The Lesser Bourgeoisie Part 75

"Monsieur Cerizet," continued Thuillier, still holding himself on the reserve, "as I have said more than once to la Peyrade, no man is indispensable; and if the editors.h.i.+p of my paper becomes vacant, I feel confident that I shall at once meet with persons very eager to offer me their services."

"Is it for me you say that?" asked Cerizet. "Well, you haven't hit the nail; if you did me the honor to want my services it would be impossible for me to grant them. I have long been disgusted with journalism. I let la Peyrade, I hardly know why, persuade me to make this campaign with you; it didn't turn out happily, and I have vowed to myself to have no more to do with newspapers. It was about another matter altogether than I came to speak to you."

"Ah!" said Thuillier.

"Yes," continued Cerizet, "remembering the business-like manner in which you managed the affair of this house in which you do me the honor to receive me, I thought I could not do better than to call your attention to a matter of the same kind which I have just now in hand. But I shall not do as la Peyrade did,--make a bargain for the hand of your G.o.ddaughter, and profess great friends.h.i.+p and devotion to you personally. This is purely business, and I expect to make my profit out of it. Now, as I still desire to become the princ.i.p.al tenant of this house,--the letting of which must be a care and a disappointment to mademoiselle, for I saw as I came along that the shops were still unrented,--I think that this lease to me, if you will make it, might be reckoned in to my share of the profits. You see, monsieur, that the object of my visit has nothing to do with the newspaper."

"What is this new affair?" said Brigitte; "that's the first thing to know."

"It relates to a farm in Beauce, which has just been sold for a song, and it is placed in my hands to resell, at an advance, but a small one; you could really buy it, as the saying is, for a bit of bread."

And Cerizet went on to explain the whole mechanism of the affair, which we need not relate here, as no one but Brigitte would take any interest in it. The statement was clear and precise, and it took close hold on the old maid's mind. Even Thuillier himself, in spite of his inward distrust, was obliged to own that the affair had all the appearance of a good speculation.

"Only," said Brigitte, "we must first see the farm ourselves."

This, the reader will remember, was her answer to la Peyrade when he first proposed the purchase of the house at the Madeleine.

"Nothing is easier than that," said Cerizet. "I myself want to see it, and I have been intending to make a little excursion there. If you like, I'll be at your door this afternoon with a post-chaise, and to-morrow morning, very early, we can examine the farm, breakfast at some inn near by, and be back in time for dinner."

"A post-chaise!" said Brigitte, "that's very lordly; why not take the diligence?"

"Diligences are so uncertain," replied Cerizet; "you never know at what time they will get to a place. But you need not think about the expense, for I should otherwise go alone, and I am only too happy to offer you two seats in my carriage."

To misers, small gains are often determining causes in great matters; after a little resistance "pro forma," Brigitte ended by accepting the proposal, and three hours later the trio were on the road to Chartres, Cerizet having advised Thuillier not to let la Peyrade know of his absence, lest he might take some unfair advantage of it.

The next day, by five o'clock, the party had returned, and the brother and sister, who kept their opinions to themselves in presence of Cerizet, were both agreed that the purchase was a good one. They had found the soil of the best quality, the buildings in perfect repair, the cattle looked sound and healthy; in short, this idea of becoming the mistress of rural property seemed to Brigitte the final consecration of opulence.

"Minard," she remarked, "has only a town-house and invested capital, whereas we shall have all that and a country-place besides; one can't be really rich without it."

Thuillier was not sufficiently under the charm of that dream--the realization of which was, in any case, quite distant--to forget, even for a moment, the "Echo de la Bievre" and his candidacy. No sooner had he reached home than he asked for the morning's paper.

"It has not come," said the "male domestic."

"That's a fine distribution, when even the owner of the paper is not served!" cried Thuillier, discontentedly.

Although it was nearly dinner-time, and after his journey he would much rather have taken a bath than rush to the rue Saint-Dominique, Thuillier ordered a cab and drove at once to the office of the "Echo."

There a fresh disappointment met him. The paper "was made," as they say, and all the employees had departed, even la Peyrade. As for Coffinet, who was not to be found at his post of office-boy, nor yet at his other post of porter, he had gone "of an errand," his wife said, taking the key of the closet in which the remaining copies of the paper were locked up. Impossible, therefore, to procure the number which the unfortunate proprietor had come so far to fetch.

To describe Thuillier's indignation would be impossible. He marched up and down the room, talking aloud to himself, as people do in moments of excitement.

"I'll turn them all out!" he cried. And we are forced to omit the rest of the furious objurgation.

As he ended his anathema a rap was heard on the door.

"Come in!" said Thuillier, in a tone that depicted his wrath and his frantic impatience.

The door opened, and Minard rushed precipitately into his arms.

"My good, my excellent friend!" cried the mayor of the eleventh arrondiss.e.m.e.nt, concluding his embrace with a hearty shake of the hand.

"Why! what is it?" said Thuillier, unable to comprehend the warmth of this demonstration.

"Ah! my dear friend," continued Minard, "such an admirable proceeding!

really chivalrous! most disinterested! The effect, I a.s.sure you, is quite stupendous in the arrondiss.e.m.e.nt."

"But what, I say?" cried Thuillier, impatiently.

"The article, the whole action," continued Minard, "so n.o.ble, so elevated!"

"But what article? what action?" said the proprietor of the "Echo,"

getting quite beside himself.

"The article of this morning," said Minard.

"The article of this morning?"

"Ah ca! did you write it when you were asleep; or, like Monsieur Jourdain doing prose, do you do heroism without knowing it?"

"I! I haven't written any article!" cried Thuillier. "I have been away from Paris for a day, and I don't even know what is in this morning's paper; and the office-boy is not here to give me a copy."

"I have one," said Minard, pulling the much desired paper from his pocket. "If the article is not years you have certainly inspired it; in any case, the deed is done."

Thuillier hurriedly unfolded the sheet Minard had given him, and devoured rather than read the following article:--

Long enough has the proprietor of this regenerated journal submitted without complaint and without reply to the cowardly insinuations with which a venal press insults all citizens who, strong in their convictions, refuse to pa.s.s beneath the Caudine Forks of power. Long enough has a man, who has already given proofs of devotion and abnegation in the important functions of the aedility of Paris, allowed these sheets to call him ambitious and self-seeking. Monsieur Jerome Thuillier, strong in his dignity, has suffered such coa.r.s.e attacks to pa.s.s him with contempt. Encouraged by this disdainful silence, the stipendiaries of the press have dared to write that this journal, a work of conviction and of the most disinterested patriotism, was but the stepping-stone of a man, the speculation of a seeker for election.

Monsieur Jerome Thuillier has held himself impa.s.sible before these shameful imputations because justice and truth are patient, and he bided his time to scotch the reptile. That time has come.

"That deuce of a Peyrade!" said Thuillier, stopping short; "how he does touch it off!"

"It is magnificent!" cried Minard.

Reading aloud, Thuillier continued:--

Every one, friends and enemies alike, can bear witness that Monsieur Jerome Thuillier has done nothing to seek a candidacy which was offered to him spontaneously.

"That's evident," said Thuillier, interrupting himself. Then he resumed:--

But, since his sentiments are so odiously misrepresented, and his intentions so falsely travestied, Monsieur Jerome Thuillier owes it to himself, and above all to the great national party of which he is the humblest soldier, to give an example which shall confound the vile sycophants of power.

"It is fine, the way la Peyrade poses me!" said Thuillier, pausing once more in his reading. "I see now why he didn't send me the paper; he wanted to enjoy my surprise--'confound the vile sycophants of power!'

how fine that is!"

After which reflection, he continued:--

Monsieur Thuillier was so far from founding this journal of dynastic opposition to support and promote his election that, at the very moment when the prospects of that election seem most favorable to himself and most disastrous to his rivals, he here declares publicly, and in the most formal, absolute, and irrevocable manner that he _renounces his candidacy_.

"What?" cried Thuillier, thinking he had read wrong, or had misunderstood what he read.