Jack Part 37

"Ah, yes, the Pyrenees!" she sighed. "Gavarni, the Mer de Glace, and all that. I made that journey fifteen years ago with a friend of my family, the Duc de Casares, a Spaniard. I made his acquaintance at Biarritz in a most amusing way!"

Cecile having said how fond she was of the sea, Ida again began,--

"Ah, my love, had you seen it as I have seen it in a tempest off Palma!

I was in the saloon with the captain, a coa.r.s.e sort of man, who insisted on my drinking punch. I refused. Then the wretch got very angry, and opened the window, took me just at the waist, and held me above the water in the lightning and rain."

Jack tried to cut in two these dangerous recitals, but they came to life again, like those reptiles which, however mutilated, still retain life and animation.

The climax of his uneasiness was reached, however, when, just as his lessons were to begin, he heard his mother propose to Cecile to go down into the garden. What would she say when he was not there? He watched them from the window; Cecile's slender figure and quiet movements were those of a well-born, well-bred woman, while Ida, still handsome, but loud in her style and costume, affected the manners of a young girl. For the first time Jack felt his lessons to be very long, and only breathed freely again when they were all together walking in the woods. But on this day his mother's presence disturbed the harmony. She had no comprehension of love, and saw it only as something utterly ridiculous.

But the worst of all was the sudden respect she entertained for _les convenances_. She recalled the young people, bade them "not to wander away so far, but to keep in sight," and then she looked at the doctor in a significant way. Jack saw more than once that his mother grated on the old doctor's nerves; but the forest was so lovely, Cecile so affectionate, and the few words they ex-changed were so mingled with the sweet clatter of birds and the humming of bees, that by degrees the poor boy forgot his terrible companion. But Ida wished to make a sensation, so they stopped at the forester's. Mere archambauld was delighted to see her old mistress, paid her many compliments, but asked not a question in regard to D'Argenton, her keen personal sense telling her that she had best not. But the sight of this good creature, for a long time so intimately connected with their life at Aul-nettes, was too much for Ida. Without waiting for the lunch so carefully prepared by Mother Archambauld, she rose suddenly from her chair, as suddenly as if in answer to a summons unheard by the others, and went swiftly through the forest paths to her old home at Aulnettes.

The tower was more enshrouded than ever in its green foliage, and the blinds were closely drawn. Ida stood in lonely silence, listening to the tale told with silent eloquence by these gray stones. Then she broke a branch from the clematis that threw its sprays over the wall, and inhaled the breath of its starry white blossoms.

"What is it, dear mother?" said Jack, who had hastened to follow her.

"Ah!" she said, with rapidly falling tears, "you know I have so much buried here!"

Indeed the house, in its melancholy silence and with the Latin inscription over the door, resembled a tomb. She dried her eyes, but for that evening her gayety was gone. In vain did Cecile, who had been told that Madame D'Argenton was separated from her husband, try with minor cares to efface the painful impression of the day; in vain did Jack seek to interest her in all his projects for the future.

"You see, my child," she said, on her way home, "that it is not best for me to come here with you. I have suffered too much, and the wound is too recent."

Her voice trembled, and it was easy to see that, after all the humiliations to which she had been subjected by this man, she yet loved him.

For many Sundays after, Jack came alone to Etiolles, and relinquished what to him was the greatest happiness of the day, the twilight walk, and the quiet talk with Cecile, that he might return to Paris in time to dine with his mother. He took the afternoon train, and pa.s.sed from the tranquillity of the country to the animation of a Sunday in the Faubourg. The sidewalks were covered by little tables, where families sat drinking their coffee, and crowds were standing, with their noses in the air, watching an enormous yellow balloon that had just been released from its moorings.

In remoter streets, people sat on the steps of the doors, and in the courtyard of the large, silent house the concierge was chatting with his neighbors, who had taken chairs out to breathe air a little fresher than they could obtain in their confined quarters within.

Sometimes, in Jack's absence, Ida, tired of her loneliness, went to a little reading-room kept by a certain Madame Leveque. The shop was filled with mouldy books, was literally obstructed by magazines and ill.u.s.trated papers, which she let for a sou a day.

Here lived a dirty, pretentious old woman, who spent her time in making a certain kind of antiquated tr.i.m.m.i.n.g of narrow, colored ribbons.

It seems that Madame Leveque had known better days, and that under the first empire her father was a man of considerable importance. "I am the G.o.dchild of the Duc de Dantzic," she said to Ida, with emphasis. She was one of the relics of past days, such as one finds occasionally in the secluded corners of old Paris. Like the dusty contents of her shop, her gilt-edged books torn and incomplete, her conversation glittered with stories of past splendors. That enchanting reign, of which she had seen but the conclusion, had dazzled her eyes, and the mere tone in which she p.r.o.nounced the t.i.tles of that time evoked the memory of epaulettes and gold lace. And her anecdotes of Josephine, and of the ladies of the court! One especial tale Madame Leveque was never tired of telling: it was of the fire at the Austrian emba.s.sy, the night of the famous ball given by the Princess of Schwartzenberg. All her subsequent years had been lighted by those flames, and by that light she saw a procession of gorgeous marshals, tall ladies in very low dresses, with heads dressed _a la t.i.tus or a la Grecque_, and the emperor, in his green coat and white trousers, carrying in his arms across the garden the fainting Madame de Schwartzenberg.

Ida, with her pa.s.sion for rank, delighted in the society of this half-crazed old creature, and while the two women sat in the dark shop, with the names of dukes and marquises gliding lightly from their tongues, a workman would come in to buy a paper for a sou, or some woman, impatient for the conclusion of some serial romance, would come in to ask if the magazine had not yet arrived, and cheerfully pay the two cents that would deprive her, if she were old, of her snuff, and, if she were young, of her radishes for breakfast.

Occasionally Madame Leveque pa.s.sed a Sunday with friends, and then Ida had no other amus.e.m.e.nt than that which she derived from turning over a pile of books taken at hazard from Madame Leveque's shelves. These books were soiled and tumbled, with spots of grease and crumbs of bread upon them, showing that they had been read while eating. She sat reading by the window,--reading until her head swam. She read to escape thinking.

Singularly out of place in this house, the incessant toil that she saw going on about her depressed her, instead of, as with her son, exciting her to more strenuous exertions.

The pale, sad woman who sat at her machine day after day, the other with her sing-song repet.i.tion of the words, "How happy people ought to be who can go to the country in such weather!" exasperated her almost beyond endurance. The transparent blue of the sky, the soft summer air, made all these miseries seem blacker and less endurable; in the same way that the repose of Sunday, disturbed only by church-bells and the twitter of the sparrows on the roofs, weighed painfully on her spirits. She thought of her early life, of her drives and walks, of the gay parties in the country, and above all of the more recent years at Etiolles. She thought of D'Argenton reciting one of his poems on the porch in the moonlight.

Where was he? What was he doing? Three months had pa.s.sed since she left him, and he had not written one word. Then the book fell from her hands, and she sat buried in thought until the arrival of her son, whom she endeavored to welcome with a smile. But he read the whole story in the disorder of the room and in the careless toilet. Nothing was in readiness for dinner.

"I have done nothing," she said, sadly. "The weather is so warm, and I am discouraged."

"Why discouraged, dear mother? Are you not with me? You want some little amus.e.m.e.nt, I fancy. Let us dine out to-day," he continued, with a tender, pitying smile. But Ida wished to make a toilet; to take out from her wardrobe some one of her pretty costumes of other days, too coquettish, too conspicuous for her present circ.u.mstances. To dress as modestly as possible, and walk through these poor streets, afforded her no amus.e.m.e.nt. In spite of her care to avoid anything noticeable in her costume, Jack always detected some eccentricity,--in the length of her skirts, which required a carriage, or in the cut of her corsage, or the tr.i.m.m.i.n.g of her hat. Jack and his mother then went to dine at Bagnolet or Romainville, and dined drearily enough. They attempted some little conversation, but they found it almost impossible. Their lives had been so different that they really now had little in common. While Ida was disgusted with the coa.r.s.e table-cloth spotted by wine, and polished, with a disgusted face, her plate and gla.s.s with her napkin, Jack hardly perceived this negligence of service, but was astonished at his mother's ignorance and indifference upon many other points.

She had certain phrases caught from D'Argenton, a peremptory tone in discussion, a didactic "I think so; I believe; I know." She generally began and finished her arguments with some disdainful gesture that signified, "I am very good to take the trouble to talk to you." Thanks to that miracle of a.s.similation by which, at the end of some years, husband and wife resemble each other, Jack was terrified to see an occasional look of D'Argenton on his mother's face. On her lips was often to be detected the sarcastic smile that had been the bugbear of his boy-hood, and which he always dreaded to see in D'Argenton.

Never had a sculptor found in his clay more docile material than the pretentious poet had discovered in this poor woman.

After dinner, one of their favorite walks on these long summer evenings was the Square des b.u.t.tes-Chaumont, a melancholy-looking spot on the old heights of Montfaucon. The grottos and bridges, the precipices and pine groves, seemed to add to the general dreariness. But there was something artificial and romantic in the place that pleased Ida by its resemblance to a park. She allowed her dress to trail over the sand of the alleys, admired the exotics, and would have liked to write her name on the ruined wall, with the scores of others that were already there. When they were tired with walking, they took their seats at the summit of the hill, to enjoy the superb view that was spread out before them. Paris, softened and veiled by dust and smoke, lay at their feet. The heights around the faubourgs looked in the mist like an immense circle, connected by Pere la Chaise on one side, and Montmartre on the other, with Montfaucon; nearer them they could witness the enjoyment of the people. In the winding alleys and under the groups of trees young people were singing and dancing, while on the hillside, sitting amid the yellowed gra.s.s, and on the dried red earth, families were gathered together like flocks of sheep.

Ida saw all this with weary, contemptuous eyes, and her very att.i.tude said, "How inexpressibly tiresome it is!" Jack felt helpless before this persistent melancholy. He thought he might make the acquaintance of some one of these honest, simple families, and perhaps in their society his mother might be cheered. Once he thought he had found what he wanted.

It was one Sunday. Before them walked an old man, rustic in appearance, leading two little children, over whom he was bending with that wonderful patience which only grandfathers are possessed of.

"I certainly know that man," said Jack to his mother; "it is--it must be M. Rondic."

Rondic it was, but so aged and grown so thin, that it was a wonder that his former apprentice had recognized him. The girl with him was a miniature of Zenade, while the boy looked like Maugin.

The good old man showed great pleasure in meeting Jack, but his smile was sad, and then Jack saw that he wore c.r.a.pe on his hat. The youth dared not ask a question until, as they turned a corner, Zenade bore down upon them like a s.h.i.+p under full sail. She had changed her plaited skirt and ruffled cap for a Parisian dress and bonnet, and looked larger than ever. She had the arm of her husband, who was now attached to one of the custom-houses, and who was in uniform. Zenade adored M. Maugin and was absurdly proud of him, while he looked very happy in being so wors.h.i.+pped.

Jack presented his mother to all these good people; then, as they divided into two groups, he said in a low voice to Zenade, "What has happened? Is it possible that Madame Clarisse--"

"Yes, she is dead; she was drowned in the Loire accidentally."

Then she added, "We say 'accidentally' on father's account; but you, who knew her so well, may be quite sure that it was by no accident that she perished. She died because she could never see Chariot again. Ah, what wicked men there are in this world!"

Jack glanced at his mother, and was quite ready to agree with his companion.

"Poor father! we thought that he could not survive the shock," resumed Zenade; "but then he never suspected the truth. When M. Maugin got his position in Paris, we made him come with us, and we live all together in the Eue des Silas at Charonne. You will come and see him, won't you, Jack? You know he always loved you; and now only the children amuse him.

Perhaps you can make him talk. But let us join him; he is looking at us, and thinks we are speaking of him, and he does not like that."

Ida, who was deep in conversation with M. Maugin, stopped short as Jack approached her. He suspected that she had been talking of D'Argenton, as indeed she had, praising his genius and recounting his successes, which, had she confined herself to the truth, would not have taken long. They separated, promising to meet again soon; and Jack, not long afterward, called upon them with his mother.

He found the old ornaments on the chimney that he had learned to know so well at Indret, the sponges and corals; he recognized the big wardrobe as an old friend. The rooms were exquisitely clean, and presented a perfect picture of a Breton interior transplanted to Paris. But he soon saw that his mother was bored by Zenade, who was too energetic and positive to suit her, and that there, as everywhere else, she was haunted by the same melancholy and the same disgust which she expressed in the brief phrase, "It smells of the work-shop."

The house, the room she lived in, the bread she ate, all seemed impregnated with one smell, one especial flavor. If she opened the window, she perceived it even more strongly; if she went out, each breath of wind brought it to her. The people she saw--even her own Jack, when he returned at night with his blouse spotted with oil--exhaled the same baleful odor, which she fancied clung even to herself--the odor of toil--and filled her with immense sadness.

One evening, Jack found his mother in a state of extraordinary excitement; her eyes were bright and complexion animated. "D'Argenton has written to me!" she cried, as he entered the room; "yes, my dear, he has actually dared to write to me. For four months he did not vouchsafe a syllable. He writes me now that he is about to return to Paris, and that, if I need him, he is at my disposal."

"You do not need him, I think," said Jack, quietly, though he was in reality as much moved as his mother herself.

"Of course I do not," she answered, hurriedly.

"And what shall you say?"

"Say! To a wretch who has dared to lift his hand to me? You do not yet know me. I have, thank Heaven, more pride than that. I have just finished his letter, and have torn it into a thousand bits. I am curious to see his house, though, now that I am not there to keep all in order.

He is evidently out of spirits, and perhaps he is not well, as he has been for two months at--what is the name of the place?" and she calmly drew from her pocket the letter which she said she had destroyed. "Ah, yes, it is at the springs of Royat that he has been. What nonsense!

Those mineral springs have always been bad for him."

Jack colored at her falsehood, but said not one word. All the evening she was busy, and seemed to have regained the courage and animation of her first days with her son. While at work she talked to herself.

Suddenly she crossed the room to Jack.

"You are full of courage, my boy," she said, kissing him.

He was occupied in watching all that was going on within his mother's mind. "It is not I whom she kisses," he said, shrewdly; and his suspicions were confirmed by a trifle that proved how completely the past had taken possession of the poor woman's mind. She never ceased humming the words of a little song of D'Argenton's, which the poet was in the habit of singing himself at the piano in the twilight. Over and over again she sang the refrain, and the words revived in Jack's mind only sad and shameful memories. Ah, if he had dared, what words he would have said to the woman before him! But she was his mother; he loved her, and wished by his own respect to teach her to respect herself. He therefore kept strict guard over his lips. This first warning of coming danger, however, awoke in him all the jealous foreboding of a man who was about to be betrayed. He studied her way of saying good-bye to him when he left in the morning, and he a.n.a.lyzed her smile of greeting on his return. He could not watch her himself, nor could he confide to any other person the distrust with which she inspired him. He knew how often a woman surrounds the man whom she deceives in an atmosphere of tender attentions,--the manifestations of hidden remorse. Once, on his way home, he thought he saw Hirsch and Laba.s.sandre turning a distant corner.

"Has any one been here?" he said to the concierge; and by the way he was answered he saw that some plot was already organized against him.

The Sunday after on his return from Etiolles he found his mother so completely absorbed in her book that she did not even hear him come in.

He would not have noticed this, knowing her mania for romances, had not Ida made an attempt to conceal the book.