Читать книгу A Chair on the Boulevard - Merrick Leonard - Страница 6

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One night when Pitou went home, an unaccustomed perfume floated to meet him on the stairs. He climbed them in amazement.

"If we lived in an age of miracles I should conclude that Tricotrin was smoking a cigar," he said to himself. "What can it be?"

The pair occupied a garret in the rue des Trois Frères at this time, where their window, in sore need of repairs, commanded an unrivalled view of the dirty steps descending to the passage des Abbesses. To-night, behold Tricotrin pacing the garret with dignity, between his lips an Havannah that could have cost no less than a franc. The composer rubbed his eyes.

"Have they made you an Academician?" he stammered. "Or has your uncle, the silk manufacturer, died and left you his business?"

"My friend," replied the poet, "prepare yourself forthwith for 'a New and Powerful Serial of the Most Absorbing Interest'! I am no longer the young man who went out this evening—I am a celebrity."

"I thought," said the composer, "that it couldn't be you when I saw the cigar."

"Figure yourself," continued Tricotrin, "that at nine o'clock I was wandering on the Grand Boulevard with a thirst that could have consumed a brewery. I might mention that I had also empty pockets, but—"

"It would be to pad the powerful Serial shamelessly," said Pitou: "there are things that one takes for granted."

"At the corner of the place de l'Opera a fellow passed me whom I knew and yet did not know; I could not recall where it was we had met. I turned and followed him, racking my brains the while. Suddenly I remembered—"

"Pardon me," interrupted the composer, "but I have read Bel-Ami myself. Oh, it is quite evident that you are a celebrity—you have already forgotten how to be original!"

"There is a resemblance, it is true," admitted Tricotrin. "However, Maupassant had no copyright in the place de l'Opera. I say that I remembered the man; I had known him when he was in the advertisement business in Lyons. Well, we have supped together; he is in a position to do me a service—he will ask an editor to publish an Interview with me!"

"An Interview?" exclaimed Pitou. "You are to be Interviewed? Ah, no, my poor friend, too much meat has unhinged your reason! Go to sleep—you will be hungry and sane again to-morrow."

"It will startle some of them, hein? 'Gustave Tricotrin at Home'—in the illustrated edition of Le Demi-Mot?"

"Illustrated?" gasped Pitou. He looked round the attic. "Did I understand you to say 'illustrated'?"

"Well, well," said Tricotrin, "we shall move the beds! And, when the concierge nods, perhaps we can borrow the palm from the portals. With a palm and an amiable photographer, an air of splendour is easily arrived at. I should like a screen—we will raise one from a studio in the rue Ravignan. Mon Dieu! with a palm and a screen I foresee the most opulent effects. 'A Corner of the Study'—we can put the screen in front of the washhand-stand, and litter the table with manuscripts—you will admit that we have a sufficiency of manuscripts?—no one will know that they have all been rejected. Also, a painter in the rue Ravignan might lend us a few of his failures—'Before you go, let me show you my pictures,' said monsieur Tricotrin: 'I am an ardent collector'!"

In Montmartre the sight of two "types" shifting household gods makes no sensation—the sails of the remaining windmills still revolve. On the day that it had its likeness taken, the attic was temporarily transformed. At least a score of unappreciated masterpieces concealed the dilapidation of the walls; the broken window was decorated with an Eastern fabric that had been a cherished "property" of half the ateliers in Paris; the poet himself—with the palm drooping gracefully above his head—mused in a massive chair, in which Solomon had been pronouncing judgment until 12:15, when the poet had called for it. The appearance of exhaustion observed by admirers of the poet's portrait was due to the chair's appalling weight. As he staggered under it up the steps of the passage des Abbesses, the young man had feared he would expire on the threshold of his fame.

However, the photographer proved as resourceful as could be desired, and perhaps the most striking feature of the illustration was the spaciousness of the apartment in which monsieur Tricotrin was presented to readers of Le Demi-Mot. The name of the thoroughfare was not obtruded.

With what pride was that issue of the journal regarded in the rue des

Trois Frères!

"Aha!" cried Tricotrin, who in moments persuaded himself that he really occupied such noble quarters, "those who repudiated me in the days of my struggles will be a little repentant now, hein? Stone Heart will discover that I was not wrong in relying on my genius!"

"I assume," said Pitou, "that 'Stone Heart' is your newest pet-name for the silk-manufacturing uncle?"

"You catch my meaning precisely. I propose to send a copy of the paper to Lyons, with the Interview artistically bordered by laurels; I cannot draw laurels myself, but there are plenty of persons who can. We will find someone to do it when we palter with starvation at the Café du Bel Avenir this evening—or perhaps we had better fast at the Lucullus Junior, instead; there is occasionally some ink in the bottle there. I shall put the address in the margin—my uncle will not know where it is, and on the grounds of euphony I have no fault to find with it. It would not surprise me if I received an affectionate letter and a bank-note in reply—the perversity of human nature delights in generosities to the prosperous."

"It is a fact," said Pitou. "That human nature!"

"Who knows?—he may even renew the allowance that he used to make me!"

"Upon my word, more unlikely things have happened," Pitou conceded.

"Mon Dieu, Nicolas, we shall again have enough to eat!"

"Ah, visionary!" exclaimed Pitou; "are there no bounds to your imagination?"

Now, the perversity to which the poet referred did inspire monsieur Rigaud, of Lyons, to loosen his purse-strings. He wrote that he rejoiced to learn that Gustave was beginning to make his way, and enclosed a present of two hundred and fifty francs. More, after an avuncular preamble which the poet skipped—having a literary hatred of digression in the works of others—he even hinted that the allowance might be resumed.

What a banquet there was in bohemia! How the glasses jingled afterwards in La Lune Rousse, and oh, the beautiful hats that Germaine and Marcelle displayed on the next fine Sunday! Even when the last ripples of the splash were stilled, the comrades swaggered gallantly on the boulevard Rochechouart, for by any post might not the first instalment of that allowance arrive?

Weeks passed; and Tricotrin began to say, "It looks to me as if we needed another Interview!"

And then came a letter which was no less cordial than its predecessor, but which stunned the unfortunate recipient like a warrant for his execution. Monsieur Rigaud stated that business would bring him to Paris on the following evening and that he anticipated the pleasure of visiting his nephew; he trusted that his dear Gustave would meet him at the station. The poet and composer stared at each other with bloodless faces.

"You must call at his hotel instead," faltered Pitou at last.

"But you may be sure he will wish to see my elegant abode."

"'It is in the hands of the decorators. How unfortunate!'"

"He would propose to offer them suggestions; he is a born suggester."

"'Fever is raging in the house—a most infectious fever'; we will ask a medical student to give us one."

"It would not explain my lodging in a slum meanwhile."

"Well, let us admit that there is nothing to be done; you will have to own up!"

"Are you insane? It is improvident youths like you, who come to lament their wasted lives. If I could receive him this once as he expects to be received, we cannot doubt that it would mean an income of two thousand francs to me. Prosperity dangles before us—shall I fail to clutch it? Mon Dieu, what a catastrophe, his coming to Paris! Why cannot he conduct his business in Lyons? Is there not enough money in the city of Lyons to satisfy him? O grasper! what greed! Nicolas, my more than brother, if it were night when I took him to a sumptuous apartment, he might not notice the name of the street—I could talk brilliantly as we turned the corner. Also I could scintillate as I led him away. He would never know that it was not the rue des Trois Frères."

"You are right," agreed Pitou; "but which is the pauper in our social circle whose sumptuous apartment you propose to acquire?"

"One must consider," said Tricotrin. "Obviously, I am compelled to entertain in somebody's; fortunately, I have two days to find it in. I shall now go forth!"

It was a genial morning, and the first person he accosted in the rue Ravignan was Goujaud, painting in the patch of garden before the studios. "Tell me, Goujaud," exclaimed the poet, "have you any gilded acquaintance who would permit me the use of his apartment for two hours to-morrow evening?"

Goujaud reflected for some seconds, with his head to one side. "I have never done anything so fine as this before," he observed; "regard the atmosphere of it!"

"It is execrable!" replied Tricotrin, and went next door to Flamant. "My old one," he explained, "I have urgent need of a regal apartment for two hours to-morrow—have you a wealthy friend who would accommodate me?"

"You may beautify your bedroom with all my possessions," returned

Flamant heartily. "I have a stuffed parrot that is most decorative, but

I have not a friend that is wealthy."

"You express yourself like a First Course for the Foreigner," said

Tricotrin, much annoyed. "Devil take your stuffed parrot!"

The heat of the sun increased towards midday, and drops began to trickle under the young man's hat. By four o'clock he had called upon sixty-two persons, exclusive of Sanquereau, whom he had been unable to wake. He bethought himself of Lajeunie, the novelist; but Lajeunie could offer him nothing more serviceable than a pass for the Elysée- Montmartre. "Now how is it possible that I spend my life among such imbeciles?" groaned the unhappy poet; "one offers me a parrot, and another a pass for a dancing-hall! Can I assure my uncle, who is a married man, and produces silk in vast quantities, that I reside in a dancing-hall? Besides, we know those passes—they are available only for ladies."

"It is true that you could not get in by it," assented Lajeunie, "but I give it to you freely. Take it, my poor fellow! Though it may appear inadequate to the occasion, who knows but what it will prove to be the basis of a fortune?"

"You are as crazy as the stories you write," said Tricotrin, "Still, it can go in my pocket." And he made, exhausted, for a bench in the place Dancourt, where he apostrophised his fate.

Thus occupied, he fell asleep; and presently a young woman sauntered from the sidewalk across the square. In the shady little place Dancourt is the little white Theatre Montmartre, and she first perused the play-bill, and then contemplated the sleeping poet. It may have been that she found something attractive in his bearing, or it may have been that ragamuffins sprawled elsewhere; but, having determined to wait awhile, she selected the bench on which he reposed, and forthwith woke him.

"Now this is nice!" he exclaimed, realising his lapse with a start.

"Oh, monsieur!" said she, blushing.

"Pardon; I referred to my having dozed when every moment is of consequence," he explained. "And yet," he went on ruefully, "upon my soul, I cannot conjecture where I shall go next!"

Her response was so sympathetic that it tempted him to remain a little longer, and in five minutes she was recounting her own perplexities. It transpired that she was a lady's-maid with a holiday, and the problem before her was whether to spend her money on a theatre, or on a ball.

"Now that is a question which is disposed of instantly," said Tricotrin, "You shall spend your money on a theatre, and go to a ball as well." And out fluttered the pink pass presented to him by Lajeunie.

The girl's tongue was as lively as her gratitude. She was, she told him, maid to the famous Colette Aubray, who had gone unattended that afternoon to visit the owner of a villa in the country, where she would stay until the next day but one. "So you see, monsieur, we poor servants are left alone in the flat to amuse ourselves as best we can!"

"Mon Dieu!" ejaculated Tricotrin, and added mentally, "It was decidedly the good kind fairies that pointed to this bench!"

He proceeded to pay the young woman such ardent attentions that she assumed he meant to accompany her to the ball, and her disappointment was extreme when he had to own that the state of his finances forbade it. "All I can suggest, my dear Léonie," he concluded, "is that I shall be your escort when you leave. It is abominable that you must have other partners in the meantime, but I feel that you will be constant to me in your thoughts. I shall have much to tell you—I shall whisper a secret in your ear; for, incredible as it may sound, my sweet child, you alone in Paris have the power to save me!"

"Oh, monsieur!" faltered the admiring lady's-maid, "it has always been my great ambition to save a young man, especially a young man who used such lovely language. I am sure, by the way you talk, that you must be a poet!"

"Extraordinary," mused Tricotrin, "that all the world recognises me as a poet, excepting when it reads my poetry!" And this led him to reflect that he must sell some of it, in order to provide refreshment for Léonie before he begged her aid. Accordingly, he arranged to meet her when the ball finished, and limped back to the attic, where he made up a choice assortment of his wares.

He had resolved to try the office of Le Demi-Mot; but his reception there was cold. "You should not presume on our good nature," demurred the Editor; "only last month we had an article on you, saying that you were highly talented, and now you ask us to publish your work besides. There must be a limit to such things."

He examined the collection, nevertheless, with a depreciatory countenance, and offered ten francs for three of the finest specimens. "From Le Demi-Mot I would counsel you to accept low terms," he said, with engaging interest, "on account of the prestige you, derive from appearing in it."

"In truth it is a noble thing, prestige," admitted Tricotrin; "but, monsieur, I have never known a man able to make a meal of it when he was starving, or to warm himself before it when he was without a fire. Still—though it is a jumble-sale price—let them go!"

"Payment will be made in due course," said the Editor, and became immersed in correspondence.

Tricotrin paled to the lips, and the next five minutes were terrible; indeed, he did not doubt that he would have to limp elsewhere. At last he cried, "Well, let us say seven francs, cash! Seven francs in one's fist are worth ten in due course." And thus the bargain was concluded.

"It was well for Hercules that none of his labours was the extraction of payment from an editor!" panted the poet on the doorstep. But he was now enabled to fête the lady's-maid in grand style, and—not to be outdone in generosity—she placed mademoiselle Aubray's flat at his disposal directly he asked for it.

"You have accomplished a miracle!" averred Pitou, in the small hours, when he heard the news.

Tricotrin waved a careless hand. "To a man of resource all things are possible!" he murmured.

The next evening the silk manufacturer was warmly embraced on the platform, and not a little surprised to learn that his nephew expected a visit at once. However, the young man's consternation was so profound when objections were made that, in the end, they were withdrawn. Tricotrin directed the driver after monsieur Rigaud was in the cab, and, on their reaching the courtyard, there was Léonie, all frills, ready to carry the handbag.

"Your servant?" inquired monsieur Rigaud, with some disapproval, as they went upstairs; "she is rather fancifully dressed, hein?"

"Is it so?" answered Tricotrin. "Perhaps a bachelor is not sufficiently observant in these matters. Still, she is an attentive domestic. Take off your things, my dear uncle, and make yourself at home. What joy it gives me to see you here!"

"Mon Dieu," exclaimed the silk manufacturer, looking about him, "you have a place fit for a prince! It must have cost a pretty penny."

"Between ourselves," said Tricotrin, "I often reproach myself for what I spent on it; I could make very good use to-day of some of the money I squandered."

"What curtains!" murmured monsieur Rigaud, fingering the silk enraptured. "The quality is superb! What may they have charged you for these curtains?"

"It was years ago—upon my word I do not remember," drawled Tricotrin, who had no idea whether he ought to say five hundred francs, or five thousand. "Also, you must not think I have bought everything you see—many of the pictures and bronzes are presents from admirers of my work. It is gratifying, hein?"

"I—I—To confess the truth, we had not heard of your triumphs," admitted monsieur Rigaud; "I did not dream you were so successful."

"Ah, it is in a very modest way," Tricotrin replied. "I am not a millionaire, I assure you! On the contrary, it is often difficult to make both ends meet—although," he added hurriedly, "I live with the utmost economy, my uncle. The days of my thoughtlessness are past. A man should save, a man should provide for the future."

At this moment he was astonished to see Léonie open the door and announce that dinner was served. She had been even better than her word.

"Dinner?" cried monsieur Rigaud. "Ah, now I understand why you were so dejected when I would not come!"

"Bah, it will be a very simple meal," said his nephew, "but after a journey one must eat. Let us go in." He was turning the wrong way, but Léonie's eye saved him.

"Come," he proceeded, taking his seat, "some soup—some good soup! What will you drink, my uncle?"

"On the sideboard I see champagne," chuckled monsieur Rigaud; "you treat the old man well, you rogue!"

"Hah," said Tricotrin, who had not observed it, "the cellar, I own, is an extravagance of mine! Alone, I drink only mineral waters, or a little claret, much diluted; but to my dearest friends I must give the dearest wines. Léonie, champagne!" It was a capital dinner, and the cigars and cigarettes that Léonie put on the table with the coffee were of the highest excellence. Agreeable conversation whiled away some hours, and Tricotrin began to look for his uncle to get up. But it was raining smartly, and monsieur Rigaud was reluctant to bestir himself. Another hour lagged by, and at last Tricotrin faltered:

"I fear I must beg you to excuse me for leaving you, my uncle; it is most annoying, but I am compelled to go out. The fact is, I have consented to collaborate with Capus, and he is so eccentric, this dear Alfred—we shall be at work all night."

"Go, my good Gustave," said his uncle readily; "and, as I am very tired, if you have no objection, I will occupy your bed."

Tricotrin's jaw dropped, and it was by a supreme effort that he stammered how pleased the arrangement would make him. To intensify the fix, Leonie and the cook had disappeared—doubtless to the mansarde in which they slept—and he was left to cope with the catastrophe alone. However, having switched on the lights, he conducted the elderly gentleman to an enticing apartment. He wished him an affectionate "good-night," and after promising to wake him early, made for home, leaving the manufacturer sleepily surveying the room's imperial splendour.

"What magnificence!" soliloquised monsieur Rigaud. "What toilet articles!" He got into bed. "What a coverlet—there must be twenty thousand francs on top of me!"

He had not slumbered under them long when he was aroused by such a commotion that he feared for the action of his heart. Blinking in the glare, he perceived Léonie in scanty attire, distracted on her knees—and, by the bedside, a beautiful lady in a travelling cloak, raging with the air of a lioness.

"Go away!" quavered the manufacturer. "What is the meaning of this intrusion?"

"Intrusion?" raved the lady. "That is what you will explain, monsieur!

How comes it that you are in my bed?"

"Yours?" ejaculated monsieur Rigaud. "What is it you say? You are making a grave error, for which you will apologise, madame!"

"Ah, hold me back," pleaded the lady, throwing up her eyes, "hold me back or I shall assault him!" She flung to Leonie. "Wretched girl, you shall pay for this! Not content with lavishing my champagne and my friend's cigars on your lover, you must put him to recuperate in my room!"

"Oh!" gasped the manufacturer, and hid his head under the priceless coverlet. "Such an imputation is unpardonable," he roared, reappearing. "I am monsieur Rigaud, of Lyons; the flat belongs to my nephew, monsieur Tricotrin; I request you to retire!"

"Imbecile!" screamed the lady; "the flat belongs to me—Colette Aubray. And your presence may ruin me—I expect a visitor on most important business! He has not my self-control; if he finds you here he will most certainly send you a challenge. He is the best swordsman in Paris! I advise you to believe me, for you have just five minutes to save your life!"

"Monsieur," wailed Léonie, "you have been deceived!" And, between her sobs, she confessed the circumstances, which he heard with the greatest difficulty, owing to the chattering of his teeth.

The rain was descending in cataracts when monsieur Rigaud got outside, but though the trams and the trains had both stopped running, and cabs were as dear as radium, his fury was so tempestuous that nothing could deter him from reaching the poet's real abode. His attack on the front door warned Tricotrin and Pitou what had happened, and they raised themselves, blanched, from their pillows, to receive his curses. It was impossible to reason with him, and he launched the most frightful denunciation at his nephew for an hour, when the abatement of the downpour permitted him to depart. More, at noon, who should arrive but Leonie in tears! She had been dismissed from her employment, and came to beg the poet to intercede for her.

"What calamities!" groaned Tricotrin. "How fruitless are man's noblest endeavours without the favouring breeze! I shall drown myself at eight o'clock. However, I will readily plead for you first, if your mistress will receive me."

By the maid's advice he presented himself late in the day, and when he had cooled his heels in the salon for some time, a lady entered, who was of such ravishing appearance that his head swam.

"Monsieur Tricotrin?" she inquired haughtily. "I have heard your name from your uncle, monsieur. Are you here to visit my servant?"

"Mademoiselle," he faltered, "I am here to throw myself on your mercy. At eight o'clock I have decided to commit suicide, for I am ruined. The only hope left me is to win your pardon before I die."

"I suppose your uncle has disowned you?" she said. "Naturally! It was a pretty situation to put him in. How would you care to be in it yourself?"

"Alas, mademoiselle," sighed Tricotrin, "there are situations to which a poor poet may not aspire!"

After regarding him silently she exclaimed, "I cannot understand what a boy with eyes like yours saw in Léonie?"

"Merely good nature and a means to an end, believe me! If you would ease my last moments, reinstate her in your service. Do not let me drown with the knowledge that another is suffering for my fault! Mademoiselle, I entreat you—take her back!"

"And why should I ease your last moments?" she demurred.

"Because I have no right to ask it; because I have no defence for my sin towards you; because you would be justified in trampling on me—and to pardon would be sublime!"

"You are very eloquent for my maid," returned the lady.

He shook his head. "Ah, no—I fear I am pleading for myself. For, if you reinstate the girl, it will prove that you forgive the man—and I want your forgiveness so much!" He fell at her feet.

"Does your engagement for eight o'clock press, monsieur?" murmured the lady, smiling. "If you could dine here again to-night, I might relent by degrees."

"And she is adorable!" he told Pitou. "I passed the most delicious evening of my life!" "It is fortunate," observed Pitou, "for that, and your uncle's undying enmity, are all you have obtained by your imposture. Remember that the evening cost two thousand francs a year!"

"Ah, misanthrope," cried Tricotrin radiantly, "there must be a crumpled roseleaf in every Eden!"