Part 16 (1/2)
”No sarcasm, if you please; not everybody can share your taste for princesses, who make you go a hundred leagues to follow them and then upon your arrival, only give you the tip of a glove to kiss. Such intrigues are not to my fancy.
Je suis sergent, Brave--”
”Again, I say, will you stop that noise? Don't you know that I have n.o.body on my side at present but this respectable dowager on the first floor below? If she supposes that I am making all this racket over her head we shall be deadly enemies by to-morrow.”
”Zitto, zitto, piano, piano, Senza strepito e rumore,”
replied Marillac, putting his finger to his lips and lowering his voice.
”What you say is a surprise to me. From the way in which you offered your arm to Madame de Bergenheim to lead her into the drawing-room after supper, I thought you understood each other perfectly. As I was returning, for I made it my duty to offer my arm to the old lady--and you say that I do nothing for you--it seemed to me that I noticed a meeting of hands--You know that I have an eagle eye. She slipped a note into your hand as sure as my name is Marillac.”
Gerfaut took the note which he held crumpled up in his hand, and held it in the flame of one of the candles. The paper ignited, and in less than a second nothing of it remained but a few dark pieces which fell into ashes upon the marble mantel.
”You burn it! You are wrong,” said the artist; ”as for me, I keep everything, letters and hair. When I am old, I shall have the letters to read evenings, and shall weave an allegorical picture with the hair. I shall hang it before my desk, so as to have before me a souvenir of the adorable creatures who furnished the threads. I will answer for it that there will be every shade in it from that of Camille Hautier, my first love, who was an albino, to this that I have here.”
As he spoke, he took out of his pocket a small parcel from which he drew a lock of coal-black hair, which he spread out upon his hand.
”Did you pull this hair from t.i.tania's mane?” asked Gerfaut, as he drew through his fingers the more glossy than silky lock, which he ridiculed by this ironical supposition.
”They might be softer, I admit,” replied Marillac negligently; and he examined the lock submitted to this merciless criticism as if it were simply a piece of goods, of the fineness of whose texture he wished to a.s.sure himself.
”You will admit at least that the color is beautiful, and the quant.i.ty makes up for the quality. Upon my word, this poor Reine has given me enough to make a pacha's banner. Provincial and primitive simplicity! I know of one woman in particular who never gave an adorer more than seven of her hairs; and yet, at the end of three years, this cautious beauty was obliged to wear a false front. All her hair had disappeared.
”Are you like me, Octave? The first thing I ask for is one of these locks. Women rather like this sort of childishness, and when they have granted you that, it is a snare spread for them which catches them.”
Marillac took the long, dark tress and held it near the candle; but his movement was so poorly calculated that the hair caught fire and was instantly destroyed.
”A bad sign,” exclaimed Gerfaut, who could not help laughing at his friend's dismayed look.
”This is a day of autos-de-fe,” said the artist, dropping into a chair; ”but bah! small loss; if Reine asks to see this lock, I will tell her that I destroyed it with kisses. That always flatters them, and I am sure it will please this little field-flower. It is a fact that she has cheeks like rosy apples! On my way back I thought of a vaudeville that I should like to write about this. Only I should lay the scene in Switzerland and I should call the young woman Betty or Kettly instead of Reine, a name ending in 'Y' which would rhyme with Rutly, on account of local peculiarities. Will you join in it? I have almost finished the scenario. First scene--Upon the rising of the curtain, harvesters are discovered--”
”Will you do me the favor of going to bed?” interrupted Gerfaut.
”Chorus of harvesters:
Deja l'aurore Qui se colore--”
”If you do not leave me alone, I will throw the contents of this water-pitcher at your head.”
”I never have seen you in such a surly temper. It looks indeed as if your divinity had treated you cruelly.”
”She has treated me shamefully!” exclaimed the lover, whose anger was freshly kindled at this question; ”she has treated me as one would treat a barber's boy. This note, which I just burned, was a most formal, unpleasant, insolent dismissal. This woman is a monster, do you understand me?”
”A monster! your angel, a monster!” said Marillac, suppressing with difficulty a violent outburst of laughter.
”She, an angel? I must say that she is a demon--This woman--”
”Do you not adore her?”
”I hate her, I abhor her, she makes me shudder. You may laugh, if you like!”
As he said these words, Gerfaut struck a violent blow upon the table with his fist.