The martial rhetoric of this eighth book annoyed him, and it seemed to him absurd that Venus should give Æneas a shield embossed with pictures of the scenes of Roman history up to the battle of Actium and the flight of Cleopatra. Patrio vocat agmina sistro. Having reached the cross-roads at the Bergères, which give toward Duroc Hill, he paused for a moment before the wine-coloured front of Maillard’s tavern, now damp, deserted and shuttered. Here the thought occurred to him that these Romans, although he had devoted his whole life to the study of them, were, after all, but terrors of pomposity and mediocrity. As he grew older and his taste became more mellowed, there was scarcely one of them that he prized, save Catullus and Petronius. But, after all, it was his business to make the best of the lot to which fate had called him. Patrio vocat agmina sistro. Would Virgil and Propertius try to make one believe, said he to himself, that the timbrel, whose shrill sound accompanied the frenzied religious dances of the priests, was also the instrument of the Egyptian soldiers and sailors? It was really incredible.
As he descended the street of the Bergères, on the side opposite Duroc Hill, he suddenly noticed the mildness of the air. Just here the road winds downward between walls of limestone, where the roots of tiny oak-trees find a difficult foothold. Here M. Bergeret was sheltered from the wind, and in the eye of the December sun which filtered down on him in a half-hearted, rayless fashion, he still murmured, but more softly: Patrio vocat agmina sistro. Doubtless Cleopatra had fled from Actium to Egypt, but still it was through the fleet of Octavius and Agrippa which tried to stop her passage.
Allured by the sweetness of air and sun, M. Bergeret sat down by the side of the road, on one of the blocks which had been quarried out of the mountain years ago, and which were now covered with a coating of black moss. Through the delicate tracery of the branches overhead he noticed the lilac hue of the sky, streaked here and there with smoke trails. Thus to plunge in lonely reverie filled his soul with peaceful sadness.
In attacking Agrippa’s galleys which blocked their way, he reflected, Antony and Cleopatra had but one object, and that was to clear a passage. It was this precise feat that Cleopatra, who raised the blockade of her sixty ships, succeeded in accomplishing. Seated in the cutting, M. Bergeret enjoyed the harmless elation of settling the fate of the world on the far-famed waves of Acarnania. Then, as he happened to throw a glance three paces in front of him, he caught sight of an old man who was sitting on a heap of dead leaves on the other side of the road and leaning against the grey wall. It was scarcely possible to distinguish between this wild figure and its surroundings, for his face, his beard and his rags were exactly the colour of the stones and the leaves. He was slowly scraping a piece of wood with an old knife-blade ground thin on the millstone of the years.
“Good-day to you, sir,” said the old fellow. “The sun is pretty. And I’ll tell you what’s more — it isn’t going to rain.”
M. Bergeret recognised the man: it was Pied d’Alouette, the tramp whom M. Roquincourt, the magistrate, had wrongly implicated in the murder that took place in Queen Marguerite’s house and whom he had imprisoned for six months in the vague hope that unforeseen charges would be laid at his door. This he did, either because he thought that the longer the imprisonment continued the more justifiable it would seem, or merely through spite against a simpleton who had misled the officers of the law. M. Bergeret, who always had a fellow-feeling for the oppressed, answered Pied d’Alouette in a kindly style that reflected the old fellow’s good-will.
“Good-day, friend,” said he. “I see that you know all the pleasant nooks. This hillside is warm and well sheltered.”
There was a moment’s silence, and then Pied d’Alouette answered:
“I know better spots than this. But they are far away from here. One mustn’t be afraid of a walk. Feet are all right. Shoes aren’t. I can’t wear good shoes because they’re strange to my feet. I only rip them up, when they give me sound ones.”
And raising his foot from the cushion of dead leaves, he pointed to his big toe sticking out, wrapped in wads of linen, through the slits in the leather of his boot.
Relapsing into silence once more, he began to polish the piece of hard wood.
M. Bergeret soon returned to his own thoughts.
Pallentem morte futura. Agrippa’s galleys could not bar the way to Antony’s purple-sailed trireme. This time, at least, the dove escaped the vulture.
But hereupon Pied d’Alouette began again:
“They have taken away my knife!”
“Who have?”
Lifting his arm, the tramp waved it in the direction of the town and gave no other answer. Yet he was following the course of his own slow thought, for presently he said:
“They never gave it back to me.”
He sat on in solemn silence, powerless to express the ideas that revolved in his darkened mind. His knife and his pipe were the only possessions he had in the world. It was with his knife that he cut the lump of hard bread and the bacon rind they gave him at farm-house doors, food which his toothless gums would not bite; it was with his knife that he chopped up cigar-ends to stuff them into his pipe; it was with his knife that he scraped out the rotten bits in fruit and with it he managed to drag out from the dung-heaps things good to eat. It was with his knife that he shaped his walking-sticks and cut down branches to make a bed of leaves for himself in the woods at night. With his knife he carved boats out of oak-bark for the little boys, and dolls out of deal for the little girls. His knife was the tool with which he practised all the arts of life, the most skilled, as well as the most homely, everyday ones. Always famished and often full of ingenuity, he not only supplied his own wants, but also made dainty reed fountains which were much admired in the town.
For, although the man would not work, he was yet a jack of all trades. When he came out of prison nothing would induce them to restore his knife to him; they kept it in the record office. And so he went on tramp once more, but now weaponless, stripped, weaker than a child, wretched wherever he went. He wept over his loss: tiny tear-drops came, that scorched his bloodshot eyes without overflowing. Then, as he went out of the town, his courage returned, for in the corner of a milestone he came upon an old knife-blade. Now he had cut a strong beechen handle for it in the woods of the Bergères, and was fitting it on with skilful hands.
The idea of his knife suggested his pipe to him. He said:
“They let me keep my pipe.”
Drawing from the woollen bag which he wore against his breast, a kind of black, sticky thimble, he showed the bowl of a pipe without the fragment of a stem.
“My poor fellow,” said M. Bergeret, “you don’t look at all like a great criminal. How do you manage to get put in gaol so often?”
Pied d’Alouette had not acquired the dialogue habit and he had no notion of how to carry on a conversation. Although he had a kind of deep intelligence, it took him some time to grasp the sense of the words addressed to him. It was practice that he lacked and at first, therefore, he made no attempt to answer M. Bergeret, who sat tracing lines with the point of his stick in the white dust of the road. But at last Pied d’Alouette said: “I don’t do any wrong things. Then I am punished for other things.”
At length he seemed able to talk connectedly, with but few breaks.
“Do you mean to say that they put you in prison for doing nothing wrong?”
“I know the people who do the wrong things, but I should do myself harm if I blabbed.”
“You herd, then, with vagabonds and evildoers?”
“You are trying to make me peach. Do you know Judge Roquincourt?”
“I know him a little. He’s rather stern, isn’t he?”
“Judge Roquincourt, he is a good talker. I never heard anyone speak so well and sc quickly. A body hasn’t time to understand him. A body can’t answer. There isn’t anybody who speaks one half as well.”
“He kept you in solitary confinement for long months and yet you bear him no grudge. What a hu
mble example of mercy and long-suffering.”
Pied d’Alouette resumed the polishing of his knife-handle. As the work progressed, he became quieter and seemed to recover his peace of mind. Suddenly he demanded:
“Do you know a man called Corbon?”
“Who is he, this Corbon?”
It was too difficult to explain. Pied d’Alouette waved his arm in a vague semicircle that covered a quarter of the horizon. Yet his mind was busy with the man he had just mentioned, for again he repeated: “Corbon.”
“Pied d’ Alouette,” said M. Bergeret, “they say you are a queer sort of vagabond and that, even when you are in absolute want, you never steal anything. Yet you live with evil-doers and you are the friend of murderers.”
Pied d’ Alouette answered:
“There are some who think one thing and others who think another. But if I myself thought of doing wrong, I should dig a hole under a tree on Duroc Hill and bury my knife at the bottom of the hole. Then I should pound down the earth on top of it with my feet. For when people have the notion of doing wrong, it’s the knife that leads them on. It’s also pride which leads them on. As for me, I lost my pride when I was a lad, for men, women and children in my own parts all made fun of me.”
“And have you never had wicked, violent thoughts?”
“Sometimes, when I came upon women alone on the roads, for the fancy I had for them. But that’s all over now.”
“And that fancy never comes back to you?”
“Time and again it does.”
“Pied d’Alouette, you love liberty and you are free. You live without toil. I call you a happy man.”
“There are some happy folks. But not me.”
“Where are these happy folks, then?”
“At the farms.”
M. Bergeret rose and slipping a ten-sou piece into Pied d’Alouette’s hand, said:
“So you fancy, Pied d’Alouette, that happiness is to be found under a roof, by the chimney-corner, or on a feather-bed. I thought you had more sense.
IV
ON New Year’s Day M. Bergeret was always in the habit of dressing himself in his black suit the first thing in the morning. Nowadays, it had lost all its gloss and the grey wintry light made it look ashen-colour. The gold medal that hung from M. Bergeret’s buttonhole by a violet riband, although it gave him a false air of splendour, testified clearly to the fact that he was no Knight of the Legion of Honour. In fact, in this dress he always felt strangely thin and poverty-stricken. Even his white tie seemed to his fancy a wretchedly paltry affair, for to tell the truth, it was not even a fresh one. At length, after vainly crumpling the front of his shirt, he recognised the fact that it is impossible to make mother-of-pearl buttons stay in buttonholes that have been stretched by long wear: at the thought he became utterly disconsolate, for he recognised the fact sorrowfully that he was no man of the world. And sitting down on a chair, he fell into a reverie:
“But, after all, does there in truth exist a world populated by men of the world? For it seems to me, indeed, that what is commonly called the world is but a cloud of gold and silver hung in the blue of heaven. To the man who has actually entered it, it seems but a mist. In fact, social distinctions are matters of much confusion. Men are drawn together in flocks by their common prejudices or their common tastes. But tastes often war against prejudices, and chance sets everything at variance. All the same, a large income and the leisure given by it tend to produce a certain style of life and special habits. This fact is the bond which links society people, and this kinship produces a certain standard which rules manners, physique and sport. Hence we derive the ‘tone’ of society. This ‘tone’ is purely superficial and for that very reason fairly perceptible. There are such things as society manners and appearances, but there is no such thing as society human nature, for what truly decides our character is passion, thought and feeling. Within us is a tribunal with which the world has no concern.”
Still, the wretched look of his shirt and tie continued to harass him, till at last he went to look at himself in the sitting-room mirror. Somehow his face assumed a far-off appearance in the glass, quite obscured as it was by an immense basket of heather festooned with ribands of red satin. The basket was of wicker, in the shape of a chariot with gilded wheels, and stood on the piano between two bags of marrons glacés. To its gilded shaft was affixed M. Roux’s card, for the basket was a present from him to Madame Bergeret.
The professor made no attempt to push aside the beribboned tufts of heather; he was satisfied with catching a glimpse of his left eye in the glass behind the flowers, and he continued to gaze at it benevolently for some little time. M. Bergeret, firmly convinced as he was that no one loved him, either in this world or in any other, sometimes treated himself to a little sympathy and pity. For he always behaved with the greatest consideration to all unhappy people, himself included. Now, dropping further consideration of his shirt and tie, he murmured to himself:
“You interpret the bosses on the shield of Æneas and yet your own tie is crumpled. You are ridiculous on both counts. You are no man of the world. You should teach yourself, then, at least, how to live the inner life and should cultivate within yourself a wealthy kingdom.”
On New Year’s Day he had always grounds for bewailing his destiny, before he set out to pay his respects to two vulgar, offensive fellows, for such were the rector and the dean. The rector, M. Leterrier, could not bear him. This feeling was a natural antipathy that grew as regularly as a plant and brought forth fruit every year. M. Leterrier, a professor of philosophy and the author of a text-book which summed up all systems of thought, had the blind dogmatic instincts of the official teacher. No doubt whatever remained in his mind touching the questions of the good, the beautiful and the true, the characteristics of which he had summarised in one chapter of his work (pages 216 to 262). Now he regarded M. Bergeret as a dangerous and misguided man, and M. Bergeret, in his turn, fully appreciated the perfect sincerity of the dislike he aroused in M. Leterrier. Nor, in fact, did he make any complaint against it; sometimes he even treated it with an indulgent smile. On the other hand, he felt abjectly miserable whenever he met the dean, M. Torquet, who never had an idea in his head, and who, although he was crammed with learning, still retained the brain of a positive ignoramus. He was a fat man with a low forehead and no cranium to speak of, who did nothing all day but count the knobs of sugar in his house and the pears in his garden, and who would go on hanging bells, even when one of his professional colleagues paid him a visit. In doing mischief he showed an activity and a something approaching intelligence which filled M. Bergeret with amazement. Such thoughts as these were in the professor’s mind, as he put on his overcoat to go and wish M. Torquet a happy New Year.
Yet he took a certain pleasure in being out of doors, for in the street he could enjoy that most priceless blessing, the liberty of the mind. In front of the Two Satyrs at the corner of the Tintelleries, he paused for a moment to give a friendly glance at the little acacia which stretched its bare branches over the wall of Lafolie’s garden.
“Trees in winter,” thought he, “take on an aspect of homely beauty that they never show in all the pomp of foliage and flowers. It is in winter that they reveal their delicate structure, that they show their charming framework of black coral: these are no skeletons, but a multitude of pretty little limbs in which life slumbers. If I were a landscape-painter...”
As he stood wrapt in these reflections, a portly man called him by name, seized his arm and walked on with him. This was M. Compagnon, the most popular of all the professors, the idolised master who gave his mathematical lectures in the great amphitheatre.
“Hullo! my dear Bergeret, happy New Year, I bet you’re going to call on the dean. So am I. We’ll walk on together.”
“Gladly,” answered M. Bergeret, “since in that way I shall travel pleasantly towards a painful goal. For I must confess it is no pleasure to me to see M. Torquet.”
On hearing this unc
alled-for confidence, M. Compagnon, whether instinctively or inadvertently it was hard to say, withdrew the hand which he had slipped under his colleague’s arm.
“Yes, yes, I know! You and the dean don’t get on very well. Yet in general he isn’t a man who is difficult to get on with.”
“In speaking to you as I have done,” answered M. Bergeret, “I was not even thinking of the hostility which, according to report, the dean persists in keeping up towards me. But it chills me to the very marrow whenever I come in contact with a man who is totally lacking in imagination of any kind. What really saddens is not the idea of injustice and hatred, nor is it the sight of human misery. Quite the contrary, in fact, for we find the misfortunes of our fellows quite laughable, if only they are shown to us from a humorous standpoint. But those gloomy souls on whom the outer world seems to make no impression, those beings who have the faculty of ignoring the entire universe — the very sight of them reduces me to distress and desperation. My intercourse with M. Torquet is really one of the most painful misfortunes of my life.”
“Just so!” said M. Compagnon. “Our college is one of the most splendid in France, on account of the high attainments of the lecturers and the convenience of the buildings. It is only the laboratories that still leave something to be desired. But let us hope that this regrettable defect will soon be remedied, thanks to the combined efforts of our devoted rector and of so influential a senator as M. Laprat-Teulet.”
“It is also desirable,” said M. Bergeret, “that the Latin lectures should cease to be given in a dark, unwholesome cellar.”
As they crossed the Place Saint-Exupère, M. Compagnon pointed to Deniseau’s house.
“We no longer,” said he, “hear any chatter about the prophetess who held communion with Saint Radegonde and several other saints from Paradise. Did you go to see her, Bergeret? I was taken to see her by Lacarelle, the préfet’s chief secretary, just at the time when she was at the height of her popularity. She was sitting with her eyes shut in an arm-chair, while a dozen of the faithful plied her with questions. They asked her if the Pope’s health was satisfactory, what would be the result of the Franco-Russian alliance, whether the income-tax bill would pass, and whether a remedy for consumption would soon be found. She answered every question poetically and with a certain ease. When my turn came, I asked her this simple question:
Complete Works of Anatole France Page 131