Part 10 (1/2)
Monsieur Bargemont was left alone to digest his stupefaction; even so his first thought was to save the honour of his Department.
He reopened the door and shouted, ”Leave the room!” after Jean, who, mastered once more by his natural timidity, was flying like a thief down the corridors.
XX
In the court, which was enlivened by a parterre of roses, Jean, carrying a letter in his hand, was trying to find his bearings according to the directions given him in a low voice, as if it were a secret, by the lay-brother who acted as doorkeeper. He was wandering uncertainly from door to door along the walls of the old silent buildings when a little boy noticed his plight and accosted him:
”Do you want to see the Director? He is in his study with mamma.
Go and wait in the parlour.”
This was a large hall with bare walls, a n.o.ble enough apartment in its unadorned simplicity, in spite of the mean horsehair chairs that stood round it. Above the fire-place, instead of a mirror, was a _Mater dolorosa_ that caught the eye by its dazzling whiteness. Big marble tears stood arrested in mid-career down the cheeks, while the features expressed the pious absorption of the Divine Mother's grief. Jean Servien read the inscription cut in red letters on the pedestal, which ran thus:
PRESENTED TO THE REVEREND ABBE BORDIER, IN MEMORY OF PHILIPPE-GUY DE THIERERCHE, WHO DIED AT PAU, NOVEMBER 11, 1867, IN THE SEVENTEENTH YEAR OF HIS AGE, BY THE COUNTESS VALENTINE DE THIERERCHE, NeE DE BRUILLE DE SAINT-AMAND.
_LAUDATE PUERI DOMINUM_
Then he forgot his anxieties, forgot he was there to beg for employment, shook off the instinctive dread that had seized him on the threshold of the great silent house. He forgot his fears and hopes--hopes of being promoted usher! He was absorbed by this cruel domestic drama revealed to him in the inscription.
A scion of one of the greatest families of France, a pupil of the Abbe Bordier, attacked by phthisis in the midst of his now profitless studies and leaving school, not to enjoy life and taste the glorious pleasures only those contemn who have drained them to the dregs, but to die at a southern town in the arms of his mother whose overwhelming, but still self-conscious grief was symbolized by this pompous memorial of her sorrow. He could feel, he could see it all. The three Latin words that represent the stricken mother saying: ”Children, praise ye the Lord who hath taken away my child,” astonished him by their austere piety, while at the same time he admired the aristocratic bearing that was preserved even in the presence of death.
He was still lost in these day-dreams when an old priest beckoned him to walk into an inner room. The worthy man took the letter of recommendation which Jean handed him, set on his big nose a pair of spectacles with round gla.s.ses for all the world like the two wheels of a miniature silver chariot, and proceeded to read the letter, holding it out at the full stretch of his arm.
The windows giving on the garden stood open, and a tendril of wild vine hung down on to the desk at the foot of a crucifix of old ivory, while a light breeze set the papers on it fluttering like white wings.
The Abbe Bordier, his reading concluded, turned to the young man, showing a deeply lined countenance and a forehead beautifully polished by age. He took off his spectacles and rubbed his eyes.
Then the worn eyelids lifted slowly and discovered a pair of grey eyes of a shade that somehow reminded you of an autumn morning.
He lay back in his armchair, his legs stretched out in front of him, displaying his silver-buckled shoes and black stockings.
”It seems then, my dear boy,” he began, ”you wish, so my venerable friend the Abbe Marguerite informs me, to devote yourself to teaching; and your idea would be to prepare for your degree while at the same time performing the duties of an a.s.sistant master to supervise the boys at their work. It is a humble office; but it will depend entirely on yourself, my dear young friend, to dignify it by a heartfelt zeal and a determination to succeed.
I shall entrust the studies of the _Remove_ to your care. Our bursar will inform you of the conditions attaching to the post.”
Jean bowed and made to leave the room; but suddenly the Abbe Bordier beckoned him to stop and asked abruptly:
”You understand the rules of verse?”
”Latin verse?” queried Jean.
”No, no! French verse. Now, would you rhyme _trone_ with _couronne_?
The rhyme is not, it must be allowed, quite satisfactory to the ear, yet the usage of the great writers authorizes it.”
So saying, the old fellow laid hold of a bulky ma.n.u.script book.
”Listen,” he cried, ”listen. It is St. Fabricius addressing the Proconsul Flavius:
_Acheve, fais dresser l'appareil souhaite De ma mort, ou plutot de ma felicite.
Le Roi des Rois, du haut de son celeste trone, Deja me tend la palme et tresse ma couronne._
”Do you think it would be better if he said: