Sentimental Education (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) (13 page)

He received from the very heart of Germany or of Italy a painting purchased in Paris for fifteen hundred francs, and, exhibiting an invoice that brought the price up to four thousand, sold it over again, as a favor, for three thousand five hundred. One of his usual tricks with painters was to demand a small-scale copy of their painting, under the pretext that he would bring out an engraving of it. He always sold the copy; but the engraving never appeared. To those who complained that he had taken an advantage of them, he would reply with a playful slap on the stomach. Generous in other ways, he squandered money on cigars for his acquaintances, “spoke familiarly” to people whom he did not know, displayed enthusiasm about a work or a man; and, after that, sticking to his opinion, and, regardless of consequences, spared no expense in journeys, correspondence, and advertising. He looked upon himself as very upright, and, yielding to an irresistible impulse to pour his heart out, naively told his friends about certain indelicate acts of which he had been guilty.

Once, in order to annoy a member of his own trade who inaugurated another art journal with a big banquet, he asked Frédéric to write out in front of him, a little before the hour it was to begin, letters to the guests recalling the invitations.

“This impugns nobody’s honour, do you understand?”

And the young man did not dare to refuse the service.

Next day, on entering M. Arnoux’s office with Hussonnet, Frédéric saw through the door (the one opening on the staircase) the hem of a lady’s dress disappearing.

“A thousand pardons!” said Hussonnet. “If I had known that there were women—”

“Oh! as for that one, she is my own,” replied Arnoux. “She just came in to pay me a visit as she was passing.”

“What?!” said Frédéric.

“Why, yes; she is going back home again.”

The charm of the things around him was suddenly withdrawn. That which had seemed to him to be diffused vaguely through the place had now vanished—or, rather, it had never been there. He experienced an infinite amazement, and, as it were, the painful sensation of having been betrayed.

Arnoux, while rummaging about in his drawer, began to smile. Was he laughing at him? The clerk laid down a bundle of damp papers on the table.

“Ah! the posters,” exclaimed the art-dealer.

“It’s going to be a while before I can go to dinner tonight.”

Regimbart took up his hat.

“What, are you leaving me?”

“Seven o’clock,” said Regimbart.

Frédéric followed him.

At the corner of the Rue Montmartre, he turned round. He glanced towards the windows of the first floor, and he laughed internally with self-pity as he recalled to mind with what love he had so often contemplated them. Where, then, did she reside? How was he to meet her now? Once more around the object of his desire a solitude opened more immense than ever!

“Are you coming along to have some?” asked Regimbart.

“To have what?”

“Absinthe.”

And, yielding to his obsession, Frédéric allowed himself to be led towards the Bordelais café. Whilst his companion, leaning on his elbow, was staring at the decanter, he was looking around. But he caught a glimpse of Pellerin’s profile on the sidewalk outside; the painter gave a quick tap at the window-pane, and he had scarcely sat down when Regimbart asked him why they no longer saw him at the office of
L’Art Industriel.

“I’d rather die than go back there again. The fellow is a brute, a bourgeois, a scoundrel, a criminal!”

These insulting words matched Frédéric’s angry mood. Nevertheless, he was wounded, for it seemed to him that they reflected on Madame Arnoux.

“Why, what has he done to you?” said Regimbart.

Pellerin stamped his foot on the ground, and his only response was a heavy sigh.

He had been devoting himself to artistic work of a kind that he did not care to connect his name with, such as chalk and charcoal portraits, or pasticcios from the great masters for amateurs of limited knowledge; and, as he felt humiliated by these inferior productions, he preferred to hold his tongue on the subject as a general rule. But “Arnoux’s dirty conduct” exasperated him too much. He had to express his feelings.

In accordance with an order, which had been given in Frédéric’s very presence, he had brought Arnoux two pictures. Thereupon the dealer took the liberty of criticising them. He found fault with the composition, the colouring, and the drawing—above all the drawing; he would not, in short, take them at any price. But, finding himself in difficulties over a bill falling due, Pellerin had to give them to the Jew Isaac; and, a fortnight later, Arnoux himself sold them to a Spaniard for two thousand francs.

“Not a sou less! What a filthy trick! and, faith, he has done many other things just as bad. One of these mornings we’ll see him in court!”

“How you exaggerate,” said Frédéric, in a timid voice.

“So I exaggerate, do I?!” exclaimed the artist, giving the table a great blow with his fist.

This violence had the effect of completely restoring the young man’s self-command. No doubt he might have behaved better; still, if Arnoux thought these two pictures—

“Were bad! say it! Are you a good judge of them? Is this your profession? Now, you know, my young man, I don’t accept this sort of thing from mere amateurs.”

“Ah! well, it’s not my business,” said Frédéric.

“Then, what interest have you in defending him?” returned Pellerin, coldly.

The young man faltered:

“But—since I am his friend—”

“Go, and give him a hug for me. Good night!”

And the painter rushed away in a rage, and, of course, without paying for his drink.

Frédéric, whilst defending Arnoux, had convinced himself. In the heat of his eloquence, he was filled with tenderness towards this man, so intelligent and kind, whom his friends maligned, and who had now to work all alone, abandoned by them. He could not resist a strange impulse to go at once and see him again. Ten minutes afterwards he pushed open the door of the art shop.

Arnoux was preparing, with the assistance of his clerks, some huge posters for an exhibition of paintings.

“Hello! what brings you back again?”

This question, simple though it was, embarrassed Frédéric, and, at a loss for an answer, he asked whether they had happened to find a notebook of his—a little notebook with a blue leather cover.

“The one that you put your letters to women in?” said Arnoux.

Frédéric, blushing like a school girl, protested against such an assumption.

“Your verses, then?” returned the art-dealer.

He handled the pictorial specimens that were to be exhibited, discussing their form, colour, and borders; and Frédéric felt more and more irritated by his air of deliberation, and particularly by the appearance of his hands—large hands, rather soft, with flat nails. At length, M. Arnoux arose, and saying, “That’s that!” he chucked the young man familiarly under the chin. Frédéric was offended at this liberty, and recoiled a pace or two; then he made a dash for the shop-door, and passed through it, as he imagined, for the last time in his life. Madame Arnoux herself had been lowered by the vulgarity of her husband.

During the same week he got a letter from Deslauriers, informing him that the clerk would be in Paris on the following Thursday. In a violent reaction, he fell back on this affection as one of a more solid and lofty nature. A man of this sort was worth all the women in the world. He would no longer have any need of Regimbart, of Pellerin, of Hussonnet, of anyone! In order to provide his friend with as comfortable lodgings as possible, he bought an iron bedstead and a second armchair, and stripped off some of his own bed-covering to make up this one properly. On Thursday morning he was dressing himself to go to meet Deslauriers when there was a ring at the door. Arnoux entered.

“Just one word. Yesterday I got a lovely trout from Geneva. We expect you this evening—at seven o’clock sharp. The address is the Rue de Choiseul 24
bis.
Don’t forget!”

Frédéric was obliged to sit down; his knees were tottering under him. He repeated to himself, “At last! at last!” Then he wrote to his tailor, to his hatter, and to his bootmaker; and he dispatched these three notes by three different messengers. The key turned in the lock, and the concierge appeared with a trunk on his shoulder.

Frédéric, on seeing Deslauriers, began to tremble like an adulteress under the glance of her husband.

“What has happened to you?” said Deslauriers.

“Surely you got my letter?”

Frédéric had not enough energy left to lie.

He opened his arms, and flung his arms around on his friend’s neck.

Then the clerk told his story. His father had avoided giving an account of his guardianship thinking that the period for rendering such accounts was ten years; but, well versed in legal procedure, Deslauriers had managed to get the share coming to him from his mother into his clutches—seven thousand francs clear—which he had there with him in an old wallet.

“’Tis a reserve fund, in case of misfortune. I must think over the best way of investing it, and find quarters for myself to-morrow morning. To-day I’m perfectly free, and am entirely at your service, my old friend.”

“Oh! don’t put yourself out,” said Frédéric.

“If you had anything of importance to do this evening—”

“Come, now! I would be a selfish wretch—”

This epithet, flung out at random, touched Frédéric to the quick, like a reproachful allusion.

The concierge had placed on the table close to the fire some chops, cold meat, a large lobster, some sweets for dessert, and two bottles of Bordeaux. Deslauriers was touched by these excellent preparations to welcome his arrival.

“Upon my word, you are treating me like a king!”

They talked about their past and about the future; and, from time to time, they grasped each other’s hands across the table, looking at each other with affection for a moment.

A messenger came with a new hat. Deslauriers, in a loud tone, remarked that this head-gear was very showy.

Next came the tailor himself to fit on the coat, to which he had given a touch-up with the iron.

“One would imagine you were going to be married,” said Deslauriers.

An hour later, a third individual appeared on the scene, and drew forth from a big black bag a pair of shiny patent leather boots. While Frédéric was trying them on, the bootmaker slyly drew attention to the shoes of the young man from the country.

“Does Monsieur require anything?”

“No, thanks,” replied the clerk, pulling behind his chair his old shoes fastened with strings.

This humiliating incident annoyed Frédéric. At length he exclaimed, as if an idea had suddenly taken possession of him:

“Good heavens! I was forgetting.”

“What is it, pray?”

“I have to dine in the city this evening.”

“At the Dambreuses’? Why did you never say anything to me about them in your letters?”

“It is not at the Dambreuses’, but at the Arnoux’s.”

“You should have let me know beforehand,” said Deslauriers. “I would have come a day later.”

“Impossible,” returned Frédéric, abruptly. “I only got the invitation this morning, a little while ago.”

And to redeem his error and distract his friend’s mind from the occurrence, he proceeded to unfasten the tangled cords round the trunk, and to arrange all his belongings in the chest of drawers, expressed his willingness to give him his own bed, and offered to sleep in the dressing-room bed himself. Then, as soon as it was four o’clock, he began his preparations to get dressed.

“You have plenty of time,” said the other.

At last he was dressed and off he went.

“That’s the way with the rich,” thought Deslauriers.

And he went to dine in the Rue Saint-Jacques, at a little restaurant kept by a man he knew.

Frédéric stopped several times while going up the stairs, so violently did his heart beat. One of his gloves, which was too tight, ripped open, and, while he was fastening back the torn part under his shirt-cuff, Arnoux, who was mounting the stairs behind him, took his arm and led him in.

The hall, decorated in the Chinese fashion, had a painted lantern hanging from the ceiling, and bamboo plants in the corners. As he was passing into the drawing-room, Frédéric stumbled against a tiger’s skin. The candelabra had not yet been lit, but two lamps were burning in the boudoir in the far corner.

Mademoiselle Marthe came to announce that her mamma was dressing. Arnoux raised her up in order to kiss her; then, as he wished to go to the cellar himself to select certain bottles of wine, he left Frédéric with the little girl.

She had grown much larger since the trip in the steamboat. Her dark hair fell in long ringlets, which curled over her bare arms. Her dress, more puffed out than the petticoat of a
danseuse,
allowed her rosy calves to be seen, and her pretty childlike form had all the fresh scent of a bunch of flowers. She received the young gentleman’s compliments with a coquettish air, fixed on him her large, dreamy eyes, then slipping in between the furniture, disappeared like a cat.

After this he no longer felt ill at ease. The globes of the lamps, covered with a paper lace-work, sent forth a white light, softening the colour of the walls, hung with mauve satin. Through the bars of the fireguard which resembled a big fan, the coal could be seen in the fireplace, and close beside the clock there was a little chest with silver clasps. Here and there things lay about which gave the place a look of home—a doll in the middle of the sofa, a fichu against the back of a chair, and on the work-table a knitted woollen vest, from which two ivory needles were hanging with their points downwards. It was altogether a peaceful spot, suggesting propriety and innocent family life.