The Yellow Sign & Other Stories

by Robert W. Chambers

  He took her in his arms; “Hush, what are you saying? Look,— look out at the sunlight, the meadows and the streams. We shall be very happy in so bright a world.”

  She turned to the sunlight. From the window, the world below seemed very fair to her.

  Trembling with happiness, she sighed: “Is this the world? Then I have never known it.”

  “Nor have I, God forgive me,” he murmured.

  Perhaps it was our gentle Lady of the Fields who forgave them both.

  Rue Barrée

  “For let Philosopher and Doctor preach Of what they will and what they will not,—each Is but one link in an eternal chain That none can slip nor break nor over-reach.”

  “Crimson nor yellow roses nor The savour of the mounting sea Are worth the perfume I adore That clings to thee.” . “The languid-headed lilies tire, The changeless waters weary me; I ache with passionate desire Of thine and thee.” . “There are but these things in the world— Thy mouth of fire, Thy breasts, thy hands, thy hair upcurled And my desire.”

  I

  ONE morning at Julian’s, a student said to Selby; “that is Foxhall Clifford,” pointing with his brushes at a young man who sat before an easel, doing nothing. Selby, shy and nervous, walked over and began: “My name is Selby,—I have just arrived in Paris, and bring a letter of introduc- tion—” His voice was lost in the crash of a falling easel, the owner of which promptly assaulted his neighbor, and for a time the noise of battle rolled through the studios of MM. Boulanger and Lefebvre, presently subsiding into a scuffle on the stairs outside. Selby, appre- hensive as to his own reception in the studio, looked at Clifford, who sat serenely watching the fight.

  “It’s a little noisy here,” said Clifford, “but you will like the fellows when you know them.” His unaffected manner delighted Selby. Then with a simplicity that won his heart, he presented him to half a dozen students of as many nationalities. Some were cordial, all were polite. Even the majestic creature who held the position of Massier, unbent enough to say: “My friend, when a man speaks French as well as you do, and is also a friend of Monsieur Clifford, he will have no trouble in this studio. You expect, of course, to fill the stove until the next new man comes?”

  “Of course.”

  “And you don’t mind chaff?”

  “No,” replied Selby. who hated it.

  Clifford, much amused, put on his hat, saying, “You must expect lots of it at first.

  Selby placed his own hat on his head and followed him to the door. As they passed the model stand there was a furious cry of “Chapeau! Chapeau!” and a student sprang from his easel menacing Selby, who reddened but looked at Clifford.

  “Take off your hat for them,” said the latter, laughing. A little embarrassed, he turned and saluted the studio. “Et moi?” cried the model.

  “You are charming,” replied Selby, astonished at his own audacity, but the studio rose as one man, shouting: “He has done well! he’s all right!” while the model, laughing, kissed her hand to him and cried: “À demain beau jeune homme!”

  All that week Selby worked at the studio unmolested. The French students christened him “l’Enfant Prodigue,” which was freely translated, “The Prodigious Infant,” The Kid,”

  “Kid Selby,” and “Kidby,’’ to “Kidney,” and then naturally to “Tidbits” where it was arrested by Clifford’s authority and ultimately relapsed to “Kid.”

  Wednesday came, and with it M. Boulanger. For three hours the students writhed under his biting sarcasms,—among the others Clifford, who was informed that he knew even less about a work of art than he did about the art of work. Selby was more fortunate. The professor examined his drawing in silence, looked at him sharply, and passed on with a noncommittal gesture. He presently departed arm in arm with Bouguereau, to the relief of Clifford who was then at liberty to jam his hat on his head and depart.

  The next day, he did not appear, and Selby, who had counted on seeing him at the studio, a thing which he learned later it was vanity to count on, wandered back to the Latin Quarter alone.

  Paris was still strange and new to him. He was vaguely troubled by its splendor. No tender memories stirred his American bosom at the Place du Châtelet, nor even by Notre Dame. The Palais de Justice with its clock and turrets and stalking sentinels in blue and vermilion, the Place St. Michel with its jumble of omnibuses and ugly water-spitting griffins, the hill of the Boulevard St. Michel, the tooting trams, the policemen dawdling two by two, and the table-lined terraces of the Café Vachette, were nothing to him, as yet, nor did he even know, when he stepped from the stones of the Place St. Michel to the asphalt of the Boulevard, that he had crossed the frontier and entered the student zone,—the famous Latin Quarter.

  A cabman hailed him as “bourgeois,” and urged the superiority of driving over walking, A gamin, with an appearance of great concern, requested the latest telegraphic news from London, and then, standing on his head, invited Selby to feats of strength. A pretty girl gave him a glance from a pair of violet eyes. He did not see her, but she, catching her own reflection in a window, wondered at the color burning in her cheeks. Turning to resume her course, she met Foxhall Clifford, and hurried on. Clifford, open-mouthed, followed her with his eyes; then he looked after Selby, who had turned into the Boulevard St. Germain toward the rue de Seine. Then he examined himself in the shop window. The result seemed to be unsatisfactory. “I’m not a beauty,” he mused, “but neither am I a hobgoblin.

  What does she mean by blushing at Selby? I never before saw her look at a fellow in my life, neither has any one in the Quarter. Anyway, I can swear she never looks at me, and goodness knows I have done all that respectful adoration can do.”

  He sighed, and murmuring a prophecy concerning the salvation of his immortal soul swung into that graceful lounge which at all times characterized Clifford. With no apparent exertion, he overtook Selby at the corner, and together they crossed the sunlit Boulevard and sat down under the awning of the Café du Cercle. Clifford bowed to everybody on the terrace, saying, “You shall meet them all later, but now let me present you to two of the sights of Paris, Mr. Richard Elliott and Mr. Stanley Rowden.”

  The “sights” looked amiable and took vermouth.

  “You cut tile studio to-day,” said Elliott, suddenly turning on Clifford who avoided his eyes.

  “To commune with nature?” observed Rowden.

  “What’s her name this time?” asked Elliott, and Rowden answered promptly; “Name, Yvette; nationality, Breton—” “Wrong,” replied Clifford blandly, “its Rue Barrée.” The subject changed instantly, and Selby listened in surprise to names which were new to him, and eulogies on the latest Prix de Rome winner. He was delighted to hear opinions boldly expressed and points honestly debated, although the vehicle was mostly slang, both English and French. He longed for the time when he too should be plunged into the strife for fame.

  The bells of St. Sulpice struck the hour, and the Palace of the Luxembourg answered chime on chime. With a glance at the sun, dipping low in the golden dust behind the Palais Bourbon, they rose, and turning to the east, crossed the Boulevard St. Germain and sauntered toward the École de Medecine. At the corner a girl passed them, walking hurriedly. Clifford smirked, Elliott and Rowden were agitated, but they all bowed, and, without raising her eyes, she returned their salute. But Selby, who had lagged behind, fascinated by some gay shop window, looked up to meet two of the bluest eyes he had ever seen. The eyes were dropped in an instant, and the young fellow hastened to overtake the others.

  “By Jove,” he said, “do you fellows know I have just seen the prettiest girl—” An exclamation broke from the trio, gloomy, fore- boding. like the chorus in a Greek play.

  “Rue Barrée!”

  “What !” cried Selby, bewildered.

  The only answer was a vague gesture from Clifford.

  Two hours later, during dinner, Clifford turned to Selby and said, “You want to ask me something; I can tell by the way you fidg-
et about.”

  “Yes, I do,” he said, innocently enough; “it’s about that girl. Who is she?”

  In Rowden’s smile there was pity, in Elliott’s, bitterness. “Her name,” said Clifford solemnly, “is unknown to any one, at least,” he added with much conscientiousness, “as far as I can learn. Every fellow in the Quarter bows to her and she returns the salute gravely, but no man has ever been known to obtain more than that. Her profession, judging from her music-roll, is that of a pianist. Her residence is in a small and humble street which is kept in a perpetual process of repair by the city authorities, and from the black letters painted on the barrier which defends the street from traffic, she has taken the name by which we know her,—Rue Barrée. Mr. Rowden, in his imperfect knowledge of the French tongue, called our attention to it as Roo Barry—”

  “I didn’t,” said Rowden hotly.

  “And Roo Barry or Rue Barrée, is to-day an object of adoration to every rapin in the Quarter—”

  “We are not rapins,” corrected Elliott. “I am not,” returned Clifford, “and I beg to call to your attention, Selby, that these two gentlemen have at various and apparently unfortunate moments, offered to lay down life and limb at the feet of Rue Barrée. The lady possesses a chilling smile which she uses on such occasions and,” here he became gloomily impressive, “I have been forced to believe that neither the scholarly grace of my friend Elliott nor the buxom beauty of my friend Rowden have touched that heart of ice.”

  Elliott and Rowden, boiling with indignation, cried out, “And you!” “I,” said Clifford blandly, “do fear to tread where you rush in.”

  II TWENTY-FOUR hours later Selby had completely forgotten Rue Barrée. During the week he worked with might and main at the studio, and Saturday night found him so tired that he went to bed before dinner and had a nightmare about a river of yellow ochre in which he was drowning. Sunday morning, apropos of nothing at all, he thought of Rue Barrée and ten seconds afterwards he saw her. It was at the flower market on the marble bridge. She was examining a pot of pan- sies. The gardener had evidently thrown heart and soul into the transaction, but Rue Barrée shook her head.

  It is a question whether Selby would have stopped then and there to inspect a cabbage-rose had not Clifford unwound for him the yarn of the previous Tuesday. It is possible that his curiosity was piqued, for with the exception of a hen-turkey, a boy of nineteen is the most openly curious biped alive. From twenty until death he tries to conceal it. But, to be fair to Selby, it is also true that the market was attractive. Under a cloudless sky the flowers were packed and heaped along the marble bridge to the parapet. The air was soft, the sun spun a shadowy lacework among the palms and glowed in the hearts of a thousand roses. Spring had come,—was in full tide. The watering carts and sprinklers, spread freshness over the Boulevard, the sparrows had become vulgarly obtrusive and the credulous Seine angler anxiously followed his gaudy quill, floating among the soapsuds of the lavoirs. The white-spiked chestnuts clad in tender green, vibrated with the hum of bees. Shoddy butterflies flaunted their winter rags among the heliotrope. There was a smell of fresh earth in the air, an echo of the woodland brook in the ripple of the Seine, and swallows soared and skimmed among the anchored river craft. Somewhere in a window, a caged bird was singing its heart out to the sky.

  Selby looked at the cabbage-rose and then at the sky. Something in the song of the caged bird may have moved him, or perhaps it was that dangerous sweetness in the air of May.

  At first he was hardly conscious that he had stopped, then he was scarcely conscious why he had stopped, then he thought he would move on, then he thought he wouldn’t, then he looked at Rue Barrée.

  The gardener said; “ Mademoiselle, this is undoubtedly a fine pot of pansies.”

  Rue Barrée shook her head. The gardener smiled. She evidently did not want the pansies. She had bought many pots of pansies there, two or three every spring, and never argued. What did she want then? The pansies were evidently a feeler toward a more important transaction. The gardener rubbed his hands and gazed about him.

  “These tulips are magnificent,” he observed, “and these hya - cinths—” He fell into a trance at the mere sight of the scented thick- ets.

  “That,” murmured Rue, pointing to a splendid rose-bush with her furled parasol, but in spite of her, her voice trembled a little. Selby noticed it, more shame to him that he was listening, and the gardener noticed it, and, burying his nose in the roses, scented a bargain. Still, to do him justice, he did not add a centime to the honest value of the plant, for after all, Rue was probably poor, and any one could see she was charming.

  “Fifty francs, Mademoiselle.” The gardener’s tone was grave. Rue felt that argument would be wasted. They both stood silent for a moment. The gardener did not eulogize his prize,—the rose-tree was gorgeous and any one could see it.

  “I will take the pansies,” said the girl, and drew two francs from a worn purse. Then she looked up. A teardrop stood in the way refracting the light like a diamond, but as it rolled into a little corner by her nose, a vision of Selby replaced it, and when a brush of the handkerchief had cleared the startled blue eyes, Selby himself appeared, very much embarrassed. He instantly looked up into the sky, apparently devoured with a thirst for astronomical research, and as he continued his investigations for fully five minutes, the gardener looked up too and so did a policeman. Then Selby looked at the tips of his boots, the gardener looked at him and the policeman slouched on. Rue Barrée had been gone some time.

  “What,” said the gardener, “may I offer Monsieur?” Selby never knew why, but he suddenly began to buy flowers. The gardener was electrified. Never before had he sold so many flowers, never at such satisfying prices, and never, never with such absolute unanimity of opinion with a customer. But he missed the bargaining, the arguing, the calling of Heaven to witness. The transaction lacked spice.

  “These tulips are magnificent!”

  “They are!” cried Selby, warmly.

  “But alas, they are dear.”

  “I will take them.”

  “Dieu!” murmured the gardener in a perspiration, “he’s madder than most Englishmen.” “This cactus—”

  “Is gorgeous!”

  “Alas—”

  “Send it with the rest”

  The gardener braced himself against the river wall.

  “That splendid rose-bush,” he began faintly.

  “That is a beauty. I believe it is fifty francs—” He stopped, very red. The gardener relished his confusion. Then a sudden cool selfpossession took the place of his momentary confusion and he held the gardener with his eye, and bullied him.

  “I’ll take that bush. Why did not the young lady buy it?” Mademoiselle is not wealthy.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Dame, I sell her many pansies; pansies are not expensive.” “Those are the pansies she bought?”

  “These Monsieur, the blue and gold.”

  “Then you intend to send them to her?”

  “At midday after the market.”

  “Take this rose-bush with them, and”—here he glared at the gar - dener, “don’t you dare say from whom they came.” The gardener’s eyes were like saucers, but Selby, calm and victorious, said: “Send the others to the Hôtel du Sénat, 7 rue de Tournon. I will leave directions with the concierge.”

  Then he buttoned his glove with much dignity and stalked off, but when well around the corner and hidden from the gardener’s view, the conviction that he was an idiot came home to him in a furious blush. Ten minutes later he sat in his room in the Hôtel du Sénat repeating with an imbecile smile: “What an ass I am, what an ass!”

  An hour later found him in the same chair, in the same position, his hat and gloves still on, his stick in his hand, but he was silent, apparently lost in contemplation of his boot toes, and his smile was less imbecile and even a bit retrospective.

  III ABOUT five o’clock that afternoon, the little sad-eyed woman who
fills the position of concierge at the Hôtel du Sénat, held up her hands in amazement to see a wagon-load of flower-bearing shrubs draw up before the doorway. She called Joseph, the intemperate garçon who, while calculating the value of the flowers in petit verres, gloomily disclaimed any knowledge as to their destination.

  “Voyons,” said the little concierge, “cherchons la fermme!” “You?” he suggested.

  The little woman stood a moment pensive and then sighed. Joseph caressed his nose, a nose which for gaudiness could vie with any floral display.

  Then the gardener came in, hat in hand, and a few minutes later Selby stood in the middle of his room, his coat off, his shirt-sleeves rolled up. The chamber originally contained, besides the furniture, about two square feet of walking room, and now this was occupied by a cactus. The bed groaned under crates of pansies, lilies and heliotrope, the lounge was covered with hyacinths and tulips, and the washstand supported a species of young tree warranted to bear flow- ers at some time or other.

  Clifford came in a little later, fell over a box of sweet peas, swore a little, apologized, and then as the full splendor of the floral fête burst upon him, sat down in astonishment upon a geranium. The geranium was a wreck, but Selby said, “ don’t mind,” and glared at the cactus.

  “Are you going to give a ball?” demanded Clifford.

  “N—no,—I’m very fond of flowers,” said Selby, but the state- ment lacked enthusiasm.

  “I should imagine so.” Then, after a silence, “That’s a fine cac- tus.”

  Selby contemplated the cactus, touched it with the air of a connaisseur, and pricked his thumb. Clifford poked a pansy with his stick. Then Joseph came in with the bill, announcing the sum total in a loud voice, partly to impress Clifford, partly to intimidate Selby into disgorging a pourboire which he would share if he chose, with the gardener. Clifford tried to pretend that he had not heard, while Selby paid bill and tribute without a murmur. Then he lounged back into the room with an attempt at indifference which failed entirely when he tore his trousers on the cactus.