinian?"

"No. "

"Justinian?"

"No. "

"Then I see only one resource. "

"What is that?"

"Go to see Charnot. "

I felt myself growing pale, and stammered, with a piteous look:

"Monsieur Charnot, of the Acad--"

"The Academy of Inscriptions; an intimate friend of mine, who willwelcome you like a son, for he has none himself, poor man!"

"But perhaps the question is hardly important enough for me to troublehim like this--"

"Hey? Not important enough? All new questions are important. Charnotspecializes on coins. Coins and costumes are all one. I will write totell him you are coming. "

"I beg, sir--"

"Nonsense; Nonsense; I'll write him this very evening. He will bedelighted to see you. I know him well, you understand. He is like me; helikes industrious young men. "

M. Flamaran held out his hand. 

"Good-by, young man. Marry as soon as you have taken your degree. "

I did not recover from the shock till I was halfway across theLuxembourg Gardens, near the Tennis Court, when I sat down, overcome. See what comes of enthusiasm and going to call on your tutor! Ah, youngthree-and-twenty, when will you learn wisdom?

CHAPTER III. AN APOLOGY

 9 P. M. 

I have made up my mind. I shall go to see M. Charnot. But before thatI shall go to his publisher's and find out something about this famousman's works, of which I know nothing whatever. 

 December 31st

He lives in the Rue de l'Universite. 

I have called. I have seen him. I owe this to an accident, to theservant's forgetting her orders. 

As I entered, on the stroke of five, he was spinning a spiral twist ofpaper beneath the lamplight to amuse his daughter--he a member of theInstitute, she a girl of eighteen. So that is how these big-wigs employtheir leisure moments!

The library where I found them was full of book cases-open bookcases, bookcases with glass doors, tall bookcases, dwarf bookcases, bookcasesstanding on legs, bookcases standing on the floor--of statuettes yellowwith smoke, of desks crowded with paper-weights, paper-knives, pens, andinkstands of "artistic" pat terns. He was seated at the table, with hisback to the fire, his arm lifted, and a hairpin between his fingerand thumb--the pivot round which his paper twist was spinning briskly. Across the table stood his daughter, leaning forward with her chin onher hands and her white teeth showing as she laughed for laughing'ssake, to give play to her young spirits and gladden her old father'sheart as he gazed on her, delighted. 

I must confess it made a pretty picture; and M. Charnot at that momentwas extremely unlike the M. Charnot who had confronted me from behindthe desk. 

I was not left long to contemplate. 

The moment I lifted the 'portiere' the girl jumped up briskly andregarded me with a touch of haughtiness, meant, I think, to hide aslight confusion. To compare small things with great, Diana must haveworn something of that look at sight of Actaeon. M. Charnot did notrise, but hearing somebody enter, turned half-round in his armchair, while his eyes, still dazzled with the lamplight, sought the intruder inthe partial shadow of the room. 

I felt myself doubly uneasy in the presence of this reader of the EarlyText and of this laughing girl. 

"Sir, " I began, "I owe you an apology--"

He recognized me. The girl moved a step. 

"Stay, Jeanne, stay. We shall not take long. This gentleman has come tooffer an apology. "

This was a cruel beginning. 

She thought so, too, perhaps, and withdrew discreetly into a dim corner, near the bookcase at the end of the room. 

"I have felt deep regret, sir, for that accident the other day--Iset down the penholder clumsily, in equilibrium--unstableequilibrium--besides, I had no notion there was a reader behind thedesk. Of course, if I had been aware, I should--I should have acteddifferently. "

M. Charnot allowed me to flounder on with the contemplative satisfactionof an angler who has got a fish at the end of his line. He seemed tofind me so very stupid, that as a matter of fact I became stupid. Andthen, there was no answer--not a word. Silence, alas! is not the reproofof kings alone. It does pretty well for everybody. I stumbled on two orthree more phrases quite as flatly infelicitous, and he received themwith the same faint smile and the same silence. 

To escape from my embarrassment:

"Sir, " I said, "I came also to ask for a piece of information. "

"I am at your service, sir. "

"Monsieur Flamaran has probably written to you on the matter?"

"Flamaran?"

"Yes, three days ago. "

"I have received no letter; have I, Jeanne?"

"No, father. "

"This is not the first time that my excellent colleague has promisedto write a letter and has not written it. Never mind, sir; your ownintroduction is sufficient. "

"Sir, I am about to take my doctor's degree. "

"In arts?"

"No, in law; but I have a bachelor's degree in arts. "

"You will follow it up with a degree in medicine, no doubt?"

"Really, sir--"

"Why--Why not, since you are collecting these things? You have, then, abent toward literature?"

"So I have been told. "

"A pronounced inclination--hey? to scribble verse. "

"Ah, yes!"

"The old story; the family driving a lad into law; his heart leaningtoward letters; the Digest open on the table, and the drawers stuffedwith verses! Isn't that so?"

I bowed. He glanced toward his daughter. 

"Well, sir, I confess to you that I don't understand--don't understandat all--this behavior of yours. Why not follow your natural bent? Youyoungsters nowadays--I mean no offence--you youngsters have no longerany mind of your own. Take my case; I was seventeen when I began to takean interest in numismatics. My family destined me for the Stamp Office;yes, sir, the Stamp Office. I had against me two grandfathers, twograndmothers, my father, my mother, and six uncles--all furious. I heldout, and that has led me to the Institute. Hey, Jeanne?"

Mademoiselle Jeanne had returned to the table, where she was standingwhen I entered, and seemed, after a moment, to busy herself in arrangingthe books scattered in disarray on the green cloth. But she had asecret object--to regain possession of the paper spiral that lay thereneglected, its pin sticking up beside the lamp-stand. Her light hand, hovering hither and thither, had by a series of cunning manoeuvresgot the offending object behind a pile of duodecimos, and was nowwithdrawing it stealthily among the inkstands and paperweights. 

M. Charnot interrupted this little stratagem. 

She answered very prettily, with a slight toss of the head:

"But, father, not everybody can be in the Institute. "

"Far from it, Jeanne. This gentleman, for instance, devotes himself toone method of inking parchment that never will make him my colleague. Doctor of Laws and Master of Arts, --I presume, sir, you are going to bea notary?"

"Excuse me, an advocate. "

"I was sure of it. Jeanne, my dear, in country families it is a standingdilemma; if not a notary, then an advocate; if not an advocate, then anotary. "

M. Charnot spoke with an exasperating half-smile. 

I ought to have laughed, to be sure; I ought to have shown sense enoughat any rate to hold my tongue and not to answer the gibes of thisvindictive man of learning. Instead, I was stupid enough to be nettledand to lose my head. 

"Well, " I retorted, "I must have a paying profession. That one oranother--what does it matter? Not everybody can belong to the Institute, as your daughter remarked; not everybody can afford himself the luxuryof publishing, at his own expense, works that sell twenty-seven copiesor so. "

I expected a thunderbolt, an explosion. Not a bit of it. M. Charnotsmiled outright with an air of extreme geniality. 

"I perceive, sir, that you are given to gossiping with the booksellers. "

"Why, yes, sir, now and then. "

"It's a very pretty trait, at your age, to be already so strong inbibliography. You will permit me, nevertheless, to add something to yourpresent stock of notions. A large sale is one thing to look at, butnot the right thing. Twenty-seven copies of a book, when read bytwenty-seven men of intelligence, outweigh a popular success. Would youbelieve that one of my friends had no more than eight copies printedof a mathematical treatise? Three of these he has given away. The otherfive are still unsold. And that man, sir, is the first mathematician inFrance!"

Mademoiselle Jeanne had taken it differently. With lifted chin andreddened cheek she shot this sentence at me from the edge of a lipdisdainfully puckered:

"There are such things as 'successes of esteem, ' sir!"

Alas! I knew that well, and I had no need of this additional lesson toteach me the rudeness of my remark, to make me feel that I was a brute, an idiot, hopelessly lost in the opinion of M. Charnot and his daughter. It was cruel, all the same. Nothing was left for me but to hurry mydeparture. I got up to go. 

"But, " said M. Charnot in the smoothest of tones, "I do not think wehave yet discussed the question that brought you here. "

"I should hesitate, sir, to trespass further on your time. "

"Never mind that. Your question concerns?"

"The costume of the Latini Juniani. "

"Difficult to answer, like most questions of dress. Have you read thework, in seventeen volumes, by the German, Friedchenhausen?"

"No. "

"You must have read, at any rate, Smith, the Englishman, on ancientcostume?"

"Nor that either. I only know Italian. "

"Well, then, look through two or three treatises on numismatics, the'Thesaurus Morellianus', or the 'Praestantiora Numismata', of Valliant, or Banduri, or Pembrock, or Pellerin. You may chance upon a scent. "

"Thank you, thank you, sir!"

He saw me to the door. 

As I turned to go I noticed that his daughter was standing motionlessstill, with the face of an angry Diana. She held between her fingers therecovered spiral. 

I found myself in the street. 

I could not have been more clumsy, more ill-bred, or more unfortunate. Ihad come to make an apology and had given further offence. Just likemy luck! And the daughter, too--I had hurt her feelings. Still, she hadstood up for me; she had said to her father, "Not every one can be inthe Institute, " evidently meaning, "Why are you torturing this pooryoung man? He is bashful and ill at ease. I feel sorry for him. "Sorry--yes; no doubt she felt sorry for me at first. But then I came outwith that impertinence about the twenty-seven copies, and by this timeshe hates me beyond a doubt. Yes, she hates me. It is too painful tothink of. 

Mademoiselle Charnot will probably remain but a stranger to me, afugitive apparition in my path of life; yet her anger lies heavy uponme, and the thought of those disdainful lips pursues me. 

I had rarely been more thoroughly disgusted with myself, and with allabout me. I needed something to divert me, to distract me, to make meforget, and so I set off for home by the longest way, going down the Ruede Beaune to the Seine. 

I declare, we get some perfect winter days in Paris! Just now, the folkswho sit indoors believe that the sun is down and have lighted theirlamps; but outside, the sky--a pale, rain-washed blue--is streaked withbroad rays of rose-pink. It is freezing, and the frost has sprinkleddiamonds everywhere, on the trees, the roofs, the parapets, even on thecabmen's hats, that gather each a sparkling cockade as they pass alongthrough the mist. The river is running in waves, white-capped here andthere. On the penny steamers no one but the helmsman is visible. Butwhat a crowd on the Pont de Carrousel! Fur cuffs and collars pass andrepass on the pavements; the roadway trembles beneath the endless lineof Batignolles--Clichy omnibuses and other vehicles. Every one seems ina hurry. The pedestrians are brisk, the drivers dexterous. Two lines oftraffic meet, mingle without jostling, divide again into fresh linesand are gone like a column of smoke. Although slips are common in thiscrowd, its intelligent agility is all its own. Every face is ruddy, and almost all are young. The number of young men, young maidens, youngwives, is beyond belief, Where are the aged? At home, no doubt, by thechimney-corner. All the city's youth is out of doors. 

Its step is animated; that is the way of it. It is wide-eyed, and in itseyes is the sparkle of life. The looks of the young are always full ofthe future; they are sure of life. Each has settled his position, hiscareer, his dream of commonplace well-being. They are all alike; andthey might all be judges, so serious they appear about it. They walk inpairs, bolt upright, looking neither right nor left, talking little asthey hurry along toward the old Louvre, and are soon swallowed out ofsight in the gathering mist, out of which the gaslights glimmer faintly. 

They are all on their way to dine on the right bank. 

I am going to dine on the left bank, at Carre's, where one sees many oddcustomers. Farewell, river! Good night, old Charnot! Blessings on you, Mademoiselle Jeanne!

CHAPTER IV. THE STORY OF SYLVESTRE

 8 P. M. 

I am back in my study. It is very cold; Madame Menin, my housekeeper, has let the fire out. Hallo! she has left her duster, too, lying on themanuscript of my essay. 

Is it an omen, a presage of that dust which awaits my still unfinishedwork? Who can fathom Dame Fortune's ironic humor?

Eight o'clock. .. . Counsellor Mouillard has finished his pleadings andmust be sitting down to a game of whist with Counsellors Horlet andHublette, of the Court of Bourges. They wait for me to make up the four. Perish the awful prospect!

And M. Charnot? He, I suppose, is still spinning the paper spiral. Howeasily serious people are amused! Perhaps I am a serious person. Theleast thing amuses me. By the way, is Mademoiselle Jeanne fair or dark?Let me try to recollect. Why, fair, of course. I remember the glint ofgold in the little curls about her temples, as she stood by the lamp. A pleasant face, too; not exactly classic, but rosy and frank; and thenshe has that animation which so many pretty women lack. 

Madame Menin has forgotten something else. She has forgotten to shut mywindow. She has designs upon my life!

I have just shut the window. The night is calm, its stars twinklingthrough a haze. The year ends mournfully. 

I remember at school once waking suddenly on such a night as this, tofind the moonlight streaming into my eyes. At such a moment it isalways a little hard to collect one's scattered senses, and take in themidnight world around, so unhomely, so absolutely still. First I castmy eyes along the two rows of beds that stretched away down thedormitory--two parallel lines in long perspective; my comrades huddledunder their blankets in shapeless masses, gray or white according asthey lay near or far from the windows; the smoky glimmer of the oillamp half-way down the room; and at the end, in the deeper shadows, theenclosure of yellow curtains surrounding the usher's bed. 

Not a sound about me; all was still. But without, my ear, excited andalmost feverishly awake, caught the sound of a strange call, very sweet, again and again repeated--fugitive notes breathing appeal, tenderand troubled. Now they grew quite distant, and I heard no more than aphantom of sound; now they came near, passed over my head, and fadedagain into the distance. The moon's clear rays invited me to clear upthe mystery. I sprang from my bed, and ran in my nightshirt to open thewindow. It was about eleven o'clock. Together the keen night-air andthe moonlight wrapped me round, thrilling me with delight. The largecourtyard lay deserted with its leafless poplars and spiked railings. Here and there a grain of sand sparkled. I raised my eyes, and from oneconstellation to another I sought the deep blue of heaven in vain; nota shadow upon it, not one dark wing outlined. Yet all the while thesame sad and gentle cry wandered and was lost in air, the chant of aninvisible soul which seemed in want of me, and had perhaps awakened me. 

The thought came upon me that it was the soul of my mother calling tome--my mother, whose voice was soft and very musical. 

"I am caring for thee, " said the voice. "I am caring for thee; I can seethee, " it said, "I can see thee. I love thee! I love thee!"

"Reveal thyself!" I called back. "Oh, mother, reveal thyself!" And Istrove feverishly to catch sight of her, following the voice as it sweptaround in circles; and seeing nothing, I burst into tears. 

Suddenly I was seized roughly by the ear. 

"What are you doing here, you young rascal? Are you mad? The wind isblowing right on to my bed. Five hundred lines!"

The usher, in nightdress and slippers, was rolling his angry eyes on me. 

"Yes, sir; certainly, sir! But don't you hear her?"

"Who is it?"

"My mother. "

He looked to see whether I were awake; cocked his head to one sideand listened; then shut the window angrily and went off shrugging hisshoulders. 

"It's only the plovers flying about the moon, " said he. "Five hundredlines!"

I did my five hundred lines. They taught me that dreaming was illegaland dangerous, but they neither convinced nor cured me. 

I still believe that there are scattered up and down in nature voicesthat speak, but which few hear; just as there are millions of flowersthat bloom unseen by man. It is sad for those who catch a hint of it. Perforce they come back and seek the hidden springs. They waste theiryouth and vigor upon empty dreams, and in return for the fleetingglimpses they have enjoyed, for the perfect phrase half caught andlost again, will have given up the intercourse of their kind, and evenfriendship itself. Yes, it is sad for the schoolboys who open theirwindows to gaze at the moon, and never drop the habit! They will findthemselves, all too soon, solitaries in the midst of life, desolate as Iam desolate tonight, beside my dead fire. 

No friend will come to knock at my door; not one. I have a few comradesto whom I give that name. We do not loathe one another. At need theywould help me. But we seldom meet. What should they do here? Dreamersmake no confidences; they shrivel up into themselves and are caught awayon the four winds of heaven. Politics drive them mad; gossip fails tointerest them; the sorrows they create have no remedy save the joys thatthey invent; they are natural only when alone, and talk well only tothemselves. 

The only man who can put up with this moody contrariety of mine isSylvestre Lampron. He is nearly twenty years older than I. That explainshis forbearance. Besides, between an artist like him and a dreamer likemyself there is only the difference of handiwork. He translates hisdreams. I waste mine; but both dream. Dear old Lampron! Kindly, stalwartheart! He has withstood that hardening of the moral and physical fibrewhich comes over so many men as they near their fortieth year. Heshows a brave front to work and to life. He is cheerful, with the manlycheerfulness of a noble heart resigned to life's disillusions. 

When I enter his home, I nearly always find him sitting before asmall ground-glass window in the corner of his studio, bent over someengraving. I have leave to enter at all hours. He is free not to stirfrom his work. "Good-day, " he calls out, without raising his head, without knowing for certain who has come in, and goes on with theengraving he has in hand. I settle down at the end of the room, onthe sofa with the faded cover, and, until Lampron deigns to grant meaudience, I am free to sleep, or smoke, or turn over the wonderfuldrawings that lean against the walls. Among them are treasures beyondprice; for Lampron is a genius whose only mistake is to live and actwith modesty, so that as yet people only say that he has "immensetalent. " No painter or engraver of repute--and he is both--has served amore conscientious apprenticeship, or sets greater store on thoroughnessin his art. His drawing is correct beyond reproach--a little stiff, likethe early painters. You can guess from his works his partiality for theold masters--Perugino, Fra Angelico, Botticelli, Memling, Holbein--who, though not the masters in fashion, will always be masters in vigor ofoutline, directness, in simple grace, and genuine feeling. He has copiedin oils, water-colors, pen, or pencil, nearly all the pictures of thesemasters in the Louvre, in Germany, in Holland, and especially in Italy, where he lived for many years. With tastes such as his came the habit, or rather the fixed determination, never to paint or engrave any butsacred subjects. Puffs and cliques are his abomination. His ideal isthe archaic rendered by modern methods. An artist of this type can butobtain the half-grudging esteem of his own profession, and of the fewcritics who really understand something about art. Gladly, and withabsolute disdain, he leaves to others the applause of the mob, thegilded patronage of American purchasers, and the right to wear lacecuffs. In short, in an age when the artist is often half a manufacturerand half a charlatan, he is an artist only. 

Now and then he is rich, but never for long. Half of his earnings goesin alms; half into the pockets of his mendicant brethren. They hear thegold jingle before it is counted, and run with outstretched palms. Eachis in the depths of misfortune; on the eve of ascending the fatal slope;lost, unless the helpful hand of Lampron will provide, saved if he willlend wherewithal to buy a block of marble, to pay a model, to dine thatevening. He lends--I should say gives; the words mean the same in manysocieties. Of all that he has gained, fame alone remains, and even thishe tries to do without--modest, retiring, shunning all entertainments. I believe he would often be without the wherewithal to live were it notfor his mother, whom he supports, and who does him the kindness to needsomething to live on. Madame Lampron does not hoard; she only fills theplace of those dams of cut turf which the peasants build in the channelsof the Berry in spring; the water passes over them, beneath them, eventhrough them, but still a little is left for the great droughts. 

I love my friend Lampron, though fully aware of his superiority. Hisenergy sets me up, his advice strengthens me, he peoples for me the vastsolitude of Paris. 

Suppose I go to see him? A lonely watch to-night would be gloomier thanusual. The death of the year brings gloomy thoughts, the thirty-first ofDecember, St. Sylvester's day--St. Sylvester! Why, that is his birthday!Ungrateful friend, to give no thought to it! Quick! my coat, my stick, my hat, and let me run to see these two early birds before they seektheir roost. 

When I entered the studio, Lampron was so deep in his work that he didnot hear me. The large room, lighted only in one corner, looked weirdenough. Around me, and among the medley of pictures and casts and thepiles of canvases stacked against the wall, the eye encountered onlya series of cinder-gray tints and undetermined outlines casting longamorphous shadows half-way across the ceiling. A draped lay figureleaning against a door seemed to listen to the whistling of the windoutside; a large glass bay opened upon the night. Nothing was alive inthis part of the room, nothing alight except a few rare glints uponthe gold of the frames, and the blades of two crossed swords. Only ina corner, at the far end, at a distance exaggerated by the shadows, satLampron engraving, solitary, motionless, beneath the light of a lamp. His back was toward me. The lamp's rays threw a strong light on hisdelicate hand, on the workmanlike pose of his head, which it surroundedwith a nimbus, and on a painting--a woman's head--which he was copying. He looked superb like that, and I thought how doubly tempted Rembrandtwould have been by the deep significance as well as by the chiaroscuroof this interior. 

I stamped my foot. Lampron started, and turned half around, narrowinghis eyes as he peered into the darkness. 

"Ah, it's you, " he said. He rose and came quickly toward me, as if toprevent me from approaching the table. 

"You don't wish me to look?"

He hesitated a moment. 

"After all, why not?" he answered. 

The copper plate was hardly marked with a few touches of the needle. Heturned the reflector so as to throw all its rays upon the painting. 

"O Lampron, what a charming head!"

It was indeed a lovely head; an Italian girl, three quarter face, painted after the manner of Leonardo, with firm but delicate touches, and lights and shades of infinite subtlety, and possessing, like allthat master's portraits of women, a straightforward look that respondsto the gazer's, but which he seeks to interrogate in vain. The hair, brown with golden lights, was dressed in smooth plaits above thetemples. The neck, 1351 somewhat long, emerged from a dark robe broadlyindicated. 

"I do not know this, Sylvestre?"

"No, it's an old thing. "

"A portrait, of course?"

"My first. "

"You never did better; line, color, life, you have got them all. "

"You need not tell me that! In one's young days, look you, there aremoments of real inspiration, when some one whispers in the ear andguides the hand; a lightness of touch, the happy audacity of thebeginner, a wealth of daring never met with again. Would you believethat I have tried ten times to reproduce that in etching withoutsuccess?"

"Why do you try?"

"Yes, that is the question. Why? It's a bit foolish. "

"You never could find such a model again; that is one reason. "

"Ah, no, you are right. I never could find her again. "

"An Italian of rank? a princess, eh?"

"Something like it. "

"What has become of her?"

"Ah, no doubt what becomes of all princesses. Fabien, my young friend, you who still see life through fairy-tales, doubtless you imagine herhappy in her lot--wealthy, spoiled, flattered, speaking with disdainfullips at nightfall, on the terrace of her villa among the great pines, ofthe barbarian from across the Alps who painted her portrait twenty yearssince; and, in the same sentence, of her--last new frock from Paris?"

"Yes, I see her so--still beautiful. "

"You are good at guessing, Fabien. She is dead, my friend, and thatideal beauty is now a few white bones at the bottom of a grave. "

"Poor girl!"

Sylvestre had used a sarcastic tone which was not usual with him. Hewas contemplating his work with such genuine sadness that I was awed. I divined that in his past, of which I knew but little, Lampron kept asorrow buried that I had all unwittingly revived. 

"My friend, " said I, "let that be; I come to wish you many happyreturns. "

"Many happy returns? Ah, yes, my poor mother wished me that thismorning; then I set to work and forgot all about it. I am glad youcame. She would feel hurt, dear soul, if I forgot to pass a bit of thisevening with her. Let us go and find her. "

"With all my heart, Sylvestre, but I, too, have forgotten something. "

"What?"

"I have brought no flowers. "

"Never mind, she has plenty; strong-scented flowers of the south, awhole basketful, enough to keep a hive of bees or kill a man inhis sleep, which you will. It is a yearly attention from an unhappycreditor. "

"Debtor, you mean. "

"I mean what I say--a creditor. "

He lifted the lamp. The shadows shifted and ran along the walls likehuge spiders, the crossed swords flashed, the Venus of Milo threw us alofty glance, Polyhymnia stood forth pensive and sank back into shadow. At the door I took the draped lay figure in my arms. "Excuse me, " Isaid as I moved it--and we left the studio for Madame Lampron's littlesitting-room. 

She was seated near a small round table, knitting socks, her feet on ahot-water bottle. Her kind old rough and wrinkled face beamed upon us. She thrust her needles under the black lace cap she always wore, anddrew them out again almost immediately. 

"It needed your presence, Monsieur Mouillard, " said she, "to drag himfrom his work. "

"Saint Sylvester's day, too. It is fearful! Love for his art has changedyour son's nature, Madame Lampron. "

She gave him a tender look, as on entering the room he bent over thefire and shook out his half-smoked pipe against the bars, a thing henever failed to do the moment he entered his mother's room. 

"Dear child!" said she. 

Then turning to me:

"You are a good friend, Monsieur Fabien. Never have we celebrated aSaint Sylvester without you since you came to Paris. "

"Yet this evening, Madame, I have failed in my traditions, I have noflowers. But Sylvestre tells me that you have just received flowers fromthe south, from an unfortunate creditor. "

My words produced an unusual effect upon her. She, who never stoppedknitting to talk or to listen, laid her work upon her knees, and fixedher eyes upon me, filled with anxiety. 

"Has he told you?"

Lampron who was poking the fire, his slippered feet stretched out towardthe hearth, turned his head. 

"No, mother, I merely told him that we had received a basket of flowers. Not much to confide. Yet why should he not know all? Surely he is ourfriend enough to know all. He should have known it long since were itnot cruel to share between three a burden that two can well bear. "

She made no answer, and began again to twist the wool between herneedles, but nervously and as if her thoughts were sad. 

To change the conversation I told them the story of my twofold mishapat the National Library and at M. Charnot's. I tried to be funny, andfancied I succeeded. The old lady smiled faintly. Lampron remainedgrave, and tossed his head impatiently. I summed my story thus:

"Net gain: two enemies, one of them charming. "

"Oh, enemies!" said Sylvestre, "they spring up like weeds. One can notprevent them, and great sorrows do not come from them. Still, beware ofcharming enemies. "

"She hates me, I swear. If you could have seen her!"

"And you?"

"Me? She is nothing to me. "

"Are you sure?"

He put the question gravely, without looking in my face, as he twisted apaper spill. 

I laughed. 

"What is the matter with you to-day, misanthrope? I assure you that sheis absolutely indifferent to me. But even were it otherwise, Sylvestre, where would be the wrong?"

"Wrong? No wrong at all; but I should be anxious for you; I should beafraid. See here, my friend. I know you well. You are a born man ofletters, a dreamer, an artist in your way. You have to help you onentering the redoubtable lists of love neither foresight, nor a coolhead, nor determination. You are guided solely by your impressions; bythem you rise or fall. You are no more than a child. "

"I quite agree. What next?"

"What next?" He had risen, and was speaking with unusual vehemence. "I once knew some one like you, whose first passion, rash, but deep asyours would be, broke his heart forever. The heart, my friend, is liableto break, and can not be mended like china. "

Lampron's mother interrupted him afresh, reproachfully. 

"He came to wish you a happy birthday, my child. "

"One day, mother, is as good as another to listen to good advice. Besides, I am only talking of one of my friends. 'Tis but a short story, Fabien, and instructive. I will give it you in very few words. My friendwas very young and enthusiastic. He was on his way through the galleriesof Italy, brush in hand, his heart full of the ceaseless song of youthin holiday. The world never had played him false, nor balked him. Hemade the future bend to the fancy of his dreams. He seldom descendedamong common men from those loftier realms where the contemplation ofendless masterpieces kept his spirit as on wings. He admired, copied, filled his soul with the glowing beauty of Italian landscape andItalian art. But one day, without reflection, without knowledge, withoutforesight, he was rash enough to fall in love with a girl of noble birthwhose portrait he was painting; to speak to her and to win her love. Hethought then, in the silly innocence of his youth, that art abridges alldistance and that love effaces it. Crueller nonsense never was uttered, my poor Fabien. He soon found this; he tried to struggle against theparent's denial, against himself, against her, powerless in all alike, beaten at every point. .. . The end was--Do you care to learn the end?The girl was carried off, struck down by a brief illness, soon dead; theman, hurled out of heaven, bruised, a fugitive also, is still so weak inpresence of his sorrow that even after these long years he can not thinkof it without weeping. "

Lampron actually was weeping, he who was so seldom moved. Down his brownbeard, tinged already with gray, a tear was trickling. I noticed thatMadame Lampron was stooping lower and lower over her needles. He wenton:

"I have kept the portrait, the one you saw, Fabien. They would like tohave it over yonder. They are old folk by now. Every year they ask mefor this relic of our common sorrow; every year they send me, about thistime a basket of white flowers, chiefly lilacs, the dead girl'sflower, and their meaning is, 'Give up to us what is left of her, themasterpiece built up of your youth and hers. ' But I am selfish, Fabien. I, like them, am jealous of all the sorrows this portrait recalls to me, and I deny them. Come, mother, where are the flowers? I have promisedFabien to show them to him. "

But his old mother could not answer. Having no doubt bewept this sorrowtoo often to find fresh tears, her eyes followed her son with restlesscompassion. He, beside the window, was hunting among the chairs andlounges crowded in this corner of the little sitting-room. 

He brought us a box of white wood. "See, " said he, "'tis my weddingbouquet. "

And he emptied it on the table. Parma violets, lilacs, white camelliasand moss rolled out in slightly faded bunches, spreading a sweet smellin which there breathed already a vague scent of death and corruption. Aviolet fell on my knees. I picked it up. 

He looked for a moment at the heap on the table. 

"I keep none, " said he: "I have too many reminders without them. Cursedflowers!"

With one motion of his arm he swept them all up and cast them uponthe coals in the hearth. They shrivelled, crackled, grew limp anddiscolored, and vanished in smoke. 

"Now I am going back to my etching. Good-by, Fabien. Good-night, mother. "

Without turning his head, he left the room and went back to his studio. 

I made a movement to follow him and bring him back. 

Madame Lampron stopped me. "I will go myself, " said she, "later--muchlater. "

We sat awhile in silence. When she saw me somewhat recovered from theshock of my feelings she went on:

"You never have seen him like this, but I have seen it often. It is sohard! I knew her whom he loved almost as soon as he, for he never hidanything from me. You can judge from her portrait whether hers was notthe face to attract an artist like Sylvestre. I saw at once that itwas a trial, in which I could do nothing. They were very great people;different from us, you know. "

"They refused to let them marry?"

"Oh, no! Sylvestre did not ask; they never had the opportunity ofrefusing. No, no; it was I. I said to him: 'Sylvestre, this can neverbe-never!' He was convinced against his will. Then she spoke to herparents on her own account. They carried her off, and there was an endof it. "

"He never saw her again. "

"Never; he would not have wished it; and then she lived a very littletime. I went back there two years later, when they wanted to buy thepicture. We were still living in Italy. That was one of the hardesthours of my life. I was afraid of their reproaches, and I did not feelsure of myself. But no, they suffered for their daughter as I formy son, and that brought us together. Still, I did not give up theportrait; Sylvestre set too great store by it. He insists on keepingit, feeding his eyes on it, reopening his wound day by day. Poor child!Forget all this, Monsieur Fabien; you can do nothing to help. Be true toyour youth, and tell us next time of Monsieur Charnot and MademoiselleJeanne. "

Dear Madame Lampron! I tried to console her; but as I never knew mymother, I could find but little to say. All the same, she thanked me andassured me I had done her good. 

CHAPTER V. A FRUITLESS SEARCH

 January 1, 1885. 

The first of January! When one is not yet an uncle and no longer agodson, if one is in no government employ and goes out very little, thenumber of one's calls on New Year's Day is limited. I shall make five orsix this afternoon. It will be "Not at home" in each case; and that willbe all my compliments of the season. 

No, I am wrong. I have received the compliments of the season. Myporter's wife came up just now, wreathed in smiles. 

"Monsieur Mouillard, I wish you a Happy New Year, good health, andHeaven to end your days. " She had just said the same to the tenants onthe first, second, and third floors. My answer was the same as theirs. I slipped into her palm (with a "Many thanks!" of which she took nonotice) a piece of gold, which brought another smile, a curtsey, and sheis gone. 

This smile comes only once a year; it is not reproduced at any otherperiod, but is a dividend payable in one instalment. This, and a tear onAll Souls' Day, when she has been to place a bunch of chrysanthemums onher baby's grave, are the only manifestations of sensibility that I havediscovered in her. From the second of January to the second of Novembershe is a human creature tied to a bell-rope, with an immovably stolidface and a monosyllabic vocabulary in which politer terms occur butsparsely. 

This morning, contrary to her habits, she has brought up by post twoletters; one from my Uncle Mouillard (an answer), and the other--I don'trecognize the other. Let's open it first: big envelope, ill-writtenaddress, Paris postmark. Hallo! a smaller envelope inside, and on it:

 ANTOINE AND MARIE PLUMET. 

Poor souls! they have no visiting-cards. But kind hearts are more thanpasteboard. 

Ten months ago little Madame Plumet, then still unmarried, was in aterrible bother. I remember our first meeting, on a March day, at thecorner of the Rue du Quatre-Septembre and the Rue Richelieu. I waswalking along quickly, with a bundle of papers under my arm, on myway back to the office where I was head clerk. Suddenly a dressmaker'serrand-girl set down her great oilcloth-covered box in my way. I nearlywent head first over it, and was preparing to walk around it, when thelittle woman, red with haste and blushes, addressed me. "Excuse me, sir, are you a lawyer?"

"No, Mademoiselle, not yet. "

"Perhaps, sir, you know some lawyers?"

"To be sure I do; my master, to begin with, Counsellor Boule. He isquite close, if you care to follow me. "

"I am in a terrible hurry, but I can spare a minute or two. Thank youvery much, Monsieur. "

And thus I found myself escorted by a small dressmaker and a box offashions. I remember that I walked a little ahead for fear of beingseen in such company by a fellow-clerk, which would have damaged myreputation. 

We got to the office. Down went the box again. The little dressmakertold me that she was engaged to M. Plumet, frame-maker. She told hertale very clearly; a little money put by, you see, out of ten years'wages; one may be careful and yet be taken in; and, alas! all has beenlent to a cousin in the cabinetmaking trade, who wanted to set up shop;and now he refuses to pay up. The dowry is in danger, and the marriagein suspense. 

"Do not be alarmed, Mademoiselle; we will summons this atrociouscabinet-maker, and get a judgment against him. We shall not let him gountil he has disgorged, and you shall be Madame Plumet. "

We kept our word. Less than two months later--thanks to my efforts--thedowry was recovered; the banns were put up; and the little dressmakerpaid a second visit to the office, this time with M. Plumet, who waseven more embarrassed than she. 

"See, Antoine! this is Monsieur Mouillard, who undertook our case! Thankyou again and again, Monsieur Mouillard, you really have been too kind!What do I owe you for your trouble?"

"You must ask my master what his fees come to, Mademoiselle. "

"Yes, but you? What can I do for you?"

The whole office, from the messenger to the clerk who came next to me, had their eyes upon me. I rose to the occasion, and in my uncle's bestmanner I replied:

"Be happy, Mademoiselle, and remember me. "

We laughed over it for a week. 

She has done better, she has remembered it after eight months. But shehas not given her address. That is a pity. I should have liked to seethem both again. These young married folk are like the birds; you heartheir song, but that does not tell you the whereabouts of their nest. 

Now, uncle, it's your turn. 

Here it is again, your unfailing letter anticipated, like the return ofthe comets, but less difficult to analyze than the weird substance ofwhich comets are composed. Every year I write to you on December 28th, and you answer me on the 31st in time for your letter to reach me on NewYear's morning. You are punctual, dear uncle; you are even attentive;there is something affectionate in this precision. But I do not knowwhy your letters leave me unmoved. The eighteen to twenty-five lines ofwhich each is composed are from your head, rather than your heart. Whydo you not tell me of my parents, whom you knew; of your daily life; ofyour old servant Madeleine, who nursed me as a baby; of the Angora catalmost as old as she; of the big garden, so green, so enticing, whichyou trim with so much care, and which rewards your attention withsuch luxuriance. It would be so nice, dear uncle, to be a shade moreintimate. 

Ah, well! let us see what he writes:

 "BOURGES, December 31, 1884. 

 "MY DEAR NEPHEW:

 "The approach of the New Year does not find me with the same sentiments with which it leaves you. I make up my yearly accounts from July 31st, so the advent of the 31st of December finds me as indifferent as that of any other day of the said month. Your repinings appear to me the expressions of a dreamer. 

 "It would, however, not be amiss if you made a start in practical life. You come of a family not addicted to dreaming. Three Mouillards have, if I may say so, adorned the legal profession at Bourges. You will be the fourth. 

 "As soon as you have taken your doctor's degree-which I presume should not be long--I shall expect you the very next day, or the day after that at the furthest; and I shall place you under my supervision. 

 "The practice is not falling off, I can assure you. In spite of age, I still possess good eyes and good teeth, the chief qualifications for a lawyer. You will find everything ready and in good order here. 

 "I am obliged to you for your good wishes, which I entirely reciprocate. 

 "Your affectionate uncle, "BRUTUS MOUILLARD. "

 "P. S. --The Lorinet family have been to see me. Mademoiselle Berthe is really quite pretty. They have just inherited 751, 351 francs. 

 "I was employed by them in an action relating thereto. "

Yes, my dear uncle, you were employed, according to the formula, "invirtue of these and subsequent engagements, " and among the "subsequentengagements" you are kind enough to reckon one between MademoiselleBerthe Lorinet, spinster, of no occupation, and M. Fabien Mouillard, lawyer. "Fabien Mouillard, lawyer"--that I may perhaps endure, but"Fabien Mouillard, son-in-law of Lorinet, " never! One pays too dear forthese rich wives. Mademoiselle Berthe is half a foot taller than I, whoam moderately tall, and she has breadth in proportion. Moreover, Ihave heard that her wit is got in proportion. I saw her when she wasseventeen, in a short frock of staring blue; she was very thin then, andwas escorted by a brother, squeezed inside a schoolboy's suit; theywere out for their first walk alone, both red-faced, flurried, shufflingalong the sidewalks of Bourges. That was enough. For me she will alwayswear that look, that frock, that clumsy gait. Recollections, my gooduncle, are not unlike instantaneous photographs; and this one is adistinct negative to your designs. 

 March 3d. 

The year is getting on. My essay is growing. The Junian Latin emergesfrom the fogs of Tiber. 

I have had to return to the National Library. My first visits were notmade without trepidation. I fancied that the beadle was colder, and thatthe keepers were shadowing me like a political suspect. I thoughtit wise to change my side, so now I make out my list of books at theleft-hand desk and occupy a seat on the left side of the room. 

M. Charnot remains faithful to his post beneath the right-hand inkstand. 

I have been watching him. He is usually one of the first to arrive, withnimble, almost springy, step. His hair, which he wears rather long, isalways carefully parted in the middle, and he is always freshly shaven. His habit of filling the pockets of his frock-coat with bundles of noteshas made that garment swell out at the top into the shape of a basket. He puts on a pair of spectacles mounted in very thin gold, and readsdeterminedly, very few books it is true, but they are all bound invellum, and that fixes their date. In his way of turning the leavesthere is something sacerdotal. He seems popular with the servants. Someof the keepers worship him. He has very good manners toward every one. Me he avoids. Still I meet him, sometimes in the cloakroom, oftener inthe Rue Richelieu on his way to the Seine. He stops, and so do I, nearthe Fontaine Moliere, to buy chestnuts. We have this taste in common. He buys two sous' worth, I buy one; thus the distinctions of rank arepreserved. If he arrives after me, I allow him the first turn to beserved; if he is before me, I await my turn with a patience whichbetokens respect. Yet he never seems to notice it. Once or twice, certainly, I fancied I caught a smile at the corners of his mouth, and asly twinkle in the corners of his eyes; but these old scholars smile soausterely. 

He must have guessed that I wish to meet him. For I can not deny it. Iam looking out for an opportunity to repair my clumsy mistake and showmyself in a less unfavorable light than I did at that ill-starred visit. And she is the reason why I haunt his path!

Ever since M. Mouillard threatened me with Mademoiselle Berthe Lorinet, the graceful outlines of Mademoiselle Jeanne have haunted me with apersistence to which I have no objection. 

It is not because I love her. It does not go as far as that. I amleaving her and leaving Paris forever in a few months. No; the height ofmy desire is to see her again--in the street, at the theatre, no matterwhere--to show her by my behavior and, if possible, by my words that Iam sorry for the past, and implore her forgiveness. Then there will nolonger be a gulf betwixt her and me, I shall be able to meet her withoutconfusion, to invoke her image to put to flight that of MademoiselleLorinet without the vision of those disdainful lips to dash me. She willbe for me at once the type of Parisian grace and of filial affection. Iwill carry off her image to the country like the remembered perfume ofsome rare flower; and if ever I sing 'Hymen Hymnaee'! it shall be withone who recalls her face to me. 

I do not think my feelings overpass these bounds. Yet I am not quitesure. I watch for her with a keenness and determination which surpriseme, and the disappointment which follows a fruitless search is a shadetoo lively to accord with cool reason. 

After all, perhaps my reason is not cool. 

Let me see, I will make up the account of my ventures. 

One January afternoon I walked up and down the Rue de l'Universite eighttimes in succession, from No. 1 to No. 107, and from No. 107 to No. 1. Jeanne did not come out in spite of the brilliancy of the clear winterday. 

On the nineteenth of the same month I went to see Andromache, althoughthe classic writers, whom I swear by, are not the writers I most care tohear. I renewed this attempt on the twenty-seventh. Neither on the firstnor on the second occasion did I see Mademoiselle Charnot. 

And yet if the Institute does not escort its daughters in shoals toapplaud Andromache, where on earth does it take them?

Perhaps nowhere. 

Every time I cross the Tuileries Garden I run my eyes over the groupsscattered among the chestnut-trees. I see children playing and fallingabout; nursemaids who leave them crying; mothers who pick them up again;a vagrant guardsman. No Jeanne. 

To wind up, yesterday I spent five hours at the Bon Marche. 

The spring show was on, one of the great occasions of the year; and Ipresumed, not without an apparent foundation of reason, that no youngor pretty Parisian could fail to be there. When I arrived, about oneo'clock, the crowd already filled the vast bazaar. It was not easyto stand against certain currents that set toward the departmentsconsecrated to spring novelties. Adrift like a floating spar I was sweptaway and driven ashore amid the baby-linen. There it flung me highand dry among the shop-girls, who laughed at the spectacle of anundergraduate shipwrecked among the necessaries of babyhood. I felt shy, and attaching myself to the fortunes of an Englishwoman, who worked herelbows with the vigor of her nation, I was borne around nearly twentycounters. At last, wearied, mazed, dusty as with a long summer walk, Itook refuge in the reading-room. 

Poor simpleton! I said to myself, you are too early; you might haveknown that. She can not come with her father before the National Librarycloses. Even supposing they take an omnibus, they will not get herebefore a quarter past four. 

I had to find something to fill up the somewhat long interval whichseparated me from that happy moment. I wrote a letter to my UncleMouillard, taking seven minutes over the address alone. I had not shownsuch penmanship since I was nine years old. When the last flourish wascompleted I looked for a paper; they were all engaged. The directory wasfree. I took it, and opened it at Ch. I discovered that there weremany Charnots in Paris without counting mine: Charnot, grocer; Charnot, upholsterer; Charnot, surgical bandage-maker. I built up a whole familytree for the member of the Institute, choosing, of course, those personsof the name who appeared most worthy to adorn its branches. Of whatfollowed I retain but a vague recollection. I only remember that I felttwice as if some inquisitive individual were looking over my shoulder. The third time I woke up with a start. 

"Sir, " said a shopwalker, with the utmost politeness, "a gentleman hasbeen waiting three quarters of an hour for the directory. Would youkindly hand it to him if you have quite finished with it?"

It was a quarter to six. I still waited a little while, and then I left, having wasted my day. 

O Jeanne! where do you hide yourself? Must I, to meet you, attend massat St. Germain des Pres? Are you one of those early birds who, beforethe world is up, are out in the Champs Elysees catching the first raysof the morning, and the country breeze before it is lost in the smoke ofParis? Are you attending lectures at the Sorbonne? Are you learning tosing? and, if so, who is your teacher?

You sing, Jeanne, of course. You remind me of a bird. You have allthe quick and easy graces of the skylark. Why should you not have theskylark's voice?

Fabien, you are dropping into poetry!

CHAPTER VI. THE FLOWER-SHOW

 April 3d. 

For a month I have written nothing in this brown notebook. But to-daythere is plenty to put down, and worth the trouble too. 

Let me begin with the first shock. This morning, my head crammed withpassages from Latin authors, I leaned my brow against the pane of mywindow which looks on the garden. The garden is not mine, of course, since I live on the fourth floor; but I have a view of the bigweeping-willow in the centre, the sanded path that runs around it, andthe four walls lined with borders, one of which separates it from thehuge premises of the Carmelites. It is an almost deserted garden. Thefirst-floor tenant hardly ever walks there. His son, a schoolboy ofseventeen, was there this morning. He stood two feet from the streetwall, motionless, with head thrown back, whistling a monotonous air, which seemed to me like a signal. Before him, however, was nothing butthe moss on the old wall gleaming like golden lights. People do notwhistle to amuse stones nor yet moss. Farther off, on the other side ofthe street, the windows of the opposite houses stretched away in longstraight lines, most of them standing open. 

I thought: "The bird is somewhere there. Some small Abigail with herwhite cap will look out in a moment. "

The suspicion was stupid and ill-natured. How rash are our lightestjudgments! Suddenly the school-boy took one step forward, swept his handquickly along the moss as if he were trying to catch a fly, and ran offto his mother triumphant, delighted, beside himself, with an innocentgray lizard on the tips of his fingers. 

"I've got him! I've got him! He was basking in the sun and I charmedhim!"

"Basking in the sun!" This was a revelation to me. I flung up thewindow. Yes, it was true. Warmth and light lay everywhere: on the roofsstill glistening with last night's showers; across the sky, whose gayblue proclaimed that winter was done. I looked downward and saw whatI had not seen before: the willow bursting into bud; the hepatica inflower at the foot of the camellias, which had ceased to bloom; thepear-trees in the Carmelites' garden flushing red as the sap rose withinthem; and upon the dead trunk of a fig-tree was a blackbird, escapedfrom the Luxembourg, who, on tiptoe, with throat outstretched, drunkwith delight, answered some far-off call that the wind brought to him, singing, as if in woodland depths, the rapturous song of the year's newbirth. Then, oh! then, I could contain myself no longer. I ran down thestairs four at a time, cursing Paris and the Junian Latins who had beencheating me of the spring. What! live there cut off from the world whichwas created for me, tread an artificial earth of stone or asphalt, livewith a horizon of chimneys, see only the sky chopped into irregularstrips by roofs smirched with smoke, and allow this exquisite spring tofleet by without drinking in her bountiful delight, without renewingin her youthfulness our youth, always a little staled and overcast bywinter! No, that can not be; I mean to see the spring. 

And I have seen it, in truth, though cut and tied into bouquets, for myaimless steps led me to the Place St. Sulpice, where the flower-sellerswere. There were flowers in plenty, but very few people; it was alreadylate. None the less did I enjoy the sight of all the plants arranged byheight and kind, from the double hyacinths, dear to hall-porters, to thefirst carnations, scarcely in bud, whose pink or white tips just peepedfrom their green sheaths; then the bouquets, bundles of the same kindsand same shades of flowers wrapped up in paper: lilies-of-the-valley, lilacs, forget-me-nots, mignonette, which being grown under glass hasguarded its honey from the bees to scent the air here. Everyone hada look of welcome for those exiles. The girls smiled at them withoutknowing the reason why. The cabdrivers in line along the sidewalk seemedto enjoy their neighborhood. I heard one of them, with a face likea halfripened strawberry, red, with a white nose, say to a comrade, "Hallo, Francis! that smells good, doesn't it!"

I was walking along slowly, looking into every stall, and when I came tothe end I turned right about face. 

Great Heavens! Not ten feet off! M. Flamaran, M. Charnot, andMademoiselle Jeanne!

They had stopped before one of the stalls that I had just left. M. Flamaran was carrying under his arm a pot of cineraria, which made hisstomach a perfect bower. M. Charnot was stooping, examining a superbpink carnation. Jeanne was hovering undecided between twenty bunches offlowers, bending her pretty head in its spring hat over each in turn. 

"Which, father?"

"Whichever you like; but make up your mind soon; Flamaran is waiting. "

A moment more, and the elective affinities carried the day. 

"This bunch of mignonette, " she said. 

I would have wagered on it. She was sure to choose the mignonette--afair, well-bred, graceful plant like herself. Others choose theircamellias and their hyacinths; Jeanne must have something more refined. 

She put down her money, caught up the bunch, looked at it for a moment, and held it close to her breast as a mother might hold her child, whileall its golden locks drooped over her arm. Then off she ran after herfather, who had only changed one carnation for another. They went ontoward St. Sulpice--M. Flamaran on the right, M. Charnot in the middle, Jeanne on the left. She brushed past without seeing me. I followedthem at a distance. All three were laughing. At what? I can guess; shebecause she was eighteen, they for joy to be with her. At the end ofthe marketplace they turned to the left, followed the railings of thechurch, and bent their steps toward the Rue St. Sulpice, doubtless totake home M. Flamaran, whose cineraria blazed amid the crowd. Iwas about to turn in the same direction when an omnibus of theBatignolles-Clichy line stopped my way. In an instant I was overwhelmedby the flood of passengers which it poured on the pavements. 

"Hallo, you here! How goes it? What are you staring at? My stovepipe?Observe it well, my dear fellow--the latest invention of Leon; thepatent ventilating, anti-sudorific, and evaporating hat!"

It was Larive who had just climbed down from the knifeboard. 

Every one knows Larive, head clerk in Machin's office. He is to beseen everywhere--a tall, fair man, with little closetrimmed beard, andmoustache carefully twisted. He is always perfectly dressed, always in atall hat and new gloves, full of all the new stories, which he tellsas his own. If you believe him, he is at home in all the ministries, whatever party is in power; he has cards for every ball, and tickets forevery first night. With all that he never misses a funeral, is a goodlawyer, and as solemn when in court as a dozen old mandarins. 

"Come, Fabien, will you answer? What are you staring at?"

He turned his head. 

"Oh, I see--pretty Mademoiselle Charnot. "

"You know her?"

"Of course I do, and her father, too. A pretty little thing!"

I blushed with pleasure. 

"Yes, a very pretty little thing; but wants style--dances poorly. "

"An admirable defect. "

"A little big, too, for her eyes. "

"What do you mean by that?"

"Her eyes are a little too small, you understand me?"

"What matters that if they are bright and loving?"

"No matter at all to me; but it seems to have some effect on you. Mightyou be related?"

"No. "

"Or connected by marriage?"

"No. "

"So much the better--eh, my boy? And how's uncle? Still going strong?"

"Yes; and longing to snatch me from this Babylon. "

"You mean to succeed him?"

"As long hence as possible. "

"I had heard you were not enthusiastic. A small practice, isn't it?"

"Not exactly. A matter of a thousand a year!"

"Clear profit?"

"Yes. "

"That's good enough. But in the country, my poor fellow, in thecountry!"

"It would be the death of you, wouldn't it?"

"In forty-eight hours. "

"However did you manage to be born there, Larive? I'm surprised at you. "

"So am I. I often think about it. Good-by. I must be off. "

I caught him by the hand which he held out to me. 

"Larive, tell me where you have met Mademoiselle Charnot?"

"Oh, come!--I see it's serious. My dear fellow, I am so sorry I did nottell you she was perfection. If I had only known!"

"That's not what I asked you. Where have you seen her?"

"In society, of course. Where do you expect me to see young girls exceptin society? My dear Fabien!"

He went off laughing. When he was about ten yards off he turned, andmaking a speaking-trumpet of his hands, he shouted through them:

"She's perfection!"

Larive is decidedly an ass. His jokes strike you as funny at first;but there's nothing in him, he's a mere hawker of stale puns; there'snothing but selfishness under his jesting exterior. I have no beliefin him. Yet he is an old school friend; the only one of my twenty-eightclassmates whose acquaintance I have kept up. Four are dead, twenty-three others are scattered about in obscure country places; lostfor want of news, as they say at the private inquiry offices. Larivemakes up the twenty-eight. I used to admire him, when we were low in theschool, because of his long trousers, his lofty contempt of discipline, and his precocious intimacy with tobacco. I preferred him to the good, well-behaved boys. Whenever we had leave out I used to buy gum-arabic atthe druggist's in La Chatre, and break it up with a small hammer at thefar end of my room, away from prying eyes. I used there to distributeit into three bags ticketed respectively: "large pieces, " "middle-sizedpieces, " "small pieces. " When I returned to school with the three bagsin my pocket, I would draw out one or the other to offer them to myfriends, according to the importance of the occasion, or the degrees offriendship. Larive always had the big bits, and plenty of them. Yethe was none the more grateful to me, and even did not mind chaffing meabout these petty attentions by which he was the gainer. He used to makefun of everything, and I used to look up to him. He still makes funof everything; but for me the age of gumarabic is past and my faith inLarive is gone. 

If he believes that he will disparage this charming girl in my eyes bytelling me that she is a bad dancer, he is wrong. Of great importance itis to have a wife who dances well! She does not dance in her own house, nor with her husband from the wardrobe to the cradle, but at others'houses, and with other men. Besides, a young girl who dances much hasa lot of nonsense talked to her. She may acquire a taste for Larive'sbuffooneries, for a neat leg, or a sharp tongue. In that case whatwelcome can she give to simple, timid affection? She will only laughat it. But you would not laugh, Jeanne, were I to tell you that I lovedyou. No, I am quite convinced that you would not laugh. And if you lovedme, Jeanne, we should not go into society. That would just suit me. Ishould protect you, yet not hide you. We should have felicity at homeinstead of running after it to balls and crushes, where it is never tobe found. You could not help being aware of the fascination you exert;but you would not squander it on a mob of dancers, and bring home onlythe last remnants of your good spirits, with the last remnants of yourtrain. Jeanne, I am delighted to hear that you dance badly. 

Whither away, Fabien, my friend, whither away? You are letting yourimagination run away with you again. A hint from it, and off you go. Come, do use your reason a little. You have seen this young lady again, that is true. You admired her; that was for the second time. But she, whom you so calmly speak of as "Jeanne, " as if she were something toyou, never even noticed you. You know nothing about her but what yoususpect from her maiden grace and a dozen words from her lips. You donot know whether she is free, nor how she would welcome the notionsyou entertain if you gave them utterance, yet here you are saying, "Weshould go here, " "We should do this and that. " Keep to the singular, my poor fellow. The plural is far away, very far away, if not entirelybeyond your reach. 

CHAPTER VII. A WOODLAND SKETCH

April 27th. 

The end of April. Students, pack and be off! The first warm breezesburst the buds. Meudon is smiling; Clamart breaks into song; the air inthe valley of Chevreuse is heavy with violets; the willows shower theircatkins on the banks of the Yvette; and farther yet, over yonder beneaththe green domes of the forest of Fontainebleau, the deer prick theirears at the sound of the first riding-parties. Off with you! Flowersline the pathways, the moors are pink with bloom, the undergrowth teemswith darting wings. All the town troops out to see the country in itsgala dress. The very poorest have a favorite nook, a recollection of thebygone year to be revived and renewed; a sheltered corner that invitedsleep, a glade where the shade was grateful, a spot beside the river'sbrink where the fish used to bite. Each one says, "Don't you remember?"Each one seeks his nest like a home-coming swallow. Does it still holdtogether? What havoc has been made by the winter's winds, and the rain, and the frost? Will it welcome us, as of old?

I, too, said to Lampron, "Don't you remember?" for we, too, have ournest, and summer days that smile to us in memory. He was in the mood forwork, and hesitated. I added in a whisper, "The blackbird's pool!" Hesmiled, and off we went. 

Again, as of old, our destination was St. Germain--not the town, nor theItalian palace, nor yet the terrace whence the view spreads so wide overthe Seine, the country dotted with villas, to Montmartre blue in thedistance--not these, but the forest. "Our forest, " we call it; for weknow all its young shoots, all its giant trees, all its paths wherepoachers and young lovers hide. With my eyes shut I could find theblackbird's pool, the way to which was first shown us by a deer. 

Imagine at thirty paces from an avenue, a pool--no, not a pool (theword is incorrect), nor yet a pond--but a fountain hollowed out by theremoval of a giant oak. Since the death of this monarch the bircheswhich its branches kept apart have never closed together, and thefountain forms the centre of a little clearing where the moss is thickat all seasons and starred in August with wild pinks. The water, thoughdeep, is deliciously clear. At a depth of more than six feet you candistinguish the dead leaves at the bottom, the grass, the twigs, andhere and there a stone's iridescent outline. They all lie asleep there, the waste of seasons gone by, soon to be covered by others in theirturn. From time to time out of the depths of these submerged thicketsan eft darts up. He comes circling up, quivering his yellowbanded tail, snatches a mouthful of air, and goes down again head first. Save forthese alarms the pool is untroubled. It is guarded from the winds by ajuniper, which an eglantine has chosen for its guardian and crowns eachyear with a wreath of roses. Each year, too, a blackbird makes his nesthere. We keep his secret. He knows we shall not disturb him. And when Icome back to this little nook in the woods, which custom has endeared tous, merely by looking in the water I feel my very heart refreshed. 

"What a spot to sleep in!" cried Lampron. "Keep sentry, Fabien; I amgoing to take a nap. "

We had walked fast. It was very hot. He took off his coat, rolled itinto a pillow, and placed it beneath his head as he lay down on thegrass. I stretched myself prone on a velvety carpet of moss, and gavemyself up to a profound investigation of the one square foot of groundwhich lay beneath my eyes. The number of blades of grass wasprodigious. A few, already awned, stood above their fellows, wavinglike palms-meadowgrass, fescue, foxtail, brome-grass--each slender stalkcrowned with a tuft. Others were budding, only half unfolded, amidthe darker mass of spongy moss which gave them sustenance. Amidthe numberless shafts thus raised toward heaven a thousand pathscrisscrossed, each full of obstacles-chips of bark, juniper-berries, beech-nuts, tangled roots, hills raised by burrowing insects, ravinesformed by the draining off of the rains. Ants and beetles bustled alongthem, pressing up hill and down to some mysterious goal. Above them acunning red spider was tying a blade of grass to an orchid leaf, thepillars it had chosen for its future web; and when the wind shook theleaves and the sun pierced through to this spot, I saw the delicate roofalready mapped out. 

I do not know how long my contemplation lasted. The woods were still. Save for a swarm of gnats which hummed in a minor key around thesleeping Lampron, nothing stirred, not a leaf even. All nature wassilent as it drank in the full sunshine. 

A murmur of distant voices stole on my ear. I rose, and crept throughthe birches and hazels to the edge of the glade. 

At the top of the slope, on the green margin of the glade, shaded by thetall trees, two pedestrians were slowly advancing. At the distance theystill were I could distinguish very little except that the man wore afrock-coat, and that the girl was dressed in gray, and was young, tojudge by the suppleness of her walk. Nevertheless I felt at once that itwas she!

I hid at they came near, and saw her pass on her father's arm, chattingin low tones, full of joy to have escaped from the Rue de l'Universite. She was looking before her with wide-open eyes. M. Charnot kept hiseyes on his daughter, more interested in her than in all the wealth ofspring. He kept well to the right of the path as the sun ate away theedge of the shadows; and asked, from time to time:

"Are you tired?"

"Oh, no!"

"As soon as you are tired, my dear, we will sit down. I am not walkingtoo fast?"

She answered "No" again, and laughed, and they went on. 

Soon they left the avenue and were lost in a green alley. Then a suddentwilight seemed to have closed down on me, an infinite sadness swelledin my heart. I closed my eyes, and--God forgive my weakness, but thetears came. 

"Hallo! What part do you intend me to play in all this?" said Lampronbehind me. 

"'What part'?"

"Yes. It's an odd notion to invite me to your trysting-place. "

"Trysting-place? I haven't one. "

"You mean to tell me, perhaps, that you came here by chance?"

"Certainly. "

"And chanced upon the very moment and the spot where she was passing?"

"Do you want a proof? That young lady is Mademoiselle Charnot. "

"Well?"

"Well, I never have said another word to her since my one visit to herfather; I have only seen her once, for a moment, in the street. Yousee there can be no question of trysting-places in this case. I waswondering at her appearance when you awoke. It is luck, or a friendlyprovidence, that has used the beauty of the sunlight, the breeze, andall the sweets of April to bring her, as it brought us, to the forest. "

"And that is what fetched the tears?"

"Well, no. "

"What, then?"

"I don't know. "

"My full-grown baby, I will tell you. You are in love with her!"

"Indeed, Sylvestre, I believe you're right. I confess it frankly to youas to my best friend. It is an old story already; as old, perhaps, as the day I first met her. At first her figure would rise in myimagination, and I took pleasure in contemplating it. Soon this phantomceased to satisfy; I longed to see her in person. I sought her in thestreets, the shops, the theatre. I still blinded myself, and pretendedthat I only wanted to ask her pardon, so as to remove, before I leftParis, the unpleasant impression I had made at our first meeting. Butnow, Sylvestre, all these false reasons have disappeared, and the trueone is clear. I love her!"

"Not a doubt of it, my friend, not a doubt of it. I have been through itmyself. "

He was silent, and his eyes wandered away to the faroff woods, perhapsback to those distant memories of his. A shadow rested on his strongface, but only for an instant. He shook off his depression, and his oldsmile came back as he said:

"It's serious, then?"

"Yes, very serious. "

"I'm not surprised; she is a very pretty girl. "

"Isn't she lovely?"

"Better than that, my friend; she is good. What do you know about her?"

"Only that she is a bad dancer. "

"That's something, to be sure. "

"But it isn't all. "

"Well, no. But never mind, find out the rest, speak to her, declare yourpassion, ask for her hand, and marry her. "

"Good heavens, Sylvestre, you are going ahead!"

"My dear fellow, that is the best and wisest plan; these vague idylsought to be hurried on, either to a painless separation or an honorableend in wedlock. In your place I should begin to-morrow. "

"Why not to-day?"

"How so?"

"Let's catch them up, and see her again at least. "

He began to laugh. 

"Run after young girls at my age! Well, well, it was my advice. Comealong!"

We crossed the avenue, and plunged into the forest. 

Lampron had formerly acquired a reputation for tireless agility amongthe fox-hunters of the Roman Campagna. He still deserves it. In twentystrides he left me behind. I saw him jumping over the heather, knockingoff with his cane the young shoots on the oaks, or turning his head tolook at me as I struggled after, torn by brambles and pricked by gorse. A startled pheasant brought him to a halt. The bird rose under his feetand soared into the full light. 

"Isn't it beautiful?" said he. "Look out, we must be more careful; weare scaring the game. We should come upon the path they took, aboutsixty yards ahead. "

Five minutes later he was signalling to me from behind the trunk of agreat beech. 

"Here they are. "

Jeanne and M. Charnot were seated on a fallen trunk beside the path, which here was almost lost beneath the green boughs. Their backs weretoward us. The old man, with his shoulders bent and his gold-knobbed canestuck into the ground beside him, was reading out of a book which wecould not see, while Jeanne, attentive, motionless, her face half turnedtoward him, was listening. Her profile was outlined against a strip ofclear sky. The deep silence of the wood wrapped us round, and we couldhear the old scholar's voice; it just reached us. 

"Straightway the godlike Odysseus spake these cunning words to the fairNausicaa: 'Be thou goddess or mortal, O queen, I bow myself before thee!If thou art one of the deities who dwell in boundless heaven, by thyloveliness and grace and height I guess thee to be Artemis, daughter ofhigh Zeus. If thou art a mortal dwelling upon earth, thrice blessed thyfather and thy queenly mother, thrice blessed thy dear brothers! Surelytheir souls ever swell with gladness because of thee, when they see amaiden so lovely step into the circle of the dance. But far the mostblessed of all is he who shall prevail on thee with presents and leadthee to his home!'"

I turned to Lampron, who had stopped a few steps in front of me, alittle to the right. He had got out his sketch-book, and was drawinghurriedly. Presently he forgot all prudence, and came forth from theshelter of a beech to get nearer to his model. In vain I made sign uponsign, and tried to remind him that we were not thereto paint or sketch. It was useless; the artist within him had broken loose. Sitting down atthe required distance on a gnarled root, right in the open, he went onwith his work with no thought but for his art. 

The inevitable happened. Growing impatient over some difficulty inhis sketch, Lampron shuffled his feet; a twig broke, some leavesrustled-Jeanne turned round and saw me looking at her, Lampron sketchingher. 

What are the feelings of a young girl who in the middle of a forestsuddenly discovers that two pairs of eyes are busy with her? A littlefright at first; then--when the idea of robbers is dismissed, and asecond glance has shown her that it is her beauty, not her life, theywant--a touch of satisfied vanity at the compliment, not unmixed withconfusion. 

This is exactly what we thought we saw. At first she slightly drewback, with brows knitted, on the verge of an exclamation; then her browsunbent, and the pleasure of finding herself admired, confusion at beingtaken unawares, the desire of appearing at ease, all appeared at once onher rosy cheeks and in her faintly troubled smile. 

I bowed. Sylvestre pulled off his cap. 

M. Charnot never stirred. 

"Another squirrel?" he said. 

"Two this time, I think, father, " she answered, in a low voice. 

He went on reading. 

"'My guest, ' made answer the fair Nausicaa, 'for I call thee so sincethou seemest not base nor foolish, it is Zeus himself that giveth wealto men--'"

Jeanne was no longer listening. She was thinking. Of what? Of severalthings, perhaps, but certainly of how to beat a retreat. I guessed it bythe movement of her sunshade, which was nervously tracing figures in theturf. I signalled to Lampron. We retired backward. Yet it was in vain;the charm was broken, the peace had been disturbed. 

She gave two coughs--musical little coughs, produced at will. 

M. Charnot broke off his reading. 

"You are cold, Jeanne?"

"Why, no, father. "

"Yes, yes, you're cold. Why did you not say so before? Lord, Lord, thesechildren! Always the same--think of nothing!"

He rose without delay, put his book in his pocket, buttoned up his coat, and, leaning on his stick, glanced up a moment at the tree-tops. Then, side by side, they disappeared down the path, Jeanne stepping briskly, upright and supple, between the young branches which soon concealed her. 

Still Lampron continued to watch the turning in the path down which shehad vanished. 

"What are you thinking about?" said I. 

He stroked his beard, where lurked a few gray hairs. 

"I am thinking, my friend, that youth leaves us in this same way, atthe time when we love it most, with a faint smile, and without a word totell us whither. Mine played me this trick. "

"What a good idea of yours to sketch them both. Let me see the sketch. "

"No!"

"Why not?"

"It can scarcely be called a sketch; it's a mere scratch. "

"Show it, all the same. "

"My good Fabien, you ought to know that when I am obstinate I have myreasons, like Balaam's ass. You will not see my sketch-book to-day, norto-morrow, nor the day after. "

I answered with foolish warmth:

"Please yourself; I don't care. "

Really I was very much annoyed, and I was rather cool with Lampron whenwe parted on the platform. 

What has come to the fellow? To refuse to show me a sketch he had madebefore my eyes, and a sketch of Jeanne, too!

 April 28th, 9 A. M. 

Hide your sketches, Sylvestre; stuff them away in your portfolios, oryour pockets; I care little, for I bear Jeanne's image in my heart, andcan see it when I will, and I love her, I love her, I love her!

What is to become of her and of me I can not tell. I hope withoutknowing what or why, or when, and hope alone is comforting. 

 9 P. M. 

This afternoon, at two o'clock, I met Lampron in the Boulevard St. Michel. He was walking fast with a portfolio under his arm. I went upto him. He looked annoyed, and hardly seemed pleased when I offered toaccompany him. I grew red and angry. 

"Oh, very well, " I said; "good-by, then, since you don't care to be seenwith me. "

He pondered a moment. 

"Oh, come along if you like; I am going to my framemaker's. "

"A picture?"

"Something of the kind. "

"And that's all the mystery! Yesterday it was a sketch I mustn'tlook at; to-day it's a picture. It is not nice of you, Sylvestre; no, decidedly it is not nice. "

He gave me a look of friendly compassion. 

"Poor little chap!" said he. 

Then, in his usual clear, strong voice:

"I am in a great hurry; but come if you like. I would rather it werefour days later; but as it is, never mind; it is never too soon to behappy. "

When Lampron chooses to hold his tongue it is useless to ask himquestions. I gave myself up to meditating on the words, "It is never toosoon to be happy. "

We went down the boulevard, past the beer-houses. There is distinctionin my friend's walk; he is not to be confused with the crowd throughwhich he passes. You can tell, from the simple seriousness of the man, his indifference to the noise and petty incidents of the streets, thathe is a stout and noble soul. Among the passers-by he is a somebody. Iheard from a group of students seated before a cafe the following words, which Sylvestre did not seem to notice:

"Look, do you see the taller of those two there? That's SylvestreLampron. "

"Prix du Salon two years ago?"

"A great gun, you know. "

"He looks it. "

"To the left, " said Lampron. 

We turned to the left, and found ourselves in the Rue Hautefeuille, before a shabby house, within the porch of which hung notices ofapartments to let; this was the framemaker's. The passage was dark, thewalls were chipped by the innumerable removals of furniture they hadwitnessed. We went upstairs. On the fourth floor a smell of glue andsour paste on the landing announced the tenant's profession. Tomake quite certain there was a card nailed to the door with "Plumet, Frame-Maker. "

"Plumet? A newly-married couple?"

But already Madame Plumet is at the door. It is the same little womanwho came to Boule's office. She recognizes me in the dim light of thestaircase. 

"What, Monsieur Lampron, do you know Monsieur Mouillard?"

"As you apparently do, too, Madame Plumet. "

"Oh, yes! I know him well; he won my action, you know. "

"Ah, to be sure-against the cabinet-maker. Is your husband in?"

"Yes, sir, in the workshop. Plumet!"

Through the half-opened door giving access to an inner room w e couldsee-in the midst of his molders, gilders, burnishers, and framers--alittle dark man with a beard, who looked up and hurriedly undid thestrings of his working-apron. 

"Coming, Marie!"

Little Madame Plumet was a trifle upset at having to receive us inundress, before she had tidied up her rooms. I could see it byher blushes and by the instinctive movement she made to smooth herdisordered curls. 

The husband had hardly answered her call before she left us and wentoff to the end of the room, into the obscure recesses of an alcoveovercrowded with furniture. There she bent over an oblong object, whichI could not quite see at first, and rocked it with her hand. 

"Monsieur Mouillard, " said she, looking up to me--"Monsieur Mouillard, this is my son, Pierre!"

What tender pride in those words, and the smile which accompanied them!With a finger she drew one of the curtains aside. Under the blue muslin, between the pillow and the white coverlet, I discovered two little blackeyes and a tuft of golden hair. 

"Isn't he a little rogue!" she went on, and began to caress the wakingbaby. 

Meanwhile Sylvestre had been talking to Plumet at the other end of theroom. 

"Out of the question, " said the frame-maker; "we are up to our knees inarrears; twenty orders waiting. "

"I ask you to oblige me as a friend. "

"I wish I could oblige you, Monsieur Lampron; but if I made you apromise, I should not be able to keep it. "

"What a pity! All was so well arranged, too. The sketch was to have beenhung with my two engravings. Poor Fabien! I was saving up a surprise foryou. Come and look here. "

I went across. Sylvestre opened his portfolio. 

"Do you recognize it?"

At once I recognized them. M. Charnot's back; Jeanne's profile, exactlylike her; a forest nook; the parasol on the ground; the cane stuck intothe grass; a bit of genre, perfect in truth and execution. 

"When did you do that?"

"Last night. "

"And you want to exhibit it?"

"At the Salon. "

"But, Sylvestre, it is too late to send in to the Salon. The Ides ofMarch are long past. "

"Yes, for that very reason I have had the devil of a time, intriguingall the morning. With a large picture I never should have succeeded; butwith a bit of a sketch, six inches by nine--"

"Bribery of officials, then?"

"Followed by substitution, which is strictly forbidden. I happened tohave hung there between two engravings a little sketch of underwoods notunlike this; one comes down, the other is hung instead--a little bitof jobbery of which I am still ashamed. I risked it all for you, in thehope that she would come and recognize the subject. "

"Of course she will recognize it, and understand; how on earth could shehelp it? My dear Sylvestre, how can I thank you?"

I seized my friend's hand and begged his forgiveness for my foolishhaste of speech. 

He, too, was a little touched and overcome by the pleasure his surprisehad given me. 

"Look here, Plumet, " he said to the frame-maker, who had taken thesketch over to the light, and was studying it with a professional eye. "This young man has even a greater interest than I in the matter. He isa suitor for the lady's hand, and you can be very useful to him. If youdo not frame the picture his happiness is blighted. "

The frame-maker shook his head. 

"Let's see, Antoine, " said a coaxing little voice, and Madame Plumetleft the cradle to come to our aid. 

I considered our cause as won. Plumet repeated in vain, as he pulled hisbeard, that it was impossible; she declared it was not. He made a movefor his workshop; she pulled him back by the sleeve, made him laugh andgive his consent. 

"Antoine, " she insisted, "we owe our marriage to Monsieur Mouillard; youmust at least pay what you owe. "

I was delighted. Still, a doubt seized me. 

"Sylvestre, " I said to Lampron, who already had his hand upon thedoor-handle, "do you really think she will come?"

"I hope so; but I will not answer for it. To make certain, some one mustsend word to her: 'Mademoiselle Jeanne, your portrait is at the Salon. 'If you know any one who would not mind taking this message to the Rue del'Universite--"

"I'm afraid I don't. "

"Come on, then, and trust to luck. "

"Rue de l'Universite, did you say?" broke in little Madame Plumet, whocertainly took the liveliest interest in my cause. 

"Yes; why?"

"Because I have a friend in the neighborhood, and perhaps--"

I risked giving her the number and name under the seal of secrecy; andit was a good thing I did so. 

In three minutes she had concocted a plan. It was like this: her friendlived near the hotel in the Rue de l'Universite, a porter's wife ofadvanced years, and quite safe; by means of her it might be possible tohint to Mademoiselle Jeanne that her portrait, or something like it, wasto be seen at the Salon--discreetly, of course, and as if it were themerest piece of news. 

What a plucky, clever little woman it is! Surely I was inspired when Idid her that service. I never thought I should be repaid. And here I amrepaid both capital and interest. 

Yet I hesitated. She snatched my consent. 

"No, no, " said she, "leave me to act. I promise you, Monsieur Mouillard, that she shall hear of it, and you, Monsieur Lampron, that the pictureshall be framed. "

She showed us to the top of the stairs, did little Madame Plumet, pleased at having won over her husband, at having shown herself socunning, and at being employed in a conspiracy of love. In the streetLampron shook me by the hand. "Good-by, my friend, " he said; "happy mendon't need company. Four days hence, at noon, I shall come to fetch you, and we will pay our first visit to the Salon together. "

Yes, I was a happy man! I walked fast, without seeing anything, my eyeslost in day dreams, my ears listening to celestial harmonies. I seemedto wear a halo. It abashed me somewhat; for there is something insolentin proclaiming on the housetops: "Look up at me, my heart is full, Jeanne is going to love me!" Decidedly, my brain was affected. 

Near the fountain in the Luxembourg, in front of the old palace wherethe senate sits, two little girls were playing. One pushed the other, who fell down crying, "Naughty Jeanne, naughty girl!" I rushed to pick her up, and kissed herbefore the eyes of her astonished nurse, saying, "No, Mademoiselle, sheis the most charming girl in the world!"

And M. Legrand! I still blush when I think of my conversation with M. Legrand. He was standing in a dignified attitude at the door of hisshop. 

 "ITALIAN WAREHOUSE; DRESSED PROVISIONS; SPECIALTY IN COLONIAL PRODUCE. "

He and I are upon good terms; I buy oranges, licorice from him, and rumwhen I want to make punch. But there are distinctions. Well, to-dayI called him "Dear Monsieur Legrand;" I addressed him, though I hadnothing to buy; I asked after his business; I remarked to him, "Whata heavenly day, Monsieur Legrand! We really have got fine weather atlast!"

He looked up to the top of the street, and looked down again at me, butrefrained from differing, out of respect. 

And, as a matter of fact, I noticed afterward that there was a mostunpleasant drizzle. 

To wind up with, just now as I was coming home after dinner, I passed aworkman and his family in the Rue Bonaparte, and the man pointed afterme, saying:

"Look! there goes a poet. "

He was right. In me the lawyer's clerk is in abeyance, the lawyer ofto-morrow has disappeared, only the poet is left--that is to say, theessence of youth freed from the parasitic growths of everyday life. I feel it roused and stirring. How sweet life is, and what wonderfulinstruments we are, that Hope can make us thus vibrate by a touch of herlittle finger!

BOOK 2. 

CHAPTER VIII. JOY AND MADNESS

 May 1st. 

These four days have seemed as if they never would end--especially thelast. But now it wants only two minutes of noon. In two minutes, ifLampron is not late--

Rat-a-tat-tat!

"Come in. "

"It is twelve o'clock, my friend; are you coming?"

It was Lampron. 

For the last hour I had had my hat on my head, my stick between my legs, and had been turning over my essay with gloved hands. He laughed at me. I don't care. We walked, for the day was clear and warm. All the worldwas out and about. Who can stay indoors on May Day? As we neared theChamber of Deputies, perambulators full of babies in white capes camepouring from all the neighboring streets, and made their resplendent waytoward the Tuileries. Lampron was in a talkative mood. He was pleasedwith the hanging of his pictures, and his plan of campaign againstMademoiselle Jeanne. 

"She is sure to have heard of it, Fabien, and perhaps is there already. Who can tell?"

"Oh, cease your humbug! Yes, very possibly she is there before us. Ihave had a feeling that she would be for these last four days. "

"You don't say so!"

"I have pictured her a score of times ascending the staircase onher father's arm. We are at the foot, lost in the crowd. Her noble, clear-cut profile stands out against the Gobelin tapestries which frameit with their embroidered flowers; one would say some maiden of bygonedays had come to life, and stepped down from her tapestried panel. "

"Gentlemen!" said Lampron, with a sweep of his arm which took in thewhole of the Place de la Concorde, "allow me to present to you theintending successor of Counsellor Mouillard, lawyer, of Bourges. Everyinch of him a man of business!"

We were getting near. Crowds were on their way to the exhibition fromall sides, women in spring frocks, many of the men in white waistcoats, one hand in pocket, gayly flourishing their canes with the other, as much as to say, "Look at me-well-to-do, jaunty, and out in fineweather. " The turnstiles were crowded, but at last we got through. Wemade but one step across the gravel court, the realm of sculpture whereantique gods in every posture formed a mythological circle round themodern busts in the central walk. There was no loitering here, for myheart was elsewhere. We cast a look at an old wounded Gaul, an ancestorunhonored by the crowd, and started up the staircase--no Jeanne to leadthe way. We came to the first room of paintings. Sylvestre beamed like aman who feels at home. 

"Quick, Sylvestre, where is the sketch? Let's hurry to it. "

But he dragged me with him around several rooms. 

Have you ever experienced the intoxication of color which seizes theuninitiated at the door of a picture-gallery? So many staring huesimpinge upon the eyes, so many ideas take confused shape and struggletogether in the brain, that the eyes grow weary and the brain harassed. It hovers undecided like an insect in a meadow full of flowers. Thebuzzing remarks of the crowd add to the feeling of intoxication. Theydistract one's attention before it can settle anywhere, and carry it offto where some group is gathered before a great name, a costly frame, anenormous canvas, or an outrage on taste; twenty men on a gallowsagainst a yellow sky, with twenty crows hovering over them, or an agedantediluvian, some mighty hunter, completely nude and with no propertybeyond a loaded club. One turns away, and the struggle begins againbetween the eye, attracted by a hundred subjects, and the brain, whichwould prefer to study one. 

With Lampron this danger has no existence; he takes in a room at aglance. He has the sportsman's eye which, in a covey of partridges, marks its bird at a glance. He never hesitates. "That is the thing tomake for, " he says, "come along"--and we make for it. He plants himselfright in front of the picture, with both hands in his overcoat pockets, and his chin sunk in his collar; says nothing, but is quite happydeveloping an idea which has occurred to him on his way to it; comparingthe picture before him with some former work by the same artist whichhe remembers. His whole soul is concentrated on the picture. And when heconsiders that I have understood and penetrated the meaning of the work, he gives his opinion in few words, but always the right ones, summing upa long sequence of ideas which I must have shared with him, since I seeexactly as he does. 

In this way we halted before the "Martyrdom of Saint Denis, " by Bonnat, the two "Adorations, " by Bouguereau, a landscape of Bernier's, someother landscapes, sea pieces, and portraits. 

At last we left the oil paintings. 

In the open gallery, which runs around the inside of the huge oblong andlooks on the court, the watercolors, engravings, and drawings slumbered, neglected. Lampron went straight to his works. I should have awardedthem the medaille d'honneur; an etching of a man's head, a largeengraving of the Virgin and Infant Jesus from the Salon Carre at theLouvre, and the drawing which represents--

"Great Heavens! Sylvestre, she's perfectly lovely; she will make a greatmistake if she does not come and see herself!"

"She will come, my dear sir; but I shall not be there to see her. "

"Are you going?"

"I leave you to stalk your game; be patient, and do not forget to comeand tell me the news this evening. "

"I promise. "

And Lampron vanished. 

The drawing was hung about midway between two doorways draped withcurtains, that opened into the big galleries. I leaned against thewoodwork of one of them, and waited. On my left stretched a solitudeseldom troubled by the few visitors who risk themselves in the realms ofpen and pencil. These, too, only came to get fresh air, or to look downon the many-colored crowd moving among the white statues below. 

At my right, on the contrary, the battling currents of the crowd keptpassing and repassing, the provincial element easily distinguished byits jaded demeanor. Stout, exhausted matrons, breathless fathers offamilies, crowded the sofas, raising discouraged glances to the walls, while around them turned and tripped, untiring as at a dance, legionsof Parisiennes, at ease, on their high heels, equally attentive to thepictures, their own carriage, and their neighbors' gowns. 

O peaceful functionaries, you whose business it is to keep an eye uponthis ferment! unless the ceaseless flux of these human phenomena lullyou to a trance, what a quantity of silly speeches you must hear! Ipicked up twenty in as many minutes. 

Suddenly there came a sound of little footsteps in the gallery. Twolittle girls had just come in, two sisters, doubtless, for both hadthe same black eyes, pink dresses, and white feathers in their hats. Hesitating, with outstretched necks, like fawns on the border of aglade, they seemed disappointed at the unexpected length of the gallery. They looked at each other and whispered. Then both smiled, and turningtheir backs on each other, they set off, one to the right, the other tothe left, to examine the drawings which covered the walls. They made arapid examination, with which art had obviously little to do; they werelooking for something, and I thought it might be for Jeanne's portrait. And so it turned out; the one on my side soon came to a stop, pointeda finger to the wall, and gave a little cry. The other ran up; theyclapped their hands. 

"Bravo, bravo!"

Then off they went again through the farther door. 

I guessed what they were about to do. 

I trembled from head to foot, and hid myself farther behind thecurtains. 

Not a minute elapsed before they were back, not two this time, butthree, and the third was Jeanne, whom they were pulling along betweenthem. 

They brought her up to Lampron's sketch, and curtsied neatly to her. 

Jeanne bent down, smiled, and seemed pleased. Then, a doubt seizing her, she turned her head and saw me. The smile died away; she blushed, a tearseemed ready to start to her eyes. Oh, rapture! Jeanne, you are touched;Jeanne, you understand!

A deep joy surged across my soul, so deep that I never have felt itslike. 

Alas! at that instant some one called, "Jeanne!"

She stood up, took the two little girls by the hand, and was gone. 

Far better had it been had I too fled, carrying with me that dream ofdelight!

But no, I leaned forward to look after them. In the doorway beyond I sawM. Charnot. A young man was with him, who spoke to Jeanne. She answeredhim. Three words reached me:

"It's nothing, George. "

The devil! She loves another!

 May 2d. 

In what a state of mind did I set out this morning to face my examiners!Downhearted, worn out by a night of misery, indifferent to all thatmight befall me, whether for good or for evil. 

I considered myself, and indeed I was, very wretched, but I neverthought that I should return more wretched than I went. 

It was lovely weather when at half past eleven I started for the LawSchool with an annotated copy of my essay under my arm, thinking moreof the regrets for the past and plans for the future with which I hadwrestled all night, than of the ordeal I was about to undergo. I met inthe Luxembourg the little girl whom I had kissed the week before. Shestopped her hoop and stood in my way, staring with wideopen eyes anda coaxing, cunning look, which meant, "I know you, I do!" I passed bywithout noticing. She pouted her lip, and I saw that she was thinking, "What's the matter with him?"

What was the matter? My poor little golden-locks, when you are grown afair woman I trust you may know as little of it as you do to-day. 

I went up the Rue Soufliot, and entered the stuffy courtyard on thestroke of noon. 

The morning lectures were over. Beneath the arcades a few scatteredstudents were walking up and down. I avoided them for fear of meetinga friend and having to talk. Several professors came running from theirlunch, rather red in the face, at the summons of the secretary. Thesewere my examiners. 

It was time to get into costume, for the candidate, like the criminal, has his costume. The old usher, who has dressed me up I don't know howmany times in his hired gowns, saw that I was downcast, and thought Imust be suffering from examination fever, a peculiar malady, which islike what a young soldier feels the first time he is under fire. 

We were alone in the dark robing-room; he walked round me, brushing andencouraging me; doctors of law have a moral right to this touch of thebrush. 

"It will be all right, Monsieur Mouillard, never fear. No one has beenrefused a degree this morning. "

"I am not afraid, Michu. "

"When I say 'no one, ' there was one refused--you never heard thelike. Just imagine--a little to the right, please, MonsieurMouillard--imagine, I say, a candidate who knew absolutely nothing. Thatis nothing extraordinary. But this fellow, after the examination wasover, recommended himself to mercy. 'Have compassion on me, gentlemen, 'he said, 'I only wish to be a magistrate!' Capital, isn't it?"

"Yes, yes. "

"You don't seem to think so. You don't look like laughing this morning. "

"No, Michu, every one has his bothers, you know. "

"I said to myself as I looked at you just now, Monsieur Mouillard hassome bother. Button up all the way, if you please, for a doctor's essay;if-you-please. It's a heartache, then?"

"Something of the kind. "

He shrugged his shoulders and went before me, struggling with anasthmatic chuckle, until we came to the room set apart for theexamination. 

It was the smallest and darkest of all, and borrowed its light froma street which had little enough to spare, and spared as little as itcould. On the left against the wall is a raised desk for the candidate. At the end, on a platform before a bookcase, sit the six examinersin red robes, capes with three bands of ermine, and gold-laced caps. Between the candidate's desk and the door is a little enclosure forspectators, of whom there were about thirty when I entered. 

My performance, which had a chance of being brilliant, was only fair. 

The three first examiners had read my essay, especially M. Flamaran, whoknew it well and had enjoyed its novel and audacious propositions. Hepursed up his mouth preparatory to putting the first question, like anepicure sucking a ripe fruit. And when at length he opened it, amidthe general silence, it was to carry the discussion at once up tosuch heights of abstraction that a good number of the audience, notunderstanding a word of it, stealthily made for the door. 

Each successive answer put fresh spirit into him. 

"Very good, " he murmured, "very good; let us carry it a step farther. Now supposing--"

And, the demon of logic at his heels, we both went off like inspiredlunatics into a world of hypotheses where never man had set foot. Hewas examining no longer, he was inventing and intoxicating himself withdeductions. No one was right or wrong. We were reasoning about chimeras, he radiant, I cool, before his gently tickled colleagues. I neverrealized till then what imagination a jurist's head could contain. 

Perspiring freely, he set down a white mark, having exceeded by tenminutes the recognized time for examination. 

The second examiner was less enthusiastic. He made very fewsuppositions, and devoted all his art to convicting me of acontradiction between page seventeen and page seventy-nine. Hekept repeating, "It's a serious matter, sir, very serious. " But, nevertheless, he bestowed a second white mark on me. I only got halfwhite from the third. The rest of the examination was taken up inmatters extraneous to the subject of my essay, a commonplace trialof strength, in which I replied with threadbare arguments to outwornobjections. 

And then it ended. Two hours had passed. 

I left the room while the examiners made up their minds. 

A few friends came up to me. 

"Congratulations, old man, I bet on six whites. "

"Hallo, Larive! I never noticed you. "

"I quite believe you; you didn't notice anybody, you still lookbewildered. Is it the emotion inseparable from--"

"I dare say. "

"The candidate is requested to return to the examination room!" said theusher. 

And old Michu added, in a whisper, "You have passed. I told you so. Youwon't forget old Michu, sir. "

M. Flamaran conferred my degree with a paternal smile, and a few kindwords for "this conscientious study, full of fresh ideas on a difficultsubject. "

I bowed to the examiners. Larive was waiting for me in the courtyard, and seized me by the arm. 

"Uncle Mouillard will be pleased. "

"I suppose so. "

"Better pleased than you. "

"That's very likely. "

"He might easily be that. Upon my word I can't understand you. These twoyears you have been working like a gang of niggers for your degree, andnow you have got it you don't seem to care a bit. You have won a smilefrom Flamaran and do not consider yourself a spoiled child of Fortune!What more did you want? Did you expect that Mademoiselle Charnot wouldcome in person--"

"Look here, Larive--"

"To look on at your examination, and applaud your answers with herneatly gloved hands? Surely you know, my dear fellow, that that is nolonger possible, and that she is going to be married. "

"Going to be married?"

"Don't pretend you didn't know it. "

"I have suspected as much since yesterday; I met her at the Salon, andsaw a young man with her. "

"Fair?"

"Yes. "

"Tall?"

"Rather. "

"Good-looking?"

"H'm--well"

"Dufilleul, old chap, friend Dufilleul. Don't you know Dufilleul?"

"No. "

"Oh, yes you do--a bit of a stockjobber, great at ecarte, studied law inour year, and is always to be seen at the Opera with little Tigra of theBouffes. "

"Poor girl!"

"You pity her?"

"It's too awful. "

"What is?"

"To see an unhappy child married to a rake who--"

"She will not be the first. "

"A gambler!"

"Yes, there is that, to be sure. "

"A fool, as it seems, who, in exchange for her beauty, grace, and youth, can offer only an assortment of damaged goods! Yes, I do pity girlsduped thus, deceived and sacrificed by the very purity that makes thembelieve in that of others. "

"You've some queer notions! It's the way of the world. If the innocentvictims were only to marry males of equal innocence, under theguardianship of virtuous parents, the days of this world would benumbered, my boy. I assure you that Dufilleul is a good match, handsomefor one thing--"

"That's worth a deal!"

"Rich. "

"The deuce he is!"

"And then a name which can be divided. "

"Divided?"

"With all the ease in the world. A very rare quality. At his marriagehe describes himself as Monsieur du Filleul. A year later he is Barondu Filleul. At the death of his father, an old cad, he becomes Comtedu Filleul. If the young wife is pretty and knows how to cajole herhusband, she may even become a marquise. "

"Ugh!"

"You are out of spirits, my poor fellow; I will stand you an absinthe, the only beverage that will suit the bitterness of your heart. "

"No, I shall go home. "

"Good-by, then. You don't take your degree cheerfully. "

"Good-by. "

He spun round on his heels and went down the Boulevard St. Michel. 

So all is over forever between her and me, and, saddest of all, she iseven more to be pitied than I. Poor girl! I loved her deeply, but I didit awkwardly, as I do everything, and missed my chance of speaking. Themute declaration which I risked, or rather which a friend risked for me, found her already engaged to this beast who has brought more skill tothe task, who has made no blots at the National Library, who has daredall when he had everything to fear--

I have allowed myself to be taken by her maiden witchery. All the fault, all the folly is mine. She has given me no encouragement, no sign ofliking me. If she smiled at St. Germain it was because she was surprisedand flattered. If she came near to tears at the Salon it was because shepitied me. I have not the shadow of a reproach to make her. 

That is all I shall ever get from her--a tear, a smile. That's all;never mind, I shall contrive to live on it. She has been my first love, and I shall keep her a place in my heart from which no other shall driveher. I shall now set to work to shut this poor heart which did so wrongto open. .. . I thought to be happy to-night, and I am full of sorrow. Henceforward I think I shall understand Sylvestre better. Our sorrowswill bring us nearer. I will go to see him at once, and will tell himso. 

But first I must write to my uncle to tell him that his nephew is aDoctor of Law. All the rest, my plans, my whole future can be put offtill to-morrow, or the day after, unless I get disgusted at the verythought of a future and decide to conjugate my life in the presentindicative only. That is what I feel inclined to do. 

 May 4th. 

Lampron has gone to the country to pass a fortnight in an out-of-the-wayplace with an old relative, where he goes into hiding when he wishes tofinish an engraving. 

But Madame Lampron was at home. After a little hesitation I told herall, and I am glad I did so. She found in her simple, womanly heartjust the counsel that I needed. One feels that she is used to givingconsolation. She possesses the secret of that feminine deftness whichis the great set-off to feminine weakness. Weak? Yes, women perhaps areweak, yet less weak than we, the strong sex, for they can raise us toour feet. She called me, "My dear Monsieur Fabien, " and there wasbalm in the very way she said the words. I used to think she wantedrefinement; she does not, she only lacks reading, and lack of readingmay go with the most delicate and lofty feelings. No one ever taught hercertain turns of expression which she used. "If your mother was alive, "said she, "this is what she would say. " And then she spoke to me of God, who alone can determinate man's trials, either by the end He ordains, or the resignation He inspires. I felt myself carried with her intothe regions where our sorrows shrink into insignificance as the horizonbroadens around them. And I remember she uttered this fine thought, "Seehow my son has suffered! It makes one believe, Monsieur Fabien, that theelect of the earth are the hardest tried, just as the stones that crownthe building are more deeply cut than their fellows. "

I returned from Madame Lampron's, softened, calmer, wiser. 

CHAPTER IX. A VISIT FROM MY UNCLE

 May 5th. 

A letter from M. Mouillard breathing fire and fury. Were I not so lowspirited I could laugh at it. 

He would have liked me, after taking my degree at two in the afternoon, to take the train for Bourges the same evening, where my uncle, hispractice, and provincial bliss awaited me. M. Mouillard's friends hadhad due notice, and would have come to meet me at the station. In short, I am an ungrateful wretch. At least I might have fixed the hour of myimminent arrival, for I can not want to stop in Paris with nothing thereto detain me. But no, not a sign, not a word of returning; simply theannouncement that I have passed. This goes beyond the bounds of merefolly and carelessness. M. Mouillard, his most elementary notions oflife shaken to their foundations, concludes in these words:

 "Fabien, I have long suspected it; some creature has you in bondage. I am coming to break the bonds!

 "BRUTUS MOUILLARD. "

I know him well; he will be here tomorrow. 

 May 6th. No uncle as yet. 

 May 7th. No more uncle than yesterday. 

 May 8th. Total eclipse continues. No news of M. Mouillard. This is very strange. 

 May 9th. This evening at seven o'clock, just as I was going out to dine, I saw, a few yards away, a tall, broad-brimmed hat surmounting a head of lankwhite hair, a long neck throttled in a white neckcloth, a frock-coatflapping about a pair of attenuated legs. I lifted up my voice:

"Uncle!"

He opened his arms to me and I fell into them. His first remark was:

"I trust at least that you have not yet dined. "

"No, uncle. "

"To Foyot's, then!"

When you expect to meet a man in his wrath and get an invitation todinner, you feel almost as if you had been taken in. You are heated, your arguments are at your fingers' ends, your stock of petulance isready for immediate use; and all have to be stored in bond. 

When I had recovered from my surprise, I said:

"I expected you sooner, from your letter. "

"Your suppositions were correct. I have been two days here, at theGrand Hotel. I went there on account of the dining-room, for my friendHublette (you remember Hublette at Bourges) told me: 'Mouillard, youmust see that room before you retire from business. '"

"I should have gone to see you there, uncle, if I had known it. "

"You would not have found me. Business before pleasure, Fabien. I had tosee three barristers and five solicitors. You know that business of thatkind can not wait. I saw them. Business over, I can indulge my feelings. Here I am. Does Foyot suit you?"

"Certainly, uncle. "

"Come on, then nephew, quick, march! Paris, makes one feel quite youngagain!"

And really Uncle Mouillard did look quite young, almost as young as helooked provincial. His tall figure, and the countrified cut of his coat, made all who passed him turn to stare, accustomed as Parisians are tocuriosities. He tapped the wood pavement with his stick, admiredthe effects of Wallace's philanthropy, stopped before the enamelledstreet-signs, and grew enthusiastic over the traffic in the Rue deVaugirard. 

The dinner was capital--just the kind a generous uncle will give to ablameless nephew. M. Mouillard, who has a long standing affection forchambertin, ordered two bottles to begin with. He drank the whole of oneand half of the other, eating in proportion, and talked unceasinglyand positively at the top of his voice, as his wont was. He told me thestory of two of his best actions this year, a judicial separation--myuncle is very strong in judicial separations--and the abduction of aminor. At first I looked out for personal allusions. But no, he toldthe story from pure love of his art, without omitting an interlocutoryjudgment, or a judgment reserved, just as he would have told the storyof Helen and Paris, if he had been employed in that well-known case. Nota word about myself. I waited, yet nothing came but the successive stepsin the action. 

After the ice, M. Mouillard called for a cigar. 

"Waiter, what cigars have you got?"

"Londres, conchas, regalias, cacadores, partagas, esceptionales. Whichwould you like, sir?"

"Damn the name! a big one that will take some time to smoke. "

Emile displayed at the bottom of a box an object closely resembling adistaff with a straw through the middle, doubtless some relic of thelast International Exhibition, abandoned by all, like the Great Eastern, on account of its dimensions. My uncle seized it, stuck it in the ambermouthpiece that is so familiar to me, lighted it, and under the pretextthat you must always first get the tobacco to burn evenly, went outtrailing behind him a cloud of smoke, like a gunboat at full speed. 

We "did" the arcades round the Odeon, where my uncle spent an eternitythumbing the books for sale. He took them all up one after another, fromthe poetry of the decedents to the Veterinary Manual, gave a glance atthe author's name, shrugged his shoulders, and always ended by turningto me with:

"You know that writer?"

"Why, yes, uncle. "

"He must be quite a new author; I can't recall that name. "

M. Mouillard forgot that it was forty-five years since he had lastvisited the bookstalls under the Odeon. 

He thought he was a student again, loafing along the arcades afterdinner, eager for novelty, careless of draughts. Little by little helost himself in dim reveries. His cigar never left his lips. The ashgrew longer and longer yet, a lovely white ash, slightly swollen at thetip, dotted with little black specks, and connected with the cigar by athin red band which alternately glowed and faded as he drew his breath. 

M. Mouillard was so lost in thought, and the ash was getting so long, that a young student--of the age that knows no mercy-was struck by thesetwin phenomena. I saw him nudge a friend, hastily roll a cigarette, and, doffing his hat, accost my uncle. 

"Might I trouble you for a light, sir!"

M. Mouillard emitted a sigh, turned slowly round, and bent two terribleeyes upon the intruder, knocked off the ash with an angry gesture, andheld out the ignited end at arm's length. 

"With pleasure, sir!"

Then he replaced the last book he had taken up--a copy of Musset--andcalled me. 

"Come, Fabien. "

Arm in arm we strolled up the Rue de Medicis along the railings of theLuxembourg. 

I felt the crisis approaching. My uncle has a pet saying: "When a thingis not clear to me, I go straight to the heart of it like a ferret. "

The ferret began to work. 

"Now, Fabien, about these bonds I mentioned? Did I guess right?"

"Yes, uncle, I have been in bondage. "

"Quite right to make a clean breast of it, my boy; but we must breakyour bonds. "

"They are broken. "

"How long ago?"

"Some days ago. "

"On your honor?"

"Yes. "

"That's quite right. You'd have done better to keep out of bondage. Butthere, you took your uncle's advice; you saw the abyss, and drew backfrom it. Quite right of you. "

"Uncle, I will not deceive you. Your letter arrived after the event. Thecause of the rupture was quite apart from that. "

"And the cause was?"

"The sudden shattering of my illusions. "

"Men still have illusions about these creatures?"

"She was a perfect creature, and worthy of all respect. "

"Come, come!"

"I must ask you to believe me. I thought her affections free. "

"And she was--"

"Betrothed. "

"Really now, that's very funny!"

"I did not find it funny, uncle. I suffered bitterly, I assure you. "

"I dare say, I dare say. The illusions you spoke of anyhow, it's allover now?"

"Quite over. "

"Well, that being the case, Fabien, I am ready to help you. Confessfrankly to me. How much is required?"

"How much?"

"Yes, you want something, I dare say, to close the incident. You knowwhat I mean, eh? to purchase what I might call the veil of oblivion. Howmuch?"

"Why, nothing at all, uncle. "

"Don't be afraid, Fabien; I've got the money with me. "

"You have quite mistaken the case, uncle; there is no question ofmoney. I must tell you again that the young lady is of the highestrespectability. "

My uncle stared. 

"I assure you, uncle. I am speaking of Mademoiselle Jeanne Charnot. "

"I dare say. "

"The daughter of a member of the Institute. "

"What!"

My uncle gave a jump and stood still. 

"Yes, of Mademoiselle Charnot, whom I was in love with and wished tomarry. Do you understand?"

He leaned against the railing and folded his arms. 

"Marry! Well, I never! A woman you wanted to marry?"

"Why, yes; what's the matter?"

"To marry! How could I have imagined such a thing? Here were matters ofthe utmost importance going on, and I knew nothing about them. Marry! You might be announcing your betrothal to me at this moment ifyou'd-Still you are quite sure she is betrothed?"

"Larive told me so. "

"Who's Larive?"

"A friend of mine. "

"Oh, so you have only heard it through a friend?"

"Yes, uncle. Do you really think there may still be hope, that I stillhave a chance?"

"No, no; not the slightest. She is sure to be betrothed, very muchbetrothed. I tell you I am glad she is. The Mouillards do not come toParis for their wives, Fabien--we do not want a Parisienne to carry onthe traditions of the family, and the practice. A Parisienne! I shudderat the thought of it. Fabien, you will leave Paris with me to-morrow. That's understood. "

"Certainly not, uncle. "

"Your reasons?"

"Because I can not leave my friends without saying goodby, and becauseI have need to reflect before definitely binding myself to the legalprofession. "

"To reflect! You want to reflect before taking over a family practice, which has been destined for you since you were an infant, in view ofwhich you have been working for five years, and which I have nursed foryou, I, your uncle, as if you had been my son?"

"Yes, uncle. "

"Don't be a fool! You can reflect at Bourges quite as well as here. Yourobject in staying here is to see her again. "

"It is not. "

"To wander like a troubled spirit up and down her street. By the way, which is her street?"

"Rue de l'Universite. "

My uncle took out his pocketbook and made a note, "Charnot, Rue del'Universite. " Then all his features expanded. He gave a snort, whichI understood, for I had often heard it in court at Bourges, where itmeant, "There is no escape now. Old Mouillard has cornered his man. "

My uncle replaced his pencil in its case, and his notebook in hispocket, and merely added:

"Fabien, you're not yourself to-night. We'll talk of the matter anothertime. Five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. " He was counting on hisfingers. "These return tickets are very convenient; I need not leavebefore to-morrow evening. And, what's more, you'll go with me, my boy. "

M. Mouillard talked only on indifferent subjects during our brief walkfrom the Rue Soufflot to catch the omnibus at the Odeon. There he shookme by the hand and sprang nimbly into the first bus. A lady in black, with veil tightly drawn over a little turned up nose, seeing my uncleburst in like a bomb, and make for the seat beside her, hurriedly drewin the folds of her dress, which were spread over the seat. My unclenoticed her action, and, fearing he had been rude, bent over toward herwith an affable expression. "Do not disturb yourself, Madame. I amnot going all the way to Batignolles; no farther, indeed, than theBoulevards. I shall inconvenience you for a few moments only, a very fewmoments, Madame. " I had time to remark that the lady, after giving herneighbor a glance of Juno-like disdain, turned her back upon him, andproceeded to study the straps hanging from the roof. 

The brake was taken off, the conductor whistled, the three horses, theirhoofs hammering the pavement, strained for an instant amid showers ofsparks, and the long vehicle vanished down the Rue de Vaugirard, bearingwith it Brutus and his fortunes. 

CHAPTER X. A FAMILY BREACH

May 10th. 

It is an awful fate to be the nephew of M. Mouillard! I always knew hewas obstinate, capable alike of guile and daring, but I little imaginedwhat his intentions were when he left me!

My refusal to start, and my prayer for a respite before embarking in hispractice, drove him wild. He lost his head, and swore to drag me off, 'per fas et nefas'. He has mentally begun a new action--Mouillard v. Mouillard, and is already tackling the brief; which is as much as to saythat he is fierce, unbridled, heartless, and without remorse. 

Some might have bent. I preferred to break. 

We are strangers for life. I have just seen him to the landing of mystaircase. 

He came here about a quarter of an hour ago, proud, and, I may say, swaggering, as he does over his learned friends when he has found a flawin one of their pleadings. 

"Well, nephew?"

"Well, uncle?"

"I've got some news for you. "

"Indeed?"

M. Mouillard banged his hat down furiously upon my table. 

"Yes, you know my maxim: when anything does not seem quite clear tome--"

"You ferret it out. "

"Quite so; I have always found it answer. Your business did not seemclear to me. Was Mademoiselle Charnot betrothed, or was she not? To whatextent had she encouraged your attentions? You never would have told methe story correctly, and I never should have known. That being so, I putmy maxim into practice, and went to see her father. "

"You did that?"

"Certainly I did. "

"You have been to see Monsieur Charnot?"

"In the Rue de l'Universite. Wasn't it the simplest thing to do?Besides, I was not sorry to make the acquaintance of a member of theInstitute. And I must admit that he behaved very nicely to me--not a bitstuck up. "

"And you told him?"

"My name to begin with: Brutus Mouillard. He reflected a bit, just amoment, and recalled your appearance: a shy youth, a bachelor of arts, wearing an eyeglass. "

"Was that all his description?"

"Yes, he remembered seeing you at the National Library, and once at hishouse. I said to him, 'That is my nephew, Monsieur Charnot. ' He replied, 'I congratulate you, sir; he seems a youth of parts. '--'That he is, buthis heart is very inflammable. '--'At his age, sir, who is not liable totake fire?' That was how we began. Your friend Monsieur Charnot has apretty wit. I did not want to be behindhand with him, so I answered, 'Well, sir, it caught fire in your house. ' He started with frightand looked all round the room. I was vastly amused. Then we came toexplanations. I put the case before him, that you were in love with hisdaughter, without my consent, but with perfectly honorable intentions;that I had guessed it from your letters, from your unpardonable neglectof your duties to your family, and that I hurried hither from Bourgesto take in the situation. With that I concluded, and waited for him todevelop. There are occasions when you must let people develop. I couldnot jump down his throat with, 'Sir, would you kindly tell me whetheryour daughter is betrothed or not?' You follow me? He thought, no doubt, I had come to ask for his daughter's hand, and passing one hand over hisforehead, he replied, 'Sir, I feel greatly flattered by your proposal, and I should certainly give it my serious attention, were it not that mydaughter's hand is already sought by the son of an old schoolfellowof mine, which circumstance, as you will readily understand, does notpermit of my entertaining an offer which otherwise should have receivedthe most mature consideration. ' I had learned what I came for withoutrisking anything. Well, I didn't conceal from him that, so far as I wasconcerned, I would rather you took your wife from the country than thatyou brought home the most charming Parisienne; and that the Mouillardsfrom father to son had always taken their wives from Bourges. He enteredperfectly into my sentiments, and we parted the best of friends. Now, myboy, the facts are ascertained: Mademoiselle Charnot is another's;you must get your mourning over and start with me to-night. To-morrowmorning we shall be in Bourges, and you'll soon be laughing over yourParisian delusions, I warrant you!"

I had heard my uncle out without interrupting him, though wrath, astonishment, and my habitual respect for M. Mouillard were strugglingfor the mastery within me. I needed all my strength of mind to answer, with apparent calm. 

"Yesterday, uncle, I had not made up my mind; today I have. "

"You are coming?"

"I am not. Your action in this matter, uncle--I do not know if you areaware of it--has been perfectly unheard-of. I can not acknowledge yourright to act thus. It puts between you and me two hundred miles of rail, and that forever. Do you understand me? You have taken the liberty ofdisclosing a secret which was not yours to tell; you have revealeda passion which, as it was hopeless, should not have been furthermentioned, and certainly not exposed to such humiliation. You went tosee Monsieur Charnot without reflecting whether you were not bringingtrouble into his household; without reflecting, further, whethersuch conduct as yours, which may perhaps be usual among your businessacquaintances, was likely to succeed with me. Perhaps you thought itwould. You have merely completed an experiment, begun long ago, whichproves that we do not understand life in the same way, and that itwill be better for both of us if I continue to live in Paris, and youcontinue to live at Bourges. "

"Ha! that's how you take it, young man, is it? You refuse to come? youtry to bully me?"

"Yes. "

"Consider carefully before you let me leave here alone. You know theamount of your fortune--fourteen hundred francs a year, which meanspoverty in Paris. "

"Yes, I do. "

"Well, then, attend to what I am about to say. For years past I havebeen saving my practice for you--that is, an honorable and lucrativeposition all ready for you to step into. But I am tired at length ofyour fads and your fancies. If you do not take up your quarters atBourges within a fortnight from now, the Mouillard practice will changeits name within three weeks!" My uncle sniffed with emotion as he lookedat me, expecting to see me totter beneath his threats. I made noanswer for a moment; but a thought which had been harassing me from thebeginning of our interview compelled me to say:

"I have only one thing to ask you, Monsieur Mouillard. "

"Further respite, I suppose? Time to reflect and fool me again? No, ahundred times no! I've had enough of you; a fortnight, not a day more!"

"No, sir; I do not ask for respite. "

"So much the better, for I should refuse it. What do you want?"

"Monsieur Mouillard, I trust that Jeanne was not present at theinterview, that she heard none of it, that she was not forced toblush--"

My uncle sprang to his feet, seized his gloves, which lay spread outon the table, bundled them up, flung them passionately into his hat, clapped the whole on his head, and made for the door with angry strides. 

I followed him; he never looked back, never made answer to my "Good-by, uncle. " But, at the sixth step, just before turning the corner, heraised his stick, gave the banisters a blow fit to break them, and wenton his way downstairs exclaiming:

"Damnation!"

 May 20th. 

And so we have parted with an oath, my uncle and I! That is how I havebroken with the only relative I possess. It is now ten days since then. I now have five left in which to mend the broken thread of the familytradition, and become a lawyer. But nothing points to such conversion. On the contrary, I feel relieved of a heavy weight, pleased to be free, to have no profession. I feel the thrill of pleasure that a fugitivefrom justice feels on clearing the frontier. Perhaps I was meant for adifferent course of life than the one I was forced to follow. As a childI was brought up to worship the Mouillard practice, with the fixed ideathat this profession alone could suit me; heir apparent to a lawyer'sstool--born to it, brought up to it, without any idea, at any rate for along time, that I could possibly free myself from the traditions of thelaw's sacred jargon. 

I have quite got over that now. The courts, where I have been a frequentspectator, seem to me full of talented men who fine down and belittletheir talents in the practice of law. Nothing uses up the noblervirtues more quickly than a practice at the bar. Generosity, enthusiasm, sensibility, true and ready sympathy--all are taken, leaving the man, in many instances nothing but a skilful actor, who apes all the emotionswhile feeling none. And the comedy is none the less repugnant to mebecause it is played through with a solemn face, and the actors arerichly recompensed. 

Lampron is not like this. He has given play to all the noble qualitiesof his nature. I envy him. I admire his disinterestedness, his broadviews of life, his faith in good in spite of evil, his belief in poetryin spite of prose, his unspoiled capacity for receiving new impressionsand illusions--a capacity which, amid the crowds that grow old in mindbefore they are old in body, keeps him still young and boyish. I thinkI might have been devoted to his profession, or to literature, or toanything but law. 

We shall see. For the present I have taken a plunge into the unknown. Mytime is all my own, my freedom is absolute, and I am enjoying it. 

I have hidden nothing from Lampron. As my friend he is pleased, I cansee, at a resolve which keeps me in Paris; but his prudence cries outupon it. 

"It is easy enough to refuse a profession, " he said; "harder to findanother in its place. What do you intend to do?"

"I don't know. "

"My dear fellow, you seem to be trusting to luck. At sixteen that mightbe permissible, at twenty-four it's a mistake. "

"So much the worse, for I shall make the mistake. If I have to live onlittle--well, you've tried that before now; I shall only be followingyou. "

"That's true; I have known want, and even now it attacks me sometimes;it's like influenza, which does not leave its victims all at once; butit is hard, I can tell you, to do without the necessaries of life; asfor its luxuries--"

"Oh, of course, no one can do without its luxuries. "

"You are incorrigible, " he answered, with a laugh. Then he said no more. Lampron's silence is the only argument which struggles in my heart infavor of the Mouillard practice. Who can guess from what quarter thewind will blow?

CHAPTER XI. IN THE BEATEN PATH

 June 5th. 

The die is cast; I will not be a lawyer. 

The tradition of the Mouillards is broken for good, Sylvestre isdefeated for good, and I am free for good--and quite uncertain of myfuture. 

I have written my uncle a calm, polite, and clearly worded letter toconfirm my decision. He has not answered it, nor did I expect an answer. 

I expected, however, that he would be avenged by some faint regret on mypart, by one of those light mists that so often arise and hang about ourfirmest resolutions. But no such mist has arisen. 

Still, Law has had her revenge. Abandoned at Bourges, she has recapturedme at Paris, for a time. I realized that it was impossible for meto live on an income of fourteen hundred francs. The friends whom Idiscreetly questioned, in behalf of an unnamed acquaintance, as tothe means of earning money, gave me various answers. Here is a fairlycomplete list of their expedients:

"If your friend is at all clever, he should write a novel. "

"If he is not, there is the catalogue of the National Library: ten hoursof indexing a day. "

"If he has ambition, let him become a wine-merchant. "

"No; 'Old Clo, ' and get his hats gratis. "

"If he is very plain, and has no voice, he can sing in the chorus at theopera. "

"Shorthand writer in the Senate is a peaceful occupation. "

"Teacher of Volapuk is the profession of the future. "

"Try 'Hallo, are you there?' in the telephones. "

"Wants to earn money? Advise him first not to lose any!"

The most sensible one, who guessed the name of the acquaintance I wasinterested in, said:

"You have been a managing clerk; go back to it. "

And as the situation chanced to be vacant, I went back to my old master. I took my old seat and den as managing clerk between the outer officeand Counsellor Boule's glass cage. I correct the drafts of the inferiorclerks; I see the clients and instruct them how to proceed. They oftentake me for the counsellor himself. I go to the courts nearly every day, and hang about chief clerks' and judges' chambers; and go to the theatreonce a week with the "paper" supplied to the office. 

Do I call this a profession? No, merely a stop-gap which allows me tolive and wait for something to turn up. I sometimes have forebodingsthat I shall go on like this forever, waiting for something whichwill never turn up; that this temporary occupation may become only toopermanent. 

There is an old clerk in the office who has never had any otheroccupation, whose appearance is a kind of warning to me. He has a redface--the effect of the office stove, I think--straight, white hair, the expression when spoken to of a startled sheep-gentle, astonished, slightly flurried. His attenuated back is rounded off with a stoopbetween the neck and shoulders. He can hardly keep his hands fromshaking. His signature is a work of art. He can stick at his desk forsix hours without stirring. While we lunch at a restaurant, he consumesat the office some nondescript provisions which he brings in the morningin a paper bag. On Sundays he fishes, for a change; his rod takes theplace of his pen, and his can of worms serves instead of inkstand. 

He and I have already one point of resemblance. The old clerk was oncecrossed in love with a flowergirl, one Mademoiselle Elodie. He has toldme this one tragedy of his life. In days gone by I used to think thisthirty-year-old love-story dull and commonplace; to-day I understandM. Jupille; I relish him even. He and I have become sympathetic. I nolonger make him move from his seat by the fire when I want to ask him aquestion: I go to him. On Sundays, on the quays by the Seine, I pick himout from the crowd intent upon the capture of tittlebats, because he isseated upon his handkerchief. I go up to him and we have a talk. 

"Fish biting, Monsieur Jupille?"

"Hardly at all. "

"Sport is not what it used to be?"

"Ah! Monsieur Mouillard, if you could have seen it thirty years ago!"

This date is always cropping up with him. Have we not all our own date, a few months, a few days, perhaps a single hour of full-hearted joy, forwhich half our life has been a preparation, and of which the other halfmust be a remembrance?

 June 5th. 

"Monsieur Mouillard, here is an application for leave to sign judgmentin a fresh matter. "

"Very well, give it me. "

"To the President of the Civil Court:

"Monsieur Plumet, of 27 Rue Hauteville, in the city of Paris, byCounsellor Boule, his advocate, craves leave--"

It was a proceeding against a refractory debtor, the commonest thing inthe world. 

"Monsieur Massinot!"

"Yes, sir. "

"Who brought these papers?"

"A very pretty little woman brought them this morning while you wereout, sir. "

"Monsieur Massinot, whether she was pretty or not, it is no business ofyours to criticise the looks of the clients. "

"I did not mean to offend you, Monsieur Mouillard. "

"You have not offended me, but you have no business to talk of a 'prettyclient. ' That epithet is not allowed in a pleading, that's all. The ladyis coming back, I suppose?"

"Yes, sir. "

Little Madame Plumet soon called again, tricked out from head to foot inthe latest fashion. She was a little flurried on entering a room full ofjocular clerks. Escorted by Massinot, both of them with their eyes fixedon the ground, she reached my office. I closed the door after her. Sherecognized me. 

"Monsieur Mouillard! What a pleasant surprise!"

She held out her hand to me so frankly and gracefully that I gave hermine, and felt sure, from the firm, expressive way in which she claspedit, that Madame Plumet was really pleased to see me. Her ruddy cheeksand bright eyes recalled my first impression of her, the littledressmaker running from the workshop to the office, full of her love forM. Plumet and her grievances against the wicked cabinetmaker. 

"What, you are back again with Counsellor Boule? I am surprised!"

"So am I, Madame Plumet, very much surprised. But such is life! How isMaster Pierre progressing?"

"Not quite so well, poor darling, since I weaned him. I had to wean him, Monsieur Mouillard, because I have gone back to my old trade. "

"Dressmaking?"

"Yes, on my own account this time. I have taken the flat opposite toours, on the same floor. Plumet makes frames, while I make gowns. I havealready three workgirls, and enough customers to give me a start. I donot charge them very dear to begin with. 

"One of my customers was a very nice young lady--you know who! I havenot talked to her of you, but I have often wanted to. By the way, Monsieur Mouillard, did I do my errand well?"

"What errand?"

"The important one, about the portrait at the Salon. "

"Oh, yes; very well indeed. I must thank you. "

"She came?"

"Yes, with her father. "

"She must have been pleased! The drawing was so pretty. Plumet, who isnot much of a talker, is never tired of praising it. I tell you, he andI did not spare ourselves. He made a bit of a fuss before he would takethe order; he was in a hurry--such a hurry; but when he saw that I wasbent on it he gave in. And it is not the first time he has given in. Plumet is a good soul, Monsieur Mouillard. When you know him betteryou will see what a good soul he is. Well, while he was cutting out theframe, I went to the porter's wife. What a business it was! I am glad myerrand was successful!"

"It was too good of you, Madame Plumet; but it was useless, alas! she isto marry another. "

"Marry another? Impossible!"

I thought Madame Plumet was about to faint. Had she heard that her sonPierre had the croup, she could not have been more upset. Herbosom heaved, she clasped her hands, and gazed at me with sorrowfulcompassion. 

"Poor Monsieur Mouillard!"

And two tears, two real tears, coursed down Madame Plumet's cheeks. Ishould have liked to catch them. They were the only tears that had beenshed for me by a living soul since my mother died. 

I had to tell her all, every word, down to my rival's name. When sheheard that it was Baron Dufilleul, her indignation knew no bounds. Sheexclaimed that the Baron was an awful man; that she knew all sorts ofthings about him! Know him? she should think so! That such a union wasimpossible, that it could never take place, that Plumet, she knew, wouldagree with her:

"Madame Plumet, " I said, "we have strayed some distance from thebusiness which brought you here. Let us return to your affairs; mine arehopeless, and you can not remedy them. "

She got up trembling, her eyes red and her feelings a little hurt. 

"My action? Oh, no! I can't attend to it to-day. I've no heart to talkabout my business. What you've told me has made me too unhappy. Anotherday, Monsieur Mouillard, another day. "

She left me with a look of mystery, and a pressure of the hand whichseemed to say: "Rely on me!"

Poor woman!

CHAPTER XII. I GO TO ITALY

June 10th. 

In the train. We have passed the fortifications. The stuccoed houses ofthe suburbs, the factories, taverns, and gloomy hovels in the debatableland round Paris are so many points of sunshine in the far distance. The train is going at full speed. The fields of green or gold are beingunrolled like ribbons before my eyes. Now and again a metallic sound anda glimpse of columns and advertisements show that we are rushing througha station in a whirlwind of dust. A flash of light across our path isa tributary of the river. I am off, well on my way, and no one can stopme--not Lampron, nor Counsellor Boule, nor yet Plum et. The dream ofyears is about to be realized. I am going to see Italy--merely a cornerof it; but what a pleasure even that is, and what unlooked-for luck!

A few days ago, Counsellor Boule called me into his office. 

"Monsieur Mouillard, you speak Italian fluently, don't you?"

"Yes, sir. " "Would you like a trip at a client's expense?"

"With pleasure, wherever you like. "

"To Italy?"

"With very great pleasure. "

"I thought so, and gave your name to the court without asking yourconsent. It's a commission to examine documents at Milan, to prove somecopies of deeds and other papers, put in by a supposititious Italianheir to establish his rights to a rather large property. You rememberthe case of Zampini against Veldon and others?"

"Quite well. "

"It is Zampini's copies of the deeds on which he bases his claim whichyou will have to compare with the originals, with the help of a clerkfrom the Record Office and a sworn translator. You can go by Switzerlandor by the Corniche route, as you please. You will be allowed six hundredfrancs and a fortnight's holiday. Does that suit you?"

"I should think so!"

"Then pack up and be off. You must be at Milan by the morning of theeighteenth. "

I ran to tell the news to Lampron, who was filled with surprise and nota little emotion at the mention of Italy. And here I am flying alongin the Lyons express, without a regret for Paris. All my heart leapsforward toward Switzerland, where I shall be to-morrow. I have chosenthis green route to take me to the land of blue skies. Up to the lastmoment I feared that some obstacle would arise, that the ill-luck whichdogs my footsteps would keep me back, and I am quite surprised that ithas let me off. True, I nearly lost the train, and the horse of cabNo. 7382 must have been a retired racer to make up for the loss of timecaused by M. Plumet. 

Counsellor Boule sent me on a business errand an hour before I started. On my way back, just as I was crossing the Place de l'Opera in theaforesaid cab, a voice hailed me:

"Monsieur Mouillard!"

I looked first to the right and then to the left, till, on a refuge, Icaught sight of M. Plumet struggling to attract my attention. Istopped the cab, and a smile of satisfaction spread over M. Plumet'scountenance. He stepped off the refuge. I opened the cab-door. But abrougham passed, and the horse pushed me back into the cab with hisnose. I opened the door a second time; another brougham came by; then athird; finally two serried lines of traffic cut me off from M. Plumet, who kept shouting something to me which the noise of the wheels and thecrowd prevented me from hearing. I signalled my despair to M. Plumet. Herose on tiptoe. I could not hear any better. 

Five minutes lost! Impossible to wait any longer! Besides, who couldtell that it was not a trap to prevent my departure, though in friendlyguise? I shuddered at the thought and shouted:

"Gare de Lyon, cabby, as fast as you can drive!"

My orders were obeyed. We got to the station to find the train made upand ready to start, and I was the last to take a ticket. 

I suppose M. Plumet managed to escape from his refuge. 

 GENEVA. 

On my arrival I found, keeping order on the way outside the station, thedrollest policeman that ever stepped out of a comic opera. At homewe should have had to protect him against the boys; here he protectsothers. 

Well, it shows that I am really abroad. 

I have only two hours to spare in this town. What shall I see? Thecountry; that is always beautiful, whereas many so-called "sights" arenot. I will make for the shores of the lake, for the spot where theRhone leaves it, to flow toward France. The Rhone, which is so muddy atAvignon, is clean here; deep and clear as a creek of the sea. It rushesalong in a narrow blue torrent compressed between a quay and a line ofhouses. 

The river draws me after it. We leave the town together, and I am soonin the midst of those market-gardens where the infant Topffer losthimself, and, overtaken by nightfall, fell to making his famous analysisof fear. The big pumping wheels still overtop the willows, and casttheir shadows over the lettuce-fields. In the distance rise slopes ofwoodland, on Sundays the haunt of holiday-makers. The Rhone leaps andeddies, singing over its gravel beds. Two trout-fishers are taxing alltheir strength to pull a boat up stream beneath the shelter of the bank. 

Perhaps I was wrong in not waiting to hear what M. Plumet had to tellme. He is not the kind of man to gesticulate wildly without good reason. 

 ON THE LAKE. 

The steamer is gaining the open water and Geneva already lies farbehind. Not a ripple on the blue water that shades into deep blue behindus. Ahead the scene melts into a milky haze. A little boat, with idlesails embroidered with sunlight, vanishes into it. On the right risethe mountains of Savoy, dotted with forests, veiled in clouds which casttheir shadows on the broken slopes. The contrast is happy, and I cannot help admiring Leman's lovely smile at the foot of these ruggedmountains. 

At the bend in the banks near St. Maurice-en-Valais, the wind catchesus, quite a squall. The lake becomes a sea. At the first roll anEnglishwoman becomes seasick. She casts an expiring glance upon Chillon, the ancient towers of which are being lashed by the foam. Her husbanddoes not think it worth his while to cease reading his guide-book orfocusing his field-glass for so trifling a matter. 

 ON THE DILIGENCE

I am crossing the Simplon at daybreak, with rosepink glaciers on everyside. We are trotting down the Italian slope. How I have longed for thesight of Italy! Hardly had the diligence put on the brake, and begunbowling down the mountain-side, before I discovered a change on theface of all things. The sky turned to a brighter blue. At the very firstglance I seemed to see the dust of long summers on the leaves of thefirs, six thousand feet above the sea, in the virgin atmosphere of themountain-tops: and I was very near taking the creaking of my looselyfixed seat for the southern melody of the first grasshopper. 

 BAVENO

No one could be mistaken; this shaven, obsequious, suavely jovialinnkeeper is a Neapolitan. He takes his stand in his mosaic-pavedhall, and is at the service of all who wish for information about LagoMaggiore, the list of its sights; in a word, the programme of the piece. 

 ISOLA BELLA, ISOLA MADRE. 

Yes, they are scraped clean, carefully tended, pretty, all a-blowing anda-growing; but unreal. The palm trees are unhomely, the tropical plantsseem to stand behind footlights. Restore them to their homes, or give meback Lake Leman, so simply grand. 

 MENAGGIO. 

After the sky-blue of Maggiore and the vivid green of Lugano, comes theviolet-blue of Como, with its luminous landscape, its banks covered witholives, Roman ruins, and modern villas. Never have I felt the air soclear. Here for the first time I said to myself: "This is the spot whereI would choose to dwell. " I have even selected my house; it peeps outfrom a mass of pomegranates, evergreens, and citrons, on a peninsulaaround which the water swells with gentle murmur, and whence the view isperfect across lake, mountain, and sky. 

A nightingale is singing, and I can not help reflecting that his fellowshere are put to death in thousands. Yes, the reapers, famed in poemsand lithographs, are desperate bird-catchers. At the season of migrationthey capture thousands of these weary travellers with snares or limedtwigs; on Maggiore alone sixty thousand meet their end. We have butthose they choose to leave us to charm our summer nights. 

Perhaps they will kill my nightingale in the Carmelite garden. The ideafills me with indignation. 

Then my thoughts run back to my rooms in the Rue de Rennes, and I seeMadame Menin, with a dejected air, dusting my slumbering furniture;Lampron at work, his mother knitting; the old clerk growing sleepy withthe heat and lifting his pen as he fancies he has got a bite; MadamePlumet amid her covey of workgirls, and M. Plumet blowing away withimpatient breath the gold dust which the gum has failed to fix on themouldings of a newly finished frame. 

M. Plumet is pensive. He is burdened with a secret. I am convinced I didwrong in not waiting longer on the Place de L'Opera. 

 MILAN. 

At last I am in Milan, an ancient city, but full of ideas and energy, mydestination, and the cradle of the excellent Porfirio Zampini, suspectedforger. The examination of documents does not begin till the day afterto-morrow, so I am making the best of the time in seeing the sights. 

There are four sights to see at Milan if you are a musician, and threeif you are not: the Duomo, 'vulgo', cathedral; "The Marriage of theVirgin, " by Raphael; "The Last Supper, " by Leonardo; and, if it suitsyour tastes, a performance at La Scala. 

I began with the Duomo, and on leaving it I received the news that stillworries me. 

But first of all I must make a confession. When I ascended through thetropical heat to the marble roof of the cathedral, I expected so muchthat I was disappointed. Surprise goes for so much in what we admire. Neither this mountain of marble, nor the lacework and pinnacles whichadorn the enormous mass, nor the amazing number of statues, nor thesight of men smaller than flies on the Piazza del Duomo, nor the vaststretch of flat country which spreads for miles on every side of thecity--none of these sights kindled the spark of enthusiasm within mewhich has often glowed for much less. No, what pleased me was somethingquite different, a detail not noticed in the guide-books, I suppose. 

I had come down from the roof and was wandering in the vast nave frompillar to pillar, when I found myself beneath the lantern. I raisedmy eyes, but the flood of golden light compelled me to close them. The sunlight passing through the yellow glass of the windows overheadencircled the mighty vault of the lantern with a fiery crown, and playedaround the walls of its cage in rays which, growing fainter as theyfell, flooded the floor with their expiring flames, a mysteriousdayspring, a diffused glory, through which litany and sacred chantwinged their way up toward the Infinite. 

I left the cathedral tired out, dazed with weariness and sunlight, andfell asleep in a chair as soon as I got back to my room, on the fifthfloor of the Albergo dell' Agnello. 

I had been asleep for about an hour, perhaps, when I thought I heard avoice near me repeating "Illustre Signore!"

I did not wake. The voice continued with a murmur of sibilants:

"Illustrissimo Signore!"

This drew me from my sleep, for the human ear is very susceptible tosuperlatives. 

"What is it?"

"A letter for your lordship. As it is marked 'Immediate, ' I thought Imight take the liberty of disturbing your lordship's slumbers. "

"You did quite right, Tomaso. "

"You owe me eight sous, signore, which I paid for the postage. "

"There's half a franc, keep the change. "

He retired calling me Monsieur le Comte; and all for two sous--Ofatherland of Brutus! The letter was from Lampron, who had forgotten toput a stamp on it. 

 "MY DEAR FRIEND:

 "Madame Plumet, to whom I believe you have given no instructions so to do, is at present busying herself considerably about your affairs. I felt I ought to warn you, because she is all heart and no brains, and I have often seen before the trouble into which an overzealous friend may get one, especially if the friend be a woman. 

 "I fear some serious indiscretion has been committed, for the following reasons. 

 "Yesterday evening Monsieur Plumet came to see me, and stood pulling furiously at his beard, which I know from experience is his way of showing that the world is not going around the right way for him. By means of questions, I succeeded, after some difficulty, in dragging from him about half what he had to tell me. The only thing which he made quite clear was his distress on finding that Madame Plumet was a woman whom it was hard to silence or to convince by argument. 

 "It appears that she has gone back to her old trade of dress-making, and that one of her first customers--God knows how she got there!-- was Mademoiselle Jeanne Charnot. 

 "Well, last Monday Mademoiselle Jeanne was selecting a hat. She was blithe as dawn, while the dressmaker was gloomy as night. 

 "'Is your little boy ill, Madame Plumet?'

 "'No, Mademoiselle. '

 "'You look so sad. '

 "Then, according to her husband's words, Madame Plumet took her courage in her two hands, and looking her pretty customer in the face, said:

 "'Mademoiselle, why are you marrying?'

 "'What a funny question! Why, because I am old enough; because I have had an offer; because all young girls marry, or else they go into convents, or become old maids. Well, Madame Plumet, I never have felt a religious vocation, and I never expected to become an old maid. Why do you ask such a question?'

 "'Because, Mademoiselle, married life may be very happy, but it may be quite the reverse!'

 "After giving expression to this excellent aphorism, Madame Plumet, unable to contain herself any longer, burst into tears. 

 "Mademoiselle Jeanne, who had been laughing before, was now amazed and presently grew rather anxious. 

 "Still, her pride kept her from asking any further questions, and Madame Plumet was too much frightened to add a word to her answer. But they will meet again the day after to-morrow, on account of the hat, as before. 

 "Here the story grew confused, and I understood no more of it. 

 "Clearly there is more behind this. Monsieur Plumet never would have gone out of his way merely to inform me that his wife had given him a taste of her tongue, nor would he have looked so upset about it. But you know the fellow's way; whenever it's important for him to make himself clear he loses what little power of speech he has, becomes worse than dumb-unintelligible. He sputtered inconsequent ejaculations at me in this fashion:

 "'To think of it, to-morrow, perhaps! And you know what a business! Oh, damnation! Anyhow, that must not be! Ah! Monsieur Lampron, how women do talk!'

 "And with this Monsieur Plumet left me. 

 "I must confess, old fellow, that I am not burning with desire to get mixed up in this mess, or to go and ask Madame Plumet for the explanation which her husband was unable to give me. I shall bide my time. If anything turns up to-morrow, they are sure to tell me, and I will write you word. 

 "My mother sends you her love, and begs you to wrap up warmly in the evening; she says the twilight is the winter of hot climates. 

 "The dear woman has been a little out of sorts for the last two days. Today she is keeping her bed. I trust it is nothing but a cold. 

 "Your affectionate friend, "SYLVESTRE LAMPRON. "

CHAPTER XIII. STARTLING NEWS FROM SYLVESTRE

 MILAN, June 18th. 

The examination of documents began this morning. I never thought weshould have such a heap to examine, nor papers of such a length. Thefirst sitting passed almost entirely in classifying, in examiningsignatures, in skirmishes of all kinds around this main body. 

My colleagues and I are working in a room in the municipal Palazzo delMarino, a vast deserted building used, I believe, as a storehouse. Ourleathern armchairs and the table on which the documents are arrangedoccupy the middle of the room. Along the walls are several cupboards, nests of registers and rats; a few pictures with their faces to thewall; some carved wood scutcheons, half a dozen flagstaffs and atriumphal arch in cardboard, now taken to pieces and rotting--gloomyapparatus of bygone festivals. 

The persons taking part in the examination besides the three Frenchmen, are, in the first place, a little Italian judge, with a mean face, wrinkled like a winter apple, whose eyelids always seem heavy withsleep; secondly, a clerk, shining with fat, his dress, hair, andcountenance expressive of restrained jollity, as he dreams voluptuousdreams of the cool drinks he means to absorb through a straw when thehour of deliverance shall sound from the frightful cuckoo clock, a relicof the French occupation, which ticks at the end of the room; thirdly, a creature whose position is difficult to determine--I think he mustbe employed in some registry; he is here as a mere manual laborer. Thisthird person gives me the idea of being very much interested in thefortunes of Signore Porfirio Zampini, for on each occasion, when hisduties required him to bring us documents, he whispered in my ear:

"If you only knew, my lord, what a man Zampini is! what a noble heart, what a paladin!"

Take notice that this "paladin" is a macaroni-seller, strongly suspectedof trying to hoodwink the French courts. 

Amid the awful heat which penetrated the windows, the doors, even thesun-baked walls, we had to listen to, read, and compare documents. Gnats of a ferocious kind, hatched by thousands in the hangings of thishothouse, flew around our perspiring heads. Their buzzing got the upperhand at intervals when the clerk's voice grew weary and, diminishing involume, threatened to fade away into snores. 

The little judge rapped on the table with his paperknife and urged thereader afresh upon his wild career. My colleague from the RecordOffice showed no sign of weariness. Motionless, attentive, classing thesmallest papers in his orderly mind, he did not even feel the' gnatsswooping upon the veins in his hands, stinging them, sucking them, andflying off red and distended with his blood. 

I sat, both literally and metaphorically, on hot coals. Just as I cameinto the room, the man from the Record Office handed me a letter whichhad arrived at the hotel while I was out at lunch. It was a letter fromLampron, in a large, bulky envelope. Clearly something important musthave happened. 

My fate, perhaps, was settled, and was in the letter, while I knew itnot. I tried to get it out of my inside pocket several times, for to meit was a far more interesting document than any that concerned Zampini'saction. I pined to open it furtively, and read at least the first fewlines. A moment would have sufficed for me to get at the point of thislong communication. But at every attempt the judge's eyes turned slowlyupon me between their half-closed lids, and made me desist. No--athousand times no! This smooth-tongued, wily Italian shall have noexcuse for proving that the French, who have already such a reputationfor frivolity, are a nation without a conscience, incapable offulfilling the mission with which they are charged. 

And yet. .. . There came a moment when he turned his back and began tosort a fresh bundle with the man of records. Here was an unlooked-foropportunity. I cut open the envelope, unfolded the letter, and foundeight pages! Still I began:

 "MY DEAR FRIEND:

 "In spite of my anxiety about my mother, and the care her illness demands (to-day it is found to be undoubted congestion of the lungs), I feel bound to tell you the story of what has happened in the Rue Hautefeuille, as it is very important--"

"Excuse me, Monsieur Mou-il-ard, " said the little judge, halfturning toward me, "does the paper you have there happen to be numbertwenty-seven, which we are looking for?"

"Oh, dear, no; it's a private letter. "

"A private letter? I ask pardon for interrupting you. "

He gave a faint smile, closed his eyes to show his pity for suchfrivolity, and turned away again satisfied, while the other members ofthe Zampini Commission looked at me with interest. 

The letter was important. So much the worse, I must finish it:

 "I will try to reconstruct the scene for you, from the details which I have gathered. 

 "The time is a quarter to ten in the morning. There is a knock at Monsieur Plumet's door. The door opposite is opened half-way and Madame Plumet looks out. She withdraws in a hurry, 'with her heart in her mouth, ' as she says; the plot she has formed is about to succeed or fail, the critical moment is at hand; the visitor is her enemy, your rival Dufilleul. 

 "He is full of self-confidence and comes in plump and flourishing, with light gloves, and a terrier at his heels. 

 "'My portrait framed, Plumet?'

 "'Yes, my lord-yes, to be sure. '

 "'Let's see it. '

 "I have seen the famous portrait: a miniature of the newly created baron, in fresh butter, I think, done cheap by some poor girl who gains her living by coloring photographs. It is intended for Mademoiselle Tigra of the Bouffes. A delicate attention from Dufilleul, isn't it? While Jeanne in her innocence is dreaming of the words of love he has ventured to utter to her, and cherishes but one thought, one image in her heart, he is exerting his ingenuity to perpetuate the recollection of that image's adventures elsewhere. 

 "He is pleased with the elaborate and costly frame which Plumet has made for him. 

 "'Very nice. How much?'

 "'One hundred and twenty francs. '

 "'Six louis? very dear. '

 "'That's my price for this kind of work, my lord; I am very busy just now, my lord. '

 "'Well, let it be this once. I don't often have a picture framed; to tell the truth, I don't care for pictures. '

 "Dufilleul admires and looks at himself in the vile portrait which he holds outstretched in his right hand, while his left hand feels in his purse. Monsieur Plumet looks very stiff, very unhappy, and very nervous. He evidently wants to get his customer off the premises. 

 "The rustling of skirts is heard on the staircase. Plumet turns pale, and glancing at the half-opened door, through which the terrier is pushing its nose, steps forward to close it. It is too late. 

 "Some one has noiselessly opened it, and on the threshold stands Mademoiselle Jeanne in walking-dress, looking, with bright eyes and her most charming smile, at Plumet, who steps back in a fright, and Dufilleul, who has not yet seen her. 

 "'Well, sir, and so I've caught you!'

 "Dufilleul starts, and involuntarily clutches the portrait to his waistcoat. 

 "'Mademoiselle--No, really, you have come--?'

 "'To see Madame Plumet. What wrong is there in that?'

 "'None whatever--of course not. '

 "'Not the least in the world, eh? Ha, ha! What a trifle flurries you. Come now, collect yourself. There is nothing to be frightened at. As I was coming upstairs, your dog put his muzzle out; I guessed he was not alone, so I left my maid with Madame Plumet, and came in at the right-hand door instead of the left. Do you think it improper?'

 "'Oh, no, Mademoiselle. '

 "'However, I am inquisitive, and I should like to see what you are hiding there. '

 "'It's a portrait. '

 "'Hand it to me. '

 "'With pleasure; unfortunately it's only a portrait of myself. '

 "'Why unfortunately? On the contrary, it flatters you--the nose is not so long as the original; what do you say, Monsieur Plumet?'

 "'Do you think it good?'

 "'Very. '

 "'How do you like the frame?'

 "'It's very pretty. '

 "'Then I make you a present of it, Mademoiselle. '

 "'Why! wasn't it intended for me?'

 "'I mean--well! to tell the truth, it wasn't; it's a wedding present, a souvenir--there's nothing extraordinary in that, is there?'

 "'Nothing whatever. You can tell me whom it's for, I suppose?'

 "'Don't you think that you are pushing your curiosity too far?'

 "'Well, really!'

 "'Yes, I mean it. '

 "'Since you make such a secret of it, I shall ask Monsieur Plumet to tell me. Monsieur Plumet, for whom is this portrait?'

 "Plumet, pale as death, fumbled at his workman's cap, like a naughty child. 

 "'Why, you see, Mademoiselle--I am only a poor framemaker. '

 "'Very well! I shall go to Madame Plumet, who is sure to know, and will not mind telling me. '

 "Madame Plumet, who must have been listening at the door, came in at that moment, trembling like a leaf, and prepared to dare all. 

 "I beg you won't, Mademoiselle, ' broke in Dufilleul; 'there is no secret. I only wanted to tease you. The portrait is for a friend of mine who lives at Fontainebleau. '

 "'His name?'

 "'Gonin--he's a solicitor. '

 "'It was time you told me. How wretched you both looked. Another time tell me straight out, and frankly, anything you have no reason to conceal. Promise you won't act like this again. '

 "'I promise. '

 "'Then, let us make peace. '

 "She held out her hand to him. Before he could grasp it, Madame Plumet broke in:

 "'Excuse me, Mademoiselle, I can not have you deceived like this in my house. Mademoiselle, it is not true!'

 "'What is not true, Madame?'

 "'That this portrait is for Monsieur Gonin, or anybody else at Fontainebleau. '

 "Mademoiselle Charnot drew back in surprise. 

 "'For whom, then?'

 "'An actress. '

 "'Take care what you are saying, Madame. '

 "'For Mademoiselle Tigra of the Bouffes. '

 "'Lies!' cried Dufilleul. 'Prove it, Madame; prove your story, please!'

 "'Look at the back, ' answered Madame Plumet, quietly. 

 "Mademoiselle Jeanne, who had not put down the miniature, turned it over, read what was on the back, grew deathly pale, and handed it to her lover. 

 "'What does it say?' said Dufilleul, stooping over it. 

 "It said: 'From Monsieur le Baron D-----to Mademoiselle T-----, Boulevard Haussmann. To be delivered on Thursday. '

 "'You can see at once, Mademoiselle, that this is not my writing. It's an abominable conspiracy. Monsieur Plumet, I call upon you to give your wife the lie. She has written what is false; confess it!'

 "The frame-maker hid his face in his hands and made no reply. 

 "'What, Plumet, have you nothing to say for me?'

 "Mademoiselle Charnot was leaving the room. 

 "'Where are you going, Mademoiselle? Stay, you will soon see that they lie!'

 "She was already half-way across the landing when Dufilleul caught her and seized her by the hand. 

 "'Stay, Jeanne, stay!'

 "'Let me go, sir!'

 "'No, hear me first; this is some horrible mistake. I swear'

 "At this moment a high-pitched voice was heard on the staircase. 

 "'Well, George, how much longer are you going to keep me?'

 "Dufilleul suddenly lost countenance and dropped Mademoiselle Charnot's hand. 

 "The young girl bent over the banisters, and saw, at the bottom of the staircase, exactly underneath her, a woman looking up, with head thrown back and mouth still half-opened. Their eyes met. Jeanne at once turned away her gaze. 

 "Then, turning to Madame Plumet, who leaned motionless against the wall:

 "'Come, Madame, ' she said, 'we must go and choose a hat. ' And she closed the dressmaker's door behind her. 

 "This, my friend, is the true account of what happened in the Rue Hautefeuille. I learned the details from Madame Plumet in person, who could not contain herself for joy as she described the success of her conspiracy, and how her little hand had guided old Dame Fortune's. For, as you will doubtless have guessed, the meeting between Jeanne and her lover, so dreaded by the framemaker, had been arranged by Madame Plumet unknown to all, and the damning inscription was also in her handwriting. 

 "I need not add that Mademoiselle Charnot, upset by the scene, had a momentary attack of faintness. However, she soon regained her usual firm and dignified demeanor, which seems to show that she is a woman of energy. 

 "But the interest of the story does not cease here. I think the betrothal is definitely at an end. A betrothal is always a difficult thing to renew, and after the publicity which attended the rupture of this one, I do not see how they can make it up again. One thing I feel sure of is, that Mademoiselle Jeanne Charnot will never change her name to Madame Dufilleul. 

 "Do not, however, exaggerate your own chances. They will be less than you think for some time yet. I do not believe that a young girl who has thus been wounded and deceived can forget all at once. There is even the possibility of her never forgetting--of living with her sorrow, preferring certain peace of mind, and the simple joys of filial devotion, to all those dreams of married life by which so many simple-hearted girls have been cruelly taken in. 

 "In any case do not think of returning yet, for I know you are capable of any imprudence. Stay where you are, examine your documents, and wait. 

 "My mother and I are passing through a bitter trial. She is ill, I may say seriously ill. I would sooner bear the illness than my present anxiety. 

 "Your friend, "SYLVESTRE LAMPRON. 

 "P. S. --Just as I was about to fasten up this letter, I got a note from Madame Plumet to tell me that Monsieur and Mademoiselle Charnot have left Paris. She does not know where they have gone. "

I became completely absorbed over this letter. Some passages I read asecond time; and the state of agitation into which it threw me did notat once pass away. I remained for an indefinite time without a notionof what was going on around me, entirely wrapped up in the past or thefuture. 

The Italian attendant brought me back to the present with a jerk of hiselbow. He was replacing the last register in the huge drawers of thetable. He and I were alone. My colleagues had left, and our firstsitting had come to an end without my assistance, though before myeyes. They could not have gone far, so, somewhat ashamed of my want ofattention, I put on my hat, and went to find them and apologize. Thelittle attendant caught me by the sleeve, and gave a knowing smile atthe letter which I was slipping into my pocketbook. 

"E d'una donna?" he asked. 

"What's that to you?"

"I am sure of it; a letter from a man would never take so long to read;and, 'per Bacco', you were a time about it! 'Oh, le donne, illustresignore, le downe!'"

"That's enough, thank you. "

I made for the door, but he threw himself nimbly in my way, grimacing, raising his eyebrows, one finger on his ribs. "Listen, my lord, I cansee you are a true scholar, a man whom fame alone can tempt. I couldget your lordship such beautiful manuscripts--Italian, Latin, Germanmanuscripts that never have been edited, my noble lord!"

"Stolen, too!" I replied, and pushed past him. 

I went out, and in the neighboring square, amicably seated at the sametable, under the awning of a cafe, I found my French colleagues and theItalian judge. At a table a little apart the clerk was sucking somethingthrough a straw. And they all laughed as they saw me making my waytoward them through the still scorching glare of the sun. 

 MILAN, June 25th. 

Our mission was concluded to-day. Zampini is a mere rogue. Brought faceto face with facts he could not escape from, he confessed that he hadintended to "have a lark" with the French heirs by claiming to be therightful heir himself, though he lacked two degrees of relationship toestablish his claim. 

We explained to him that this little "lark" was a fraudulent act whichexposed him at least to the consequence of having to pay the costs ofthe action. He accepted our opinion in the politest manner possible. Ibelieve he is hopelessly insolvent. He will pay the usher in macaroni, and the barrister in jests. 

My colleagues, the record man and the translator, leave Milan to-morrow. I shall go with them. 

CHAPTER XIV. A SURPRISING ENCOUNTER

 MILAN, June 26th. 

I have just had another letter from Sylvestre. My poor friend is verymiserable; his mother is dead--a saint if ever there was one. I wasvery deeply touched by the news, although I knew this lovable woman veryslightly--too slightly, indeed, not having been a son, or related in anyway to her, but merely a passing stranger who found his way within thehorizon of her heart, that narrow limit within which she spread abroadthe treasures of her tenderness and wisdom. How terribly her son mustfeel her loss!

He described in his letter her last moments, and the calmness with whichshe met death, and added:

 "One thing, which perhaps you will not understand, is the remorse which is mingled with my sorrow. I lived with her forty years, and have some right to be called 'a good son. ' But, when I compare the proofs of affection I gave her with those she gave me, the sacrifices I made for her with those she made for me; when I think of the egoism which found its way into our common life, on which I founded my claims to merit, of the wealth of tenderness and sympathy with which she repaid a few walks on my arm, a few kind words, and of her really great forbearance in dwelling beneath the same roof with me--I feel that I was ungrateful, and not worthy of the happiness I enjoyed. 

 "I am tortured by the thought that it is impossible for me to repair all my neglect, to pay a debt the greatness of which I now recognize for the first time. She is gone. All is over. My prayers alone can reach her, can tell her that I loved her, that I worshipped her, that I might have been capable of doing all that I have left undone for her. 

 "Oh, my friend, what pleasant duties have I lost! I mean, at least, to fulfil her last wishes, and it is on account of one of them that I am writing to you. 

 "You know that my mother was never quite pleased at my keeping at home the portrait of her who was my first and only love. She would have preferred that my eyes did not recall so often to my heart the recollection of my long-past sorrows. I withstood her. On her death-bed she begged me to give up the picture to, those who should have had it long ago. 'So long as I was here to comfort you in the sorrows which the sight of it revived in you, ' she said, 'I did not press this upon you; but soon you will be left alone, with no one to raise you when your spirits fail you. They have often begged you to give up the picture to them. The time is come for you to grant their prayers. '

 "I promised. 

 "And now, dear friend, help me to keep my promise. I do not wish to write to them. My hand would tremble, and they would tremble when they saw my writing. Go and see them. 

 "They live about nine miles from Milan, on the Monza road, but beyond that town, close to the village of Desio. The villa is called Dannegianti, after its owners. It used to be hidden among poplars, and its groves were famous for their shade. You must send in your card to the old lady of the house together with mine. They will receive you. Then you must break the news to them as you think best, that, in accordance with the dying wish of Sylvestre Lampron's mother, the portrait of Rafaella is to be given in perpetuity to the Villa Dannegianti. Given, you understand. 

 "You may even tell them that it is on its way. I have just arranged with Plumet about packing it. He is a good workman, as you know. To-morrow all will be ready, and my home an absolute void. 

 "I intend to take refuge in hard work, and I count upon you to alleviate to some extent the hardships of such a method of consolation. 

 "SYLVESTRE LAMPRON. "

When I got Lampron's letter, at ten in the morning, I went at once tosee the landlord of the Albergo dell' Agnello. 

"You can get me a carriage for Desio, can't you?"

"Oh, your lordship thinks of driving to Desio? That is quite right. Itis much more picturesque than going by train. A little way beyond Monza. Monza, sir, is one of our richest jewels; you will see there--"

"Yes, " said I, repeating my Baedeker as accurately as he, "the VillaReale, and the Iron Crown of the Emperors of the West. "

"Exactly so, sir, and the cathedral built--"

"By Theodolinda, Queen of the Lombards, A. D. 595, restored in thesixteenth century. I know; I only asked whether you could get me adecent carriage. "

"A matchless one! At half-past three, when the heat is less intense, your lordship will find the horses harnessed. You will have plenty oftime to get to Desio before sunset, and be back in time for supper. "

At the appointed time I received notice. My host had more than kept hisword, for the horses sped through Milan at a trot which they did notrelinquish when we got into the Como road, amid the flat and fertilecountry which is called the garden of Italy. 

After an hour and a half, including a brief halt at Monza, the coachmandrew up his horses before the first house in Desio--an inn. 

It was a very poor inn, situated at the corner of the main street andof a road which branched off into the country. In front of it a fewplane-trees, trained into an arbor, formed an arch of shade. A few feetof vine clambered about their trunks. The sun was scorching the leavesand the heavy bunches of grapes which hung here and there. The shutterswere closed, and the little house seemed to have been lulled to sleep bythe heat and light of the atmosphere and the buzzing of the gnats. 

"Oh, go in; they'll wake up at once, " said the coachman, who had divinedmy thoughts. 

Then, without waiting for my answer, like a man familiar with thecustoms of the country, he took his horses down the road to the stable. 

I went in. A swarm of bees and drones were buzzing like a whirlwindbeneath the plane-trees; a frightened white hen ran cackling from hernest in the dust. No one appeared. I opened the door; still nobody wasto be seen. Inside I found a passage, with rooms to right and left anda wooden staircase at the end. The house, having been kept well closed, was cool and fresh. As I stood on the threshold striving to accustom myeyes to the darkness of the interior, I heard the sound of voices to myright:

"Picturesque as you please, but the journey has been a failure! Thesepeople are no better than savages; introductions, distinctions, and Imay say even fame, had no effect upon them!"

"Do you think they have even read your letters?" "That would be stillworse, to refuse to read letters addressed to them! No, I tell you, there's no excuse. "

"They have suffered great trouble, I hear, and that is some excuse forthem, father. "

"No, my dear, there is no possible excuse for their keeping hiddentreasures of such scientific interest. I do not consider that even anItalian nobleman, were he orphan from his cradle, and thrice a widower, has any right to keep locked up from the investigation of scholars anunequalled collection of Roman coins, and a very presentable showof medallions and medals properly so-called. Are you aware that thisboorish patrician has in his possession the eight types of medal of thegens Attilia?"

"Really?"

"I am certain of it, and he has the thirty-seven of the gens Cassia, onehundred and eighteen to one hundred and twenty-one of the gens Cornelia, the eleven Farsuleia, and dozens of Numitoria, Pompeia, and Scribonia, all in perfect condition, as if fresh from the die. Besides these, hehas some large medals of the greatest rarity; the Marcus Aurelius withhis son on the reverse side, Theodora bearing the globe, and aboveall the Annia Faustina with Heliogabalus on the reverse side, anincomparable treasure, of which there is only one other example, andthat an imperfect one, in the world--a marvel which I would give a dayof my life to see; yes, my dear, a day of my life!"

Such talk as this, in French, in such an inn as this!

I felt a presentiment, and stepped softly to the right-hand door. 

In the darkened room, lighted only by a few rays filtered between theslats of the shutters, sat a young girl. Her hat was hung upon a nailabove her head; one arm rested on a wretched white wood table; herhead was bent forward in mournful resignation. On the other side of thetable, her father was leaning back in his chair against the whitewashedwall, with folded arms, heightened color, and every sign of extremedisgust. Both rose as I entered--Jeanne first, M. Charnot after her. They were astonished at seeing me. 

I was no less astounded than they. 

We stood and stared at each other for some time, to make sure that wewere not dreaming. 

M. Charnot was the first to break the silence. He did not seemaltogether pleased at my appearance, and turned to his daughter, whoseface had grown very red and yet rather chilling:

"Jeanne, put your hat on; it is time to go to the station. " Then headdressed me:

"We shall leave you the room to yourself, sir; and since the mostextraordinary coincidence"--he emphasized the words--"has brought you tothis damnable village, I hope you will enjoy your visit. "

"Have you been here long, Monsieur?"

"Two hours, Monsieur, two mortal hours in this inn, fried by the sun, bored to death, murdered piecemeal by flies, and infuriated by the wantof hospitality in this out-of-the-way hole in Lombardy. "

"Yes, I noticed that the host was nowhere to be seen, and that is thereason why I came in here; I had no idea that I should have the honor ofmeeting you. "

"Good God! I'm not complaining of him! He's asleep in his barn overthere. You can wake him up; he doesn't mind showing himself; he evenmakes himself agreeable when he has finished his siesta. "

"I only wish to ask him one question, which perhaps you could answer, Monsieur; then I need not waken him. Could you tell me the way to theVilla Dannegianti?"

M. Charnot walked up to me, looked me straight in the eyes, shrugged hisshoulders, and burst out laughing. 

"The Villa Dannegianti!"

"Yes, Monsieur. "

"Are you going to the Villa Dannegianti?"

"Yes, Monsieur. "

"Then you may as well turn round and go home again. "

"Why?"

"Because there's no admission. "

"But I have a letter of introduction. "

"I had two, Monsieur, without counting the initials after my name, whichare worth something and have opened the doors of more than one foreigncollection for me; yet they denied me admission! Think of it! The porterof that insolent family denied me admission! Do you expect to succeedafter that?"

"I do, Monsieur. "

My words seemed to him the height of presumption. 

"Come, Jeanne, " he said, "let us leave this gentleman to his youthfulillusions. They will soon be shattered--very soon. "

He gave me an ironical smile and made for the door. 

At this moment Jeanne dropped her sunshade. I picked it up for her. 

"Thank you, Monsieur, " she said. 

Of course these words were no more than ordinarily polite. She wouldhave said the same to the first comer. Nothing in her attitude or herlook displayed any emotion which might put a value on this common formof speech. But it was her voice, that music I so often dream of. Had itspoken insults, I should have found it sweet. It inspired me with thesudden resolution of detaining this fugitive apparition, of resting, ifpossible, another hour near her to whose side an unexpected stroke offortune had brought me. 

M. Charnot had already left the room; his rotund shadow rested on thewall of the passage. He held a travelling-bag in his hand. 

"Monsieur, " said I, "I am sorry that you are obliged to return alreadyto Milan. I am quite certain of admission to the Villa Dannegianti, andit would have given me pleasure to repair a mistake which is clearly dueonly to the stupidity of the servants. "

He stopped; the stroke had told. 

"It is certainly quite possible that they never looked at my card or myletters. But allow me to ask, since my card did not reach the host, whatsecret you possess to enable yours to get to him?"

"No secret at all, still less any merit of my own. I am the bearer ofnews of great importance to the owners of the villa, news of a purelyprivate nature. They will be obliged to see me. My first care, whenI had fulfilled my mission, would have been to mention your name. Youwould have been able to go over the house, and inspect a collection ofmedals which, I have heard, is a very fine one. "

"Unique, Monsieur!"

"Unfortunately you are going away, and to-morrow I have to leave Milanmyself, for Paris. "

"You have been some time in Italy, then?"

"Nearly a fortnight. "

M. Charnot gave his daughter a meaning look, and suddenly became morefriendly. 

"I thought you had just come. We have not been here so long, " he added;"my daughter has been a little out of sorts, and the doctor advised usto travel for change of air. Paris is not healthful in this very hotweather. "

He looked hard at me to see whether his fib had taken me in. I replied, with an air of the utmost conviction, "That is putting it mildly. Paris, in July, is uninhabitable. "

"That's it, Monsieur, uninhabitable; we were forced to leave it. We soonmade up our minds, and, in spite of the time of the year, we turned oursteps toward the home of the classics, to Italy, the museum of Europe. And you really think, then, that by means of your good offices we shouldhave been admitted to the villa?"

"Yes, Monsieur, but owing only to the missive with which I amentrusted. "

M. Charnot hesitated. He was probably thinking of the blot of ink, and certainly of M. Mouillard's visit. But he doubtless reflected thatJeanne knew nothing of the old lawyer's proceedings, that we were farfrom Paris, that the opportunity was not to be lost; and in the end hispassion for numismatics conquered at once his resentment as a bookwormand his scruples as a father. 

"There is a later train at ten minutes to eight, father, " said Jeanne. 

"Well, dear, do you care to try your luck again, and return to theassault of that Annia Faustina?"

"As you please, father. "

We left the inn together by the by-road down the hill. I could notbelieve my eyes. This old man with refined features who walked on myleft, leaning on his malacca cane, was M. Charnot. The same man whoreceived me so discourteously the day after I made my blot was nowrelying on me to introduce him to an Italian nobleman; on me, a lawyer'sclerk. I led him on with confidence, and both of us, carried away by ourdivers hopes, he dreaming of medals, I of the reopened horizon full ofpossibilities, conversed on indifferent subjects with a freedom hithertounknown between us. 

And this charming Parisienne, whose presence I divined rather than saw, whom I dared not look in the face, who stepped along by her father'sside, light of foot, her eyes seeking the vault of heaven, her earattentive though her thoughts were elsewhere, catching her Parisiansunshade in the hawthorns of Desio, was Jeanne, Jeanne of theflower-market, Jeanne whom Lampron had sketched in the woods of St. Germain! It did not seem possible. 

Yet it was so, for we arrived together at the gates of the VillaDannegianti, which is hardly a mile from the inn. 

I rang the bell. The fat, idle, insolent Italian porter was beginningto refuse me admission, with the same words and gestures which he had sooften used. But I explained, in my purest Tuscan, that I was not of theordinary kind of importunate tourist. I told him that he ran a seriousrisk if he did not immediately hand my card and my letter--Lampron'scard in an envelope--to the Comtesse Dannegianti. 

From his stony glare I could not tell whether I had produced anyimpression, nor even whether he had understood. He turned on his heelwith his keys in one hand and the letter in the other, and went on hisway through the shady avenue, rolling his broad back from side to side, attired in a jacket which might have fitted in front, but was all tooshort behind. 

The shady precincts of which Lampron wrote did not seem to have beenpruned. The park was cool and green. At the end of the avenue ofplane-trees, alternating with secular hawthorns cut into pyramids, wecould see the square mass of the villa just peeping over the immenseclumps of trees. Beyond it the tops and naked trunks of a group ofumbrella pines stood silhouetted against the sky. 

The porter returned, solemn and impassive. He opened the gate withouta word. We all passed through--M. Charnot somewhat uneasy at enteringunder false pretenses, as I guessed from the way he suddenly drew up hishead. Jeanne seemed pleased; she smoothed down a fold which the wind hadraised in her frock, spread out a flounce, drew herself up, pushed backa hairpin which her fair tresses had dragged out of its place, allin quick, deft, and graceful movements, like a goldfinch preening itsfeathers. 

We reached the terrace, and arranged that M. And Mademoiselle Charnotshould wait in an alley close at hand till I received permission tovisit the collections. 

I entered the house, and following a lackey, crossed a largemosaic-paved hall, divided by columns of rare marbles into panels filledwith mediocre frescoes on a very large scale. At the end of this hallwas the Countess's room, which formed a striking contrast, being small, panelled with wood, and filled with devotional knick-knacks that gave itthe look of a chapel. 

As I entered, an old lady half rose from an armchair, which she couldhave used as a house, the chair was so large and she was so small. Atfirst I could distinguish only two bright, anxious eyes. She looked atme like a prisoner awaiting a verdict. I began by telling her of thedeath of Lampron's mother. Her only answer was an attentive nod. Sheguessed something else was coming and stood on guard, so to speak. Iwent on and told her that the portrait of her daughter was on its wayto her. Then she forgot everything--her age, her rank, and the mournfulreserve which had hitherto hedged her about. Her motherly heart alonespoke within her; a ray of light had come to brighten the incurablegloom which was killing her; she rushed toward me and fell into my arms, and I felt against my heart her poor aged body shaking with sobs. Shethanked me in a flood of words which I did not catch. Then she drew backand gazed at me, seeking to read in my eyes some emotion responsive toher own, and her eyes, red and swollen and feverishly bright, questionedme more clearly than her words. 

"How good are you, sir! and how generous is he! What life does he lead?Has he ever lived down the sorrow which blasted his youth here? Menforget more easily, happily for them. I had given up all hope ofobtaining the portrait. Every year I sent him flowers which meant, 'Restore to us all that is left of our dead Rafaella. ' Perhaps it wasunkind. I did reproach myself at times for it. But I was her mother, youknow; the mother of that peerless girl! And the portrait is so good, solike! He has never altered it? tell me; never retouched it? Time has notmarred the lifelike coloring? I shall now have the mournful consolationI have so long desired; I shall always have before me the counterpartof my lost darling, and can gaze upon that face which none could depictsave he who loved her; for, dreadful though it be to think of, the imageof the best beloved will change and fade away even in a mother's heart, and at times I doubt whether my old memory is still faithful, andrecalls all her grace and beauty as clearly as it used to do when thewound was fresh in my heart and my eyes were still filled with theloveliness of her. Oh, Monsieur, Monsieur! to think that I shall seethat face once more!"

She left me as quickly as she had come, and went to open a door on theleft, into an adjoining room, whose red hangings threw a ruddy glow uponthe polished floor. 

"Cristoforo!" she cried, "Cristoforo! come and see a French gentlemanwho brings us great news. The portrait of our Rafaella, Cristoforo, theportrait we have so long desired, is at last to be given to us!"

I heard a chair move, and a slow footstep. Cristoforo appeared, withwhite hair and black moustache, his tall figure buttoned up in anold-fashioned frockcoat, the petrified, mummified remains of a oncehandsome man. He walked up to me, took both my hands and shook themceremoniously. His face showed no traces of emotion; his eyes were dry, and he had not a word to say. Did he understand? I really do not know. He seemed to think the affair was an ordinary introduction. As I lookedat him his wife's words came back to me, "Men forget sooner. " She gazedat him as if she would put blood into his veins, where it had longceased to flow. 

"Cristoforo, I know this will be a great joy to you, and you will joinwith me in thanking Monsieur Lampron for his generosity. You, sir, will express to him all the Count's gratitude and my own, and also thesympathy we feel for him in his recent loss. Besides, we shall write tohim. Is Monsieur Lampron rich?"

"I had forgotten to tell you, Madame, that my friend will accept nothingbut thanks. "

"Ah, that is truly noble of him, is it not, Cristoforo?"

All the answer the old Count made was to take my hands and shake themagain. 

I used the opportunity to put forward my request in behalf of M. Charnot. He listened attentively. 

"I will give orders. You shall see everything--everything. "

Then, considering our interview at an end, he bowed and withdrew to hisown apartments. 

I looked for the Countess Dannegianti. She had sunk into her greatarmchair, and was weeping hot tears. 

Ten minutes later, M. Charnot and Jeanne entered with me into thejealously guarded museum. 

Museum was the only name to give to a collection of such artistic value, occupying, as it did, the whole of the ground floor to the right ofthe hall. Two rooms ran parallel to each other, filled with pictures, medals, and engravings, and were connected by a narrow gallery devotedto sculpture. 

Hardly was the door opened when M. Charnot sought the famous medals withhis eye. There they were in the middle of the room in two rows of cases. He was deeply moved. I thought he was about to make a raid upon them, attracted after his kind by the 'auri sacra fames', by the yellow gleamof those ancient coins, the names, family, obverse and reverse of whichhe knew by heart. But I little understood the enthusiast. 

He drew out his handkerchief and spectacles, and while he was wiping theglasses he gave a rapid and impatient glance at the works that adornedthe walls. None of them could charm the numismatist's heart. After hehad enjoyed the pleasure of proving how feeble in comparison were thecharms of a Titian or a Veronese, then only did M. Charnot walk step bystep to the first case and bend reverently over it. 

Yet the collection of paintings was unworthy of such disdain. Thepictures were few, but all were signed with great names, most of themItalian, a few Dutch, Flemish, or German. I began to work systematicallythrough them, pleased at the want of a catalogue and the small number ofinscriptions on the frames. To be your own guide doubles your pleasure;you can get your impression of a picture entirely at first hand; youare filled with admiration without any one having told you that youare bound to go into ecstasies. You can work out for yourself from apicture, by induction and comparison, its subject, its school, andits author, unless it proclaims, in every stroke of the brush, "I am aHobbema, " "a Perugino, " or "a Giotto. "

I was somewhat distracted, however, by the voice of the old numismatist, as he peered into the cases, and constrained his daughter to share inthe exuberance of his learned enthusiasm. 

"Jeanne, look at this; crowned head of Cleopatra, Mark Antony on thereverse; in perfect condition, isn't it? See, an Italian 'as-IguviumUmbriae', which my friend Pousselot has sought these thirty years! Oh, my dear, this is important: Annius Verus on the reverse of Commodus, both as children, a rare example--yet not as rare as--Jeanne, you mustengrave this gold medal in your heart, it is priceless: head of Augustuswith laurel, Diana walking on the reverse. You ought to take an interestin her. Diana the fair huntress. 

"This collection is heavenly! Wait a minute; we shall soon come to theAnnia Faustina. "

Jeanne made no objection, but smiled softly upon the Cleopatra, theUmbrian 'as', and the fair huntress. 

Little by little her father's enthusiasm expanded over the vastcollection of treasures. He took out his pocketbook and began to makenotes. Jeanne raised her eyes to the walls, took one glance, then asecond, and, not being called back to the medals, stepped softly up tothe picture at which I had begun. 

She went quickly from one to another having evidently no more than achild's untutored taste for pictures. As I, on the contrary, was gettingon very slowly, she was bound to overtake me. You may be sure I took nosteps to prevent it, and so in a very short time we were both standingbefore the same picture, a portrait of Holbein the younger. A subject ofconversation was ready to hand. 

"Mademoiselle, " said I, "do you like this Holbein?"

"You must admit, sir, that the old gentleman is exceedingly plain. "

"Yes, but the painting is exquisite. See how powerful is the drawingof the head, how clear and deep the colors remain after more than threehundred years. What a good likeness it must have been! The subject tellshis own story: he must have been a nobleman of the court of Henry VIII, a Protestant in favor with the King, wily but illiterate, and wishingfrom the bottom of his heart that he were back with the companions ofhis youth at home in his country house, hunting and drinking at hisease. It is really the study of a man's character. Look at this Rubensbeside it, a mere mass of flesh scarcely held together by a spirit, astyle that is exuberantly material, all color and no expression. Here you have spirituality on one side and materialism on the other, unconscious, perhaps, but unmistakable. Compare, again, with these twopictures this little drawing, doubtless by Perugino, just a sketch ofan angel for an Annunciation; notice the purity of outline, the idealatmosphere in which the painter lives and with which he impregnates hiswork. You see he comes of a school of poets and mystics, gifted witha second sight which enabled them to beautify this world and raisethemselves above it. "

I was pleased with my little lecture, and so was Jeanne. I could tellit by her surprised expression, and by the looks she cast toward herfather, who was still taking notes, to see whether she might go on withher first lesson in art. 

He smiled in a friendly way, which meant:

"I'm happy here, my dear, thank you; 'va piano va sano'. "

This was as good as permission. We went on our way, saluting, as wepassed, Tintoretto and Titian, Veronese and Andrea Solari, old Cimabue, and a few early paintings of angular virgins on golden backgrounds. 

Jeanne was no longer bored. 

"And is this, " she would say, "another Venetian, or a Lombard, or aFlorentine?"

We soon completed the round of the first room, and made our way into thegallery beyond, devoted to sculpture. The marble gods and goddesses, the lovely fragments of frieze or cornice from the excavations atRome, Pompeii, or Greece, had but a moderate interest for MademoiselleCharnot. She never gave more than one glance to each statue, to somenone at all. 

We soon came to the end of the gallery, and the door which gave accessinto the second room of paintings. 

Suddenly Jeanne gave an exclamation of surprise. 

"What is that?" she said. 

Beneath the large and lofty window, fanned on the outside by leafybranches, a wooden panel, bearing an inscription, stood upright againstthe wall. The words were painted in black on a white ground, andarranged with considerable skill, after the style of the classicepitaphs which the Italians still cultivate. 

I drew aside the folds of a curtain:

"It is one of those memorial tablets, Mademoiselle, such as people hangup in this part of the country upon the church doors on the day of thefuneral. It means:

"To thee, Rafaella Dannegianti--who, aged twenty years and fewmonths--having fully experienced the sorrows and illusions of thisworld--on January 6--like an angel longing for its heavenly home--didstwing thy way to God in peace and happiness--the clergy of Desioand thelaborers and artificers of the noble house of Dannegianti--tender theselast solemn offices. "

"This Rafaella, then, was the Count's daughter?"

"His only child, a girl lovely and gracious beyond rivalry. "

"Oh, of course, beyond rivalry. Are not all only daughters lovely andperfect when once they are dead?" she replied with a bitter smile. "Theyhave their legend, their cult, and usually a flattering portrait. Iam surprised that Rafaella's is not here. I imagine her portrait asrepresenting a tall girl, with long, well-arched eyebrows, and browneyes--"

"Greenish-brown. "

"Green, if you prefer it; a small nose, cherry lips, and a mass of lightbrown hair. "

"Golden brown would be more correct. "

"Have you seen it, then? Is there one?"

"Yes, Mademoiselle, and it lacks no perfection that you could imagine, not even that smile of happy youth which was a falsehood ere the painthad yet dried on the canvas. Here, before this relic, which recalls itto my thoughts, I must confess that I am touched. "

She looked at me in astonishment. 

"Where is the portrait? Not here?"

"No, it is at Paris, in my friend Lampron's studio. "

"O--oh!" She blushed slightly. 

"Yes, Mademoiselle, it is at once a masterpiece and a sad reminder. Thestory is very simple, and I am sure my friend would not mind my tellingit to you--to you if to no other--before these relics of the past. 

"When Lampron was a young man travelling in Italy he fell in love withthis young girl, whose portrait he was painting. He loved her, perhapswithout confessing it to himself, certainly without avowing it to her. Such is the way of timid and humble men of heart, men whose love isnearly always misconstrued when it ceases to be unnoticed. My friendrisked the happiness of his life, fearlessly, without calculation--andlost it. A day came when Rafaella Dannegianti was carried off by herparents, who shuddered at the thought of her stooping to a painter, eventhough he were a genius. "

"So she died?"

"A year later. He never got over it. Even while I speak to you, he inhis loneliness is pondering and weeping over these very lines which youhave just read without a suspicion of the depth of their bitterness. "

"He has known bereavement, " said she; "I pity him with all my heart. "

Her eyes filled with tears. She repeated the words, whose meaning wasnow clear to her, "A to Rafaella. " Then she knelt down softly before themournful inscription. I saw her bow her head. Jeanne was praying. 

It was touching to see the young girl, whom chance had placed beforethis simple testimony of a sorrow now long past, deeply moved by the sadtale of love, filled with tender pity for the dead Rafaella, her fellowin youth and beauty and perhaps in destiny, finding in her heart thetender impulse to kneel without a word, as if beside the grave ofa friend. The daylight's last rays streaming in through the windowillumined her bowed head. 

I drew back, with a touch of awe. 

M. Charnot appeared. 

He went up to his daughter and tapped her on the shoulder. She rose witha blush. 

"What are you doing there?" he said. 

Then he adjusted his glasses and read the Italian inscription. 

"You really take unnecessary trouble in kneeling down to decipher athing like that. You can see at once that it's a modern panel, and ofno value. Monsieur, " he added, turning to me, "I do not know what yourplans are, but unless you intend to sleep at Desio, we must be off, forthe night is falling. "

We left the villa. 

Out of doors it was still light, but with the afterglow. The sun was outof sight, but the earth was still enveloped, as it were, in a haze ofluminous dust. 

M. Charnot pulled out his watch. 

"Seven minutes past eight. What time does the last train start, Jeanne?"

"At ten minutes to eight. "

"Confusion! we are stranded in Desio! The mere thought of passing thenight in that inn gives me the creeps. I see no way out of it unlessMonsieur Mouillard can get us one of the Count's state coaches. Thereisn't a carriage to be got in this infernal village!"

"There is mine, Monsieur, which luckily holds four, and is quite at yourservice. "

"Upon my word, I am very much obliged to you. The drive by moonlightwill be quite romantic. "

He drew near to Jeanne and whispered in her ear:

"Are you sure you've wraps enough? a shawl, or a cape, or some kind ofpelisse?"

She gave a merry nod of assent. 

"Don't worry yourself, father; I am prepared for all emergencies. "

At half-past eight we left Desio together, and I silently blessed thehost of the Albergo dell' Agnello, who had assured me that the carriageroad was "so much more picturesque. " I found it so, indeed. 

M. Charnot and Jeanne faced the horses. I sat opposite to M. Charnot, who was in the best of spirits after all the medals he had seen. Comfortably settled in the cushions, careless of the accidents of theroad, with graphic and untiring forefinger, he undertook to describe histravels in Greece, whither he had been sent on some learned enterpriseby the Minister of Education, and had carried an imagination alreadyprepossessed and dazzled with Homeric visions. He told his story welland with detail, combining the recollections of the scholar with theimpressions of an artist. The pediment of the Parthenon, the oleandersof the Ilissus, the stream "that runs in rain-time, " the naked peak ofParnassus, the green slopes of Helicon, the blue gulf of Argus, thepine forest beside Alpheus, where the ancients worshipped "Death theGentle"--all of them passed in recount upon his learned lips. 

I must acknowledge, to my shame, that I did not listen to all he said, but, in a favorite way I have, reserved some of my own freedom ofthought, while I gave him complete freedom of speech. And I am boundto say he did not abuse it, but consented to pause at the frontiersof Thessaly. Then followed silence. I gave him room to stretch. Soon, lulled by the motion of the carriage, the stream of reminiscence ranmore slowly--then ran dry. M. Charnot slept. 

We bowled at a good pace, without jolting, over the white road. A warmmist rose around us laden with the smell of vegetation, ripe corn, andclover from the overheated earth and the neighboring fields, which haddrunk their full of sunlight. Now and again a breath of fresh air wasblown to us from the mountains. As the darkness deepened the countrygrew to look like a vast chessboard, with dark and light squares ofgrass and corn land, melting at no great distance into a colorless andunbroken horizon. But as night blotted out the earth, the heaven lightedup its stars. Never have I seen them so lustrous nor in such number. Jeanne reclined with her eyes upturned toward those limitless fields ofprayer and vision; and their radiance, benignly gentle, rested on herface. Was she tired or downcast, or merely dreaming? I knew not. Butthere was something so singularly poetic in her look and attitude thatshe seemed to me to epitomize in herself all the beauty of the night. 

I was afraid to speak. Her father's sleep, and our consequent isolation, made me ill at ease. She, too, seemed so careless of my presence, so faraway in dreamland, that I had to await opportunity, or rather her leave, to recall her from it. 

Finally she broke the silence herself. A little beyond Monza she drewcloser her shawl, that the night wind had ruffled, and bent over towardme:

"You must excuse my father; he is rather tired this evening, for he hasbeen on his feet since five o'clock. "

"The day has been so hot, too, Mademoiselle, and the medals 'came notin single spies, but in battalions'; he has a right to sleep after thebattle. "

"Dear old father! You gave him a real treat, for which he will always beobliged to you. "

"I trust the recollection of to-day will efface that of the blot of ink, for which I am still filled with remorse. "

"Remorse is rather a serious word. "

"No, Mademoiselle, I really mean remorse, for I wounded the feelingsof a gentleman who has every claim on my respect. I never have dared tospeak of this before. But if you would be kind enough to tell MonsieurCharnot how sorry I have been for it, you would relieve me of a burden. "

I saw her eyes fixed upon me for a moment with a look of attention notpreviously granted to me. She seemed pleased. 

"With all my heart, " she said. 

There was a moment's silence. 

"Was this Rafaella, whose story you have told me, worthy of yourfriend's long regret?"

"I must believe so. "

"It is a very touching story. Are you fond of Monsieur Lampron?"

"Beyond expression, Mademoiselle; he is so openhearted, so true afriend, he has the soul of the artist and the seer. I am sure you wouldrate him very highly if you knew him. "

"But I do know him, at least by his works. Where am I to be seen now, bythe way? What has become of my portrait?"

"It's at Lampron's house, in his mother's room, where Monsieur Charnotcan go and see it if he likes. "

"My father does not know of its existence, " she said, with a glance atthe slumbering man of learning. 

"Has he not seen it?"

"No, he would have made so much ado about nothing. So Monsieur Lampronhas kept the sketch? I thought it had been sold long ago. "

"Sold! you did not think he would sell it!"

"Why not? Every artist has the right to sell his works. "

"Not work of that kind. "

"Just as much as any other kind. "

"No, he could not have done that. He would no more sell it than he wouldsell the portrait of Rafaella Dannegianti. They are two similar relics, two precious reminiscences. "

Mademoiselle Charnot turned, without a reply, to look at the countrywhich was flying past us in the darkness. 

I could just see her profile, and the nervous movement of her eyelids. 

As she made no attempt to speak, her silence emboldened me. 

"Yes, Mademoiselle, two similar relics, yet sometimes in my hours ofmadness--as to-day, for instance, here, with you near me--I dare tothink that I might be less unfortunate than my friend--that his dream isgone forever--but that mine might return to me--if you were willing. "

She quickly turned toward me, and in the darkness I saw her eyes fixedon mine. 

Did the darkness deceive me as to the meaning of this mute response? WasI the victim of a fresh delusion? I fancied that Jeanne looked sad, thatperhaps she was thinking of the oaths sworn only to be broken by herformer lover, but that she was not quite displeased. 

However, it lasted only for a second. When she spoke, it was in a higherkey:

"Don't you think the breeze is very fresh this evening?"

A long-drawn sigh came from the back part of the carriage. M. Charnotwas waking up. 

He wished to prove that he had only been meditating. 

"Yes, my dear, it's a charming evening, " he replied; "these Italiannights certainly keep up their reputation. "

Ten minutes later the carriage drew up, and M. Charnot shook hands withme before the door of his hotel. 

"Many thanks, my dear young sir, for this delightful drive home! I hopewe shall meet again. We are off to Florence to-morrow; is there anythingI can do for you there?"

"No, thank you. "

Mademoiselle Charnot gave me a slight bow. I watched her mount the firstfew steps of the staircase, with one hand shading her eyes from theglare of the gaslights, and the other holding up her wraps, which hadcome unfolded and were falling around her. 

BOOK 3. 

CHAPTER XV. BACK TO PARIS

 MILAN, June 27th. Before daybreak. 

He asked me whether there was anything he could do for me at Florence. There is something, but he would refuse to do it; for I wish him toinform his charming daughter that my thoughts are all of her; that Ihave spent the night recalling yesterday's trip--now the roads of Desioand the galleries of the villa, now the drive back to Milan. M. Charnotonly figured in my dreams as sleeping. I seemed to have found my tongue, and to be pouring forth a string of well-turned speeches which I nevershould have ready at real need. If I could only see her again now thatall my plans are weighed and thought out and combined! Really, it ishard that one can not live one's life over twice--at least certainpassages in it-this episode, for instance. .. . 

What is her opinion of me? When her eyes fixed themselves on mine Ithought I could read in their depths a look of inquiry, a touch ofsurprise, a grain of disquiet. But her answer? She is going to Florencebearing with her the answer on which my life depends. They are leavingby the early express. Shall I take it, too? Florence, Rome, Naples--whynot? Italy is free to all, and particularly to lovers. I will toss mycap over the mill for the second time. I will get money from somewhere. If I am not allowed to show myself, I will look on from a distance, hidden in the crowd. At a pinch I will disguise myself--as a guide atPompeii, a lazzarone at Naples. She shall find a sonnet in the bunch offresh flowers offered her by a peasant at the door of her hotel. And atleast I shall bask in her smile, the sound of her voice, the glints ofgold about her temples, and the pleasure of knowing that she is neareven when I do not see her. 

On second thoughts; no; I will not go to Florence. As I always distrustfirst impulses, which so often run reason to a standstill, I hadrecourse to a favorite device of mine. I asked myself: What wouldLampron advise? And at once I conjured up his melancholy, noble face, and heard his answer: "Come back, my dear boy. "

 PARIS, July 2d. 

When you arrive by night, and from the windows of the flying train, asit whirls past the streets at full speed, you see Paris enveloped inred steam, pierced by starry lines of gas-lamps crisscrossing in everydirection, the sight is weird, and almost beautiful. You might fancy itthe closing scene of some gigantic gala, where strings upon stringsof colored lanterns brighten the night above a moving throng, passing, repassing, and raising a cloud of dust that reddens in the glow ofexpiring Bengal lights. 

Moreover, the illusion is in part a reality, for the great city is intruth lighted for its nightly revel. Till one o'clock in the morning itis alight and riotous with the stir and swing of life. 

But the dawn is bleak enough. 

That, delicious hour which puts a spirit of joy into green fieldand hedgerow is awful to look upon in Paris. You leave the trainhalf-frozen, to find the porters red-eyed from their watch. The customsofficials, in a kind of stupor, scrawl cabalistic signs upon your trunk. You get outside the station, to find a few scattered cabs, their driversasleep inside, their lamps blinking in the mist. 

"Cabby, are you disengaged?"

"Depends where you want to go. "

"No. 91 Rue de Rennes. "

"Jump in!"

The blank streets stretch out interminably, gray and silent; the shopson either hand are shuttered; in the squares you will find only a dogor a scavenger; theatre bills hang in rags around the kiosks, the windsweeps their tattered fragments along the asphalt in yesterday's dust, with here and there a bunch of faded flowers. The Seine washes aroundits motionless boats; two great-coated policemen patrol the bank andwake the echoes with their tramp. The fountains have ceased to play, andtheir basins are dry. The air is chilly, and sick with evil odors. Thewhole drive is like a bad dream. Such was my drive from the Gare de Lyonto my rooms. When I was once at home, installed in my own domains, thisunpleasant impression gradually wore off. There was friendliness in mysticks of furniture. I examined those silent witnesses, my chair, mytable, and my books. What had happened while I was away? Apparentlynothing important. The furniture had a light coating of dust, whichshowed that no one had touched it, not even Madame Menin. It was funny, but I wished to see Madame Menin. A sound, and I heard my oppositeneighbor getting to work. He is a hydrographer, and engraves maps for aneighboring publisher. I never could get up as early as he. The willowseemed to have made great progress during the summer. I flung up thewindow and said "Good-morning!" to the wallflowers, to the old wall ofthe Carmelites, and the old black tower. Then the sparrows began. Whato'clock could it be? They came all together with a rush, chirping, thehungry thieves, wheeling about, skirting the walls in their flight, quick as lightning, borne on their pointed wings. They had seen thesun--day had broken!

And almost immediately I heard a cart pass, and a hawker crying:

"Ground-SEL! Groundsel for your dickey-birds!"

To think that there are people who get up at that unearthly hour to buygroundsel for their canaries! I looked to see whether any one hadcalled in my absence; their cards should be on my table. Two werethere: "Monsieur Lorinet, retired solicitor, town councillor, ofBourbonnoux-les-Bourges, deputy-magistrate"; "Madame Lorinet, neePoupard. "

I was surprised not to find a third card: "Berthe Lorinet, of nooccupation, anxious to change her name. " Berthe will be difficult toget rid of. I presume she didn't dare to leave a card on a young man, itwouldn't have been proper. But I have no doubt she was here. I scent atrick of my uncle's, one of those Atlantic cables he takes for spider'sthreads and makes his snares of. The Lorinet family have been here, withthe twofold intention of taking news of me to my "dear good uncle, " anddiscreetly recalling to my forgetful heart the charms of Berthe of thebig feet. 

"Good-morning, Monsieur Mouillard!"

"Hallo! Madame Menin! Good-morning, Madame Menin!"

"So you are back at last, sir! How brown you have got--quite sunburnt. You are quite well, I hope, sir?"

"Very well, thank you; has any one been here in my absence?"

"I was going to tell you, sir; the plumber has been here, because thetap of your cistern came off in my hand. It wasn't my fault; there hadbeen a heavy rain that morning. So--"

"Never mind, it's only a tap to pay for. We won't say any more about it. But did any one come to see me?"

"Ah, let me see--yes. A big gentleman, rather red-faced, with his wife, a fat lady, with a small voice; a fine woman, rather in my style, andtheir daughter--but perhaps you know her, sir?"

"Yes, Madame Menin, you need not describe her. You told them that I wasaway, and they said they were very sorry. "

"Especially the lady. She puffed and panted and sighed: 'Dear MonsieurMouillard! How unlucky we are, Madame Menin; we have just come to Parisas he has gone to Italy. My husband and I would have liked so much tosee him! You may think it fanciful, but I should like above all thingsto look round his rooms. A student's rooms must be so interesting. Stay there, Berthe, my child. ' I told them there was nothing veryinteresting, and that their daughter might just as well come in too, andthen I showed them everything. "

"They didn't stay long, I suppose?"

"Quite long enough. They were an age looking at your photograph album. I suppose they haven't got such things where they come from. MadameLorinet couldn't tear herself away from it. 'Nothing but men, ' she said, 'have you noticed that, Jules?'--'Well, Madame, ' I said, 'that's justhow it is here; except for me, and I don't count, only gentlemen comehere. I've kept house for bachelors where--well, there are not many--'

"That will do, Madame Menin; that will do. I know you always think toohighly of me. Hasn't Lampron been here?"

"Yes, sir; the day before yesterday. He was going off for a fortnightor three weeks into the country to paint a portrait of some priest--abishop, I think. "

 July 15th. 

"Midi, roi des etes. " I know by heart that poem by "Monsieur le Comtede l'Isle, " as my Uncle Mouillard calls him. Its lines chime in my earsevery day when I return from luncheon to the office I have left anhour before. Merciful heaven, how hot it is! I am just back from a hotclimate, but it was nothing compared to Paris in July. The asphalt meltsunderfoot; the wood pavement is simmering in a viscous mess of tar; theideal is forced to descend again and again to iced lager beer; the wallsbeat back the heat in your face; the dust in the public gardens, groundto atoms beneath the tread of many feet, rises in clouds from underthe water-cart to fall, a little farther on, in white showers upon thepassers-by. I wonder that, as a finishing stroke, the cannon in thePalais Royal does not detonate all day long. 

To complete my misery, all my acquaintances are out of town: the Boulefamily is bathing at Trouville; the second clerk has not returned fromhis holiday; the fourth only waited for my arrival to get away himself;Lampron, detained by my Lord Bishop and the forest shades, gives no signof his existence; even Monsieur and Madame Plumet have locked up theirflat and taken the train for Barbizon. 

Thus it happens that the old clerk Jupille and I have been throwntogether. I enjoy his talk. He is a simplehearted, honorable man, with aphilosophy that I am sure can not be in the least German, because I canunderstand it. I have gradually told him all my secrets. I felt the needof a confidant, for I was stifling, metaphorically as well as literally. Now, when he hands me a deed, instead of saying "All right, " as I usedto, I say, "Take a chair, Monsieur Jupille"; I shut the door, and wetalk. The clerks think we're talking law, but the clerks are mistaken. 

Yesterday, for instance, he whispered to me:

"I have come down the Rue de l'Universite. They will soon be back. "

"How did you learn that?"

"I saw a man carrying coals into the house, and asked for whom theywere, that's all. "

Again, we had a talk, just now, which shows what progress I have made inthe old clerk's heart. He had just submitted a draft to me. I had readit through and grunted my approval, yet M. Jupille did not go. 

"Anything further, Monsieur Jupille?"

"Something to ask of you--to do me a kindness, or, rather, an honor. "

"Let's hear what it is. "

"This weather, Monsieur Mouillard, is very good for fishing, thoughrather warm. "

"Rather warm, Monsieur Jupille!"

"It is not too warm. It was much hotter than this in 1844, yet thefish bit, I can tell you! Will you join us next Sunday in a fishingexpedition? I say 'us, ' because one of your friends is coming, a greatamateur of the rod who honors me with his friendship, too. "

"Who is he?"

"A secret, Monsieur Mouillard, a little secret. You will be surprised. It is settled then--next Sunday?"

"Where shall I meet you?"

"Hush, the office-boy is listening. That boy is too sharp; I'll tell yousome other time. "

"As you please, Monsieur Jupille; I accept the invitationunconditionally. "

"I am so glad you will come, Monsieur Mouillard. I only wish we couldhave a little storm between this and then. "

He spoke the truth; his satisfaction was manifest, for I never have seenhim rub the tip of his nose with the feathers of his quill pen so oftenas he did that afternoon, which was with him the sign of exuberant joy, all his gestures having subdued themselves long since to the limits ofhis desk. 

 July 20th. 

I have seen Lampron once more. He bears his sorrow bravely. We spoke fora few moments of his mother. I spoke some praise of that humble soul forthe good she had done me, which led him to enlarge upon her virtues. 

"Ah, " he said, "if you had only seen more of her! My dear fellow, if Iam an honest man; if I have passed without failing through the trialsof my life and my profession; if I have placed my ideal beyond worldlysuccess; in a word, if I am worth anything in heart or brain, it isto her I owe it. We never had been parted before; this is our firstseparation, and it is the final one. I was not prepared for it. "

Then he changed the subject brusquely:

"What about your love-affair?"

"Fresher than ever. "

"Did it survive half an hour's conversation?"

"It grew the stronger for it. "

"Does she still detest you?"

I told him the story of our trip to Desio, and our conversation in thecarriage, without omitting a detail. 

He listened in silence. At the end he said:

"My dear Fabien, there must be no delay. She must hear your proposalwithin a week. "

"Within a week! Who is to make it for me?"

"Whoever you like. That's your business. I have been making inquirieswhile you were away; she seems a suitable match for you. Besides, yourpresent position is ridiculous; you are without a profession; you havequarrelled, for no reason, with your only relative; you must get out ofthe situation with credit, and marriage will compel you to do so. "

CHAPTER XVI. A FISHING-TRIP AND AN OLD FRIEND

July 21st. 

M. Jupille had written to tell me where I was to meet him on the Sunday, giving me the most minute directions. I might take the train to Massy, or to Bievres. However, I preferred to take the train to Sceaux and walkfrom there, leaving Chatenay on my left, striking across the woodsof Verrieres toward the line of forts, coming out between Igny andAmblainvilliers, and finally reaching a spot where the Bievre broadensout between two wooded banks into a pool as clear as a spring and asfull of fish as a nursery-pond. 

"Above all things, tell nobody where it is!" begged Jupille. "It is oursecret; I discovered it myself. "

When I left Sceaux to meet Jupille, who had started before daybreak, thesun was already high. There was not a cloud nor a breath of wind; thesway of summer lay over all things. But, though the heat was broiling, the walk was lovely. All about me was alive with voice or perfume. Clouds of linnets fluttered among the branches, golden beetles crawledupon the grass, thousands of tiny whirring wings beat the air--flies, gnats, gadflies, bees--all chorusing the life--giving warmth of the dayand the sunshine that bathed and penetrated all nature. I halted fromtime to time in the parched glades to seek my way, and again pushedonward through the forest paths overarched with heavy-scented leafage, onward over the slippery moss up toward the heights, below which theBievre stole into view. 

There it lay, at my feet, gliding between banks of verdure which seemeda season younger than the grass I stood on. I began to descend theslope, knowing that M. Jupille was awaiting me somewhere in the valley. I broke into a run. I heard the murmur of water in the hollows, andcaught glimpses of forget-me-not tufts in low-lying grassy corners. Suddenly a rod outlined itself against the sky, between two trees. Itwas he, the old clerk; he nodded to me and laid down his line. 

"I thought you never were coming. "

"That shows you don't know me. Any sport?"

"Not so loud! Yes, capital sport. I'll bait a line for you. "

"And where is your friend, Monsieur Jupille?"

"There he is. "

"Where?"

"Staring you in the face; can't you see him?". 

Upon my word, I could see nobody, until he directed my gaze with hisfishing-rod, when I perceived, ten yards away, a large back view ofwhite trousers and brown, unbuckled waistcoat, a straw hat which seemedto conceal a head, and a pair of shirt-sleeves hanging over the water. 

This mass was motionless. 

"He must have got a bite, " said Jupille, "else he would have been herebefore now. Go and see him. "

Not knowing whom I was about to address, I gave a warning cough as Icame near him. 

The unknown drew a loud breath, like a man who wakes with a start. 

"That you, Jupille?" he said, turning a little way; "are you out ofbait?"

"No, my dear tutor, it is I. "

"Monsieur Mouillard, at last!"

"Monsieur Flamaran! Jupille told the truth when he said I should besurprised. Are you fond of fishing?"

"It's a passion with me. One must keep one or two for one's old age, young man. "

"You've been having sport, I hear. "

"Well, this morning, between eight and nine, there were a few nibbles;but since then the sport has been very poor. However, I'm very glad tosee you again, Mouillard. That essay of yours was extremely good. "

The eminent professor had risen, displaying a face still red from hishaving slept with his head on his chest, but beaming with good-will. Hegrasped my hand with heartiness and vigor. 

"Here's rod and line for you, Monsieur Mouillard, all ready baited, "broke in Jupille. "If you'll come with me I'll show you a good place. "

"No, no, Jupille, I'm going to keep him, " answered M. Flamaran; "Ihaven't uttered a syllable for three hours. I must let myself out alittle. We will fish side by side, and chat. "

"As you please, Monsieur Flamaran; but I don't call that fishing. "

He handed me the implement, and sadly went his way. 

M. Flamaran and I sat down together on the bank, our feet resting on thesoft sand strewn with dead branches. Before us spread the little poolI have mentioned, a slight widening of the stream of the Bievre, once awatering-place for cattle. The sun, now at high noon, massed the trees'shadow close around their trunks. The unbroken surface of the waterreflected its rays back in our eyes. The current was barely indicatedby the gentle oscillation of a few water-lily leaves. Two big bluedragonflies poised and quivered upon our floats, and not a fish seemedto care to disturb them. 

"Well, " said M. Flamaran, "so you are still managing clerk to CounsellorBoule?"

"For the time. "

"Do you like it?"

"Not particularly. "

"What are you waiting for?"

"For something to turn up. "

"And carry you back to Italy, I suppose?"

"Then you know I have just been there?"

"I know all about it. Charnot told me of your meeting, and your romanticdrive by moonlight. By the way, he's come back with a bad cold; did youknow that?"

I assumed an air of sympathy:

"Poor man! When did he get back?"

"The day before yesterday. Of course I was the first to hear of it, andwe spent yesterday evening together. It may surprise you, Mouillard, andyou may think I exaggerate, but I think Jeanne has come back prettierthan she went. "

"Do you really think so?"

"I really do. That southern sun--look out, my dear Mouillard, your lineis half out of water--has brought back her roses (they're brighter thanever, I declare), and the good spirits she had lost, too, poor girl. Sheis cheerful again now, as she used to be. I was very anxious about herat one time. You know her sad story?"

"Yes. "

"The fellow was a scoundrel, my dear Mouillard, a regular scoundrel! Inever was in favor of the match, myself. Charnot let himself be drawninto it by an old college friend. I told him over and over again, 'It'sJeanne's dowry he's after, Charnot--I'm convinced of it. He'll treatJeanne badly and make her miserable, mark my words. ' But I wasted mybreath; he wouldn't listen to a word. Anyhow, it's quite off now. Butit was no slight shock, I can tell you; and it gave me great pain towitness the poor child's sufferings. "

"You are so kind-hearted, Monsieur Flamaran!"

"It's not that, Mouillard; but I have known Jeanne ever since she wasborn. I watched her grow up, and I loved her when she was still a littlemite; she's as good as my adoptive daughter. You understand me when Isay adoptive. I do not mean that there exists between us that legalbond in imitation of nature which is permitted by our codes--'adoptioimitatur naturam'; not that, but that I love her like adaughter--Sidonie never having presented me with a daughter, nor with ason either, for that matter. "

A cry from Jupille interrupted M. Flamaran:

"Can't you hear it rattle?"

The good man was tearing to us, waving his arms like a madman, the foldsof his trousers flapping about his thin legs like banners in the wind. 

We leaped to our feet, and my first idea, an absurd one enough, was thata rattlesnake was hurrying through the grass to our attack. 

I was very far from the truth. The matter really was a new line, invented by M. Jupille, cast a little further than an ordinary one, andrigged up with a float like a raft, carrying a little clapper. The fishrang their own knell as they took the hook. 

"It's rattling like mad!" cried Jupille, "and you don't stir! I couldn'thave thought it of you, Monsieur Flamaran. "

He ran past us, brandishing a landing-net as a warrior his lance; hemight have been a youth of twenty-five. We followed, less keen and alsoless confident than he. He was right, though; when he drew up his line, the float of which was disappearing in jerks, carrying the bell alongwith it beneath the water, he brought out a fair-sized jack, which hedeclared to be a giant. 

He let it run for some time, to tire it, and to prolong the pleasure ofplaying it. 

"Gentlemen, " he cried, "it is cutting my finger off!"

A stroke from the landing-net laid the monster at our feet, its strengthall spent. It weighed rather under four pounds. Jupille swore to six. 

My learned tutor and I sat down again side by side, but the thread ofour conversation had been broken past mending. I tried to talk of her, but M. Flamaran insisted on talking of me, of Bourges, of his electionas professor, and of the radically distinct characteristics by which youcan tell the bite of a gudgeon from that of a stickleback. 

The latter part of this lecture was, however, purely theoretical, for hegot up two hours before sunset without having hooked a fish. 

"A good day, all the same, " he said. "It's a good place, and the fishwere biting this morning. We'll come here again some day, Jupille; withan east wind you ought to catch any quantity of gudgeons. " He kept pacebeside me on our way home, but wearied, no doubt, with long sitting, with the heat, and the glare from the water, fell into a reverie, fromwhich the incidents of the walk were unable to rouse him. 

Jupille trotted before us, carrying his rod in one hand, aluncheon-basket and a fish-bag in the other. He turned round and gave usa look at each cross-road, smiled beneath his heavy moustache, and wenton faster than before. I felt sure that something out of the way wasabout to happen, and that the silent quill-driver was tasting a quietjoke. 

I had not guessed the whole truth. 

At a turn of the road M. Flamaran suddenly pulled up, looked all aroundhim, and drew a deep breath. 

"Hallo, Jupille! My good sir, where are you taking us? If I can believemy eyes, this is the Chestnut Knoll, down yonder is Plessis Piquet, andwe are two miles from the station and the seven o'clock train!"

There was no denying it. A donkey emerged from the wood, hung withtassels and bells, carrying in its panniers two little girls, whoseparents toiled behind, goad in hand. The woods had become shrubberies, through which peeped the thatched roofs of rustic summerhouses, mazes, artificial waterfalls, grottoes, and ruins; all the dread handiworkof the rustic decorator burst, superabundant, upon our sight, with shyodors of beer and cooking. Broken bottles strewed the paths; the bushesall looked weary, harassed, and overworked; a confused murmur of voicesand crackers floated toward us upon the breeze. I knew full well fromthese signs that we were nearing "ROBINSON CRUSOE, " the land of rusticinns. And, sure enough, here they all were: "THE OLD ROBINSON, " "THE NEWROBINSON, " "THE REAL ORIGINAL ROBINSON, " "THE ONLY GENUINE ROBINSON, ""ROBINSON's CHESTNUT GROVE, " "ROBINSON'S PARADISE, " each unique and eachauthentic. All alike have thatched porches, sanded paths, transparencieslighted with petroleum lamps, tinsel stars, summerhouses, arrangementsfor open-air illumination and highly colored advertisements, in whichare set forth all the component elements of a "ROBINSON, " such asshooting-galleries, bowling-alleys, swings, private arbors, Munich beer, and dinner in a tree. 

"Jupille!" exclaimed M. Flamaran, "you have shipwrecked us! This isCrusoe's land; and what the dickens do you mean by it?"

The old clerk, utterly discomfited, and wearing that hangdog look whichhe always assumed at the slightest rebuke from Counsellor Boule, pulleda face as long as his arm, went up to M. Flamaran and whispered a wordin his ear. 

"Upon my word! Really, Jupille, what are you thinking of? And I aprofessor, too! Thirty years ago it would have been excusable, butto-day! Besides, Sidonie expects me home to dinner--"

He stopped for a moment, undecided, looking at his watch. 

Jupille, who was eying him intently, saw his distinguished friendgradually relax his frown and burst into a hearty laugh. 

"By Jove! it's madness at my age, but I don't care. We'll renew ouryouth for an hour or so. My dear Mouillard, Jupille has ordered dinnerfor us here. Had I been consulted I should have chosen any other place. Yet what's to be done? Hunger, friendship, and the fact that I can'tcatch the train, combine to silence my scruples. What do you say?"

"That we are in for it now. "

"So be it, then. " And led by Jupille, still carrying his catch, weentered THE ONLY GENUINE ROBINSON. 

M. Flamaran, somewhat ill at ease, cast inquiring glances on theclearings in the sgrubberies. I thought I heard stifled laughter behindthe trees. 

"You have engaged Chestnut Number Three, gentlemen, " said theproprietor. "Up these stairs, please. "

We ascended a staircase winding around the trunk. Chestnut Number 3 isa fine old tree, a little bent, its sturdy lower branches supporting aplatform surrounded by a balustrade, six rotten wooden pillars, and athatched roof, shaped like a cocked hat, to shelter the whole. Allthe neighboring trees contain similar constructions, which look from alittle distance like enormous nests. They are greatly in demand atthe dinner hour; you dine thirty feet up in the air, and your food isbrought up by a rope and pulley. 

When M. Flamaran appeared on the platform he took off his hat, andleaned with both hands on the railing to give a look around. Theattitude suggested a public speaker. His big gray head was conspicuousin the light of the setting sun. 

"He's going to make a speech!" cried a voice. "Bet you he isn't, "replied another. 

This was the signal. A rustling was heard among the leaves, and numbersof inquisitive faces peeped out from all corners of the garden. Ageneral rattling of glasses announced that whole parties were leavingthe tables to see what was up. The waiters stopped to stare at ChestnutNumber 3. The whole population of Juan Fernandez was staring up atFlamaran without in the least knowing the reason why. 

"Gentlemen, " said a voice from an arbor, "Professor Flamaran will nowbegin his lecture. "

A chorus of shouts and laughter rose around our tree. 

"Hi, old boy, wait till we're gone!"

"Ladies, he will discourse to you on the law of husband and wife!"

"No, on the foreclosure of mortgages!"

"No, on the payment of debts!"

"Oh, you naughty old man! You ought to be shut up!"

M. Flamaran, though somewhat put out of countenance for the moment, wasseized with a happy inspiration. He stretched out an arm to show that hewas about to speak. He opened his broad mouth with a smile of fatherlyhumor, and the groves, attentive, heard him thunder forth these words:

"Boys, I promise to give you all white marks if you let me dine inpeace!"

The last words were lost in a roar of applause. 

"Three cheers for old Flamaran!"

Three cheers were given, followed by clapping of hands from variousquarters, then all was silence, and no one took any further notice ofour tree. 

M. Flamaran left the railing and unfolded his napkin. 

"You may be sure of my white marks, young men, " he said, as he sat down. 

He was delighted at his success as an orator, and laughed gayly. Jupille, on the other hand, was as pale as if he had been in a streetriot, and seemed rooted to the spot where he stood. 

"It's all right, Jupille; it's all right, man! A little ready wit is allyou need, dash my wig!"

The old clerk gradually regained his composure, and the dinner grewvery merry. Flamaran's spirits, raised by this little incident, neverflagged. He had a story for every glass of wine, and told them all witha quiet humor of his own. 

Toward the end of dinner, by the time the waiter came to offer us"almonds and raisins, pears, peaches, preserves, meringues, brandycherries, " we had got upon the subject of Sidonie, the pearl of Forez. M. Flamaran narrated to us, with dates, how a friend of his one daydepicted to him a young girl at Montbrison, of fresh and pleasingappearance, a good housekeeper, and of excellent family; and how he--M. Flamaran--had forthwith started off to find her, had recognized herbefore she was pointed out to him, fell in love with her at first sight, and was not long in obtaining her affection in return. The marriage hadtaken place at St. Galmier. 

"Yes, my dear Mouillard, " he added, as if pointing a moral, "thirtyyears ago last May I became a happy man; when do you think of followingmy example?"

At this point, Jupille suddenly found himself one too many, and vanisheddown the corkscrew stair. 

"We once spoke of an heiress at Bourges, " M. Flamaran went on. 

"Apparently that's all off?"

"Quite off. "

"You were within your rights; but now, why not a Parisienne?"

"Yes, indeed; why not?"

"Perhaps you are prejudiced in some way against Parisiennes?"

"I? Not the least. "

"I used to be, but I've got over it now. They have a charm of their own, a certain style of dressing, walking, and laughing which you don't findoutside the fortifications. For a long time I used to think that thesequalities stood them in lieu of virtues. That was a slander; there areplenty of Parisiennes endowed with every virtue; I even know a few whoare angels. "

At this point, M. Flamaran looked me straight in the eyes, and, as Imade no reply, he added:

"I know one, at least: Jeanne Charnot. Are you listening?"

"Yes, Monsieur Flamaran. "

"Isn't she a paragon?"

"She is. "

"As sensible as she is tender-hearted?"

"So I believe. "

"And as clever as she is sensible?"

"That is my opinion. "

"Well, then, young man, if that's your opinion--excuse my burning myboats, all my boats--if that's your opinion, I don't understand why--Doyou suppose she has no money?"

"I know nothing about her means. "

"Don't make any mistake; she's a rich woman. Do you think you're tooyoung to marry?"

"No. "

"Do you fancy, perhaps, that she is still bound by that unfortunateengagement?"

"I trust she is not. "

"I'm quite sure she is not. She is free, I tell you, as free as you. Well, why don't you love her?"

"But I do love her, Monsieur Flamaran!"

"Why, then, I congratulate you, my boy!"

He leaned across the table and gave me a hearty grasp of the hand. Hewas so agitated that he could not speak--choking with joyful emotion, asif he had been Jeanne's father, or mine. 

After a minute or so, he drew himself up in his chair, reached out, puta hand on each of my shoulders and kept it there as if he feared I mightfly away. 

"So you love her, you love her! Good gracious, what a business I've hadto get you to say so! You are quite right to love her, of course, ofcourse--I could not have understood your doing otherwise; but I must saythis, my boy, that if you tarry too long, with her attractions, you knowwhat will happen. "

"Yes, I ought to ask for her at once. "

"To be sure you ought. "

"Alas! Monsieur Flamaran, who is there that I can send on such a missionfor me? You know that I am an orphan. "

"But you have an uncle. "

"We have quarrelled. "

"You might make it up again, on an occasion like this. "

"Out of the question; we quarrelled on her account; my uncle hatesParisiennes. "

"Damn it all, then! send a friend--a friend will do under thecircumstances. "

"There's Lampron. "

"The painter?"

"Yes, but he doesn't know Monsieur Charnot. It would only be onestranger pleading for another. My chances would be small. What I want--"

"Is a friend of both parties, isn't it? Well, what am I?"

"The very man!"

"Very well. I undertake to ask for her hand! I shall ask for the handof the charming Jeanne for both of us; for you, who will make her happy;and for myself, who will not entirely lose her if she marries one of mypupils, one of my favorite graduates--my friend, Fabien Mouillard. And Iwon't be refused--no, damme, I won't!"

He brought down his fist upon the table with a tremendous blow whichmade the glasses ring and the decanters stagger. 

"Coming!" cried a waiter from below, thinking he was summoned. 

"All right, my good fellow!" shouted M. Flamaran, leaning over therailings. "Don't trouble. I don't want anything. "

He turned again toward me, still filled with emotion, but somewhatcalmer than he had been. 

"Now, " said he, "let us talk, and do you tell me all. "

And we began a long and altogether delightful talk. 

A more genuine, a finer fellow never breathed than this professor letloose from school and giving his heart a holiday--a simple, tenderheart, preserved beneath the science of the law like a grape in sawdust. Now he would smile as I sang Jeanne's praises; now he would sit andlisten to my objections with a truculent air, tightening his lips tillthey broke forth in vehement denial. "What! You dare to say! Young man, what are you afraid of?" His overflowing kindness discharged itself inthe sincerest and most solemn asseverations. 

We had left Juan Fernandez far behind us; we were both far away in thatUtopia where mind penetrates mind, heart understands heart. We heardneither the squeaking of a swing beneath us, nor the shouts of laughteralong the promenades, nor the sound of a band tuning up in a neighboringpavilion. Our eyes, raised to heaven, failed to see the night descendingupon us, vast and silent, piercing the foliage with its first stars. Nowand again a warm breath passed over us, blown from the woods; I tastedits strangely sweet perfume; I saw in glimpses the flying vision of ahuge dark tulip, striped with gold, unfolding its petals on the moistbank of a dyke, and I asked myself whether a mysterious flower hadreally opened in the night, or whether it was but a new feeling, slowlybudding, unfolding, blossoming within my heart. 

CHAPTER XVII. PLEASURES OF EAVESDROPPING

 July 22d. 

At two o'clock to-day I went to see Sylvestre, to tell him all the greatevents of yesterday. We sat down on the old covered sofa in the shadowof the movable curtain which divides the studio, as it were, into tworooms, among the lay figures, busts, varnish-bottles, and paint-boxes. Lampron likes this chiaroscuro. It rests his eyes. 

Some one knocked at the door. 

"Stay where you are, " said Sylvestre; "it's a customer come for thebackground of an engraving. I'll be with you in two minutes. Come in!"As he was speaking he drew the curtain in front of me, and through thethin stuff I could see him going toward the door, which had just opened. 

"Monsieur Lampron?"

"I am he, Monsieur. "

"You don't recognize me, Monsieur?"

"No, Monsieur. "

"I'm surprised at that. "

"Why so? I have never seen you. "

"You have taken my portrait!"

"Really!"

I was watching Lampron, who was plainly angered at this brusqueintroduction. He left the chair which he had begun to push forward, let it stand in the middle of the studio, and went and sat down onhis engraving-stool in the corner, with a somewhat haughty look, and adefiant smile lurking behind his beard. He rested his elbow on the tableand began to drum with his fingers. 

"What I have had the honor to inform you is the simple truth, Monsieur. I am Monsieur Charnot of the Institute. "

Lampron gave a glance in my direction, and his frown melted away. 

"Excuse me, Monsieur; I only know you by your back. Had you shown methat side of you I might perhaps have recognized--"

"I have not come here to listen to jokes, Monsieur; and I should havecome sooner to demand an explanation, but that it was only this morningI heard of what I consider a deplorable abuse of your talents. Butpicture-shows are not in my line. I did not see myself there. Myfriend Flamaran had to tell me that I was to be seen at the last Salon, together with my daughter, sitting on a tree-trunk in the forest ofSaint-Germain. Is it true, Monsieur, that you drew me sitting on atrunk?"

"Quite true. "

"That's a trifle too rustic for a man who does not go outside ofParis three times a year. And my daughter you drew in profile--a goodlikeness, I believe. "

"It was as like as I could make it. "

"Then you confess that you drew both my daughter and myself?"

"Yes, I do, Monsieur. "

"It may not be so easy for you to explain by what right you did so; Iawait your explanation, Monsieur. "

"I might very well give you no explanation whatever, " replied Lampron, who was beginning to lose patience. "I might also reply that I no moreneeded to ask your permission to sketch you than to ask that of thebeeches, oaks, elms, and willows. I might tell you that you formed partof the landscape, that every artist who sketches a bit of underwood hasthe right to stick a figure in--"

"A figure, Monsieur! do you call me a figure?"

"A gentleman, I mean. Artists call it figure. Well, I might give youthis reason, which is quite good enough for you, but it is not the realone. I prefer to tell you frankly what passed. You have a very beautifuldaughter, Monsieur. "

M. Charnot made his customary bow. 

"One of my friends is in love with her. He is shy, and dares not tellhis love. We met you by chance in the wood, and I was seized with theidea of making a sketch of Mademoiselle Jeanne, so like that she couldnot mistake it, and then exhibiting it with the certainty of her seeingit and guessing its meaning. I trusted she would recall to her mind, notmyself, for my youth is past, but a young friend of mine who is of theage and build of a lover. If this was a crime, Monsieur, I am ready totake the blame for it upon myself, for I alone committed it. "

"It certainly was criminal, Monsieur; criminal in you, at anyrate--you who are a man of weight, respected for your talent and yourcharacter--to aid and abet in a frivolous love-affair. "

"It was the deepest and most honorable sentiment, Monsieur. "

"A blaze of straw!"

"Nothing of the sort!"

"Don't tell me! Your friend's a mere boy. "

"So much the better for him, and for her, too! If you want a man ofmiddle age for your son-in-law, just try one and see what they areworth. You may be sorry that you ever refused this boy, who, it is true, is only twenty-four, has little money, no decided calling, nor yet thatgift of self-confidence which does instead of merit for so many people;but who is a brave and noble soul, whom I can answer for as for myself. Go, Monsieur, you will find your daughter great names, fat purses, gold lace, long beards, swelling waistbands, reputations, pretensions, justified or not, everything, in short, in which he is poor; but him youwill never find again! That is all I have to tell you. "

Lampron had become animated and spoke with heat. There was the slightestflash of anger in his eyes. 

I saw M. Charnot get up, approach him, and hold out his hand. 

"I did not wish you to say anything else, Monsieur; that is enough forme. Flamaran asked my daughter's hand for your friend only this morning. Flamaran loses no time when charged with a commission. He, too, told memuch that was good of your friend. I also questioned Counsellor Boule. But however flattering characters they might give him, I still neededanother, that of a man who had lived in complete intimacy with MonsieurMouillard, and I could find no one but you. "

Lampron stared astonished at this little thin-lipped man who had justchanged his tone and manner so unexpectedly. 

"Well, Monsieur, " he answered, "you might have got his character from mewith less trouble; there was no need to make a scene. "

"Excuse me. You say I should have got his character; that is exactlywhat I did not want; characters are always good. What I wanted was a cryfrom the heart of a friend outraged and brought to bay. That is what Igot, and it satisfies me. I am much obliged to you, Monsieur, and begyou will excuse my conduct. "

"But, since we are talking sense at present, allow me to put you aquestion in my turn. I am not in the habit of going around the point. Ismy friend's proposal likely to be accepted or not?"

"Monsieur Lampron, in these delicate matters I have decided for thefuture to leave my daughter entirely free. Although my happiness is atstake almost as entirely as hers, I shall not say a word save to advise. In accordance with this resolve I communicated Flamaran's proposal toher. "

"Well?"

"I expected she would refuse it. "

"But she said 'Yes'?"

"She did not say 'No;' if she had, you can guess that I should not behere. "

At this reply I quite lost my head, and was very near tearing aside thecurtain, and bursting forth into the studio with a shout of gratitude. 

But M. Charnot added:

"Don't be too sure, though. There are certain serious, and, perhaps, insurmountable obstacles. I must speak to my daughter again. I willlet your friend know of our final decision as soon as I can. Good-by, Monsieur. "

Lampron saw him to the street, and I heard their steps grow distant inthe passage. A moment later Sylvestre returned and held out both handsto me, saying:

"Well, are you happy now?"

"Of course I am, to a certain extent. "

"'To a certain extent'! Why, she loves you. "

"But the obstacles, Sylvestre!"

"Nonsense!"

"Perhaps insurmountable--those were his words. "

"Why, obstacles are the salt of all our joys. What a deal you young menwant before you can be called happy! You ask Life for certainties, as ifshe had any to give you!"

And he began to discuss my fears, but could not quite disperse them, forneither of us could guess what the obstacles could be. 

 August 2d. 

After ten days of waiting, during which I have employed Lampron and M. Flamaran to intercede for me, turn and turn about; ten days passed inhovering between mortal anguish and extravagant hopes, during which Ihave formed, destroyed, taken up again and abandoned more plans thanI ever made in all my life before, yesterday, at five o'clock, I got anote from M. Charnot, begging me to call upon him the same evening. 

I went there in a state of nervous collapse. He received me in hisstudy, as he had done seven months before, at our first interview, butwith a more solemn politeness; and I noticed that the paper-knife, whichhe had taken up from the table as he resumed his seat, shook between hisfingers. I sat in the same chair in which I had felt so ill at ease. To tell the truth, I felt very much the same, yesterday. M. Charnotdoubtless noticed it, and wished to reassure me. 

"Monsieur, " said he, "I receive you as a friend. Whatever may be theresult of our interview, you may be assured of my esteem. Therefore donot fear to answer me frankly. "

He put several questions to me concerning my family, my tastes, and myacquaintance in Paris. Then he requested me to tell the simple story ofmy boyhood and my youth, the recollections of my home, of the college atLa Chatre, of my holidays at Bourges, and of my student life. 

He listened without interruption, playing with the ivory paperknife. When I reached the date--it was only last December--when I saw Jeannefor the first time--

"That's enough, " said he, "I know or guess the rest. Young man, Ipromised you an answer; this is it--"

For the moment, I ceased to breathe; my very heart seemed to stopbeating. 

"My daughter, " went on M. Charnot, "has at this moment several proposalsof marriage to choose from. You see I hide nothing from you. I haveleft her time to reflect; she has weighed and compared them all, andcommunicated to me yesterday the result of her reflections. To richerand more brilliant matches she prefers an honest man who loves her forherself, and you, Monsieur, are that honest man. "

"Oh, thank you, thank you, Monsieur!" I cried. 

"Wait a moment, there are two conditions. "

"Were there ten, I would accept them without question!"

"Don't hurry. You will see; one is my daughter's, the other comes fromboth of us. "

"You wish me to have some profession, perhaps?"

"No, that's not it. Clearly my son-in-law will never sit idle. Besides, I have some views on that subject, which I will tell you later if I havethe chance. No, the first condition exacted by my daughter, and dictatedby a feeling which is very pleasant to me, is that you promise never toleave Paris. "

"That I swear to, with all the pleasure in life!"

"Really? I feared you had some ties. "

"Not one. "

"Or dislike for Paris. "

"No, Monsieur; only a preference for Paris, with freedom to indulge it. Your second condition?"

"The second, to which my daughter and I both attach importance, is thatyou should make your peace with your uncle. Flamaran tells me you havequarrelled. "

"That is true. "

"I hope it is not a serious difference. A mere cloud, isn't it?"

"Unfortunately not. My uncle is very positive--"

"But at the same time his heart is in the right place, so far as I couldjudge from what I saw of him--in June, I think it was. "

"Yes. "

"You don't mind taking the first step?"

"I will take as many as may be needed. "

"I was sure you would. You can not remain on bad terms with yourfather's brother, the only relative you have left. In our eyes thisreconciliation is a duty, a necessity. You should desire it as much as, and even more than, we. "

"I shall use every effort, Monsieur, I promise you. "

"And in that case you will succeed, I feel sure. "

M. Charnot, who had grown very pale, held out his hand to me, and triedhard to smile. 

"I think, Monsieur Fabien, that we are quite at one, and that the hourhas come--"

He did not finish the sentence, but rose and went to open a door betweentwo bookcases at the end of the room. 

"Jeanne, " he said, "Monsieur Fabien accepts the two conditions, mydear. "

And I saw Jeanne come smiling toward me. 

And I, who had risen trembling, I, who until then had lost my head atthe mere thought of seeing her, I, who had many a time asked myself interror what I should say on meeting her, if ever she were mine, I feltmyself suddenly bold, and the words rushed to my lips to thank her, toexpress my joy. 

My happiness, however, was evident, and I might have spared my words. 

For the first half-hour all three of us talked together. 

Then M. Charnot pushed back his armchair, and we two were left toourselves. 

He had taken up a newspaper, but I am pretty sure he held it upsidedown. In any case he must have been reading between the lines, for hedid not turn the page the whole evening. 

He often cast a glance over the top of the paper, folded in four, to thecorner where we were sitting, and from us his eyes travelled to a prettyminiature of Jeanne as a child, which hung over the mantelpiece. 

What comparisons, what memories, what regrets, what hopes werestruggling in his mind? I know not, but I know he sighed, and had not webeen there I believe he would have wept. 

To me Jeanne showed herself simple as a child, wise and thoughtful asa woman. A new feeling was growing every instant within me, of perfectrest of heart; the certainty of happiness for all my life to come. 

Yes, my happiness travelled beyond the present, as I looked into thefuture and saw along series of days passed by her side; and while shespoke to me, tranquil, confident, and happy too, I thought I saw thegreat wings of my dream closing over and enfolding us. 

We spoke in murmurs. The open window let in the warm evening air and theconfused roar of the city. 

"I am to be your friend and counsellor?" said she. 

"Always. "

"You promise that you will ask my advice in all things, and that weshall act in concert?"

"I do. "

"If this very first evening I ask you for a proof of this, you won't beangry?"

"On the contrary. "

"Well, from what you have told me of your uncle, you seem to haveaccepted the second condition, of making up your quarrel, ratherlightly. "

"I have only promised to do my best. "

"Yes, but my father counts upon your success. How do you intend to act?"

"I haven't yet considered. "

"That's just what I foresaw, and I thought it would perhaps be a goodthing if we considered it together. "

"Mademoiselle, I am listening; compose the plan of campaign, and I willcriticise it. "

Jeanne clasped her hands over her knees and assumed a thoughtful look. 

"Suppose you wrote to him. "

"There is every chance that he would not answer. "

"Reply paid?"

"Mademoiselle, you are laughing; you are no counsellor any longer. "

"Yes, I am. Let us be serious. Suppose you go to see him. "

"That's a better idea. He may perhaps receive me. "

"In that case you will capture him. If you can only get a man tolisten--"

"Not my uncle, Mademoiselle. He will listen, and do you know what hisanswer will be?"

"What?"

"This, or something like it: 'My worthy nephew, you have come to tellme two things, have you not? First, that you are about to marry aParisienne; secondly, that you renounce forever the family practice. You merely confirm and aggravate our difference. You have taken a stepfurther backward. It was not worth while your coming out of your way totell me this, and you may return as soon as you please. '"

"You surprise me. There must be some way of getting at him, if he isreally good-hearted, as you say. If I could see your uncle I should soonfind out a way. "

"If you could see him! Yes, that would be the best way of all; itcouldn't help succeeding. He imagines you as a flighty Parisienne; he isafraid of you; he is more angry with me for loving you than for refusingto carry on his practice. If he could only see you, he would soonforgive me. "

"You think so?"

"I'm sure of it. "

"Do you think that if I were to look him in the face, as I now look atyou, and to say to him: 'Monsieur Mouillard, will you not consent to mybecoming your niece?' do you think that then he would give in?"

"Alas! Mademoiselle, why can not it be tried?"

"It certainly is difficult, but I won't say it can not. "

We explained, or rather Jeanne explained, the case to M. Charnot, who isassuredly her earliest and most complete conquest. At first he cried outagainst the idea. He said it was entirely my business, a family matterin which he had no right to interfere. She insisted. She carried hisscruples by storm. She boldly proposed a trip to Bourges, and a visit toM. Mouillard. She overflowed with reasons, some of them rather weak, butall so prettily urged! A trip to Bourges would be delightful--somethingso novel and refreshing! Had M. Charnot complained on the previousevening, or had he not, of having to stop in Paris in the heat ofAugust? Yes, he had complained, and quite right too, for his colleaguesdid not hesitate to leave their work and rush off to the country. Thenshe cited examples: one off to the Vosges, another at Arcachon, yetanother at Deauville. And she reminded him, too, that a certain oldlady, one of his old friends of the Faubourg St. Germain, lived only afew miles out of Bourges, and had invited him to come and see her, shedidn't know how many times, and that he had promised and promised andnever kept his word. Now he could take the opportunity of going on fromBourges to her chateau. Finally, as M. Charnot continued to urge thesingularity of such behavior, she replied:

"My dear father! not at all; in visiting Monsieur Mouillard you will beonly fulfilling a social duty. "

"How so, I should like to know?"

"He paid you a visit, and you will be returning it!"

M. Charnot tossed his head, like a father who, though he may not beconvinced, yet admits that he is beaten. 

As for me, Jeanne, I'm beginning to believe in the fairies again. 

CHAPTER XVIII. A COOL RECEPTION

August 3d. 

I have made another visit to the Rue de l'Universite. They have decidedto make the trip. I leave for Bourges tomorrow, a day in advance of M. And Mademoiselle Charnot, who will arrive on the following morning. 

I am sent on first to fulfil two duties: to engage comfortable rooms atthe hotel--first floor with southern aspect--and then to see my uncleand prepare him for his visitors. 

I am to prepare him without ruffling him. Jeanne has sketched my planof campaign. I am to be the most affectionate of nephews, though he showhimself the crustiest of uncles; to prevent him from recurring to thepast, to speak soberly of the present, to confess that MademoiselleCharnot is aware of my feelings for her, and shows herself not entirelyinsensible to them; but I am to avoid giving details, and must put off afull explanation until later, when we can study the situation together. M. Mouillard can not fail to be appeased by such deference, and toobserve a truce while I hint at the possibility of a family council. Then, if these first advances are well received, I am to tell him thatM. Charnot is actually travelling in the neighborhood, and, withoutgiving it as certain, I may add that if he stops at Bourges he may liketo return my uncle's visit. 

There my role ends. Jeanne and M. Charnot will do the rest. It is withJeanne, by the light of her eyes and her smile, that M. Mouillard is "tostudy the situation;" he will have to struggle against the redoubtablearguments of her youth and beauty. Poor man!

Jeanne is full of confidence. Her father, who has learned his lessonfrom her, feels sure that my uncle will give in. Even I, who can notentirely share this optimism, feel that I incline to the side of hope. 

When I reached home, the porter handed me two cards from Larive. On thefirst I read:

 CH. LARIVE, Managing Clerk. P. P. C. 

The second, on glazed cardboard, announced, likewise in initials, another piece of news:

 CH. LARIVE, Formerly Managing Clerk. P. F. P. M. 

So the Parisian who swore he could not exist two days in the countryis leaving Paris. That was fated. He is about to be married; I'm sureI don't object. The only consequence to me is that we never shall meetagain, and I shall not weep over that. 

 BOURGES, August 4th. 

If you have ever been in Bourges, you may have seen the little RueSous-les-Ceps, the Cours du Bat d'Argent and de la Fleur-de-lys, theRues de la Merede-Dieu, des Verts-Galants, Mausecret, du Moulin-le-Roi, the Quai Messire-Jacques, and other streets whose ancient names, preserved by a praiseworthy sentiment or instinctive conservatism, betoken an ancient city still inhabited by old-fashioned people, bywhich I mean people attached to the soil, strongly marked with the stampof the provincial in manners as in language; people who understand allthat a name is to a street--its honor, its spouse if you will, fromwhich it must not be divorced. 

My Uncle Mouillard, most devoted and faithful citizen of Bourges, naturally lives in one of these old streets, the Rue du Four, within theshadow of the cathedral, beneath the swing of its chimes. 

Within fifteen minutes after my arrival at Bourges I was pulling thedeer's foot which hangs, depilated with long use, beside his door. Itwas five o'clock, and I knew for certain that he would not be at home. When the courts rise, one of the clerks carries back his papers tothe office, while he moves slowly off, his coat-tails flapping in thebreeze, either to visit a few friends and clients, respectable dames whowere his partners in the dance in the year 1840, or more often to takea "constitutional" along the banks of the Berry Canal, where, in thepoplar shade, files of little gray donkeys are towing string afterstring of big barges. 

So I was sure not to meet him. 

Madeleine opened the door to me, and started as if shot. 

"Monsieur Fabien!"

"Myself, Madeleine. My uncle is not at home?"

"No, Monsieur. Do you really mean to come in, Monsieur?"

"Why not?"

"The master's so changed since his visit to Paris, Monsieur Fabien!"

Madeleine stood still, with one hand holding up her apron, the otherhanging, and gazed at me with reproachful anxiety. 

"I must come in, Madeleine. I have a secret to tell you. "

She made no answer, but turned and walked before me into the house. 

It was not thus that I used to be welcomed in days gone by! ThenMadeleine used to meet me at the station. She used to kiss me, and tellme how well I looked, promising the while a myriad sweet dishes whichshe had invented for me. Hardly did I set foot in the hall before myuncle, who had given up his evening walk for my sake, would run out ofhis study, heart and cravat alike out of their usual order at seeingme--me, a poor, awkward, gaping schoolboy: Today that is ancienthistory. To-day I am afraid to meet my uncle, and Madeleine is afraid tolet me in. 

She told me not a word of it, but I easily guessed that floods of tearshad streamed from her black eyes down her thin cheeks, now pale as wax. Her face is quite transparent, and looks as if a tiny lamp were lightingit from within. There are strong feelings, too, beneath that impassivemask. Madeleine comes from Bayonne, and has Spanish blood in her. I haveheard that she was lovely as a girl of twenty. With age her featureshave grown austere. She looks like a widow who is a widow indeed, andher heart is that of a grandmother. 

She glided before me in her slippers to that realm of peace and silence, her kitchen. I followed her in. Two things that never found entrancethere are dust and noise. A lonely goldfinch hangs in a wicker cage fromthe rafters, and utters from time to time a little shrill call. His noteand the metallic tick-tick of Madeleine's clock alone enliven the silentflight of time. She sat down in the low chair where she knits afterdinner. 

"Madeleine, I am about to be married; did you know it?"

She slowly shook her head. 

"Yes, in Paris, Monsieur Fabien; that's what makes the master sounhappy. "

"You will soon see her whom I have chosen, Madeleine. "

"I do not think so, Monsieur Fabien. "

"Yes, yes, you will; and you will see that it is my uncle who is in thewrong. "

"I have not often known him in the wrong. "

"That has nothing to do with it. My marriage is fully decided upon, andall I want is to get my uncle's consent to it. Do you understand? I wantto make friends with him. "

Madeleine shook her head again. 

"You won't succeed. "

"My dear Madeleine!"

"No, Monsieur Fabien, you won't succeed. "

"He must be very much changed, then!"

"So much that you could hardly believe it; so much that I can hardlykeep myself from changing too. He, who had such a good appetite, now hasnothing but fads. It's no good my cooking him dainties, or buying himearly vegetables; he never notices them, but looks out of the window asI come in at the door with a surprise for him. In the evening he oftenforgets to go out in the garden, and sits at table, his elbows on hisrumpled napkin, his head between his hands, and what he thinks of hekeeps to himself. If I try to talk of you--and I have tried, MonsieurFabien--he gets up in a rage, and forbids me to open my mouth on thesubject. The house is not cheerful, Monsieur Fabien. Every one noticeshow he has changed; Monsieur Lorinet and his lady never enter the doors;Monsieur Hublette and Monsieur Horlet come and play dummy, looking allthe time as if they had come for a funeral, thinking it will please themaster. Even the clients say that the master treats them like dogs, andthat he ought to sell his practice. "

"Then it isn't sold?"

"Not yet, but I think it will be before long. "

"Listen to me, Madeleine; you have always been good and devoted to me;I am sure you still are fond of me; do me one last service. You mustmanage to put me up here without my uncle knowing it. "

"Without his knowing it, Monsieur Fabien!"

"Yes, say in the library; he never goes in there. From there I can studyhim, and watch him, without his seeing me, since he is so irritable andso easily upset, and as soon as you see an opportunity I shall make useof it. A sign from you, and down I come. "

"Really, Monsieur Fabien--"

"It must be done, Madeleine; I must manage to speak to him before teno'clock to-morrow morning, for my bride is coming. "

"The Parisienne? She coming here!"

"Yes, with her father, by the train which gets in at six minutes pastnine to-morrow. "

"Good God! is it possible?"

"To see you, Madeleine; to see my uncle, to make my peace with him. Isn't it kind of her?"

"Kind? Monsieur Fabien! I tremble to think of what will happen. All thesame, I shall be glad to have a sight of your young lady, of course. "

And so we settled that Madeleine was not to say a word to my uncle aboutmy being in Bourges, within a few feet of him. If she perceived anybreak in the gloom which enveloped M. Mouillard, she was to let me know;if I were obliged to put off my interview to the morrow, and to pass thenight on the sofa-bed in the library, she was to bring me something toeat, a rug, and "the pillow you used in your holidays when you were aboy. "

I was installed then in the big library on the first-floor, adjoiningthe drawing-room, its other door opening on the passage opposite M. Mouillard's door, and its two large windows on the garden. What a lookof good antique middle-class comfort there was about it, from thefloor of bees'-waxed oak, with its inequalities of level, to thefour bookcases with glass doors, surmounted by four bronzed busts ofHerodotus, Homer, Socrates, and Marmontel! Nothing had been moved; thebooks were still in the places where I had known them for twenty years;Voltaire beside Rousseau, the Dictionary of Useful Knowledge, and Rollin's Ancient History, the slim, well bound octavos of theMeditations of St. Ignatius, side by side with an enormous quarto onveterinary surgery. 

The savage arrows, said to be poisoned, which always used to frightenme so much, were still arranged like a peacock's tail over themantel-shelf, each end of which was adorned by the same familiar lumpsof white coral. The musical-box, which I was not allowed to touch tillI was eighteen, still stood in the left-hand corner, and on thewriting-table, near the little blotting-book that held the note-paper, rose, still majestic, still turning obedient to the touch within itsgraduated belts, the terrestrial globe "on which are marked the threevoyages of Captain Cook, both outward and homeward. " Ah, captain, howoften have we sailed those voyages together! What grand headway wemade as we scoured the tropics in the heel of the trade-wind, our shipthreading archipelagoes whose virgin forests stared at us in wonder, alltheir strange flowers opening toward us, seeking to allure us and put usto sleep with their dangerous perfumes. But we always guessed the snare, we saw the points of the assegais gleaming amid the tall grasses; yougave the word in your full, deep voice, and our way lay infinite beforeus; we followed it, always on the track of new lands, new discoveries, until we reached the fatal isle of Owhyhee, the spot where thisterrestrial globe is spotted with a tear--for I wept over you, mycaptain, at the age when tears unlock themselves and flow easily from aheart filled with enchantment!

Seven o'clock sounded from the cathedral; the garden door slammed to; myuncle was returning. 

I saw him coming down the winding path, hat in hand, with bowed head. He did not stop before his graftings; he passed the clump of petuniaswithout giving them that all-embracing glance I know so well, theglance of the rewarded gardener. He gave no word of encouragement to theChinese duck which waddled down the path in front of him. 

Madeleine was right. The time was not ripe for reconciliation; and more, it would need a great deal of sun to ripen it. O Jeanne, if only youwere here!

"Any one called while I've been out?"

This, by the way, is the old formula to which my uncle has always beenfaithful. I heard Madeleine answer, with a quaver in her voice:

"No, nobody for you, sir. "

"Someone for you, then? A lover, perhaps, my faithful Madeleine? Theworld is so foolish nowadays that even you might take it into yourhead to marry and leave me. Come, serve my dinner quickly, and if thegentleman with the decoration calls--you know whom I mean?"

"The tall, thin gentleman?"

"Yes. Show him into the drawing-room. "

"A gentleman by himself into the drawing-room?

"No, sir, no. The floor was waxed only yesterday, and the furniture'snot yet in order. "

"Very well! I'll see him in here. "

My uncle went into the dining-room underneath me, and for twenty minutesI heard nothing more of him, save the ring of his wineglass as he struckon it to summon Madeleine. 

He had hardly finished dinner when there came a ring at the street door. Some one asked for M. Mouillard, the gentleman with the decoration, Isuppose, for Madeleine showed him in, and I could tell by the noise ofhis chair that my uncle had risen to receive his visitor. 

They sat down and entered into conversation. An indistinct murmurreached me through the ceiling. Occasionally a clearer sound struck myear, and I thought I knew that high, resonant voice. It was no doubtdelusion, still it beset me there in the silence of the library, haunting my thoughts as they wandered restlessly in search ofoccupation. I tried to recollect all the men with fluty voices that Ihad ever met in Bourges: a corn-factor from the Place St. Jean; Rollet, the sacristan; a fat manufacturer, who used to get my uncle to draw uppetitions for him claiming relief from taxation. I hunted feverishly inmy memory as the light died away from the windows, and the towers of St. Stephen's gradually lost the glowing aureole conferred on them by thesetting sun. 

After about an hour the conversation grew heated. 

My uncle coughed, the flute became shrill. I caught these fragments oftheir dialogue. 

"No, Monsieur!"

"Yes, Monsieur!"

"But the law?"

"Is as I tell you. "

"But this is tyranny!"

"Then our business is at an end. "

Apparently it was not, though; for the conversation gradually sank downthe scale to a monotonous murmur. A second hour passed, and yet a third. What could this interminable visit portend?

It was near eleven o'clock. A ray from the rising moon shone between thetrees in the garden. A big black cat crept across the lawn, shaking itswet paws. In the darkness it looked like a tiger. In my mind's eye I sawMadeleine sitting with her eyes fixed on her dead hearth, telling herbeads, her thoughts running with mine: "It is years since MonsieurMouillard was up at such an hour. " Still she waited, for never had anyhand but hers shot the bolt of the street door; the house would not beshut if shut by any other than herself. 

At last the dining-room door opened. "Let me show you a light; take careof the stairs. "

Then followed the "Good-nights" of two weary voices, the squeaking ofthe big key turning in the lock, a light footstep dying away in thedistance, and my uncle's heavy tread as he went up to his bedroom. Thebusiness was over. 

How slowly my uncle went upstairs! The burden of sorrow was nometaphor in his case. He, who used to be as active as a boy, could nowhardly-support his own weight. 

He crossed the landing and went into his room. I thought of following, him; only a few feet lay between us. No doubt it was late, but hisexcited state might have predisposed him in my favor. Suddenly I hearda sigh--then a sob. He was weeping; I determined to risk all and rush tohis assistance. 

But just as I was about to leave the library a skirt rustled against thewall, though I had heard no sound of footsteps preceding it. At the sameinstant a little bit of paper was slipped in under the door--a letterfrom the silent Madeleine. I unfolded the paper and saw the followingwords written across from one corner to the other, with a contempt forFrench spelling, which was thoroughly Spanish:

 "Ni allais pat ceux soire. "

Very well, Madeleine, since that's your advice, I'll refrain. 

I lay down to sleep on the sofa. Yet I was very sorry for the delay. Ihated to let the night go by without being reconciled to the poor oldman, or without having attempted it at least. He was evidently verywretched to be affected to tears, for I had never known him to weep, even on occasions when my own tears had flowed freely. Yet I followed myold and faithful friend's advice, for I knew that she had the peace ofthe household as much at heart as I; but I felt that I should seek longand vainly before I could discover what this latest trouble was, andwhat part I had in it. 

CHAPTER XIX. JEANNE THE ENCHANTRESS

 BOURGES, August 5th. 

I woke up at seven; my first thought was for M. Mouillard. Where couldhe be? I listened, but could hear no sound. I went to the window; theoffice-boy was lying flat on the lawn, feeding the goldfish in thefountain. This proved beyond a doubt that my uncle was not in. 

I went downstairs to the kitchen. 

"Well, Madeleine, has he gone out?"

"He went at six o'clock, Monsieur Fabien. "

"Why didn't you wake me?"

"How could I guess? Never, never does he go out before breakfast. Inever have seen him like this before, not even when his wife died. "

"What can be the matter with him?"

"I think it's the sale of the practice. He said to me last night, atthe fool of the staircase: 'I am a brokenhearted man, Madeleine, abroken-hearted man. I might have got over it, but that monsterof ingratitude, that cannibal'--saving your presence, MonsieurFabien--'would not have it so. If I had him here I don't know what Ishould do to him. '"

"Didn't he tell you what he would do to the cannibal?"

"No. So I slipped a little note under your door when I went upstairs. "

"Yes. I am much obliged to you for it. Is he any calmer this morning?"

"He doesn't look angry any longer, only I noticed that he had beenweeping. "

"Where is he?"

"I don't know at all. Besides, you might as well try to catch up with adeer as with him. "

"That's true. I'd better wait for him. When will he be in?"

"Not before ten. I can tell you that it's not once a year that he goesout like this in the morning. "

"But, Madeleine, Jeanne will be here by ten!"

"Oh, is Jeanne her name?"

"Yes. Monsieur Charnot will be here, too. And my uncle, whom I was tohave prepared for their visit, will know nothing about it, nor even thatI slept last night beneath his roof. "

"To tell the truth, Monsieur Fabien, I don't think you've managed well. Still, there is Dame Fortune, who often doesn't put in her word till thelast moment. "

"Entreat her for me, Madeleine, my dear. "

But Dame Fortune was deaf to prayers. My uncle did not return, and Icould find no fresh expedient. As I made my way, vexed and unhappy, tothe station, I kept asking myself the question that I had been turningover in vain for the last hour:

"I have said nothing to Monsieur Mouillard. Had I better say anythingnow to Monsieur Charnot?"

My fears redoubled when I saw Jeanne and M. Charnot at the windows ofthe train, as it swept past me into the station. 

A minute later she stepped on to the platform, dressed all in gray, withroses in her cheeks, and a pair of gull's wings in her hat. 

M. Charnot shook me by the hand, thoroughly delighted at having escapedfrom the train and being able to shake himself and tread once more thesolid earth. He asked after my uncle, and when I replied that he was inexcellent health, he went to get his luggage. 

"Well!" said Jeanne. "Is all arranged?"

"On the contrary, nothing is. "

"Have you seen him?"

"Not even that. I have been watching for a favorable opportunity withoutfinding one. Yesterday evening he was busy with a visitor; this morninghe went out at six. He doesn't even know that I am in Bourges. "

"And yet you were in his house?"

"I slept on a sofa in his library. "

She gave me a look which was as much as to say, "My poor boy, how veryunpractical you are!"

"Go on doing nothing, " she said; "that's the best you can do. If myfather didn't think he was expected he would beat a retreat at once. "

At this instant, M. Charnot came back to us, having seen his two trunksand a hatbox placed on top of the omnibus of the Hotel de France. 

"That is where you have found rooms for us?"

"Yes, sir. "

"It is now twelve minutes past nine; tell Monsieur Mouillard that weshall call upon him at ten o'clock precisely. "

I went a few steps with them, and saw them into the omnibus, which waswhirled off at a fast trot by its two steeds. 

When I had lost them from my sight I cast a look around me, and noticedthree people standing in line beneath the awning, and gazing upon mewith interest. I recognized Monsieur, Madame, and Mademoiselle Lorinet. They were all smiling with the same look of contemptuous mockery. I bowed. The man alone returned my salute, raising his hat. By somestrange freak of fate, Berthe was again wearing a blue dress. 

I went back in the direction of the Rue du Four, happy, though atmy wits' end, forming projects that were mutually destructive; nowexpatiating in the seventh heaven, now loading myself with the mostappalling curses. I slipped along the streets, concealed beneath myumbrella, for the rain was falling; a great storm-cloud had burst overBourges, and I blessed the rain which gave me a chance to hide my face. 

From the banks of the Voizelle to the old quarter around the cathedralis a rather long walk. When I turned from the Rue Moyenne, the Boulevarddes Italiens of Bourges, into the Rue du Four, a blazing sun wasdrying the rain on the roofs, and the cuckoo clock at M. Festuquet's--aneighbor of my uncle--was striking the hour of meeting. 

I had not been three minutes at the garden door, a key to which had beengiven me by Madeleine, when M. Charnot appeared with Jeanne on his arm. 

"To think that I've forgotten my overshoes, which I never fail to takewith me to the country!"

"The country, father?" said Jeanne, "why, Bourges is a city!--"

"To be sure--to be sure, " answered M. Charnot, who feared he had hurt myfeelings. 

He put on his spectacles and began to study the old houses around him. 

"Yes, a city; really quite a city. "

I do not remember what commonplace I stammered. 

Little did I care for M. Charnot's overshoes or the honor of Bourges atthat moment! On the other side of the wall, a few feet off, I felt thepresence of M. Mouillard. I reflected that I should have to open thedoor and launch the Academician, without preface, into the presenceof the lawyer, stake my life's happiness, perhaps, on my uncle's firstimpressions, play at any rate the decisive move in the game which hadbeen so disastrously opened. 

Jeanne, though she did her best to hide it, was extremely nervous. Ifelt her hand tremble in mine as I took it. 

"Trust in God!" she whispered, and aloud: "Open the door. "

I turned the key in the lock. I had arranged that Madeleine should go atonce to M. Mouillard and tell him that there were some strangers waitingin the garden. But either she was not on the lookout, or she did not atonce perceive us, and we had to wait a few minutes at the bottom of thelawn before any one came. 

I hid myself behind the trees whose leafage concealed the wall. 

M. Charnot was evidently pleased with the view before him, and turnedfrom side to side, gently smacking his lips like an epicure. And, intruth, my uncle's garden was perfection; the leaves, washed by therain, were glistening in the fulness of their verdure, great drops werefalling from the trees with a silvery tinkle, the petunias in the bedswere opening all their petals and wrapping us in their scent; thebirds, who had been mute while the shower lasted, were now fluttering, twittering, and singing beneath the branches. I was like one bewitched, and thought these very birds were discussing us. The greenfinch said:

"Old Mouillard, look! Here's Princess Goldenlocks at your garden gate. "

The tomtit said:

"Look out, old man, or she'll outwit you. "

The blackbird said:

"I have heard of her from my grandfather, who lived in the ChampsElysees. She was much admired there. "

The swallow said:

"Jeanne will have your heart in the time it takes me to fly round thelawn. "

The rook, who was a bit of a lawyer, came swooping down from thecathedral tower, crying:

"Caw, caw, caw! Let her show cause--cause!"

And all took up the chorus:

"If you had our eyes, Monsieur Mouillard, you would see her looking atyour study; if you had our ears, you would hear her sigh; if you had ourwings, you would fly to Jeanne. "

No doubt it was this unwonted concert which attracted Madeleine'sattention. We saw her making her way, stiffly and slowly, toward thestudy, which stood in the corner of the garden. 

M. Mouillard's tall figure appeared on the threshold, filling up theentire doorway. 

"In the garden, did you say? Whatever is your idea in showing clientsinto the garden? Why did you let them in?"

"I didn't let them in; they came in of themselves. "

"Then the door can't have been shut. Nothing is shut here. I'll havethem coming in next by the drawing-room chimney. What sort of people arethey?"

"There's a gentleman and a young lady whom I don't know. "

"A young lady whom you don't know--a judicial separation, I'llwarrant--it's indecent, upon my word it is. To think that there arepeople who come to me about judicial separations and bring their youngladies with them!"

As Madeleine fled before the storm and found shelter in her kitchen, my uncle smoothed back his white hair with both his hands--a survivingtouch of personal vanity--and started down the walk around thegrass-plot. 

I effaced myself behind the trees. M. Charnot, thinking I was justbehind him, stepped forward with airy freedom. 

My uncle came down the path with a distracted air, like a manoverwhelmed with business, only too pleased to snatch a moment's leisurebetween the parting and the coming client. He always loved to pass forbeing overwhelmed with work. 

On his way he flipped a rosebud covered with blight, kicked off a snailwhich was crawling on the path; then, halfway down the path, he suddenlyraised his head and gave a look at his disturber. 

His bent brows grew smooth, his eyes round with the stress of surprise. 

"Is it possible? Monsieur Charnot of the Institute!"

"The same, Monsieur Mouillard. "

"And this is Mademoiselle Jeanne?"

"Just so; she has come with me to repay your kind visit. "

"Really, that's too good of you, much too good, to come such a way tosee me!"

"On the contrary, the most natural thing in the world, considering whatthe young people are about. "

"Oh! is your daughter about to be married?"

"Certainly, that's the idea, " said M. Charnot, with a laugh. 

"I congratulate you, Mademoiselle!"

"I have brought her here to introduce her to you, Monsieur Mouillard, asis only right. "

"Right! Excuse me, no. "

"Indeed it is. "

"Excuse me, sir. Politeness is all very well in its way, but franknessis better. I went to Paris chiefly to get certain information which youwere good enough to give me. But, really, it was not worth your while tocome from Paris to Bourges to thank me, and to bring your daughter too. "

"Excuse me in my turn! There are limits to modesty, Monsieur Mouillard, and as my daughter is to marry your nephew, and as my daughter was inBourges, it was only natural that I should introduce her to you. "

"Monsieur, I have no longer a nephew. "

"He is here. "

"And I never asked for your daughter. "

"No, but you have received your nephew beneath your roof, andconsequently--"

"Never!"

"Monsieur Fabien has been in your house since yesterday; he told you wewere coming. "

"No, I have not seen him; I never should have received him! I tell you Ino longer have a nephew! I am a broken man, a--a--a--"

His speech failed him, his face became purple, he staggered andfell heavily, first in a sitting posture, then on his back, and laymotionless on the sanded path. 

I rushed to the rescue. 

When I got up to him Jeanne had already returned from the littlefountain with her handkerchief dripping, and was bathing his templeswith fresh water. She was the only one who kept her wits about her. Madeleine had raised her master's head and was wailing aloud. 

"Alas!" she said, "it's that dreadful colic he had ten years ago whichhas got him again. Dear heart! how ill he was! I remember how it cameon, just like this, in the garden. "

I interrupted her lamentations by saying:

"Monsieur Charnot, I think we had better take Monsieur Mouillard up tobed. "

"Then why don't you do it?" shouted the numismatist, who had completelylost his temper. "I didn't come here to act at an ambulance; but, sinceI must, do you take his head. "

I took his head, Madeleine walked in front, Jeanne behind. My uncle'svast proportions swayed between M. Charnot and myself. M. Charnot, whohad skilfully gathered up the legs, looked like a hired pallbearer. 

As we met with some difficulty in getting upstairs, M. Charnot said, with clenched teeth:

"You've managed this trip nicely, Monsieur Fabien; I congratulate yousincerely!"

I saw that he intended to treat me to several variations on this theme. 

But there was no time for talk. A moment later my uncle was laid, stillunconscious, upon his bed, and Jeanne and Madeleine were preparing amustard-plaster together, in perfect harmony. M. Charnot and I waitedin silence for the doctor whom we had sent the office-boy to fetch. M. Charnot studied alternately my deceased aunt's wreath oforange-blossoms, preserved under a glass in the centre of thechimney-piece, and a painting of fruit and flowers for which it wouldhave been hard to find a buyer at an auction. Our wait for the doctorlasted ten long minutes. We were very anxious, for M. Mouillard showedno sign of returning consciousness. Gradually, however, the remediesbegan to act upon him. The eyelids fluttered feebly; and just as thedoctor opened the door, my uncle opened his eyes. 

We rushed to his bedside. 

"My old friend, " said the doctor, "you have had plenty of people to lookafter you. Let me feel your pulse--rather weak; your tongue? Say a wordor two. "

"A shock--rather sudden--" said my uncle. 

The doctor, following the direction of the invalid's eyes, which werefixed on Jeanne, upright at the foot of the bed, bowed to the younggirl, whom he had not at first noticed; turned to me, who blushed likean idiot; then looked again at my uncle, only to see two big tearsrunning down his cheeks. 

"Yes, I understand; a pretty stiff shock, eh? At our age we should onlybe stirred by our recollections, emotions of bygone days, somethingwe're used to; but our children take care to provide us with fresh ones, eh?"

M. Mouillard's breast heaved. 

"Come, my dear fellow, " proceeded the doctor; "I give you leave to giveyour future niece one kiss, and that in my presence, that I may be quitesure you don't abuse the license. After that you must be left quitealone; no more excitement, perfect rest. "

Jeanne came forward and raised the invalid's head. 

"Will you give me a kiss, uncle?"

She offered him her rosy cheek. 

"With all my heart, " said my uncle as he kissed her; "good girl--deargirl. "

Then he melted into tears, and hid his face in his pillow. 

"And now we must be left alone, " said the doctor. 

He came down himself in a moment, and gave us an encouraging account ofthe patient. 

Hardly had the street door closed behind him when we heard the lawyer'spowerful voice thundering down the stairs. 

"Charnot!"

The old numismatist flew up the flight of stairs. 

"Did you call me, Monsieur?"

"Yes, to invite you to dinner. I couldn't say the words just now, but itwas in my mind. "

"It is very kind of you, but we leave at nine o'clock. "

"I dine at seven; that's plenty of time. "

"It will tire you too much. "

"Tire me? Why, don't you think I dine everyday?"

"I promise to come and inquire after you before leaving. "

"I can tell you at once that I am all right again. No, no, it shallnever be said that you came all the way from Paris to Bourges only tosee me faint. I count upon you and Mademoiselle Jeanne. "

"On all three of us?"

"That makes three, with me; yes, sir. "

"Excuse me, four. "

"I hope the fourth will have the sense to go and dine elsewhere. "

"Come, come, Monsieur Mouillard; your nephew, your ward--"

"I ceased to be his guardian four years ago, and his uncle three weeksago. "

"He longs to put an end to this ill feeling--"

"Allow me to rest a little, " said M. Mouillard, "in order that I may bein a better condition to receive my guests. "

He lay down again, and showed clearly his intention of saying notanother word on the subject. 

During the conversation between M. Charnot and my uncle, to which we hadlistened from the foot of the staircase, Jeanne, who had a moment beforebeen rejoicing over the completeness of the victory which she thoughtshe had achieved, grew quite downhearted. 

"I thought he had forgiven you when he kissed me, " she said. "What canwe do now? Can't you help us, Madeleine?"

Madeleine, whose heart was beginning to warm to Jeanne, sought vainlyfor an expedient, and shook her head. 

"Ought he to go and see his uncle?" asked Jeanne. 

"No, " said Madeleine. 

"Well, suppose you write to him, Fabien?"

Madeleine nodded approval, and drew from the depths of her cupboard alittle glass inkstand, a rusty penholder, and a sheet of paper, at thetop of which was a dove with a twig in its beak. 

"My cousin at Romorantin died just before last New Year's Day, " sheexplained; "so I had one sheet more than I needed. "

I sat down at the kitchen table with Jeanne leaning over me, readingas I wrote. Madeleine stood upright and attentive beside the clock, forgetting all about her kitchen fire as she watched us with her blackeyes. 

This is what I wrote beneath the dove:

 "MY DEAR UNCLE:

 "I left Paris with the intention of putting an end to the misunderstanding between us, which has lasted only too long, and which has given me more pain than you can guess. I had no possible opportunity of speaking to you between five o'clock yesterday afternoon, when I arrived here, and ten o'clock this morning. If I had been able to speak with you, you would not have refused to restore me to your affection, which, I confess, I ought to have respected more than I have. You would have given your consent to my, union, on which depends your own happiness, my dear uncle, and that of your nephew, "FABIEN. "

"Rather too formal, " said Jeanne. "Now, let me try. "

And the enchantress added, with ready pen:

"It is I, Monsieur Mouillard, who am chiefly in need of forgiveness. Mine is the greater fault by far. You forbade Monsieur Fabien to loveme, and I took no steps to prevent his doing so. Even yesterday, whenhe came to your house, it was my doing. I had assured him that your kindheart would not be proof against his loving confession. 

"Was I really wrong in that?

"The words that you spoke just now have led me to hope that I was not. 

"But if I was wrong, visit your anger on me alone. Forgive your nephew, invite him to dinner instead of us, and let me depart, regretting onlythat I was not judged worthy of calling you uncle, which would have beenso pleasant and easy a name to speak. 

 "JEANNE. "

I read the two letters over aloud. Madeleine broke into sobs as shelistened. 

A smile flickered about the corners of Jeanne's mouth. 

We left the house, committing to Madeleine the task of choosing afavorable moment to hand M. Mouillard our joint entreaty. 

And here I may as well confess that from the instant we got out of thehouse, all through breakfast at the hotel, and for a quarter of an hourafter it, M. Charnot treated me, in his best style, to the very hottest"talking-to" that I had experienced since my earliest youth. He endedwith these words: "If you have not made your peace with your uncle bynine o'clock this evening, Monsieur, I withdraw my consent, and we shallreturn to Paris. "

I strove in vain to shake his decision. Jeanne made a little face at me, which warned me I was on the wrong track. 

"Very well, " I said to her, "I leave the matter in your hands. "

"And I leave it in the hands of God, " she answered. "Be a man. Iftrouble awaits us, hope will at any rate steal us a happy hour or two. "

We were just then in front of the gardens of the Archbishop's palace, soM. Charnot walked in. The current of his reflections was soon changedby the freshness of the air, the groups of children playing around theirmothers--whom he studied ethnologically and with reference to theracial divisions of ancient Gaul--by the beauty of the landscape--itsforeground of flowers, the Place St. Michel beyond, and further yet, above the barrack-roofs, the line of poplars lining the Auron. He ceasedto be a father-in-law, and became a tourist again. 

Jeanne stepped with airy grace among the groups of strollers, and themurmurs which followed her path, though often envious, sounded none theless sweetly in my ears for that. I hoped to meet Mademoiselle Lorinet. 

After we had seen the gardens, we had to visit the Place Seraucourt, theCours Chanzy, the cathedral, Saint-Pierrele-Guillard, and the house ofJacques-Coeur. It was six o'clock by the time we got back to the Hotelde France. 

A letter was waiting for us in the small and badly furnishedentrance--hall. It was addressed to Mademoiselle Jeanne Charnot. 

I recognized at once the ornate hand of M. Mouillard, and grew as whiteas the envelope. 

M. Charnot cried, excitedly:

"Read it, Jeanne. Read it, can't you!"

Jeanne alone of us three kept a brave face. 

She read:

 "MY DEAR CHILD:

 "I treated you perhaps with undue familiarity this morning, at a moment when I was not quite myself. Nevertheless, now that I have regained my senses, I do not withdraw the expressions of which I made use--I love you with all my heart; you are a dear girl. 

 "You will not get an old stager like me to give up his prejudices against the capital. Let it suffice that I have surrendered to a Parisienne. My niece, I forgive him for your sake. 

 "Come this evening, all three of you. 

 "I have several things to tell you, and several questions to ask you. My news is not all good. But I trust that all regrets will be overwhelmed in the gladness you will bring to my old heart. 

 "BRUTUS MOUILLARD. "

When we rang at M. Mouillard's door, it was opened to us by Baptiste, the office-boy, who waits at table on grand occasions. 

My uncle received us in the large drawing-room, in full dress, with hiswhitest cravat and his most camphorous frock-coat: "not a moth in tenyears, " is Madeleine's boast concerning this garment. 

He saluted us all solemnly, without his usual effusiveness; bearinghimself with simple and touching dignity. Strong emotion, which excitesmost natures, only served to restrain his. He said not a word of thepast, nor of our marriage. This, the decisive engagement, opened withpolite formalities. 

I have often noticed this phenomenon; people meeting to "have it out"usually begin by saying nothing at all. 

M. Mouillard offered his arm to Jeanne, to escort her to thedining-room. Jeanne was in high spirits. She asked him question afterquestion about Bourges, its dances, fashions, manufactures, even aboutthe procedure of its courts. 

"I am sure you know that well, uncle, " she said. 

"Uncle" smiled at each question, his face illumined with a glow likethat upon a chimney-piece when someone is blowing the fire. He answeredher questions, but presently fell into a state of dejection, which evenhis desire to do honor to his guests could not entirely conceal. Histhoughts betrayed themselves in the looks he kept casting upon me, nolonger of anger, but of suffering, almost pleading, affection. 

M. Charnot, who was rather tired, and also absorbed in Madeleine's featsof cookery, cast disjointed remarks and ejaculations into the gaps inthe conversation. 

I knew my uncle well enough to feel sure that the end of the dinnerwould be quite unlike the beginning. 

I was right. During dessert, just as the Academician was singing thepraises of a native delicacy, 'la forestine', my uncle, who had beenrevolving a few drops of some notable growth of Medoc in his glass forthe last minute or two, stopped suddenly, and put down his glass on thetable. 

"My dear Monsieur Charnot, " said he, "I have a painful confession tomake to you. "

"Eh? What? My dear friend, if it's painful to you, don't make it. "

"Fabien, " my uncle went on, "has behaved badly to me on certainoccasions. But I say no more of it. His faults are forgotten. But I havenot behaved to him altogether as I should. "

"You, uncle?"

"Alas! It is so, my dear child. My practice, the family practice, whichI faithfully promised your father to keep for you--"

"You have sold it?"

My uncle buried his face in his hands. 

"Last night, my poor child, only last night!"

"I thought so. "

"I was weak I listened to the prompting of anger; I have compromisedyour future. Fabien, forgive me in your turn. "

He rose from the table, and came and put a trembling hand on myshoulder. 

"No, uncle, you've not compromised anything, and I've nothing to forgiveyou. "

"You wouldn't take the practice if I could still offer it to you?"

"No, uncle. "

"Upon your word?"

"Upon my word!"

M. Mouillard drew himself up, beaming:

"Ah! Thank you for that speech, Fabien; you have relieved me of a greatweight. "

With one corner of his napkin he wiped away two tears, which, havingarisen in time of war, continued to flow in time of peace. 

"If Mademoiselle Jeanne, in addition to all her other perfections, brings you fortune, Fabien, if your future is assured--"

"My dear Monsieur Mouillard, " broke in the Academician withill-concealed satisfaction. "My colleagues call me rich. They slanderme. Works on numismatics do not make a man rich. Monsieur Fabien, whomade some investigations into the subject, can prove it to you. No; Ipossess no more than an honorable competence, which does not give meeverything, but lets me lack nothing. "

"Aurea mediocritas, " exclaimed my uncle, delighted with his quotation. "Oh, that Horace! What a fellow he was!"

"He was indeed. Well, as I was saying, our daily bread is assured; butthat's no reason why my son-in-law should vegetate in idleness which Ido not consider my due, even at my age. "

"Quite right. "

"So he must work. "

"But what is he to work at?"

"There are other professions besides the law, Monsieur Mouillard. Ihave studied Fabien. His temperament is somewhat wayward. With specialtraining he might have become an artist. Lacking that early mouldinginto shape, he never will be anything more than a dreamer. "

"I should not have expressed it so well, but I have often thought thesame. "

"With a temperament like your nephew's, " continued M. Charnot, "the besthe can do is to enter upon a career in which the ideal has some part;not a predominant, but a sufficient part, something between prose andpoetry. "

"Let him be a notary, then. "

"No, that's wholly prose; he shall be a librarian. "

"A librarian?"

"Yes, Monsieur Mouillard; there are a few little libraries in Paris, which are as quiet as groves, and in which places are to be got that areas snug as nests. I have some influence in official circles, and thatcan do no harm, you know. "

"Quite so. "

"We will put our Fabien into one of those nests, where he will beprotected against idleness by the little he will do, and againstrevolutions by the little he will be. It's a charming profession; thevery smell of books is improving; merely by breathing it you live anintellectual life. "

"An intellectual life!" exclaimed my uncle with enthusiasm. "Yes, anintellectual life!"

"And cataloguing books, Monsieur Mouillard, looking through them, preserving them as far as possible from worms and readers. Don't youthink that's an enviable lot?"

"Yes, more so than mine has been, or my successor's will be. "

"By the way, uncle, you haven't told us who your successor is to be. "

"Haven't I, really? Why, you know him; it's your friend Larive. "

"Oh! That explains a great deal. "

"He is a young man who takes life seriously. "

"Very seriously, uncle. Isn't he about to be married?"

"Why, yes; to a rich wife. "

"To whom?"

"My dear boy, he is picking up all your leavings; he is going to marryMademoiselle Lorinet. "

"He was always enterprising! But, uncle, it wasn't with him you wereengaged yesterday evening?"

"Why not, pray?"

"You told Madeleine to admit a gentleman with a decoration. "

"He has one. "

"Good heavens! What is it?"

"The Nicham Iftikar, if it please you. "

 [A Tunisian order, which can be obtained for a very moderate sum. ]

"It doesn't displease me, uncle, and surprises me still less. Larivewill die with his breast more thickly plastered with decorations thanan Odd Fellow's; he will be a member of all the learned societies in thedepartment, respected and respectable, the more thoroughly provincialfor having been outrageously Parisian. Mothers will confide theiranxieties to him, and fathers their interests; but when his oldacquaintances pass this way they will take the liberty of smiling in hisface. "

"What, jealous? Are you jealous of his bit of ribbon?"

"No, uncle, I regret nothing; not even Larive's good fortune. "

M. Mouillard fixed his eyes on the cloth, and began again, after amoment's silence:

"I, Fabien, do regret some things. It will be mournful at times, growingold alone here. Yet, after all, it will be some consolation to me tothink that you others are satisfied with life, to welcome you here foryour holidays. "

"You can do better than that, " said M. Charnot. "Come and grow oldamong us. Your years will be the lighter to bear, Monsieur Mouillard. Doubtless we must always bear them, and they weigh upon us and bend ourbacks. But youth, which carries its own burden so lightly, can alwaysgive us a little help in bearing ours. "

I looked to hear my uncle break out with loud objections. 

"It is a fine night, " he said, simply; "let us go into the garden, anddo you decide whether I can leave roses like mine. "

M. Mouillard took us into the garden, pleased with himself, with me, with Jeanne, with everybody, and with the weather. 

It was too dark to see the roses, but we could smell them as we passed. I had taken Jeanne's arm in mine, and we went on in front, in the cooldusk, choosing all the little winding paths. 

The birds were all asleep. But the grasshoppers, crickets, and allmanner of creeping things hidden in the grass, or in the moss on thetrees, were singing and chattering in their stead. 

Behind us, at some distance--in fact, as far off as we could manage--thegravel crackled beneath the equal tread of the two elders, and in amurmur we could catch occasional scraps of sentences:

"A granddaughter like Jeanne, Monsieur Charnot. .. . "

"A grandson like Fabien, Monsieur Mouillard. .. . "

CHAPTER XX. A HAPPY FAMILY

 PARIS, September 18th. 

We are married. We are just back from the church. We have said good-byto all our friends, not without a quick touch or two of sadness, asquickly swallowed up in the joy which for the first time in the historyof my heart is surging there at full tide, and widening to a limitlesshorizon. In the two hours I have to spare before starting for Italy, Iam writing the last words in this brown diary, which I do not intend totake with me. 

Jeanne, my own Jeanne, is leaning upon me and reading over my shoulder, which distracts the flow of my recollections. 

There were crowds at the church. The papers had put us down among thefashionable marriages of the week. The Institute, the army, men ofletters, public officials, had come out of respect for M. Charnot;lawyers of Bourges and Paris had come out of respect for my uncle. Butthe happiest, the most radiant, next to ourselves, were the peoplewho came only for Jeanne's sake and mine; Sylvestre Lampron, painter-in-ordinary to Mademoiselle Charnot, bringing his pretty sketchas a wedding-present; M. Flamaran and Sidonie; Jupille, who wept as heused to "thirty years ago;" and M. And Madame Plumet, who took it inturns to carry their white-robed infant. 

Jeanne and I certainly shook hands with a good many persons, but notwith nearly as many as M. Mouillard. Clean-shaven, his cravat tied withexquisite care, he spun round in the crowd like a top, always draggingwith him some one who was to introduce him to some one else. "One shouldmake acquaintances immediately on arrival, " he kept saying. 

Yes, Uncle Mouillard has just arrived in Paris; he has settled down nearus on the Quai Malaquais, in a pretty set of rooms which Jeanne chosefor him. He thinks them perfect because she thought they would do. Thetastes and interests of old student days have suddenly reawakened withinhim, and will not be put to sleep again. He already knows the omnibusand tramway lines better than I; he talks of Bourges as if it weretwenty years since he left it: "When I used to live in the country, Fabien--"

My father-in-law has found in him a whole-hearted admirer, perhaps evena future pupil in numismatics. Their friendship makes me think of that--

 ["You don't mind, Jeanne?"

 "Of course not, my dear; the brown diary is for our two selves alone. " J. ]--of that of the town mouse and the country mouse. Just now, on theirway back to the house, they had a conversation, by turns pathetic andjovial, in which their different temperaments met in the same feeling, but at opposite ends of the scale of its shades. 

I caught this fragment of their talk:

"My dear Charnot, can you guess what I'm thinking about?"

"No, I haven't the least idea. "

"I think it is very queer. "

"What is queer?"

"To see a librarian begin his career with a blot of ink. For you can notdeny that Fabien's marriage and situation, and my return to the capital, are all due to that. It must have been sympathetic ink--eh?"

"'Felix culpa', as you say, Monsieur Mouillard. There are some blundersthat are lucky; but you can't tell which they are, and that's never anyexcuse for committing them. "

I could hardly get hold of Lampron for a moment in the crowd he sodislikes. He was more uncouth and more devoted than ever. 

"Well, are you happy?" he said. 

"Quite. "

"When you're less happy, come and see me. "

"We shall always be just as happy as we are now, " said Jeanne. 

And I think she is right. 

Lampron smiled. 

"Yes, I am quite happy, Sylvestre, and I owe my happiness to you, toher, and to others. I have done nothing myself to deserve happinessbeyond letting myself drift on the current of life. Whenever I tried torow a stroke the boat nearly upset. Everything that others tried to dofor me succeeded. I can't get over it. Just think of it yourself. I owedmy introduction to Jeanne to Monsieur Flamaran, who drove me to call onher father; his friend; you courted her for me by painting her portrait;Madame Plumet told her you had done so, and also removed the obstaclein my path. I met her in Italy, thanks entirely to you; and you clinchedthe proposal which had been begun by Flamaran. To crown all, the verysituation I desired has been obtained for me by my father-in-law. Whathave I had to do? I have loved, sorrowed, and suffered, nothing more;and now I tremble at the thought that I owe my happiness to every one Iknow except myself. "

"Cease to tremble, my friend; don't be surprised at it, and don't alteryour system in the least. Your happiness is your due; what matter howGod chooses to grant it? Suppose it is an income for life paid to youby your relatives, your friends, the world in general, and the naturalorder of things? Well, draw your dividends, and don't bother about wherethey come from. "

Since Lampron said so, and he is a philosopher, I think I had betterfollow his advice. If you don't mind, Jeanne, I will cherish no ambitionbeyond your love, and refrain from running after any increase in wealthor reputation which might prove a decrease in happiness. If you agree, Jeanne, we shall see little of society, and much of our friends; weshall not open our windows wide enough for Love, who is winged, to flyout of them. If such is your pleasure, Jeanne, you shall direct thehousehold of your own sweet will--I should say, of your sweet wisdom;you shall be queen in all matters of domestic economy, you shall ruleour goings-out and our comings-in, our visits, our travels. I shallleave you to guide me, as a child, along the joyous path in which Ifollow your footsteps. I am looking up at Jeanne. She has not said "No. "

 ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

 All that a name is to a street--its honor, its spouse Came not in single spies, but in battalions Distrust first impulse Felix culpa Happy men don't need company Hard that one can not live one's life over twice He always loved to pass for being overwhelmed with work I don't call that fishing If trouble awaits us, hope will steal us a happy hour or two Lends--I should say gives Men forget sooner Natural only when alone, and talk well only to themselves Obstacles are the salt of all our joys One doesn't offer apologies to a man in his wrath People meeting to "have it out" usually say nothing at first Silence, alas! is not the reproof of kings alone Skilful actor, who apes all the emotions while feeling none Sorrows shrink into insignificance as the horizon broadens Surprise goes for so much in what we admire The very smell of books is improving The looks of the young are always full of the future There are some blunders that are lucky; but you can't tell To be your own guide doubles your pleasure You a law student, while our farmers are in want of hands You must always first get the tobacco to burn evenly You ask Life for certainties, as if she had any to give you