Part 10 (1/2)
”But little imbecile, I did it to help you, to enable you to get your ten francs and half a goose. Asticot too. Haven't you been enchanted all day to be of service to Mademoiselle? Do you want to be paid for wearing a red s.h.i.+rt with a ta.s.selled collar and pommade in your hair? Aren't we going about the world like Don Quixote and Sancho Panza rescuing damsels in distress? Isn't that the lodestar of our wanderings?”
”Yes, master,” said I.
Blanquette looked open-mouthed from him to me, from me to him, scarce able to grasp such magnanimity. To the peasant, money is a commodity to be struggled for, fought for, grasped, prized; to be doled out like the drops of a priceless Elixir Vitae. Paragot had the aristocratic, artistic scorn of it; and I, as I have said before, was the pale reflexion of Paragot.
”It is yours,” I explained, as might a great prince's chamberlain, ”the master gained it for you.”
The tears came into her eyes. The corners of her lips went down. Paragot turned half round in his seat and put his hands on her shoulders.
”If you spill tears on the fowl you will make it too salt, and I shall throw it out of the window.”
Paragot paid the modest funeral expenses of the worn-out fiddler. Asked why he did not leave the matter in the hands of the communal authorities he replied that he could not take a man's name without paying for it. Such an appellation as Berzelius Nibbidard Paragot was worth a deal coffin and a ma.s.s or two. This fine sense of integrity was above Blanquette's comprehension. She thought the funeral was a waste of money.
”It should go to benefit the living and not the dead,” she argued.
”Wait till you are dead yourself,” he replied, ”and see how you would like to be robbed of your name. There are many things for you to learn, my child.”
”_Il n'y a pas beaucoup_--not many,” she said with a sigh. ”We who are poor and live on the high-roads learn very quickly. If you are hungry and have two sous you can buy bread. If you only have two sous and you throw them to a dog who doesn't need them, you have nothing to buy bread with, and you starve. And it is not so easy to gain two sous.”
Paragot sucked reflectively at his porcelain pipe.
”Asticot,” said he, ”the _argumentum ad ventrem_ is irrefutable.”
”Now I must go and make my _malle_” she said. ”I return to Chambery to try to earn my two sous.”
”Won't you stay here over the night? You must be very tired.”
”One must work for one's living, Monsieur,” she said moving away.
It was afternoon. We had trudged the three dusty miles back from the tiny churchyard where we had left the old man's unlamented grave, and Paragot, as usual, was was.h.i.+ng his throat with beer. It must be noted, not to his glorification, that about this time a chronic dryness began to be the main characteristic of Paragot's throat, and the only humectant that seemed to be of no avail was water.
The sun still blazed and the hush of the July afternoon lay over the valley. Paragot watched the thickset form of Blanquette disappear into the cafe; he poured out another bottle of beer and addressed Narcisse who was blinking idly up at him.
”If she had a pair of decent stays, my dog, or no stays at all, she might have something of a figure. What do you think? On the whole--no.”
Narcisse stood on his hind legs, his forepaws on his master's arm, and uttered little plaintive whines. Paragot patted him on the head.
As I was engaged a yard or two away, elbows on knees, in what Paragot was pleased to call my studies--Thierry's ”Recits des Temps Merovingiens,” a tattered, flyblown copy of which he had bought at Chambery--he was careful not to interrupt me; he talked to the dog.
Paragot had to talk to something. If he were alone he would have talked to his shadow; in his coffin he would have apostrophised the worms.
”Yes, my dog,” said he, after a draught of beer. ”We have pa.s.sed through more than we wotted of these two days. We have held a human being by the hand and have faced with her the eternal verities. Now she is going to earn her two sous in the whirlpool, and the whirlpool will suck her down, and as she has not claims to beauty, Narcisse, of any kind whatsoever, either of face or figure, hers will be a shuddersome career and end. Say you are sorry for poor Blanquette de Veau.”
Narcisse sniffed at the table, but finding it bare of everything but beer, in which he took no interest, dropped on his four legs and curled himself up in dudgeon.
”You d.a.m.ned cynical sensualist,” cried my master. ”I have wasted the breath of my sentiment upon you.” And he called out for the landlady and more beer.
Presently Blanquette emerged laden with zither case and fiddle and little grey valise and the pearl-b.u.t.toned suit which was slung over one arm.
”Monsieur,” she said, putting down her impedimenta, ”the _patronne_ has told me that you have paid for my lodging and my nourishment. I am very grateful, Monsieur. And if you will accept this costume it will be a way of repaying your kindness.”