Works of Honore De Balzac

by Honoré de Balzac

  “Besides, she’s taken herself off,” said Viollet.

  If any one ever betrayed astonishment it was Plissoud when he beheld the usurer of Blangy sitting at one of the tables, and more occupied in watching him, Plissoud, than in noticing the quarrel that was going on. In spite of himself, the sheriff allowed his face to show the species of bewilderment which a man feels at an unexpected meeting with a person whom he hates and is plotting against, and he speedily withdrew into the billiard-room.

  “Adieu, Pere Socquard,” said Rigou.

  “I’ll get your carriage,” said the innkeeper; “take your time.”

  “How shall I find out what those fellows have been saying over their pool?” Rigou was asking himself, when he happened to see the waiter’s face in the mirror beside him.

  The waiter was a jack at all trades; he cultivated Socquard’s vines, swept out the cafe and the billiard-room, kept the garden in order, and watered the Tivoli, all for fifty francs a year. He was always without a jacket, except on grand occasions; usually his sole garments were a pair of blue linen trousers, heavy shoes, and a striped velvet waistcoat, over which he wore an apron of homespun linen when at work in the cafe or billiard-room. This apron, with strings, was the badge of his functions. The fellow had been hired by Socquard at the last annual fair; for in this valley, as throughout Burgundy, servants are hired in the market-place by the year, exactly as one buys horses.

  “What’s your name?” said Rigou.

  “Michel, at your service,” replied the waiter.

  “Doesn’t old Fourchon come here sometimes?”

  “Two or three times a week, with Monsieur Vermichel, who gives me a couple of sous to warn him if his wife’s after them.”

  “He’s a fine old fellow, Pere Fourchon; knows a great deal and is full of good sense,” said Rigou, paying for his lemonade and leaving the evil-smelling place when he saw Pere Socquard leading his horse round.

  Just as he was about to get into the carriage, Rigou noticed the chemist crossing the square and hailed him with a “Ho, there, Monsieur Vermut!” Recognizing the rich man, Vermut hurried up. Rigou joined him, and said in a low voice: —

  “Are there any drugs that can eat into the tissue of the skin so as to produce a real disease, like a whitlow on the finger, for instance?”

  “If Monsieur Gourdon would help, yes,” answered the little chemist.

  “Vermut, not a word of all this, or you and I will quarrel; but speak of the matter to Monsieur Gourdon, and tell him to come and see me the day after to-morrow. I may be able to procure him the delicate operation of cutting off a forefinger.”

  Then, leaving the little man thoroughly bewildered, Rigou got into the carriole beside Marie Tonsard.

  “Well, you little viper,” he said, taking her by the arm when he had fastened the reins to a hook in front of the leathern apron which closed the carriole and the horse had started on a trot, “do you think you can keep Bonnebault by giving way to such violence? If you were a wise girl you would promote his marriage with that hogshead of stupidity and take your revenge afterwards.”

  Marie could not help smiling as she answered: —

  “Ah, how bad you are! you are the master of us all in wickedness.”

  “Listen to me, Marie; I like the peasants, but it won’t do for any one of you to come between my teeth and a mouthful of game. Your brother Nicolas, as Aglae said, is after La Pechina. That must not be; I protect her, that girl. She is to be my heiress for thirty thousand francs, and I intend to marry her well. I know that Nicolas, helped by your sister Catherine, came near killing the little thing this morning. You are to see your brother and sister at once, and say to them: ‘If you let La Pechina alone, Pere Rigou will save Nicolas from the conscription.’”

  “You are the devil incarnate!” cried Marie. “They do say you’ve signed a compact with him. Is that true?”

  “Yes,” replied Rigou, gravely.

  “I heard it, but I didn’t believe it.”

  “He has guaranteed that no attacks aimed at me shall hurt me; that I shall never be robbed; that I shall live a hundred years and succeed in everything I undertake, and be as young to the day of my death as a two-year old cockerel — ”

  “Well, if that’s so,” said Marie, “it must be devilishly easy for you to save my brother from the conscription — ”

  “If he chooses, that’s to say. He’ll have to lose a finger,” returned Rigou. “I’ll tell him how.”

  “Look out, you are taking the upper road!” exclaimed Marie.

  “I never go by the lower at night,” said the ex-monk.

  “On account of the cross?” said Marie, naively.

  “That’s it, sly-boots,” replied her diabolical companion.

  They had reached a spot where the high-road cuts through a slight elevation of ground, making on each side of it a rather steep slope, such as we often see on the mail-roads of France. At the end of this little gorge, which is about a hundred feet long, the roads to Ronquerolles and to Cerneux meet and form an open space, in the centre of which stands a cross. From either slope a man could aim at a victim and kill him at close quarters, with all the more ease because the little hill is covered with vines, and the evil-doer could lie in ambush among the briers and brambles that overgrow them. We can readily imagine why the usurer did not take that road after dark. The Thune flows round the little hill; and the place is called the Close of the Cross. No spot was ever more adapted for revenge or murder, for the road to Ronquerolles continues to the bridge over the Avonne in front of the pavilion of the Rendezvous, while that to Cerneux leads off above the mail-road; so that between the four roads, — to Les Aigues, Ville-aux-Fayes, Ronquerolles, and Cerneux, — a murderer could choose his line of retreat and leave his pursuers in uncertainty.

  “I shall drop you at the entrance of the village,” said Rigou when they neared the first houses of Blangy.

  “Because you are afraid of Annette, old coward!” cried Marie. “When are you going to send her away? you have had her now three years. What amuses me is that your old woman still lives; the good God knows how to revenge himself.”

  CHAPTER IV. THE TRIUMVIRATE OF VILLE-AUX-FAYES

  The cautious usurer compelled his wife and Jean to go to bed and to rise by daylight; assuring them that the house would never be attacked if he sat up till midnight, and he never himself rose till late. Not only had he thus secured himself from interruption between seven at night and five the next morning but he had accustomed his wife and Jean to respect his morning sleep and that of Hagar, whose room was directly behind his.

  So, on the following morning, about half past six, Madame Rigou, who herself took care of the poultry-yard with some assistance from Jean, knocked timidly at her husband’s door.

  “Monsieur Rigou,” she said, “you told me to wake you.”

  The tones of that voice, the attitude of the woman, her frightened air as she obeyed an order the execution of which might be ill-received, showed the utter self-abnegation in which the poor creature lived, and the affection she still bore to her petty tyrant.

  “Very good,” replied Rigou.

  “Shall I wake Annette?” she asked.

  “No, let her sleep; she has been up half the night,” he replied, gravely.

  The man was always grave, even when he allowed himself to jest. Annette had in fact opened the door secretly to Sibilet, Fourchon, and Catherine Tonsard, who all came at different hours between eleven and two o’clock.

  Ten minutes later Rigou, dressed with more care than usual, came downstairs and greeted his wife with a “Good-morning, my old woman,” which made her happier than if counts had knelt at her feet.

  “Jean,” he said to the ex-lay-brother, “don’t leave the house; if any one robs me it will be worse for you than for me.”

  By thus mingling mildness and severity, hopes and rebuffs, the clever egoist kept his three slaves faithful and close at his heels, like dogs.

  Taking the upper-r
oad, so-called, to avoid the Close of the Cross, Rigou reached the square of Soulanges about eight o’clock.

  Just as he was fastening his rein to the post nearest the little door with three steps, a blind opened and Soudry showed his face, pitted with the small-pox, which the expression of his small black eyes rendered crafty.

  “Let’s begin by taking a crust here before we start,” he said; “we sha’n’t get breakfast at Ville-aux-Fayes before one o’clock.”

  Then he softly called a servant-girl, as young and pretty as Annette, who came down noiselessly, and received his order for ham and bread; after which he went himself to the cellar and fetched some wine.

  Rigou contemplated for the hundredth time the well-known dining-room, floored in oak, with stuccoed ceiling and cornice, its high wainscot and handsome cupboards finely painted, its porcelain stone and magnificent tall clock, — all the property of Mademoiselle Laguerre. The chair-backs were in the form of lyres, painted white and highly varnished; the seats were of green morocco with gilt nails. A massive mahogany table was covered with green oilcloth, with large squares of a deeper shade of green, and a plain border of the lighter. The floor, laid in Hungarian point, was carefully waxed by Urbain and showed the care which ex-waiting-women know how to exact out of their servants.

  “Bah! it cost too much,” thought Rigou for the hundredth time. “I can eat as good a dinner in my room as here, and I have the income of the money this useless splendor would have wasted. Where is Madame Soudry?” he asked, as the mayor returned armed with a venerable bottle.

  “Asleep.”

  “And you no longer disturb her slumbers?” said Rigou.

  The ex-gendarme winked with a knowing air, and pointed to the ham which Jeannette, the pretty maid, was just bringing in.

  “That will pick you up, a pretty bit like that,” he said. “It was cured in the house; we cut into it only yesterday.”

  “Where did you find her?” said the ex-Benedictine in Soudry’s ear.

  “She is like the ham,” replied the ex-gendarme, winking again; “I have had her only a week.”

  Jeannette, still in her night-cap, with a short petticoat and her bare feet in slippers, had slipped on a bodice made with straps over the arms in true peasant fashion, over which she had crossed a neckerchief which did not entirely hide her fresh and youthful attractions, which were at least as appetizing as the ham she carried. Short and plump, with bare arms mottled red, ending in large, dimpled hands with short but well-made fingers, she was a picture of health. The face was that of a true Burgundian, — ruddy, but white about the temples, throat, and ears; the hair was chestnut; the corners of the eyes turned up towards the top of the ears; the nostrils were wide, the mouth sensual, and a little down lay along the cheeks; all this, together with a jaunty expression, tempered however by a deceitfully modest attitude, made her the model of a roguish servant-girl.

  “On my honor, Jeannette is as good as the ham,” said Rigou. “If I hadn’t an Annette I should want a Jeannette.”

  “One is as good as the other,” said the ex-gendarme, “for your Annette is fair and delicate. How is Madame Rigou, — is she asleep?” added Soudry, roughly, to let Rigou see he understood his joke.

  “She wakes with the cock, but she goes to roost with the hens,” replied Rigou. “As for me, I sit up and read the ‘Constitutionnel.’ My wife lets me sleep at night and in the morning too; she wouldn’t come into my room for all the world.”

  “It’s just the other way here,” replied Jeanette. “Madame sits up with the company playing cards; sometimes there are sixteen of them in the salon; Monsieur goes to bed at eight o’clock, and we get up at daylight — ”

  “You think that’s different,” said Rigou, “but it comes to the same thing in the end. Well, my dear, you come to me and I’ll send Annette here, and that will be the same thing and different too.”

  “Old scamp, you’ll make her ashamed,” said Soudry.

  “Ha! gendarme; you want your field to yourself! Well, we all get our happiness where we can find it.”

  Jeanette, by her master’s order, disappeared to lay out his clothes.

  “You must have promised to marry her when your wife dies,” said Rigou.

  “At your age and mine,” replied Soudry, “there’s no other way.”

  “With girls of any ambition it would be one way to become a widower,” added Rigou; “especially if Madame Soudry found fault with Jeannette for her way of scrubbing the staircase.”

  The remark made the two husbands pensive. When Jeannette returned and announced that all was ready, Soudry said to her, “Come and help me!” — a precaution which made the ex-monk smile.

  “There’s a difference, indeed!” said he. “As for me, I’d leave you alone with Annette, my good friend.”

  A quarter of an hour later Soudry, in his best clothes, got into the wicker carriage, and the two friends drove round the lake of Soulanges to Ville-aux-Fayes.

  “Look at it!” said Rigou, as they reached an eminence from which the chateau of Soulanges could be seen in profile.

  The old revolutionary put into the tone of his words all the hatred which the rural middle classes feel to the great chateaux and the great estates.

  “Yes, but I hope it will never be destroyed as long as I live,” said Soudry. “The Comte de Soulanges was my general; he did me kindness; he got my pension, and he allows Lupin to manage the estate. After Lupin some of us will have it, and as long as the Soulanges family exists they and their property will be respected. Such folks are large-minded; they let every one make his profit, and they find it pays.”

  “Yes, but the Comte de Soulanges has three children, who, at his death, may not agree,” replied Rigou. “The husband of his daughter and his sons may go to law, and end by selling the lead and iron mines to manufacturers, from whom we shall manage to get them back.”

  The chateau just then showed up in profile, as if to defy the ex-monk.

  “Ah! look at it; in those days they built well,” cried Soudry. “But just now Monsieur le Comte is economizing, so as to make Soulanges the entailed estate of his peerage.”

  “My dear friend,” said Rigou, “entailed estates won’t exist much longer.”

  When the topic of public matters was exhausted, the worthy pair began to discuss the merits of their pretty maids in terms too Burgundian to be printed here. That inexhaustible subject carried them so far that before they knew it they saw the capital of the arrondissement over which Gaubertin reigned, and which we hope excites enough curiosity in the reader’s mind to justify a short digression.

  The name of Ville-aux-Fayes, singular as it is, is explained as the corruption of the words (in low Latin) “Villa in Fago,” — the manor of the woods. This name indicates that a forest once covered the delta formed by the Avonne before it joins its confluent the Yonne. Some Frank doubtless built a fortress on the hill which slopes gently to the long plain. The savage conqueror separated his vantage-ground from the delta by a wide and deep moat and made the position a formidable one, essentially seignorial, convenient for enforcing tolls across the bridges and for protecting his rights of profit on all grains ground in the mills.

  That is the history of the beginning of Ville-aux-Fayes. Wherever feudal or ecclesiastical dominion established there we find gathered together interests, inhabitants, and, later, towns when the localities were in a position to maintain them and to found and develop great industries. The method of floating timber discovered by Jean Rouvet in 1549, which required certain convenient stations to intercept it, was the making of Ville-aux-Fayes, which, up to that time, had been, compared to Soulanges, a mere village. Ville-aux-Fayes became a storage place for timber, which covered the shores of the two rivers for a distance of over thirty miles. The work of taking out of the water, computing the lost logs, and making the rafts which the Yonne carried down to the Seine, brought together a large concourse of workmen. Such a population increased consumption and encouraged trade. Thus Ville
-aux-Fayes, which had but six hundred inhabitants at the end of the seventeenth century, had two thousand in 1790, and Gaubertin had now raised the number to four thousand, by the following means.

  When the legislative assembly decreed the new laying out of territory, Ville-aux-Fayes, which was situated where, geographically, a sub-prefecture was needed, was chosen instead of Soulanges as chief town or capital of the arrondissement. The increased population of Paris, by increasing the demand for and the value of wood as fuel, necessarily increased the commerce of Ville-aux-Fayes. Gaubertin had founded his fortune, after losing his stewardship, on this growing business, estimating the effect of peace on the population of Paris, which did actually increase by over one-third between 1815 and 1825.

  The shape of Ville-aux-Fayes followed the conformation of the ground. Each side of the promontory was lined with wharves. The dam to stop the timber from floating further down was just below a hill covered by the forest of Soulanges. Between the dam and the town lay a suburb. The lower town, covering the greater part of the delta, came down to the shores of the lake of the Avonne.

  Above the lower town some five hundred houses with gardens, standing on the heights, were grouped round three sides of the promontory, and enjoyed the varied scene of the diamond waters of the lake, the rafts in construction along its edge, and the piles of wood upon the shores. The waters, laden with timber from the river and the rapids which fed the mill-races and the sluices of a few manufactories, presented an animated scene, all the more charming because inclosed in the greenery of forests, while the long valley of Les Aigues offered a glorious contrast to the dark foil of the heights above the town itself.

  Gaubertin had built himself a house on the level of the delta, intending to make a place which should improve the locality and render the lower town as desirable as the upper. It was a modern house built of stone, with a balcony of iron railings, outside blinds, painted windows, and no ornament but a line of fret-work under the eaves, a slate roof, one story in height with a garret, a fine courtyard, and behind it an English garden bathed by the waters of the Avonne. The elegance of the place compelled the department to build a fine edifice nearly opposite to it for the sub-prefecture, provisionally lodged in a mere kennel. The town itself also built a town-hall. The law-courts had lately been installed in a new edifice; so that Ville-aux-Fayes owed to the active influence of its present mayor a number of really imposing public buildings. The gendarmerie had also built barracks which completed the square formed by the marketplace.