Cousin Pons

by Honoré de Balzac

  Héloïse, whom Bixiou, her latest lover, had brought along in a carriage, was gorgeously dressed, for she was on her way to a party given by Mariette, one of the most renowned dancers at the Opera.

  The first-floor tenant, Monsieur Chapoulot, a retired lace-maker in the rue Saint-Denis, who was just coming back from the Ambigu-Comique with his wife and daughter, was dazzled – so, even, was his wife – at meeting such a pretty creature, so beautifully dressed, on his staircase.

  ‘Who is she, Madame Cibot,’ asked Madame Chapoulot. ‘Just a nobody,’ the concierge whispered to the lace-maker’s wife. ‘A dancing-doll you can see half-naked any evening for a couple of francs.’

  ‘Victorine,’ said Madame Chapoulot to her daughter, ‘my dear, let Madame pass on ahead.’

  Héloïse well understood this cry of maternal alarm and she turned round.

  ‘Your daughter, Madame, must be more inflammable than matchwood if you’re afraid she’ll catch fire at the touch of me.’ But she gave Monsieur Chapoulot a pleasant look and a smile.

  ‘My word, she’s very fetching off stage,’ exclaimed Monsieur Chapoulot, lingering on the landing.

  Madame Chapoulot gave her husband a pinch which almost made him yelp, and pushed him into their flat.

  ‘This second floor,’ said Héloïse, ‘seems as far to climb to as a fourth floor.’

  ‘And yet,’ said La Cibot as she opened the door of the flat ‘Mademoiselle must be used to climbing staircases.’

  ‘Well, old friend,’ said Héloïse as she entered the bedroom and saw the poor musician lying there with pale, drawn features. ‘Things aren’t too good, then? We’re all anxious about you in the theatre. Our hearts are in the right place, but we’re driven off our feet, and there’s not much time to squeeze in a visit to one’s friends. Every day Gaudissart talks of coming along, but every morning he’s up to his eyes in theatre business. Still, we’re all very fond of you…’

  ‘Madame Cibot,’ said Pons, ‘have the kindness to leave me with Mademoiselle. We have theatre business to talk about, and my post as conductor of the orchestra. Schmucke will show Madame out.’

  At a sign from Pons, Schmucke took La Cibot to the door and bolted it behind her.

  ‘Oh, that rascally German! He’s getting out of hand too!’ La Cibot said to herself as she heard the significant click of the bolts. ‘It’s Pons that’s teaching him such horrible tricks. I’ll pay you out for it, my fine friends,’ she muttered as she went downstairs. ‘Well, if that dancing hussy tells him about the thousand francs, I’ll say it was just a bit of theatre clowning.’ And she sat down at Cibot’s bedside. He was complaining of burning pains in the stomach, for Rémonencq had just given him a drink while his wife was away.

  ‘My dear child,’ said Pons to the dancer as Schmucke was seeing La Cibot out. ‘I rely upon you to find me an honest notary to come here tomorrow morning at exactly half-past nine to take down my last will and testament. I’m going to leave all I have to my friend Schmucke, and if the poor man finds himself faced with legal proceedings, I rely upon this notary to advise and defend him. That is why I want a notary of high standing, well-to-do, one who will not stoop to the sharp practice to which lawyers are prone. As my heir, the poor man must be able to lean on him. I distrust Berthier, Cardot’s successor; and you know so many people that…’

  ‘Why yes! I know just the person!’ said the dancer. ‘Florine’s notary, the Comtesse de Breuil’s notary; Léopold Hannequin, an upright person who’s never even heard of women of the streets. He’s like a long-lost father, a decent sort who won’t let you play the fool with the money you’ve earned. I call him the ballet-girl’s papa, for he’s given lessons in economy to all my friends. To begin with, my dear, he has sixty thousand francs a year, besides what his practice brings in. Secondly, he’s a notary in the good old style! He walks like a notary and sleeps like a notary. He must have begotten little notaries and notar-esses. The fact is, he’s a tiresome old bore… But he wouldn’t budge an inch even with the King in person once he’s on the job. He’s never had any little minx to fleece him. He’s a family man and a fossil at that! His wife worships him and she’s never deceived him – that’s something for a notary’s wife!… What more do you want? You won’t find a better one in Paris, as notaries go. He came straight out of the Ark. Nobody’s going to get much fun out of him as Malaga did out of Cardot; but he’ll never slope off like little What’s-his-name who lived with Antonia. I’ll send him along at eight o’clock. You can sleep in peace. In any case I’m hoping you’ll get better and write some nice music for us. But you know, after all, life’s not much fun, what with producers haggling, kings niggling, ministers fiddling and rich folk tightening their belts… This is all artistes have left to them,’ she said, tapping her heart. ‘Life isn’t worth living. Good-bye, old dear!’

  ‘What I ask of you above all, Héloïse, is the greatest discretion.’

  ‘This not being a theatre matter,’ she replied, ‘it’s a secret no artiste would divulge.’

  ‘What is the name of your present benefactor, dear child?’

  ‘He’s the Mayor of your district. Monsieur Beaudoyer: as stupid a man as the late Célestin Crevel, the cosmetics dealer, one of Gaudissart’s sleeping partners. He died a few days ago, and he didn’t leave me a thing, not even a jar of face-cream! That’s what I mean when I say it’s a disgusting time we live in!’

  ‘What did he die of?’

  ‘His wife… If he’d stayed with me he’d still be alive. Good-bye, dear old thing! Don’t mind me talking about kicking the bucket. I can see you a fortnight from now, hopping along the boulevard sniffing out pretty little curios. You’re not ill – your eyes are brighter than I’ve ever seen them…’

  So the dancer went off, quite sure that Garangeot, her first cousin and protégé, was wielding his conductor’s baton for good and all.

  Every door in the house was ajar, and every household was on the watch to see the leading dancer go by. It was a great event for them.

  Fraisier, like one of those bulldogs who never let go once they have their teeth in a morsel, was stationed in the lodge with La Cibot when the dancer arrived at the street door and asked to be let out. Fraisier knew that the will had been drawn up and had come to find out what provision had been made for the concierge, for Maître Trognon had refused to say one word about the will, either to Fraisier or Madame Cibot. Naturally, the lawyer took a good look at the dancer and made up his mind to profit by this visit in extremis.

  ‘My dear Madame Cibot,’ he said, ‘this is a critical moment for you.’

  ‘For sure,’ she said. ‘Oh my poor Cibot! To think that he won’t enjoy anything I might get!’

  ‘But we must know if Monsieur Pons left you anything – in short, whether he mentioned you or left you out of his will,’ continued Fraisier. ‘I am representing the natural heirs, and in any case you’ll get nothing except through them… It’s a holograph will, and so it’s wide open to challenge… Do you know where our friend put it?’

  ‘In the secretaire drawer, and he took the key. He tied it in his handkerchief, and stuffed the handkerchief under his pillow… I saw everything.’

  ‘Is the will sealed?’

  ‘I’m afraid so.’

  ‘It’s a crime to abstract a will and destroy it, but it’s only a misdemeanour to read it… In any case, that would only be a trifling misdeed which no one would see. Does the man sleep soundly?’

  ‘Yes, but when you were going through his stuff and valuing it, he should have been sleeping like a log; yet he woke up. Never mind, I’ll see to it. Tomorrow morning I’ll go and relieve Monsieur Schmucke about four o’clock, and if you care to come along, you can see the will for ten minutes…’

  ‘Right. It’s agreed. I’ll get up about four and knock very quietly.’

  ‘I’ll warn Mademoiselle Rémonencq, who’ll be taking my place by Cibot’s bed. She’ll open the door. But tap on the window so as not to wake anybody up.�
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  ‘Agreed,’ said Fraisier. ‘There’ll be a light, won’t there? A candle will do.’

  At midnight, the poor heart-broken German was watching Pons [from his chair. The latter’s features were contorted and his cheeks had fallen in like those of a dying man; after so much mental perturbation, he looked as if he were about to expire.

  ‘I think I have just enough strength to keep going till tomorrow evening,’ said Pons philosophically. ‘No doubt, my dear Schmucke, I shall be in my death-throes tomorrow night. As soon as the notary and your two friends have gone, fetch our good Father Duplanty, the curate of Saint-François. That worthy man doesn’t know I am ill and I should like to receive the Holy Sacraments tomorrow at noon.’

  A long pause ensued.

  ‘It was not God’s will that I should have the life I dreamed of,’ Pons continued. ‘How I should have loved to have a wife, children, a family! That was my only ambition: to be cherished by one or two people, in some quiet spot. Life is bitter for everyone – I have seen people possessed of all these things which I have longed for in vain, and yet they were not happy… Then when my career was almost ended, God granted me unhoped-for consolation by giving me such a friend as you are!… So I need not blame myself for not having appreciated you at your true value, my dear Schmucke. I have loved you with all my heart and all my strength… Don’t cry, Schmucke, or I shall say no more. And I find it sweet to talk about you and me… If I had listened to you, I should have lived on. I should have given up society and my accustomed ways, and I should not have suffered these mortal injuries. Anyway, you are now my sole concern!…’

  ‘You shoult not sink of zet!’

  ‘Don’t gainsay me; listen to me, my dear friend. You are as guileless and simple as a six-year-old child who has never left his mother’s side, and I respect you for it. It seems to me that God Himself must take care of people like you. But men are so wicked that I must warn you against them. Try then to shed your noble trustfulness, your saintly credulity, God’s gracious gift to immaculate souls which is only found in men of genius or hearts like yours… You will soon be seeing Madame Cibot, who kept a close watch on us through a chink in the door. She will be coming to get hold of the spurious will – I expect the villainous woman will perform this operation in the small hours, when she believes you’re asleep. Listen carefully, and do exactly what I say. Do you understand?’

  *

  Overwhelmed with grief, and seized with alarming palpitations, Schmucke had let his head droop on to the back of his armchair and looked as if he were in a faint.

  ‘Yes. I unterstant, put tchust as if you vere two huntret yarts avay. I feel as if I vere sinkink into ze grafe viz you,’ said the German, weighed down with his sorrow.

  He then came close to Pons, took one of his hands in his, and in this posture, made a fervent mental prayer.

  ‘What’s that you are muttering in German?’

  ‘I haf peen askink Gott to take us poss togezzer,’ he answered simply, after finishing his prayer.

  Pons doubled up in pain, for his liver was causing him intolerable suffering. He managed to lean towards Schmucke and kissed him on the brow, pouring out his whole soul in blessings on this being so like the lamb resting at the foot of God’s throne.

  ‘Come, listen to me, dear Schmucke. Dying people must be obeyed!’

  ‘I am listenink.’

  ‘Your bedroom leads into mine through the little door in your alcove, which opens into one of the closets in mine.’

  ‘Yes. Put it iss schtoppt up viz picturess.’

  ‘Get the doorway free immediately – and quietly!…’

  ‘I vill.’

  ‘Clear the passage on both sides, yours and mine. Then leave your door half open. When La Cibot comes to relieve you – she may well arrive earlier than usual – you will go off to bed as usual and pretend you’re very tired. Try to look half asleep. As soon as she settles down in her chair, come through your door and stay there on the alert, drawing aside a little bit of the muslin curtain on this glazed door, and keep a good eye on what happens… Do you understand?’

  ‘I unterstant. I sink ze vicket voman vill purn ze vill.’

  ‘I don’t know what she’ll do, but I’m sure you won’t take her for an angel after this… And now, play me some music. Cheer me up with some of your improvisations… It will keep you occupied, you’ll get rid of your dismal thoughts, and you will fill this sad night for me with the poetry of your music.’

  Schmucke sat down at the piano. After a minute or two at this, his chosen instrument, musical inspiration, incited by the tremors of sorrow and the agitation it had caused, carried the good German out of this world. Wonderful themes came to him, and on them he embroidered capriccios, now rendered with the pathos and the Raphaelesque perfection of Chopin, now with the fiery, Dantesque grandeur of Liszt – those two musical techniques which come closest to those of Paganini. Such a performance, reaching such a peak of perfection, seems to put the performer on a level with the poet. He is to the composer what the actor is to the author, one who divinely translates what is divinely conceived. But on this night, as he gave Pons a foretaste of heavenly harmonies, such delicious music as might make Saint Cecilia let her instruments fall from her hands, Schmucke was at once Beethoven and Paganini, creator and interpreter! Unwearying as the nightingale, lofty as the heavens under which it sings, rich in variations like the leafy forest it floods with its warblings, he played as never before and plunged the listening musician into such ecstasy as Raphael depicts in the Saint Cecilia painting at Bologna.

  This poetry in sound was interrupted by a fearful clanging of the doorbell. The housemaid of the first-floor tenants had been sent by her employers to ask Schmucke to stop this witches’ sabbath; it had awakened Madame, Monsieur and Mademoiselle Chapoulot, she said, and they could not get to sleep again. The maid pointed out that the day was long enough for rehearsing theatre music and that people ought not to ‘bang on the piano’ at night in dwellings within the Marais!

  This happened about three in the morning. At half-past three, as exactly foreseen by Pons as if he had overheard the conference between Fraisier and La Cibot, the concierge appeared. The sick man threw a glance at his fellow-conspirator as if to say ‘I told you so,’ and settled into the posture of deep sleep.

  La Cibot had such complete faith in Schmucke’s guilelessness – such apparent innocence is a major weapon and the cause of success in all the stratagems which children devise – that she could not suspect him of lying when he came forward to her and said with an air that was at once plaintive and cheerful:

  ‘He hass hat a terriple night! He hass peen tossink apout like a temon! I vass oplitchet to play music to qvieten him town, unt ze people from ze first floor came up to schtop me… It is a shameful sink. I vass tryink to keep my frient alife. I am so tiret after playink all ze night zet I am vorn-out zis mornink.’

  ‘My poor Cibot’s in a bad state too. One more day like yesterday and there’ll be no hope… But what’s the good of fretting? It’s the Lord’s will!’

  ‘You haf so goot, so honest a heart, you are such a goot soul, zet if Papa Cibot shoult tie, ve vill lif togezzer!’ said the wily Schmucke.

  When simple, straightforward people take to deception, they are terribly thorough – exactly like children who set their little snares with a skill worthy of savages.

  ‘Oh well, get some sleep, dearie,’ said La Cibot. ‘Your eyes are so tired they’re as big as my fists. There then! The one thing that would help me to get over losing Cibot would be to think of ending my days with a good man like you! Don’t worry, I’ll give Monsieur Chapoulot something to think about!… Fancy a retired haberdasher making such a fuss!…’

  Schmucke installed himself in the observation post he had prepared.

  La Cibot had left the door of the flat ajar. Fraisier came in and shut it quietly once Schmucke had closed his own door behind him. The advocate was equipped with a lighted candle and an extremel
y fine brass wire for unsealing the will. It was all the easier for La Cibot to remove from under Pons’s pillow the handkerchief in which the key of the secretaire was tied, since the sick man had purposely let it slide out from under his bolster and was facilitating La Cibot’s manoeuvre by lying with his face to the wall in such a posture as to make it child’s play to abstract the handkerchief. She went straight to the secretaire, opened it as quietly as she could, felt for the spring of the secret drawer and slipped out into the salon with the will in her hand. Pons was highly intrigued by these manoeuvres. As for Schmucke, he was trembling from head to foot as if he had himself committed a crime.

  ‘Return to your post,’ said Fraisier as he took the will. ‘If he wakes up he must find you still there.’

  After unsealing the envelope with an adroitness which proved that this was not a first attempt, Fraisier was plunged into deep astonishment as he read this curious screed:

  THIS IS MY LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT

  On this day, the fifteenth day of April in the year of Our Lord eighteen hundred and forty-five, being of sound mind, as this testament, drawn up in concert with Monsieur Trognon, notary, will demonstrate, knowing that I must shortly die of the disease from which I have been suffering since the beginning of February last, and wishing to dispose of my goods and chattels, I have seen fit to set forth my last dispositions as follows:

  I have always been impressed by the damage done by certain inconvenient circumstances to the masterpieces of painting, often resulting in their destruction. I have been pained to see beautiful pictures condemned to be for ever moving from country to country and never being housed in one place to which admirers of these masterpieces might travel to see them. I have always thought that the truly immortal productions of the great masters should be national property, perpetually accessible to visitors from every country, just as God’s own masterpiece, the light of day, is accessible to all His children.

  Now since I have spent my life choosing and assembling certain pictures, the glorious handicraft of the greatest masters; and since these pictures are unspoilt, having been neither touched up nor repainted, it has caused me some distress to think that these paintings, which have brought me so much happiness, might be sold at auction, that they might again be dispersed as they were before I bought them, and be taken to England or Russia. I have, therefore, resolved to preserve them from such misfortune, and with them the magnificent frames which enclose them, all of them the work of skilled craftsmen.