Volume II Part 109 (1/2)
”He grumbled and muttered: 'To abandon a girl at her age is to ruin her. To return to Germany as a beggar, it is fine! Do you, her aunt, allow such conduct?' 'Well, well,' said I to myself, 'you're right.
I'll place Cecily with you, or I'll lose my name.' 'I am her aunt, it is true,' answered I, 'but it is a very unfortunate relations.h.i.+p for me; I have enough on my hands; I would be just as well pleased to have my niece go away as to have her on my hands. May Old Nick run away with such relations who send you such great girls as this without paying the postage.' To crown all, there was Cecily, who seemed to be up to trap, bursting into tears. Thereupon the notary a.s.sumed a sniveling tone, like a preacher, and said to me: 'You will have to account above for the trust that Providence has placed in your hands; it would be a crime to expose this young girl to perdition. I consent to aid you in your charitable work, if your niece promises me to be industrious, honest, and pious; and above all, never to go out. I will have pity on her, and take her in my service.' 'No, no, I would rather go back to my country,' said Cecily, still weeping.”
”Her dangerous duplicity did not fail her,” thought Rudolph; ”the diabolical creature has, I see, perfectly comprised the orders of Baron de Graun.”
Then the prince said aloud, ”Did Ferrand appear vexed at the perverseness of Cecily?”
”Yes, M. Rudolph; he muttered between his teeth, and said to her hastily, 'It is not a question, mademoiselle, of what you prefer, but of what is suitable and decent Heaven will not abandon you, if you lead an honest life and fulfill your religious duties. You will be here in a house as strict as holy; if your aunt really loves you, she will profit by my offer; at first you will have but small wages, but if by your conduct and zeal you deserve more, perhaps I will increase them.”
”Good! thought I to myself; the notary is caught! here is Cecily fixed at your house, you heartless old miser. Seraphin was in your service for many years, and you have not even the appearance of remembering that she was drowned the day before yesterday. And I said aloud: 'Doubtless, sir, the place is advantageous, but if the young woman is homesick?' 'That will pa.s.s away,' answered the notary; 'come, do you decide--yes or no? If you consent, bring your niece to-morrow night at this hour, and she can enter at once into my service--my porter will instruct her. As to wages, I commence by giving her twenty francs a month and board and lodging.' 'Oh, sir, you'll add five francs more?'
'No, by and by--if I am content--we shall see. But I must inform you, that your niece must never go out, and must have no one to come and see her.' 'Oh, sir, who would come to see her? She knows no one but me in Paris, and I have my own door to take care of; it has incommoded me enough to come with her to-day-you will never see me again-she will be as much of a stranger as if she had never come out of her own country.
As to her not going out, there is a very simple way--let her wear her own costume; she would never dare go out in the street dressed in that outdacious manner.' 'You are right,' said the notary; 'it is, besides, respectable to dress in the costume of one's country. She may, then, remain in her Alsatian dress. 'Come,' said I to Cecily, who, with her head down, wept continually; 'you must decide, my child; a good place, in an honest house, is not to be found every day; besides, if you refuse, you must make your own arrangements; I'll have no more to do with them.' Then Cecily answered sighing, 'that she consented to remain; but on condition that if in a fortnight her homesickness troubled her too much, she might go away.' 'I do not wish to keep you by force,' said the notary; 'and I am not embarra.s.sed to find servants. Here is your handsel; your aunt will only have to bring you to-morrow night.' Cecily had not ceased to weep. I accepted for her the advance of forty sous from the old screw, and we returned here.”
”Very well, Mrs. Pipelet; I do not forget my promise. Here is what I promised if you should succeed in getting a situation for this girl, who embarra.s.sed me.”
”Wait until to-morrow, my prince of lodgers,” said Mrs. Pipelet, refusing the money; ”for, perhaps, he will change his mind when I take Cecily to him this evening.”
”I do not think he will change his mind; but where is she?”
”In the cabinet belonging to M. Robert's apartments; in obedience to your orders she does not stir from them; she seems as resigned as a lamb, although she has eyes--oh! what eyes! But, apropos of M. Robert, isn't he an intriguer? When he came himself to superintend the packing of his furniture, did he not tell me that if there came any letters here addressed to Madame Vincent, they were for him, and to send them to No. 5 Rue Mondovi. He to be addressed under the name of a woman, the beautiful bird! how cunning it is! But this is not all; did he not have the impudence to ask me what had become of his wood? 'Your wood!
why not your forest at once?' I answered. Now it is true, for two mean cart-loads of nothing at all--one of drift and the other new wood, for he did not buy all new wood--the save-penny made a fuss! His wood? 'I burned all your wood,' said I, 'to save your furniture from the damp; otherwise mushrooms would have sprung up on your embroidered cap, and on your glowworm robe de chambre that you wore so often while you were waiting for the little lady who quizzed you.”
A heavy plaintive groan from Alfred interrupted. ”There is my beauty dreaming, he is going to wake up; you will allow me, my prince of lodgers?”
”Certainly; I have, besides, some more questions to ask.”
”Well! my sweet, how do you feel?” said Mrs. Pipelet to her husband, opening the curtains; ”here is M. Rudolph! he knows the new infamy of Cabrion: he pities you with all his heart.”
”Oh, sir!” said Alfred, turning his head in a languis.h.i.+ng manner toward Rudolph; ”this time I shall not get over it; the monster has stabbed me to the heart. I am the subject of the placards of the capital; my name can be read on all the walls side by side with this scoundrel's. 'Pipelet & Cabrion,' with an enormous _and_! I!
united to this infernal blackguard in the eyes of the capital of Europe!”
”M. Rudolph knows it; but what he does not know is your adventure of last night with those two strapping women.”
”Oh! sir, he kept his most monstrous infamy for the last; this pa.s.sed all bounds,” said Alfred, in a mournful tone.
”Come, my dear M. Pipelet, relate to me this new misfortune.”
”All he had done previously was nothing to this, sir. He succeeded in his object--thanks to proceedings the most shameful. I do not know if I have the strength to relate it! confusion and shame will impede me at each step.”
Pipelet being painfully raised in the bed, modestly b.u.t.toned up his flannel waistcoat, and commenced in these terms: ”My wide had just gone out; absorbed in the bitterness caused by the prost.i.tution of my name written on all the walls of the capital, I sought to distract myself by endeavoring to sole a boot, twenty times taken up and twenty times abandoned, thanks to the obstinate persecutions of my tormentor.
I was seated before a table when I saw the door of my lodge open, and a woman enter. This woman was wrapped in a cloak, with a hood; I arose politely from my seat, and touched my hat. At this moment, a second woman, also enveloped in a cloak with a hood, entered my lodge, and locked the door inside.
”Although astonished at the familiarity of this procedure, and the silence which the two women preserved, I again rose from my chair, and again carried my hand to my hat. Then, sir; no, no, I never can--my modesty revolts.”
”Come, Old Modesty, you are among men; go on then!”
”Then,” resumed Alfred, becoming crimson, ”the mantles fell, and what did I see? Two species of sirens or nymphs, with no other clothing than a tunic of leaves, the head also crowned with foliage; I was petrified. Then they both advanced toward me, extending their arms, if to invite me to precipitate myself into them.”
”The hussies!” said Anastasia.