The novels, romances, and memoirs of Alphonse Daudet (32 page)

The whole household is silently busied about

him, Mme. Eyssette spends her days at the foot of the bed, with her knitting ; the dear blind woman is so used to her long needles that she knits as well as in the time when she had her eyes. The very deserving person is there, too; and Pierrotte's kind face is constantly to be seen at the door. Even the flute-player comes up four or five times a day to ask for news, — only it must be said that he does not come for love of the patient; it is the very deserving person who attracts him. Since Camille Pierrette formally declared to him that she wanted neither him nor his flute, the fiery performer has fallen back upon the widow Tribou, who, though neither so rich nor so pretty as Pierrotte's daughter, is yet not entirely devoid of charms and savings.

The flute-player has lost no time with this romantic matron ; at the third visit, marriage was already in the air, and they talked vaguely of setting up a herb-shop in the Rue des Lombards, with the fruit of the lady's economies. It is in order not to allow these fine projects to slumber, that the young musician comes up so often for news.

And Mdlle. Pierrotte? Nobody speaks of her. Isn't she still in the house? Yes, always; only, since the patient has been out of danger, she has hardly ever entered his room. When she comes, she does so in passing, to get the blind woman and lead her to table; but she never has a word for Little What 's-His-Name. Ah ! how far away he is from the time of the red rose, the time when the black eyes opened like two velvet flowers to sa}':

" I love you." The sick boy sighs in his bed, thinking of these vanished joys. He sees she no longer loves him, that she flies from him, and has a horror of him; but it is his own fault, and he has no right to complain. And yet, it would have been so pleasant, in the midst of so much mourning and sadness, to have a little love to warm his heart! It would have been such a comfort to have a friendly shoulder to cry upon ! " After all, the harm is done," thought the poor boy to himself; " let us think no more of it, and a truce to idle dreams. It is no longer a question of my being happy in life; it is a question of doing my duty. To-morrow I shall speak to Pierrotte."

In fact, the next day, at the time when Pierrotte crosses the room on tip-toe, to go down to the shop, Little What's-His-Name, who has been watching for him since dawn from behind the curtains, calls softly: " Monsieur Pierrotte ! Monsieur Pierrotte ! "

Pierrotte goes up to the bed; and then the sick boy says, with much emotion, and without raising his eyes:

" My dear M. Pierrotte, here I am, on the way to my recovery, and I want to have a serious talk with you. I am not going to thank you for all you are dping for my mother and me "

Pierrotte cuts me short: "Not a word of that, Monsieur Daniel! What I am doing is merely my duty; it was all settled with M. Jacques."

" Yes, I know, Pierrotte; I know you always

have the same answer to all I want to say to you on this subject, so it is not of this I am going to speak. On the contrary, I have called you, because I want to ask a favor of you. Your clerk is soon to leave you; will you take me in his place? Oh, please, Pierrotte! listen till I come to the end; don't say no, till you have heard me to the end. I know, after my base conduct, I have no longer a right to live with you all. There is some one in this house to whom my presence gives pain, some one to whom the sight of me is odious, and it is only just that it should be so. But, if I arrange never to let her see me, if I promise never to come up here, and always stay in the shop, if I belong to your household without making part of it, like a big dog living in the court-yard and never entering the house, — could not you take me on these conditions?"

Pierrotte feels a desire to take Little What's-His-Name's curly head in his hands and kiss it violently; but he restrains himself, and answers quietly:

" Now, listen, Monsieur Daniel; before saying anything, I must consult my little girl. Your suggestion suits me well enough, but I don't know if the little girl — At all events, we can find out. She must be up. Camille ! Camille ! "

Camille Pierrotte, matutinal as a bee, is engaged in watering her red rose-bush on the drawing-room mantelpiece. She makes her appearance in a morning-gown, her hair brushed straight back, fresh, gay, and smelling of flowers.

" Come, little girl," said her father, " here is M. Daniel asking if he can take the place of clerk in my shop; only as he thinks his presence here would be too disagreeable to you —"

'' Too disagreeable ! " interrupted Camille Pier-rotte, changing color.

This is all she says, but the black eyes finish her sentence for her. Yes, the black eyes themselves open before Little What's-His-Name, deep as night, and luminous as stars, crying: "Love! Love! " with so much passion and fire that the poor sick boy's heart is kindled.

Then Pierrotte says, laughing in his sleeve: " You had both better explain yourselves ; there is some misunderstanding about it."

And he turns to drum the measure of a dance of the C^vennes, on the window-pane; then, when he thinks the children have explained themselves sufficiently,—O Heavens! they have hardly had time to say two or three words to each other,—he comes back and looks at them. "Well?" he says.

" Ah, Pierrotte! " says Little What's-His-Name, holding out his hands to him, " she is as kind as you; she has forgiven me!"

From that moment the patient's convalescence advances with seven-leagued boots. I should think so! The black eyes never leave the room. The days are spent in discussing plans for the future. They talk, too, of dear Mother Jacques, and his name still makes them shed many tears. But, all the same, there is love in the house of Pierrotte ;

its presence can be felt there. And if anybody is surprised that love can flourish thus in mourning and tears, I will tell him to go to the graveyard and see all the pretty little flowers that grow in the crevices of the tombs.

Besides, you must not think that love makes Little What 's-His-Namc forget his duty. Happy as he is, lying in his great bed, with his mother and the black eyes so near, he is in haste to be well again, to get up and go down to the shop. It is not certainly because he finds the china so tempting, but he is pining to begin that life of labor and self-devotion of which Mother Jacques set him the example. After all, it is better to sell plates in a shop, as Irma the actress used to say, than to sweep out the Ouly Institute, or to be hissed at Montpar-nasse. There is no farther talk of the Muse. Daniel Eyssette still loves verses, but not his own ; and on the day when the printer, weary of keeping the nine hundred and ninety-nine volumes of the Pastoral Comedy, sends them to the Passage du Saumon, the poor ex-poet has the courage to say:

" We must burn all this."

To which Pierrotte, who is more prudent, replies :

" Burn all this! No, indeed, I should rather keep it in the shop; I shall find a way to use it. If I may be allowed to say so, I have very soon to send a case of egg-cups to Madagascar. It seems that in that country, ever since they saw the wife of an English missionary eating boiled eggs in the shell, they are unwilling to eat them in any other way. With your permission, Monsieur

Daniel, your books will serve to wrap the egg-cups in."

And, in fact, two weeks afterwards, the Pastoral Comedy sets out on its journey to the country of the illustrious Rana-Volo. May it have more success there than in Paris!

And now, dear reader, before ending this history, I want to introduce you once more to the yellow drawing-room. It is a Sunday afternoon. A fine winter's day, — cold and dry and sunny. All Pierrotte's household is radiant. Little What's-His-Name is quite well again, and has just risen for the first time. In the morning, in honor of this happy event, several dozen oysters, watered with a delicious white wine of Touraine, have been sacrificed to Esculapius. Now, all are gathered together in the drawing-room; it is warm and comfortable ; a fire is blazing in the fireplace. The sun traces silver landscapes on the frost-covered panes.

In front of the fire, Little What's-His-Name sits on a stool at the feet of his poor blind mother, who is dozing, and talks in a low voice with Mdlle. Pierrotte, who is redder than the red rose she wears in her hair. That is natural, for she is so near the fire! From time to time there is a sound like the nibbling of a mouse from the bird-headed man who is pecking at sugar in the corner; or, again, a cry of distress from the very deserving person who is losing at bezique the money destined for the herb-shop. I beg you to observe the triumphant air of Mme. Lalouette who is winning, and the anxious smile of the flute-player, who is losing.

And M. Pierrette? Oh! M. Pierrette is not far distant; he is there in the recess of the window, half hidden by the long yellow curtain, entirely absorbed in a silent task over which he is perspiring. Before him on a small round table, there are compasses, pencils, rulers, squares, india ink and brushes, and also a long piece of drawing-paper, that he is covering with strange signs. His work seems to please him; every five minutes he lifts his head, holds it a little on one side and smiles complacently at the daub he is making.

What is this mysterious work of his?

Wait a minute, we shall soon know. Pierrette has finished; he leaves his hiding-place, comes softly up behind Camille and Little What 's-His-Name, then suddenly spreads out his large piece of paper in front of their eyes, saying: " There, young lovers, what do you think of this?"

There are two exclamations in reply:

"Oh, papa! "

" Oh, Monsieur Pierrette ! "

" What is it? What is it? " asks the poor blind woman, waking with a start.

Pierrette says joyously:

" What is it, Madame Eyssette? It is, if I may be allowed to say so, the draft for a new sign that we are to put up in front of the shop in a few months. Now, Monsieur Daniel, read it aloud to us so that we may judge of the effect."

In the bottom of his heart. Little What's-His-Name sheds a last tear for his blue butterflies ; and, taking the paper in both hands — Come, be

a man, Little What's-His-Name !— he reads aloud in a" steady voice the sign for the shop, in which his future is written in letters a foot long:

CHINA AND GLASS.

EYSSETTE AND PIERROTTE.

SUCCESSORS TO LALOUETTE.