I left the wood at once; Ernest followed me, after telling Dulac’s second that he would send somebody to him.
At last, fate had been just; my thirst for vengeance had been satisfied. I should have felt a little relieved, but I did not; it was because I was not avenged on her who had injured me most. I thanked Ernest and left him, promising him to go often to his house. He insisted that I should come that very day to dine with them; but I felt that I must be alone a little longer. I would go when I had learned to endure, or at least to conceal, my sorrow.
I looked for an apartment in Ernest’s neighborhood, far away from that in which I had lived. I hired the first vacant one that I found, then returned home. I went to my landlord and paid what he demanded to allow me to move at once. At last I was free. I ordered my furniture to be moved instantly.
I dismissed my servant. I had no reason to complain of her, far from it; but she had been in my service during the time that I was determined to forget; I did not want to see her again. At last I was free. I gave her enough to enable her to wait patiently for other employment.
My furniture was taken to my new apartment on Rue Saint-Louis. I installed myself there. I felt better at once, for I breathed more freely there. There is nothing like change, for diseases of the heart as well as for those of the body.
I would have liked to go to see my son, but it was too late to start for Livry that day. I went to Eugénie’s banker to try to find out where she was. I wanted to write to her, I wanted her to give me back my daughter. Two children would be none too many to take the place of all that I had lost.
The banker was a most excellent man. I was careful not to tell him the real cause of my separation from my wife. I gave him to understand that our dispositions and our tastes had changed, and we had both thought it best to adopt that course, which was irrevocable. So that it was not for the purpose of running after my wife that I wanted to know where she was, but simply to write to her on the subject of some business matters which we had not been able to adjust.
He did not know where Eugénie was; she had not written to him; but he promised to send me her address as soon as he knew it.
So I was forced to wait before seeing my daughter. If I had had her with me, it seemed to me that I might recover all my courage and be happy again. Yes, I believed that I could be happy again, embracing that sweet child. If only I had her portrait. I had often had an idea of painting her, but business or quarrels with her mother had prevented me from beginning the work. “I will wait a few days,” I thought; “then the original will return to me, and I will not part from her again.”
My regret at not having painted her portrait reminded me of that other which I always carried with me. I determined to shatter it as she had shattered mine long ago.
Eugénie’s portrait was set inside a locket. I took it out, opened it, and in spite of myself, my eyes rested upon that miniature, which reproduced her features so exactly. I do not know how it happened, but my rage faded away. I felt moved, melted. Ah! that was not the woman who had betrayed and abandoned me! that was the woman who had loved me, who had responded so heartily to my passion, whose eyes were always seeking mine! That Eugénie of the old days was a different person from the Eugénie of to-day; why then should I destroy her portrait? I looked about me; I was alone. My lips were once more pressed upon that face. It was a shameful weakness; but I persuaded myself that I saw her once more as she was five years before; and that delusion afforded me a moment’s happiness.
Early the next morning I started for Livry. That road recalled many memories. My son was only eleven months old; but I determined that as soon as it could be done without injuring his health, I would take him away from his nurse, and not go to that place any more.
I reached the peasants’ house. They asked me about my wife as before. I cut their questions short by telling them that she had gone on a long journey. Then I asked for my son. They brought little Eugène to me. I took him in my arms and was about to cover him with kisses, when suddenly a new idea, a heartrending thought passed through my mind; my features altered, I put aside the child, who was holding out his arms to me, and replaced him in his nurse’s arms.
That worthy woman utterly failed to understand the change which had taken place in me. She gazed at me and cried:
“Well! what’s the matter? You give me back your son without kissing him! Why, he is a pretty little fellow, poor child!”
“My son!” I said to myself, “my son! he is only eleven months old, and Dulac began coming to the house before Eugénie was enceinte.”
A new suspicion had come to aggravate my suffering. Who could assure me that that was my child? that I was not on the point of embracing the fruit of their guilty intercourse?
At that thought I sprang to my feet.
“Are you sick, monsieur?” the nurse asked me.
I did not answer her, but left the house. I walked about for some time in the fields. I realized that thenceforth I should not be able to think of my son without being haunted by that cruel thought; when I embraced the child, that suspicion would poison my happiness, and would diminish the affection that I should otherwise have had for him. And these women claim that they are no more guilty than we are! Ah! they are always sure when they are mothers; they are not afraid lest they may lavish their caresses on a stranger’s child. That is one great advantage that they have over us. But nature does not do everything; one becomes a father by adopting an innocent little creature; and he who neglects and abandons his children ceases to be a father.
I returned to the nurse’s house, somewhat calmer.
The poor woman was sitting in a corner with the child in her arms; she dared not bring him to me again.
I went to her and kissed the child on the forehead, heaving a profound sigh. I commended him to the peasants’ care, I gave them money, and I returned to Paris more depressed than ever.
I found Ernest at my rooms waiting for me. He had been to my former home, had learned my new address, and had been looking for me everywhere since the morning, to divert me and comfort me.
“What do people say in society?”
That was my first question when I saw him; for I confess that my greatest dread was that people should know that my wife had deceived me, and it was much less on my own account than on hers that I dreaded it.
I did not wish that she should be held guilty in the eyes of society; it was quite enough that she should be guilty to my knowledge; so I begged Ernest to conceal nothing from me.
“Your duel is known,” he said, “but it is attributed to the quarrel you had at the card table. You are generally blamed, and people are sorry for your adversary. Dulac is not dead; indeed, it is thought that he will recover; but he is seriously wounded, and he will be in bed for a long while. I do not know how it happened that Giraud knew of your change of abode, and that you have moved here without your wife. He questioned the concierges, no doubt. He has been about everywhere, telling of it. People are talking; and everyone makes up his own story; the majority think that you made your wife so unhappy that she was obliged to leave you.”
“So much the better; let people think that, and let them put all the blame on me; that is what I want. Only you and your wife know the truth, my dear Ernest; and I am very sure that you will not betray my confidence.”
“No, of course not; although it makes me angry to hear people accuse you and pity your wife. If I were in your place, I am not sure that I should be so generous.”
“But my children, my friend, my daughter!”
“That is so; I didn’t think of them.”
“What do I care for the blame of society? it will see little of me at present!”
“I trust, however, that you are not going to become a misanthrope, but that you will try to amuse yourself, and try to forget a woman who does not deserve your regrets; to act otherwise would be inexcusable weakness.”
“I promise to try to follow your advice.”
“To begin with, you must come home to dinner with me.”
I could not refuse Ernest, although solitude was all that I now desired. I went home with him. His companion overwhelmed me with attentions and friendliness; their children came to caress and to play with me. During dinner they did all that they could to divert my thoughts. I was touched by their friendship, but the sight of their domestic happiness, of that happy family, was not adapted to alleviate my pain; on the contrary, it increased it twofold. For I too had a wife and children! Ah! such pictures were not what I wanted to see; they broke my heart. What I wanted was a crowd, uproar, noisy amusements; I needed to be bewildered, not moved.
I left my good friends early. Three days later I received a letter from Eugénie’s banker; he informed me that she was temporarily at Aubonne, near Montmorency. So I knew where my daughter was, and that did me good; it always seems that we are less distant from people when we know where they are. I remembered that an old kinswoman of Eugénie’s mother lived at Aubonne; she was probably living with her. I did not know whether she would remain there, but I determined to write to her at once.
I sat down at my desk. I did not know how to begin, for it was the first time that I had ever written to Eugénie. We had never been separated. I did not propose to indulge in any reproaches in regard to her conduct. What good would it do? One should never complain, except when one is willing to forgive. I would go straight to the point, without beating about the bush.
“Madame, you have taken my daughter away; I wish, I insist, that she should remain with me. Keep your son; you can give him that name; but ought I too to call him my son? Take that child, and give me back my daughter. It will be no deprivation to you; besides, I will allow her to go to see her mother whenever you wish. I trust, madame, that I shall not be obliged to write to you a second time.”
I signed this letter and sent it at once to the post; I was impatient to have a reply.
I could no longer attend to business, so I abandoned my profession. I had enough to live on, now that I no longer proposed to keep house or to receive company. But what should I do to employ the time, which is so long when one suffers? I would return to my brushes; yes, I would cultivate once more that consoling art; I would give myself up to it entirely, and it would make my time pass happily. That idea pleased me; it seemed to me like returning to my bachelor life. But for my children, I would have left France and have travelled for some time; but my daughter was still too young for me to subject her to changes of climate which might injure her health.
Two days had not passed when I received a letter from Aubonne; it was Eugénie’s reply. I trembled as I opened it.
“Monsieur, you are mistaken when you think that it would not be a great deprivation to me not to have my daughter with me; I love her just as dearly as you can possibly love her. As for your son, he is yours in fact, monsieur. You know my frankness, so you can believe what I tell you. Things will remain as they are; my daughter shall not leave me. Appeal to the law if you wish; nothing will change my determination.
“EUGÉNIE.”
I could hardly endure to read that letter. I was angry, furious. She had dishonored me, she had made me unhappy, and she refused to give me back my daughter! Ah! that woman had no pity, no delicacy of feeling! She loved her daughter, she said; yes, as she had loved me; she defied me, she told me to appeal to the law! Ah! if I could do it! if I had proofs of her crime to produce! But no; even if I could, she knew very well that I would not; that I did not propose that the courts should ring with my complaints, that my name should never be mentioned in society without being the subject of a jest. Yes, she knew me, and that is why she had no fear. She declared that her son was mine and she expected me to believe her word! No! I would never see that child again, I wanted never to hear his name. But my daughter—ah! I neither could nor wished to forget her.
For several days I was in a state of most intense excitement; I did not know what to do, nor what course to adopt. Sometimes I determined to go away, to leave France forever; but the thought of Henriette detained me; sometimes I determined to go back into society, to have mistresses, to pass my time with them, and to do my best to forget the past.
A profound prostration succeeded to that feverish excitement of my senses. I avoided society, I did not even go to Ernest’s, although he had come several times to beg me to do so. Everything bored and tired me; I cared for nothing except to be alone, to think of my daughter. I hated and cursed her mother. Yes, I would go away, I would leave the country. What detained me there? I had no idea.
Several weeks passed, and I do not now know how I lived. I went out early in order to avoid even Ernest’s visits, for I became more misanthropical, more morose every day. I walked in solitary places, I returned early, and always ordered my concierge to say that I was not at home. My concierge was my servant also now; he took care of my apartment, which was wretchedly kept.
The house in which I was living suited me in many respects; it was gloomy and dark, like most of the old houses in the Marais, and contained but few tenants, I thought, for I never met anybody on the stairs. I had one neighbor, however, with whom I would gladly have dispensed; it was a man who lived in the attic rooms above my apartment, the house having only three floors in all.
That neighbor of mine was in the habit of beginning to sing as soon as he got home, which was ordinarily between ten and eleven o’clock at night; and I was forced to listen to his jovial refrains and drinking songs until he was in bed and asleep. It annoyed me; not because it prevented me from sleeping, for sleep never visited my eyes so early; but it disturbed me in my thoughts, in my reflections. I was inclined sometimes to complain to the concierge. But because I was unhappy, must I prevent others from being light-hearted?
For some days that music had become more unendurable than ever, because my neighbor had taken to returning much earlier, and his songs often began at eight o’clock. Although I never talked with my concierge, I decided to ask him who the man was who was always singing.
“Monsieur,” the concierge replied, “he’s a poor German, a tailor. I don’t understand how he has the courage to sing, for he hasn’t a sou, and apparently he never finds any work. That doesn’t surprise me, for he is a drunkard and he works very badly. I gave him a pair of trousers, to make a coat for my son; and it was very badly made, without fit or style, and the patches all in front! I took my custom away from him. However, he won’t trouble you long; as he doesn’t pay his rent, the landlord has decided to give him notice.”
I informed the concierge that I did not wish the man to be sent away; but it seemed that the landlord cared for nothing but his rent. That evening, about eight o’clock, I heard the tailor singing with all his lungs; he executed trills and flourishes. Who would ever have believed that the man had not a sou?
I remembered the fable of the cobbler and the banker; suppose I should go to my neighbor and give him money to keep silent? But perhaps that would make him sing all the louder; for one could find few cobblers like the one in the fable. However, I yielded to the idea of going to my neighbor. If he was an obliging person, perhaps he would consent to sing not quite so loud. But I had little hope of it, for the Germans are obstinate and they are fond of music. Never mind, I would go to see the tailor none the less.
I ascended the stairs which separated me from the attic. My neighbor’s voice guided me to his door. The key was on the outside, but for all that I knocked before opening the door.
He continued to sing a passage from Der Freischütz, and did not reply; thereupon I opened the door.
I entered a room in which there was a mattress with a wretched coverlid thrown over it, in one corner. A rickety chair, a few broken jars and a long board which served doubtless as a table, but which was then standing against the wall—that was all the furniture. Leaning on the sill of the window, which was open, was a man, still young, whose good-humored, bloated face was not unfamiliar to me. He was in his shirt sleeves, and was seated after the manner of tailors, with his knees outside the window, a position which made him likely to fall into the courtyard at the slightest forward movement.
On my arrival he stopped in the middle of a trill and exclaimed:
“Hello! I thought it was the concierge to ask for money again. I should have said to him: ‘prout, prout!’ Sit you down, monsieur.”
I sat down, for my neighbor seemed quite unceremonious; he had not risen. I do not know whether he thought that I had come to hear him sing; but he seemed inclined to resume his performance. I stopped him at once.
“Monsieur, I am your neighbor.”
“Indeed! you are my neighbor, are you? Beside me or below?”
“Below.”
“Oh, yes! it’s a fact that on this floor there’s nobody but the cooks of the house, all old women, unluckily. They don’t sing, they don’t make love, they don’t know how to make anything but sauces,—reduced consommés, as the one from the first floor says. For my part, I would give all her consommés for a bottle of beaune. Ah! how delicious beaune is! If I had any, I would give you some; but it is three days now that I haven’t drunk anything but water. Prout, prout! I must make the best of it.”
While the tailor was talking, I examined him, because I was confident that I had seen him somewhere before, but I could not remember where.
“Have you come to order trousers or a coat?” continued my neighbor. “It is just, the right time, for I have nothing to do, and I will make ‘em up for you at once, and in the latest style, although that miserable concierge presumed to complain of my skill. The idiot! he wanted me to make a new coat for his son out of an old pair of breeches that had already been turned three times.”
“I have not come for a coat or a waistcoat, but to make a request of you.”
“A request?”
“You sing a great deal, monsieur.”
“Parbleu! I have nothing else to do.”
“You sing very well, certainly.”
“Yes, I have some voice; we Germans are all musicians; it is born in us.”
“I know it; but do you think that for a person who works with his brain, who is obliged to think, to reflect, it is very pleasant to hear someone singing all the time?”
“What has all that got to do with me?”
“Look you, monsieur, I will come to the point; your singing inconveniences and annoys me; and if you would be obliging enough to sing less, or not so loud, I would beg you to take this as a slight token of my gratitude.”
I had taken my purse from my pocket and I was looking about for something to put it on, which was hard to find, unless I should put it on the floor, when the tailor, who had abruptly left the window and begun to dance about the room, strode toward me with a frown.
“I say, monsieur from below, who don’t like music, do I look to you like a man who asks alms? Who gave you leave to come to my room and insult me? Has Pettermann ever been called a beggar?”
“Pettermann!” I said, looking at him more carefully; “is your name Pettermann?”
“Schnick Pettermann, journeyman tailor from the age of fifteen. I have never succeeded in getting to be a master tailor. It isn’t my fault. Well, when will you finish staring me out of countenance?”
“Yes, I know now; you used to live on Rue Meslay.”
“I think so, but I have moved so often that I can hardly remember all the rooms that I have occupied!”
“Don’t you remember that little room that you used to climb into so often through the window in the roof, after breaking the glass, because you had lost your key?”
“Ah! I remember now, there was a broad gutter; it was very convenient, I used to walk on it.”
“And that young neighbor of yours in whose room you used to light your candle?”
“Little Marguerite—ah, yes! I recognize you now. You were my neighbor’s lover.”
“Oh, no! I was only her friend; but I used to go there often, and we used to hear you come in. Ah! how happy I was in those days!”
“You were happy when I broke the window? Did that amuse you?”
“It seems that I must always happen on something to remind me of that time, although I try to avoid it. However, I am glad to see you.”
“You are very good, monsieur. That must be at least five years ago, more than five years, in fact, and I wasn’t married then.”
“Ah! have you been married since?”
“Mon Dieu! don’t mention it! I don’t know what crazy idea came into my head, I who never gave a thought to love, when one day—prout, prout!—it took me like a longing to sneeze; I fancied that I was in love with a young cook who had sometimes asked me the time, then for a light; in short, trifling things which indicated a purpose to scrape an acquaintance. Suzanne was very pretty; yes, she was a superb creature, well put together; I will do justice to her physical charms. She had saved twelve hundred francs by cheating her employers a little in vegetables and butter. I said to myself: ‘That will be enough to set up a nice little tailor’s shop, after the style of the Palais-Royal.’ I offered my hand which she accepted, and we were married; I hired a shop on Boulevard du Pont-aux-Choux, all went well for——”
“For several months?”
“Prout! you are very polite! For a few days, a week at most. After that my wife complained that I was slow, that I talked too much, that I drank. For my part, I claimed that she ought to do nothing but make buttonholes. She refused to take hold of the buttonholes, and that made me mad; I persisted, she was obstinate, and to make a long story short, we fought! oh! we fought like prize fighters! and once we had got into the habit of it, it was all over, we never missed a single day. Prout! prout! morning and night! you should have seen how we hammered each other!”
“Wouldn’t it have been better to leave your wife?”
“To be sure it would, and that is what I said to myself; one night when my wife had almost torn off my left ear, I packed up my clothes and I left her.”
“Have you seen her since?”
“I’m not such a fool. I have no desire to see her again, and for her part I fancy that she isn’t anxious to see me. It’s all over now! To the devil with love! Whether my wife dies or not, it’s all one to me; I shall never marry again.”
“You have no children?”
“What do you suppose? As if we had time for that when we were always fighting! And faith, I am glad that we hadn’t any; they would have been left on my hands and I should have had to support the brats; and that would be hard for a man who cannot feed himself every day.”
“But your wife was faithful to you, at all events?”
“Faithful? the devil! as if I paid any attention to that! In fact we only lived together four months, and that didn’t make me rich! For some time past I haven’t had any work at all, and a man’s fingers get stiff doing nothing. But for all that, there’s no reason why you should come here with your purse in your hand!”
“Look you, Monsieur Pettermann, I have not made myself understood; I had no intention of insulting you.”
“I am not insulted, but——”
“I was told that you were without work, and I simply proposed to give you my custom.”
“Oh! that makes a difference! your custom, that’s all right.”
“I can’t show you to-night what I want you to do; but I thought that there would be no harm in offering you a little money in advance on what you do for me. We have lived under the same roof before, and we know each other; I should be very sorry to fall out with you.”
“Monsieur, if you offer me that in advance for the clothes I may make for you, that’s a very different thing. Give me what you choose; I will take it and I will not charge you any more on account of it.”
“All right; here is forty francs; we will settle up later.”
“Forty francs; I will make you a nice coat and waistcoat and trousers for that. And as for singing, if it disturbs you——”
“No, sing on, Pettermann, sing on; now that I know that it’s you, it won’t annoy me any more; I shall imagine that I am still living in my old apartment.”
I left the tailor, who could not make up his mind which pocket to put his forty francs in, and I returned to my room. But neither that night, nor during the next week, did I hear Pettermann sing, because he did not come home until midnight, and because he was always drunk and went to sleep as soon as he was in bed.