Sentimental Education (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) (23 page)

Madame Moreau made an effort to control her emotion, but could not keep herself from swooning. Frédéric caught her in his arms and kissed her on the forehead.

“Dear mother, you can now buy back your carriage—so laugh! shed no more tears! be happy!”

Ten minutes later the news had travelled as far as the faubourgs. Then M. Benoist, M. Gamblin, M. Chambion, and other friends hurried towards the house. Frédéric got away for a minute in order to write to Deslauriers. Then other visitors turned up. The afternoon passed in congratulations. They had forgotten all about “Roque’s wife,” who, however, was declared to be “very low.”

When they were alone, the same evening, Madame Moreau said to her son that she would advise him to set himself up as a lawyer at Troyes. As he was better known in his own part of the country than in any other, he might more easily find there an advantageous match.

“Ah, it is all too much!” exclaimed Frédéric. He had scarcely grasped his good fortune in his hands when they wanted to take it away from him. He announced his express determination to live in Paris.

“And what are you going to do there?”

“Nothing!”

Madame Moreau, astonished at his manner, asked what he intended to become.

“A minister,” was Frédéric’s reply. And he declared that he was not at all joking, that he meant to plunge at once into diplomacy, and that his studies and his instincts impelled him in that direction. He would first enter the Council of State under M. Dambreuse’s patronage.

“So then, you know him?”

“Oh, yes—through M. Roque.”

“That’s astonishing!” said Madame Moreau. He had awakened in her heart her former dreams of ambition. She internally abandoned herself to them, and said no more about other matters.

If he had yielded to his own impatience, Frédéric would have set off that very instant. Next morning every seat in the coaches was taken; and so he fretted and fumed till seven o’clock the following evening.

They had sat down to dinner when there were three prolonged tolls of the church-bell; and the housemaid, coming in, informed them that Madame Éléonore had just died.

This death, after all, was not a misfortune for anyone, not even for her child. The young girl would only be the better for it later on.

As the two houses were close to one another, a great coming and going and a clamor of voices could be heard; and the idea of this corpse being so near them threw a certain funereal gloom over their parting. Madame Moreau wiped her eyes two or three times. Frédéric felt a heaviness in his heart.

When the meal was over, Catherine stopped him between two doors. Mademoiselle absolutely had to see him. She was waiting for him in the garden. He went out, jumped over the hedge, and knocking into the trees, made his way towards M. Roque’s house. Lights were glittering through a window in the second story; then a form appeared in the midst of the darkness, and a voice whispered:

“ ’Tis I!”

She seemed to him taller than usual, because of her black dress, no doubt. Not knowing what to say to her, he contented himself with holding her hands, and sighing:

“Ah! my poor Louise!”

She did not reply. She gazed at him for a long time with a profound look of sadness.

Frédéric was afraid of missing the coach; he thought that he could hear the rolling of wheels some distance away, and, in order to put an end to their encounter without delay:

“Catherine told me that you had something—”

“Yes—’tis true! I wanted to tell you—”

He was astonished to find that she addressed him in a formal manner; and, as she again relapsed into silence:

“Well, what?”

“I don’t know. I forget! Is it true that you’re going away?”

“Yes, very shortly.”

She repeated: “Ah! now?—for good?—we’ll never see one another again?”

She was choking with sobs.

“Good-bye! good-bye! embrace me then!”

And she flung her arms around him.

W
hen he had taken his place behind the other passengers in the front of the stage-coach, and when the vehicle began to shake as the five horses started into a brisk trot all at the same time, he allowed himself to plunge into an intoxicating dream of the future. Like an architect drawing up the plan of a palace, he mapped out his life beforehand. He filled it with luxuries and with splendours; it rose up to the sky; a profuse display of alluring objects could be seen there; and so deeply was he buried in the contemplation of these things that he lost sight of the world around him.

At the foot of the hill at Sourdun his attention was directed to the stage which they had reached in their journey. They had travelled only about five kilometres at the most. He was annoyed at this slow pace. He pulled down the coach-window in order to get a view of the road. He asked the conductor several times at what hour they would reach their destination. However, he eventually calmed down, and remained seated in his corner of the vehicle with eyes wide open.

The lantern, which hung from the postilion’s seat, threw its light on the hindquarters of the horses. In front, only the manes of the other horses could be seen undulating like white billows. Their breathing caused a kind of fog at each side of the team. The little iron chains of the harness rang; the windows shook in their frames; and the heavy coach went rolling at an even pace over the pavement. Here and there could be distinguished the wall of a barn, or else an inn standing by itself: Sometimes, as they entered a village, a baker’s s oven threw out gleams of light; and the gigantic silhouettes of the horses kept rushing past the walls of the opposite houses. At every change of horses, when the harness was unfastened, there was a great silence for a minute. Someone could be heard stamping around on top under the canvas cover, while a woman standing in the doorway shielded her candle with her hand. Then the conductor jumped on the footboard, and the vehicle started on its way again.

At Mormans, the striking of the clocks announced that it was a quarter past one.

“So it’s today,” he thought, “I shall see her this very day!”

But gradually his hopes and his recollections, Nogent, the Rue de Choiseul, Madame Amoux, and his mother, all got mixed up together.

He was awakened by the dull sound of wheels passing over planks: they were crossing the Pont de Charenton—it was Paris. Then his two travelling companions, the first taking off his cap, and the second his silk neck-kerchief, put on their hats, and began to chat.

The first, a big, red-faced man in a velvet frock-coat, was a merchant; the second was coming up to the capital to consult a physician; and, fearing that he had disturbed this gentleman during the night, Frédéric spontaneously apologised to him, so much had the young man’s heart been softened by the feelings of happiness that possessed it. The wharf-side station being flooded, no doubt, they went straight ahead; and once more they could see green fields. In the distance, tall factory-chimneys were sending forth their smoke. Then they turned into Ivry. Then drove up a street: all at once, he saw before him the dome of the Panthéon.

The plain, in ruins, seemed a waste land. The enclosing wall of the fortifications made a horizontal ridge there; and, on the unpaved paths, on the ground at the side of the road, little branchless trees were protected by slats bristling with nails. Establishments for chemical products and timber-merchants’ yards made their appearance alternately. High gates, like those seen in farmhouses, afforded glimpses, through their openings, of wretched yards within, full of filth, with puddles of dirty water in the middle of them. Large taverns whose facades were as red as ox blood, displayed in the first floor, between the windows, two billiard-cues crossing one another, with a wreath of painted flowers. Here and there might be noticed a half-built plaster hut, which had been allowed to remain unfinished. Then the double row of houses was continuous; and over their bare fronts enormous tin cigars showed themselves at some distance from each other, indicating tobacconists’ shops. Midwives’ signboards portrayed a matron in a cap rocking a baby wrapped in a quilt trimmed with lace. The corners of the walls were covered with posters, which, three-quarters torn, were quivering in the wind like rags. Workmen in smocks, brewers’ drays, laundresses’ and butchers’ carts passed along. A thin rain was falling. It was cold. There was a pale sky; but two eyes, which to him were as precious as the sun, were shining behind the haze.

They had to wait a long time at the barrier, for vendors of poultry, wagoners, and a flock of sheep caused an obstruction there. The sentry, with his great-coat thrown back, walked to and fro in front of his box, to keep himself warm. The clerk who collected the tolls
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clambered up to the roof of the coach and a cornet sent forth a flourish. They went down the boulevard at a quick trot, the whipple-trees clapping and the traces hanging loose. The lash of the whip went cracking through the moist air. The conductor uttered his sonorous shout:

“Look alive! look alive! oho!” and the scavengers stood aside, the pedestrians sprang back, the mud gushed against the coach-windows; they crossed carts, cabs, and omnibuses. Finally, the iron gate of the Jardin des Plantes came into sight.

The Seine, which was of a yellowish colour, almost reached the platforms of the bridges. A cool breath of air issued from it. Frédéric inhaled it with his utmost energy, drinking in this good air of Paris, which seems to contain the essence of love and the emanations of the intellect. He was touched with emotion at the first glimpse of a hackney-coach. He gazed with delight on the thresholds of the winemerchants’ shops garnished with straw, on the shoeblacks with their boxes, on the lads who sold groceries as they shook their cof fee roasters. Women trotted along under umbrellas. He bent forward to see whether he could distinguish their faces—chance might have led Madame Arnoux to come out.

The shops displayed their wares. The crowd grew more dense; the noise in the streets grew louder. After passing the Quai Saint-Bernard, the Quai de la Tournelle, and the Quai Montebello, they drove along the Quai Napoleon. He was anxious to see the windows there; but they were too far away from him. Then once more they crossed the Seine over the Pont-Neuf, and descended in the direction of the Louvre; and, having crossed the Rues Saint- Honoré, Croix des Petits-Champs, and Du Bouloi, he reached the Rue Coq-Heron, and entered the courtyard of the hotel.

To make his enjoyment last the longer, Frédéric dressed himself as slowly as possible, and even walked as far as the Boulevard Montmartre. He smiled at the thought of beholding once more the beloved name on the marble plate. He cast a glance upwards; there was no longer a trace of the display in the windows, the pictures, or anything else.

He hastened to the Rue de Choiseul. M. and Madame Arnoux no longer resided there, and a woman next door was keeping an eye on the concierge’s lodge. Frédéric waited to see the concierge himself. After some time he made his appearance—it was no longer the same man. He did not know their address.

Frédéric went into a café, and, while having lunch consulted the Commercial Directory. There were three hundred Arnoux in it, but no Jacques Arnoux. Where, then, were they living? Pellerin ought to know.

He made his way to the very top of the Faubourg Poissonnière, to the artist’s studio. As the door had neither a bell nor a knocker, he rapped loudly on it with his knuckles, and then called out—shouted. But the only response was the echo of his voice from the empty house.

After this he thought of Hussonnet; but where could he discover a man of that sort? On one occasion he had waited on Hussonnet when the latter was paying a visit to his mistress’s house in the Rue de Fleurus. Frédéric had just reached the Rue de Fleurus when he became conscious of the fact that he did not even know the lady’s name.

He tried Police Headquarters. He wandered from staircase to staircase, from office to office. He found that the Information Office was closed for the day, and was told to come back again next morning.

Then he called at all the art-dealers’ shops that he could find, and enquired whether they could give him any information as to Arnoux’s whereabouts. The only answer he got was that M. Arnoux was no longer in the trade.

At last, discouraged, weary, sickened, he returned to his hotel, and went to bed. Just as he was stretching himself between the sheets, an idea flashed upon him which made him leap up with delight:

“Regimbart! what an idiot I was not to think of him before!”

Next morning, at seven o’clock, he arrived in the Rue Notre Dame des Victoires, in front of a liquor-shop, where Regimbart was in the habit of drinking white wine. It was not yet open. He walked about the neighbourhood, and at the end of about half-an-hour, presented himself at the place once more. Regimbart had left it.

Frédéric rushed out into the street. He imagined that he could even see Regimbart’s hat some distance away. A hearse and some mourning coaches intercepted his progress. When they had got out of the way, the vision had disappeared.

Fortunately, he recalled that the Citizen lunched every day at eleven o’clock sharp, at a little restaurant in the Place Gaillon. All he had to do was to wait patiently till then; and, after sauntering about from the Bourse to the Madeleine, and from the Madeleine to the Gymnase Theatre, so long that it seemed unending, Frédéric entered the restaurant on the Rue Gaillon just as the clocks struck eleven, certain of finding Regimbart there.

“Don’t know!” said the restaurant-keeper, in an unceremonious tone.

Frédéric persisted: the man replied:

“I have no longer any acquaintance with him, Monsieur”—and, as he spoke, he raised his eyebrows majestically and shook his head mysteriously.

But, in their last interview, the Citizen had referred to the Alexandre Café. Frédéric quickly swallowed a brioche, jumped into a cab, and asked the driver whether there happened to be anywhere in the vicinity of Sainte-Geneviève a certain Café Alexandre. The cabman drove him to the Rue des Francs Bourgeois Saint-Michel, where there was an establishment of that name, and in answer to Frédéric’s question “M. Regimbart, if you please?” the keeper of the café said with an unusually gracious smile: