“Who is amusing you? Is it this lady? What post does she want?” asked this nymph, giving the manager such a glance as artist gives artist, a glance that would make a subject for a picture.
Heloise, a young woman of exceedingly literary tastes, was on intimate terms with great and famous artists in Bohemia. Elegant, accomplished, and graceful, she was more intelligent than dancers usually are. As she put her question, she sniffed at a scent-bottle full of some aromatic perfume.
“One fine woman is as good as another, madame; and if I don’t sniff the pestilence out of a scent-bottle, nor daub brickdust on my cheeks — ”
“That would be a sinful waste, child, when Nature put it on for you to begin with,” said Heloise, with a side glance at her manager.
“I am an honest woman — ”
“So much the worse for you. It is not every one by a long chalk that can find some one to keep them, and kept I am, and in slap-up style, madame.”
“So much the worse! What do you mean? Oh, you may toss your head and go about in scarves, you will never have as many declarations as I have had, missus. You will never match the Belle Ecaillere of the Cadran Bleu.”
Heloise Brisetout rose at once to her feet, stood at attention, and made a military salute, like a soldier who meets his general.
“What?” asked Gaudissart, “are you really La Belle Ecaillere of whom my father used to talk?”
“In that case the cachucha and the polka were after your time; and madame has passed her fiftieth year,” remarked Heloise, and striking an attitude, she declaimed, “‘Cinna, let us be friends.’”
“Come, Heloise, the lady is not up to this; let her alone.”
“Madame is perhaps the New Heloise,” suggested La Cibot, with sly innocence.
“Not bad, old lady!” cried Gaudissart.
“It is a venerable joke,” said the dancer, “a grizzled pun; find us another old lady — or take a cigarette.”
“I beg your pardon, madame, I feel too unhappy to answer you; my two gentlemen are very ill; and to buy nourishment for them and to spare them trouble, I have pawned everything down to my husband’s clothes that I pledged this morning. Here is the ticket!”
“Oh! here, the affair is becoming tragic,” cried the fair Heloise. “What is it all about?”
“Madame drops down upon us like — ”
“Like a dancer,” said Heloise; “let me prompt you, — missus!”
“Come, I am busy,” said Gaudissart. “The joke has gone far enough. Heloise, this is M. Pons’ confidential servant; she had come to tell me that I must not count upon him; our poor conductor is not expected to live. I don’t know what to do.”
“Oh! poor man; why, he must have a benefit.”
“It would ruin him,” said Gaudissart. “He might find next day that he owed five hundred francs to charitable institutions, and they refuse to admit that there are any sufferers in Paris except their own. No, look here, my good woman, since you are going in for the Montyon prize — — ”
He broke off, rang the bell, and the youth before mentioned suddenly appeared.
“Tell the cashier to send me up a thousand-franc note. — Sit down, madame.”
“Ah! poor woman, look, she is crying!” exclaimed Heloise. “How stupid! There, there, mother, we will go to see him; don’t cry. — I say, now,” she continued, taking the manager into a corner, “you want to make me take the leading part in the ballet in Ariane, you Turk. You are going to be married, and you know how I can make you miserable — ”
“Heloise, my heart is copper-bottomed like a man-of-war.”
“I shall bring your children on the scene! I will borrow some somewhere.”
“I have owned up about the attachment.”
“Do be nice, and give Pons’ post to Garangeot; he has talent, poor fellow, and he has not a penny; and I promise peace.”
“But wait till Pons is dead, in case the good man may come back again.”
“Oh, as to that, no, sir,” said La Cibot. “He began to wander in his mind last night, and now he is delirious. It will soon be over, unfortunately.”
“At any rate, take Garangeot as a stop-gap!” pleaded Heloise. “He has the whole press on his side — ”
Just at that moment the cashier came in with a note for a thousand francs in his hand.
“Give it to madame here,” said Gaudissart. “Good-day, my good woman; take good care of the dear man, and tell him that I am coming to see him to-morrow, or sometime — as soon as I can, in short.”
“A drowning man,” said Heloise.
“Ah, sir, hearts like yours are only found in a theatre. May God bless you!”
“To what account shall I post this item?” asked the cashier.
“I will countersign the order. Post it to the bonus account.”
Before La Cibot went out, she made Mlle. Brisetout a fine courtesy, and heard Gaudissart remark to his mistress:
“Can Garangeot do the dance-music for the Mohicans in twelve days? If he helps me out of my predicament, he shall have Pons’ place.”
La Cibot had cut off the incomes of the two friends, she had left them without means of subsistence if Pons should chance to recover, and was better rewarded for all this mischief than for any good that she had done. In a few days’ time her treacherous trick would bring about the desired result — Elie Magus would have his coveted pictures. But if this first spoliation was to be effected, La Cibot must throw dust in Fraisier’s eyes, and lull the suspicions of that terrible fellow-conspirator of her own seeking; and Elie Magus and Remonencq must be bound over to secrecy.
As for Remonencq, he had gradually come to feel such a passion as uneducated people can conceive when they come to Paris from the depths of the country, bringing with them all the fixed ideas bred of the solitary country life; all the ignorance of a primitive nature, all the brute appetites that become so many fixed ideas. Mme. Cibot’s masculine beauty, her vivacity, her market-woman’s wit, had all been remarked by the marine store-dealer. He thought at first of taking La Cibot from her husband, bigamy among the lower classes in Paris being much more common than is generally supposed; but greed was like a slip-knot drawn more and more tightly about his heart, till reason at length was stifled. When Remonencq computed that the commission paid by himself and Elie Magus amounted to about forty thousand francs, he determined to have La Cibot for his legitimate spouse, and his thoughts turned from a misdemeanor to a crime. A romantic purely speculative dream, persistently followed through a tobacco-smoker’s long musings as he lounged in the doorway, had brought him to the point of wishing that the little tailor were dead. At a stroke he beheld his capital trebled; and then he thought of La Cibot. What a good saleswoman she would be! What a handsome figure she would make in a magnificent shop on the boulevards! The twofold covetousness turned Remonencq’s head. In fancy he took a shop that he knew of on the Boulevard de la Madeleine, he stocked it with Pons’ treasures, and then — after dreaming his dream in sheets of gold, after seeing millions in the blue spiral wreaths that rose from his pipe, he awoke to find himself face to face with the little tailor. Cibot was sweeping the yard, the doorstep, and the pavement just as his neighbor was taking down the shutters and displaying his wares; for since Pons fell ill, La Cibot’s work had fallen to her husband.
The Auvergnat began to look upon the little, swarthy, stunted, copper-colored tailor as the one obstacle in his way, and pondered how to be rid of him. Meanwhile this growing passion made La Cibot very proud, for she had reached an age when a woman begins to understand that she may grow old.
So early one morning, she meditatively watched Remonencq as he arranged his odds and ends for sale. She wondered how far his love could go. He came across to her.
“Well,” he said, “are things going as you wish?”
“It is you who makes me uneasy,” said La Cibot. “I shall be talked about; the neighbors will see you making sheep’s eyes at me.”
She left the doorway and div
ed into the Auvergnat’s back shop.
“What a notion!” said Remonencq.
“Come here, I have something to say to you,” said La Cibot. “M. Pons’ heirs are about to make a stir; they are capable of giving us a lot of trouble. God knows what might come of it if they send the lawyers here to poke their noses into the affair like hunting-dogs. I cannot get M. Schmucke to sell a few pictures unless you like me well enough to keep the secret — such a secret! — With your head on the block, you must not say where the pictures come from, nor who it was that sold them. When M. Pons is once dead and buried, you understand, nobody will know how many pictures there ought to be; if there are fifty-three pictures instead of sixty-seven, nobody will be any the wiser. Besides, if M. Pons sold them himself while he was alive, nobody can find fault.”
“No,” agreed Remonencq, “it is all one to me, but M. Elie Magus will want receipts in due form.”
“And you shall have your receipt too, bless your life! Do you suppose that I should write them? — No, M. Schmucke will do that. But tell your Jew that he must keep the secret as closely as you do,” she continued.
“We will be as mute as fishes. That is our business. I myself can read, but I cannot write, and that is why I want a capable wife that has had education like you. I have thought of nothing but earning my bread all my days, and now I wish I had some little Remonencqs. Do leave that Cibot of yours.”
“Why, here comes your Jew,” said the portress; “we can arrange the whole business.”
Elie Magus came every third day very early in the morning to know when he could buy his pictures. “Well, my dear lady,” said he, “how are we getting on?”
“Has nobody been to speak to you about M. Pons and his gimcracks?” asked La Cibot.
“I received a letter from a lawyer,” said Elie Magus, “a rascal that seems to me to be trying to work for himself; I don’t like people of that sort, so I took no notice of his letter. Three days afterwards he came to see me, and left his card. I told my porter that I am never at home when he calls.”
“You are a love of a Jew,” said La Cibot. Little did she know Elie Magus’ prudence. “Well, sonnies, in a few days’ time I will bring M. Schmucke to the point of selling you seven or eight pictures, ten at most. But on two conditions. — Absolute secrecy in the first place. M. Schmucke will send for you, sir, is not that so? And M. Remonencq suggested that you might be a purchaser, eh? — And, come what may, I will not meddle in it for nothing. You are giving forty-six thousand francs for four pictures, are you not?”
“So be it,” groaned the Jew.
“Very good. This is the second condition. You will give me forty-three thousand francs, and pay three thousand only to M. Schmucke; Remonencq will buy four for two thousand francs, and hand over the surplus to me. — But at the same time, you see my dear M. Magus, I am going to help you and Remonencq to a splendid bit of business — on condition that the profits are shared among the three of us. I will introduce you to that lawyer, as he, no doubt, will come here. You shall make a valuation of M. Pons’ things at the prices which you can give for them, so that M. Fraisier may know how much the property is worth. But — not until after our sale, you understand!”
“I understand,” said the Jew, “but it takes time to look at the things and value them.”
“You shall have half a day. But, there, that is my affair. Talk it over between yourselves, my boys, and for that matter the business will be settled by the day after to-morrow. I will go round to speak to this Fraisier; for Dr. Poulain tells him everything that goes on in the house, and it is a great bother to keep that scarecrow quiet.”
La Cibot met Fraisier halfway between the Rue de la Perle and the Rue de Normandie; so impatient was he to know the “elements of the case” (to use his own expression), that he was coming to see her.
“I say! I was going to you,” said she.
Fraisier grumbled because Elie Magus had refused to see him. But La Cibot extinguished the spark of distrust that gleamed in the lawyer’s eyes by informing him that Elie Magus had returned from a journey, and that she would arrange for an interview in Pons’ rooms and for the valuation of the property; for the day after to-morrow at latest.
“Deal frankly with me,” returned Fraisier. “It is more than probable that I shall act for M. Pons’ next-of-kin. In that case, I shall be even better able to serve you.”
The words were spoken so drily that La Cibot quaked. This starving limb of the law was sure to manoeuvre on his side as she herself was doing. She resolved forthwith to hurry on the sale of the pictures.
La Cibot was right. The doctor and lawyer had clubbed together to buy a new suit of clothes in which Fraisier could decently present himself before Mme. la Presidente Camusot de Marville. Indeed, if the clothes had been ready, the interview would have taken place sooner, for the fate of the couple hung upon its issues. Fraisier left Mme. Cibot, and went to try on his new clothes. He found them waiting for him, went home, adjusted his new wig, and towards ten o’clock that morning set out in a carriage from a livery stable for the Rue de Hanovre, hoping for an audience. In his white tie, yellow gloves, and new wig, redolent of eau de Portugal, he looked something like a poisonous essence kept in a cut-glass bottle, seeming but the more deadly because everything about it is daintily neat, from the stopper covered with white kid to the label and the thread. His peremptory manner, the eruption on his blotched countenance, the green eyes, and a malignant something about him, — all these things struck the beholder with the same sense of surprise as storm-clouds in a blue sky. If in his private office, as he showed himself to La Cibot, he was the common knife that a murderer catches up for his crime, — now, at the Presidente’s door, he was the daintily-wrought dagger which a woman sets among the ornaments on her what-not.
A great change had taken place in the Rue de Hanovre. The Count and Countess Popinot and the young people would not allow the President and his wife to leave the house that they had settled upon their daughter to pay rent elsewhere. M. and Mme. la Presidente, therefore, were installed on the second floor, now left at liberty, for the elderly lady had made up her mind to end her days in the country.
Mme. Camusot took Madeleine Vivet, with her cook and her man-servant, to the second floor, and would have been as much pinched for money as in the early days, if the house had not been rent free, and the President’s salary increased to ten thousand francs. This aurea mediocritas was but little satisfactory to Mme. de Marville. Even now she wished for means more in accordance with her ambitions; for when she handed over their fortune to their daughter, she spoiled her husband’s prospects. Now Amelie had set her heart upon seeing her husband in the Chamber of Deputies; she was not one of those women who find it easy to give up their way; and she by no means despaired of returning her husband for the arrondissement in which Marville is situated. So for the past two months she had teased her father-in-law, M. le Baron Camusot (for the new peer of France had been advanced to that rank), and done her utmost to extort an advance of a hundred thousand francs of the inheritance which one day would be theirs. She wanted, she said, to buy a small estate worth about two thousand francs per annum set like a wedge within the Marville lands. There she and her husband would be near their children and in their own house, while the addition would round out the Marville property. With that the Presidente laid stress upon the recent sacrifices which she and her husband had been compelled to make in order to marry Cecile to Viscount Popinot, and asked the old man how he could bar his eldest son’s way to the highest honors of the magistracy, when such honors were only to be had by those who made themselves a strong position in parliament. Her husband would know how to take up such a position, he would make himself feared by those in office, and so on and so on.
“They do nothing for you unless you tighten a halter round their necks to loosen their tongues,” said she. “They are ungrateful. What do they not owe to Camusot! Camusot brought the House of Orleans to the throne by enforcing the ordina
nces of July.”
M. Camusot senior answered that he had gone out of his depth in railway speculations. He quite admitted that it was necessary to come to the rescue, but put off the day until shares should rise, as they were expected to do.
This half-promise, extracted some few days before Fraisier’s visit, had plunged the Presidente into depths of affliction. It was doubtful whether the ex-proprietor of Marville was eligible for re-election without the land qualification.
Fraisier found no difficulty in obtaining speech of Madeleine Vivet; such viper natures own their kinship at once.
“I should like to see Mme. la Presidente for a few moments, mademoiselle,” Fraisier said in bland accents; “I have come on a matter of business which touches her fortune; it is a question of a legacy, be sure to mention that. I have not the honor of being known to Mme. la Presidente, so my name is of no consequence. I am not in the habit of leaving my chambers, but I know the respect that is due to a President’s wife, and I took the trouble of coming myself to save all possible delay.”
The matter thus broached, when repeated and amplified by the waiting-maid, naturally brought a favorable answer. It was a decisive moment for the double ambition hidden in Fraisier’s mind. Bold as a petty provincial attorney, sharp, rough-spoken, and curt as he was, he felt as captains feel before the decisive battle of a campaign. As he went into the little drawing-room where Amelie was waiting for him, he felt a slight perspiration breaking out upon his forehead and down his back. Every sudorific hitherto employed had failed to produce this result upon a skin which horrible diseases had left impervious. “Even if I fail to make my fortune,” said he to himself, “I shall recover. Poulain said that if I could only perspire I should recover.”
The Presidente came forward in her morning gown.
“Madame — ” said Fraisier, stopping short to bow with the humility by which officials recognize the superior rank of the person whom they address.
Works of Honore De Balzac Page 746