Sentimental Education (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) (44 page)

“I am the cause of it. You wanted to defend your old friend! That’s right—that’s right! Never shall I forget it! How good you are! Ah! my own dear boy!”

He gazed at Frédéric and shed tears, while he chuckled with delight. The Baron turned towards Joseph:

“I believe we are in the way at this little family party. It is over, messieurs, is it not ? Vicomte, put your arm into a sling. Hold on! here is my silk handkerchief.”

Then, with an imperious gesture: “Come! no spite! This is as it should be!”

The two adversaries shook hands in a very lukewarm fashion. The Vicomte, M. de Comaing, and Joseph disappeared in one direction, and Frédéric left with his friends in the opposite direction.

As the Madrid Restaurant was not far off, Arnoux proposed that they should go and drink a glass of beer there.

“We might even have breakfast.”

But, as Dussardier had no time to lose, they confined themselves to having some refreshments in the garden.

They all experienced that sense of satisfaction which follows happy endings. The Citizen, nevertheless, was annoyed at the duel having been interrupted at the most critical stage.

Arnoux had been apprised of it by a person named Compain, a friend of Regimbart; and with an irrepressible outburst of emotion he had rushed to the spot to prevent it, under the impression, however, that he was the cause of it. He begged Frédéric to furnish him with some details about it. Frédéric, touched by these proofs of affection, felt unscrupulous adding to his illusions.

“For mercy’s sake, don’t say any more about it!”

Arnoux thought that this reserve showed great tact. Then, with his usual levity, he passed on to a fresh subject.

“What news, Citizen?”

And they began talking about banking transactions, and the number of bills that were falling due. In order to be more undisturbed, they went to another table, where they exchanged whispered confidences.

Frédéric could overhear the following words: “You are going to apply for shares for me.” “Yes, but mind you!” “I have negotiated it at last for three hundred!” “A nice commission, faith!”

In short, it was clear that Arnoux was mixed up in a great many shady transactions with the Citizen.

Frédéric thought of reminding him about the fifteen thousand francs. But his recent actions forbade any reproachful words even of the mildest description. Besides, he felt tired himself, and this was not a convenient place for talking about such a thing. He put it off to another day.

Arnoux, seated in the shade of an evergreen, was smoking, with a look of joviality in his face. He raised his eyes towards the doors of private rooms looking out on the garden, and said he had often paid visits to the house in former days.

“Probably not by yourself?” returned the Citizen.

“Faith, you’re right there!”

“What a rascal you are! you, a married man!”

“Well, and what about yourself?” retorted Arnoux; and, with an indulgent smile: “I am even sure that this rascal here has a room of his own where he entertains young ladies.”

The Citizen confessed that this was true by simply raising his eyebrows. Then these two gentlemen proceeded to compare their respective tastes. Arnoux now preferred youth, working girls; Regimbart hated affected women, and went in for the genuine article before anything else. The conclusion which the earthenware-dealer laid down at the close of this discussion was that women were not to be taken seriously.

“Nevertheless, he is fond of his own wife,” thought Frédéric, as he made his way home; and he looked on Arnoux as a coarse man. He had a grudge against him on account of the duel, as if it had been for the sake of this individual that he risked his life.

But he felt grateful to Dussardier for his devotedness. Ere long the book-keeper came at his invitation to pay him a visit every day.

Frédéric lent him books—Thiers, Dulaure, Barante, and Lamartine’s
Girondins.
^aw

The honest fellow listened to everything the other said with a thoughtful air, and accepted his opinions as those of a master.

One evening he arrived in a panic.

That morning, on the boulevard, a man who was running so quickly that he was out of breath, had bumped into him, and having recognised him as a friend of Sénécal, had said to him:

“He has just been arrested! I am making my escape!”

There was no doubt about it. Dussardier had spent the day making enquiries. Sénécal was in jail charged with an attempted crime of a political nature.

The son of a foreman, he was born at Lyons, and having had as his teacher a former disciple of Chalier, he had, on his arrival in Paris, obtained admission into the “Society of Families.” His ways were known, and the police kept a watch on him. He was one of those who fought in the outbreak of May, 1839, and since then he had stayed in the shadows; but, his self-importance increasing more and more, he became a fanatical follower of Alibaud,
²⁶
mixing up his own grievances against society with those of the people against monarchy, and waking up every morning in the hope of a revolution which in a fortnight or a month would turn the world upside down. At last, disgusted at the inactivity of his brethren, enraged at the obstacles that retarded the realisation of his dreams, and in despair at the state of the country, he used his knowledge as a chemist in the incendiary bomb conspiracy; and he been caught carrying gunpowder, which he was going to try at Montmartre—a supreme effort to establish the Republic.

Dussardier was no less attached to the Republican idea, for, from his point of view, it meant emancipation and universal happiness. One day—at the age of fifteen—in the Rue Transnonain,
^ax
in front of a grocer’s shop, he had seen soldiers’ bayonets reddened with blood and with human hairs sticking to their rifle butts. Since that time, the Government had filled him with feelings of rage as the very incarnation of injustice. He confused the assassins with the gendarmes; and in his eyes a police-informer was just as bad as a parricide. All the evil scattered over the earth he naively attributed to Power; and he hated it with a deep-rooted, undying hatred that took possession of his heart and refined his sensibility. He had been dazzled by Sénécal’s rhetoric. It was of little consequence whether he happened to be guilty or not, however abominable was his plot! Since he was the victim of Authority, it was only right to help him.

“The Peers will condemn him, certainly! Then he will be taken off in a prison-van, like a convict, and will be shut up in Mont Saint-Michel, where the Government puts them to death! Austen went mad there! Steuben had killed himself! In order to transfer Barbès into a dungeon, they had dragged him by the legs and by the hair.
^ay
They trampled on his body, and his head bumped along the staircase with every step they took. What abominable treatment! The wretches!”

He was choking with angry sobs, and he walked about the room overtaken by tremendous anguish.

“In the meantime, something must be done! Let’s see, I don’t know what to do! Suppose we tried to rescue him, eh? While they are bringing him to the Luxembourg, we could throw ourselves on the escort in the passage! A dozen resolute men—that sometimes is enough to accomplish it!”

There was so much fire in his eyes that Frédéric was a little startled by his look. He recalled Sénécal’s sufferings and his austere life. Without feeling the same enthusiasm about him as Dussardier, he experienced nevertheless that admiration which is inspired by every man who sacrifices himself for an idea. He said to himself that, if he had helped this man, he would not be in his present position; and the two friends anxiously sought to devise some contrivance whereby they could set him free.

It was impossible for them to get access to him.

Frédéric examined the newspapers to try to find out what had become of him, and for three weeks he was a constant visitor at the reading-rooms.

One day several issues of the
Flambard
fell into his hands. The leading article was invariably devoted to taking apart some distinguished man. After that came some society gossip and some scandals. Then there were some wry observations about the Odéon Carpentras, fish-breeding, and prisoners under sentence of death, when there happened to be any. The disappearance of a steamer furnished material for a whole year’s jokes. In the third column a chronicle of the arts, in the form of anecdotes or advice, gave some tailors’ announcements, together with accounts of evening parties, advertisements of auctions, and analysis of artistic productions, writing in the same strain about a volume of verse and a pair of boots. The only serious portion of it was the criticism of the small theatres, in which fierce attacks were made on two or three managers; and the interests of art were invoked on the subjects of the scenery at the Funambules Theatre or the lead actress at the Délassements.

Frédéric was passing over all these items when his eyes alighted on an article entitled “A Hen with Three Roosters.” It was the story of his duel related in a lively style. He had no difficulty in recognising himself, for he was indicated by this little joke, which frequently recurred: “A young man from the College of Sens who has no sense.” He was even represented as a poor devil from the provinces, an obscure simpleton trying to mix with persons of high rank. As for the Vicomte, he was given the hero’s part, first by having forced his way into the dinner party, then in the affair of the wager, by having carried off the lady, and, finally, by having behaved like a perfect gentleman on the dueling-ground.

Frédéric’s courage was not denied exactly, but it was pointed out that an intermediary—the
protector
himself—had come on the scene just in the nick of time. The entire article concluded with this phrase, charged perhaps with sinister meaning:

“What is the reason for their affection? That’s the problem! and, as Bazile
^az
says, who the devil is it that is deceived here?”

This was, beyond all doubt, Hussonnet’s revenge against Frédéric for having refused him five thousand francs.

What was he to do? If he demanded an explanation from him, the Bohemian would protest that he was innocent, and nothing would be gained by doing this. The best course was to swallow the affront in silence. Nobody, after all, read the
Flambard.

As he left the reading-room, he saw some people standing in front of an art-dealer’s shop. They were staring at the portrait of a woman, with this line written underneath in black letters: “Mademoiselle Rosanette Bron, belonging to M. Frédéric Moreau of Nogent.”

It was indeed she—or, at least, like her—her full face displayed, her breasts exposed, with her hair hanging loose, and with a purse of red velvet in her hands, while behind her a peacock leaned his beak over her shoulder, covering the wall with its immense fan of feathers.

Pellerin was exhibiting it in order to compel Frédéric to pay, persuaded that he was a celebrity, and that all Paris, rallying around him, would take an interest in his plight.

Was this a conspiracy? Had the painter and the journalist prepared their attack on him at the same time?

His duel had not put a stop to anything. He had become an object of ridicule, and everyone had been laughing at him.

Three days later, at the end of June, the Northern shares had gone up fifteen francs, and as he had bought two thousand of them within the past month, he found that he had made thirty thousand francs. This stroke of luck gave him renewed self-confidence. He said to himself that he wanted nobody’s help, and that all his troubles were the result of his timidity and indecision. He ought to have been tough with the Maréchale from the start and refused Hussonnet the very first day. He should not have compromised himself with Pellerin. And, in order to show that he was not a bit embarrassed, he presented himself at one of Madame Dambreuse’s regular evening parties.

In the middle of the hall, Martinon, who had arrived at the same time as he had, turned round:

“What! so you are visiting here?” with a look of surprise, and as if displeased at seeing him.

“Why not?”

And, while asking himself what could be the cause of such a display of hostility on Martinon’s part, Frédéric made his way into the drawing-room.

The light was dim, in spite of the lamps placed in the corners, for the three windows, which were wide open, made three large squares of black shadow stand parallel with each other. Under the pictures, flower-stands occupied, five or six feet high, the spaces on the walls, and a silver teapot with a samovar cast their reflections in a mirror on the background. There arose a murmur of hushed voices. Shoes could be heard creaking on the carpet. He could distinguish a number of black coats, then a round table lighted up by a large shaded lamp, seven or eight ladies in summer dresses, and at some little distance Madame Dambreuse in a rocking chair. Her dress of lilac taffeta had sleeves with slits, from which emerged puffs of muslin, the charming tint of the material harmonising with the shade of her hair; and she sat leaning back with the tip of her foot on a cushion, with the repose of an exquisitely delicate work of art, or rare flower.

M. Dambreuse and an old gentleman with a white head were walking from one end of the drawing-room to the other. Some of the guests chatted here and there, sitting on the edges of little sofas, while the others, standing up, formed a circle in the centre of the room.

They were talking about votes, amendments, counter-amendments, M. Grandin’s speech and M. Benoist’s reply. The third party had decidedly gone too far. The Left Centre ought to have been more mindful of its origins. Serious attacks had been made on the minister. It must be reassuring, however, to see that he had no successor. In sort, the situation was completely analogous to that of 1834.

As these things bored Frédéric, he drew near the ladies. Martinon was beside them, standing up, with his hat under his arm, showing himself in three-quarter profile, and looking so neat that he resembled a piece of Sèvres porcelain. He took up a copy of the
Revue des Deux Mondes
which was lying on the table between an Imitation and an
Almanach de Gotha,
²⁷
and spoke of a distinguished poet in a contemptuous tone, said he was going to the “conferences of Saint-Francis,” complained of his larynx, swallowed from time to time a lozenge, and in the meantime kept talking about music, and made small talk. Mademoiselle Cécile, M. Dambreuse’s niece, who happened to be embroidering a pair of cuffs, gazed at him with her pale blue eyes; and Miss John, the governess, who had a flat nose, laid aside her tapestry on his account. Both of them appeared to be exclaiming internally: