Читать книгу Bijou - Gyp - Страница 5

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Bijou, assisted by Pierrot, was handing the coffee round, when suddenly she darted off in pursuit of Paul de Rueille, who had just come out of the drawing-room, and was descending the steps which led on to the terrace.

"Stop, stop! Where are you going?" she called out.

"Oh, only for a stroll," he answered, without looking round, "to get a breath of air, if that is possible with this heat."

Bijou had already caught him up.

"Oh, no, what about the play?—You must come and work."

"My head aches."

"Work will take it away! You really must come, we have only three days."

"But I am not indispensable; you can do without me," said Rueille irritably.

"Oh, but you always do the writing."

"From dictation; it is not necessary to be very clever for that."

"Yes it is; and then, too, we are used to you."

She was on the step above him, and, bending forward, she put her arms round his neck, and said in a coaxing tone:

"Paul, dear, come now, just to please me, you would be so nice, so very nice!"

M. de Rueille, turning abruptly, unclasped the soft arms, which encircled his neck and rested against his face.

"All right, all right!" he said, in a hoarse voice, "I'll come!"

The young girl stepped back, and in the evening-light he could see her large astonished eyes shining as she gazed at him.

"How cross you are!" she said timidly. "What's the matter with you?" He did not answer, and she asked again: "Won't you tell me?"

"No, no," he said curtly, and then he re-mounted the steps and went into the drawing-room.

Bijou followed him, and whispered to Bertrade:

"I don't know what is the matter with your husband, but he is very bad-tempered."

Madame de Rueille glanced at Paul. He looked rather fagged and nervous, and was trying to appear at his ease, as he talked and laughed noisily with the tutor, who, on the contrary, was silent and reserved.

"Yes, certainly something is the matter with him," said Bertrade, rather uneasy at seeing her husband so strange. "I do not know at all what it is, though," she added.

"Only imagine," Bijou proceeded to explain to the whole room, "Paul wanted to go for a stroll instead of coming to work. Yes, and it was not very easy to get him here, I can assure you."

With a resigned look, M. de Rueille took his seat at a side table with a marble top. He then took up the manuscript, and, turning to the page which was commenced, dipped a long, quill pen into the ink.

"When you are ready?"—he said calmly.

"Well, but first of all, where are we?" asked M. de Jonzac.

"Scene three of the second act."

"Still?" exclaimed Bijou, astonished.

"Alas, yes."

"My dear children, you will never have it finished," remarked the marchioness.

"Oh, yes, grandmamma, we shall," said Bijou merrily; "you will see how we are going to work now. Come now, we are at the third scene of the second act—it is where the poet is defending himself after the accusations—rather spiteful ones, too—which Venus has brought against him."

"Well, and what then?" asked M. de Rueille after a pause.

"Well," said Bijou, "in my opinion, we want a little couplet there; what do you think, Jean?"

Jean de Blaye, with an absorbed look on his face, was lounging in a deep arm-chair, his head thrown back on the cushions. He appeared to be in a reverie, and had not even heard the question.

"Are you asleep?" asked Bijou.

"Did you speak to me?" he asked, turning towards her.

"Why, yes, I did have the honour of speaking to you. I asked you whether a couplet would not be the right thing there—a couplet that would go to some well-known air?"

"Yes," he replied, in an absent sort of way, "that would do very well."

"All right, compose it then."

Jean gave a start; he was quite roused now.

"I am to compose it—why should I be the one to do it?"

"Because you always do them."

"Well, that's a nice reason," protested Jean. "I should say that is precisely why it is someone else's turn. You have only to set the others to work—Henry, or Uncle Alexis, or M. Giraud, or even Pierrot."

"Why do you say even?" asked Pierrot, annoyed. "I should do them quite as well as you."

"Well, do them then! for my part, I have had enough of it."

"Jean," said Bijou, in a pleading tone, "don't leave us in the lurch, please."

She was going across to him, her pretty head bent forward, and a most comically beseeching little pout on her lips, when M. de Rueille rose abruptly from his seat, and stopped her on the way:

"Oh, he will do your couplets right enough; he likes doing them; sit down, Bijou."

The young girl stood still in the middle of the room, surprised at this extraordinary proceeding.

"But why don't you sit down?" she exclaimed. "What have you come away from your table for?"

"Ah! I have no right to leave the table without your permission?"

"Jean!" began Bijou again, "come now, Jean!"

Once again M. de Rueille interposed.

"Why don't you kneel down to him at once?" he said, in a sharp tone.

"Goodness! I don't mind doing that even if he will only be persuaded."

She was darting across to her cousin, but Rueille caught her arm, and said angrily:

"What nonsense! it is perfectly ridiculous!"

Bijou looked at him in amazement, and stammered out:

"It is you who are ridiculous!"

"Oh, yes, of course," he answered, speaking harshly, "it is I who ought to go and sit down, and I am the one who is ridiculous; in fact, I am everything I ought not to be, and I always do everything I ought not to do."

"Whatever is the matter, children?" asked Madame de Bracieux.

M. de Jonzac explained, as he emptied his pipe by tapping it gently against a piece of furniture.

"Heaven have mercy upon us! It is nothing less than Paul quarrelling with Bijou!"

"With Bijou?" exclaimed the old lady, in perfect amazement.

"Paul quarrelling with Bijou!" repeated Madame de Rueille, putting down the newspaper she had been reading, "impossible!"

"Yes, really!" affirmed the abbé, quite horrified. "M. de Rueille is vexed with Mademoiselle Denyse!"

"Come here, Bijou!" called out the marchioness, and the young girl tripped across the room to her grandmamma, and knelt down on the cushions at her feet.

"You ought not to let Bijou go on in that way with you!" said M. de Rueille, going up to Jean, and speaking in a low voice.

"Go on in what way? are you dreaming?"

"I am not dreaming at all. Denyse is twenty years old, you know!"

"Twenty-one," corrected the young man.

"All the more reason—she really ought to behave more carefully!"

"Poor child, she behaves perfectly!" and then looking at his cousin, he added: "I really don't know what's up with you?"

"Oh, I'm in the wrong," murmured M. de Rueille, slightly embarrassed. "Of course, I'm quite in the wrong!"

"Absolutely so!" said Blaye drily, getting up from his arm-chair.

On seeing him move towards the door, Bijou left the marchioness, and rushed across to him:

"Oh, no! you are not going away! Grandmamma, tell him that he is not to leave us like this!"

"Come now, Jean," said the marchioness, half joking and half scolding, "don't plague them so!"

The young man sat down again in despair.

"And this is the country!" he exclaimed, "this is rest and holiday! I have to work like a nigger, writing plays—plays with couplets—and then go to bed regularly at two in the morning, and this is what is called being in clover!"

Pierrot had listened to this outburst with apparent solemnity.

"Continue, old man," he said jeeringly, "you interest me!"

Bijou laughed, and Jean, looking annoyed, turned towards Pierrot, and said sarcastically, "You are very witty, my dear boy!"

"Children, you are perfectly insufferable!" exclaimed Madame de Bracieux, raising her voice. She was looking at them in surprise, wondering what wind had suddenly risen to bring about this storm. She could not account for all these disagreeable little speeches, and the hostile attitude they had taken up, and which was quite a new thing to the old lady. Once again she called Bijou to her. The young girl was standing looking round at everyone with a questioning expression in her soft eyes.

"Do you know what's the matter with them?" asked the marchioness.

"I have no idea, grandmamma," she answered innocently, the wondering look still on her face.

"Don't you see how cross they are?" continued the marchioness.

"Yes, I can see that they are cross, but I do not know what it's all about; if it is on account of the play, why, we won't have it! I don't want to worry everyone with it, just because I like it; but I do like it immensely."

Just at this moment M. de Rueille called out:

"Well, are we going to work at this, yes or no? I have had enough of sitting waiting here like an imbecile."

"Where are we?" asked Jean, in a way which meant, "As there's no getting out of it, let us start at once."