Works of Honore De Balzac

by Honoré de Balzac

  “Well, for a first investigation I did not frighten him too much,” thought Godefroid.

  XIII. FURTHER INVESTIGATIONS

  Godefroid now went to the rue d’Enfer, the address given him by Monsieur Alain, and there found Dr. Berton, a cold, grave man, who astonished him much by confirming all the details given by Monsieur Bernard about his daughter’s illness. From him Godefroid obtained the address of Halpersohn.

  This Polish doctor, since so celebrated, then lived in Chaillot, rue Marbeuf, in an isolated house where he occupied the first floor. General Romanus Zarnowski lived on the second floor, and the servants of the two refugees inhabited the garret of this little house, which had but two stories. Godefroid did not find Halpersohn, and was told that he had gone into the provinces, sent for by a rich patient; he was almost glad not to meet him, for in his hurry he had forgotten to supply himself with money; and he now went back to the hotel de la Chanterie to get some.

  These various trips and the time consumed in dining at a restaurant in the rue de l’Odeon brought Godefroid to the hour when he said he would return and take possession of his lodging on the boulevard du Mont-Parnasse. Nothing could be more forlorn than the manner in which Madame Vauthier had furnished the two rooms. It seemed as though the woman let rooms with the express purpose that no one should stay in them. Evidently the bed, chairs, tables, bureau, secretary, curtains, came from forced sales at auction, articles massed together in lots as having no separate intrinsic value.

  Madame Vauthier, with her hands on her hips, stood waiting for thanks; she took Godefroid’s smile for one of surprise.

  “There! I picked out for you the very best we have, my dear Monsieur Godefroid,” she said with a triumphant air. “See those pretty silk curtains, and the mahogany bedstead which hasn’t got a worm-hole in it! It formerly belonged to the Prince of Wissembourg. When he left his house, rue Louis-le-Grand, in 1809, I was the kitchen-girl. From there, I went to live as cook with the present owner of this house.”

  Godefroid stopped the flux of confidences by paying a month’s rent in advance; and he also gave, in advance, the six francs he was to pay Madame Vauthier for the care of his rooms. At that moment he heard barking, and if he had not been duly warned by Monsieur Bernard, he would certainly have supposed that his neighbor kept a dog.

  “Does that dog bark at night?” he asked.

  “Oh! don’t be uneasy, monsieur; you’ll only have one week to stand those persons. Monsieur Bernard can’t pay his rent and we are going to put him out. They are queer people, I tell you! I have never seen their dog. That animal is sometimes months, yes, six months at a time without making a sound; you might think they hadn’t a dog. The beast never leaves the lady’s room. There’s a sick lady in there, and very sick, too; she’s never been out of her room since she came. Old Monsieur Bernard works hard, and the son, too; the lad is a day-scholar at the school of Louis-le-Grand, where he is nearly through his philosophy course, and only sixteen, too; that’s something to boast of! but the little scamp has to work like one possessed. Presently you’ll hear them bring out the plants they keep in the lady’s room and carry in fresh ones. They themselves, the grandfather and the boy, only eat bread, though they buy flowers and all sorts of dainties for the lady. She must be very ill, not to leave her room once since entering it; and if one’s to believe Monsieur Berton, the doctor, she’ll never come out except feet foremost.”

  “What does this Monsieur Bernard do?”

  “It seems he’s a learned man; he writes and goes about to libraries. Monsieur lends him money on his compositions.”

  “Monsieur? who is he?”

  “The proprietor of the house, Monsieur Barbet, the old bookseller. He is a Norman who used to sell green stuff in the streets, and afterwards set up a bookstall, in 1818, on the quay. Then he got a little shop, and now he is very rich. He is a kind of a Jew, with a score of trades; he was even a partner with the Italian who built this barrack to lodge silk-worms.”

  “So this house is a refuge for unfortunate authors?” said Godefroid.

  “Is monsieur unluckily one himself?” asked the widow Vauthier.

  “I am only just starting,” replied Godefroid.

  “Oh! my dear monsieur, take my advice and don’t go on; journalist? well, — I won’t say anything against that.”

  Godefroid could not help laughing as he bade good-night to the portress, who thus, all unconsciously, represented the bourgeoisie. As he went to bed in the horrible room, floored with bricks that were not even colored, and hung with a paper at seven sous a roll, Godefroid not only regretted his little rooms in the rue Chanoinesse, but also the society of Madame de la Chanterie. He felt a void in his soul. He had already acquired habits of mind; and could not remember to have so keenly regretted anything in all his former life as this break in his new existence. These thoughts, as they pressed upon him, had a great effect upon his soul; he felt that no life could compare in value with the one he sought to embrace, and his resolution to emulate the good old Alain became unshakable. Without having any vocation for the work, he had the will to do it.

  The next day Godefroid, already habituated by his new life to rising early, saw from his window a young man about seventeen years of age, dressed in a blouse, who was coming back, no doubt from the public fountain, bringing a crock full of water in each hand. The face of this lad, who was not aware that he was seen, revealed his feelings, and never had Godefroid observed one so artless and so melancholy. The graces of youth were all repressed by poverty, by study, by great physical fatigue. Monsieur Bernard’s grandson was remarkable for a complexion of extreme whiteness, which the contrast with his dark hair seemed to make still whiter. He made three trips; when he returned from the last he saw some men unloading a cord of wood which Godefroid had ordered the night before, for the long-delayed winter of 1838 was beginning to be felt; snow had fallen slightly during the night.

  Nepomucene, who had begun his day by going for the wood (on which Madame Vauthier levied a handsome tribute), spoke to the young lad while waiting until the woodman had sawed enough for him to carry upstairs. It was easy to see that the sudden cold was causing anxiety to Monsieur Bernard’s grandson, and that the sight of the wood, as well as that of the threatening sky, warned him that they ought to be making their own provision for wintry weather. Suddenly, however, as if reproaching himself for lost time, he seized his crocks and hastily entered the house. It was, in fact, half-past seven o’clock, the hour was just ringing from the belfry of the convent of the Visitation, and he was due at the college of Louis-le-Grand by half-past eight.

  As the young lad entered the house, Godefroid went to his door to admit Madame Vauthier who brought her new lodger the wherewithal to make a fire, and he thus became the witness of a scene which took place on the landing.

  A neighboring gardener, who had rung several times at Monsieur Bernard’s door without making any one hear (for the bell was wrapped in paper), had a rather rough dispute with the young lad who now came up with the water, demanding to be paid for the flowers he had supplied. As the man raised his voice angrily Monsieur Bernard appeared. “Auguste,” he said to his grandson, “dress yourself, it is time for school.”

  He himself took the two crocks of water, carried them into the first of his rooms, in which were many pots of flowers, and returned to speak to the gardener, carefully closing the door behind him. Godefroid’s door was open, for Nepomucene had begun his trips, and was stacking the wood in the front room. The gardener was silent in presence of Monsieur Bernard, whose tall figure, robed in a violet silk dressing-gown, buttoned to the throat, gave him an imposing air.

  “You might ask for what is owing to you without such noise,” said Monsieur Bernard.

  “Be fair, my dear monsieur,” said the gardener. “You agreed to pay me every week, and it now three months, ten weeks, since I have had a penny; you owe me a hundred and twenty francs. We let out our plants to rich people who pay us when we ask for the money; b
ut this is the fifth time I have come to you for it. I have my rent to pay and the wages of my men; I am not a bit richer than you. My wife, who supplied you with eggs and milk, will not come here any more; you owe her thirty francs. She does not like to dun you, for she is kind-hearted, that she is! If I listened to her, I couldn’t do business at all. And so I, who am not so soft — you understand?”

  Just then Auguste came out dressed in a shabby little green coat with cloth trousers of the same color, a black cravat, and worn-out boots. These clothes, though carefully brushed, showed the lowest degree of poverty; they were all too short and too narrow, so that the lad seemed likely to crack them at every motion. The seams were white, the edges curled, the buttonholes torn in spite of many mendings; the whole presenting to the most unobservant eyes the heart-breaking stigmas of honest penury. This livery contrasted sadly with the youth of the lad, who now disappeared munching a crust of stale bread with his strong and handsome teeth. He breakfasted thus on his way to the rue Saint-Jacques, carrying his books and papers under his arm, and wearing a little cap much too small for his head, from which stuck out a mass of magnificent black hair.

  In passing before his grandfather the lad had given him rapidly a look of deep distress; for he knew him to be in an almost hopeless difficulty, the consequences of which might be terrible. To leave room for the boy to pass, the gardener had stepped back to the sill of Godefroid’s door, and as at that moment Nepomucene arrived with a quantity of wood, the creditor was forced to retreat into the room.

  “Monsieur Bernard!” cried the widow Vauthier, “do you think Monsieur Godefroid hired his rooms to have you hold your meetings in them?”

  “Excuse me, madame,” said the gardener, “but there was no room on the landing.”

  “I didn’t say that for you, Monsieur Cartier,” said the widow.

  “Remain where you are!” cried Godefroid, addressing the gardener; “and you, my dear neighbor,” he added, looking at Monsieur Bernard, who seemed insensible to the cruel insult, “if it is convenient to you to have an explanation with your gardener in my room, come in.”

  The old man, half stupefied with his troubles, cast a look of gratitude on Godefroid.

  “As for you, my dear Madame Vauthier,” continued Godefroid, “don’t be so rough with monsieur, who is in the first place an old man, and one to whom you owe the obligation of my lodging here.”

  “Oh, pooh!” said the widow.

  “Besides, if poor people do not help each other, who will help them? Leave us, Madame Vauthier; I’ll blow the fire myself. Have the rest of my wood put in your cellar; I am sure you will take good care of it.”

  Madame Vauthier disappeared, for Godefroid in telling her to take care of his wood had given an opportunity to her greed.

  “Come in this way,” said Godefroid, offering chairs to both debtor and creditor.

  The old man conversed standing, but the gardener sat down.

  “My good Monsieur Cartier,” went on Godefroid, “rich people do not pay as regularly as you say they do, and you ought not to dun a worthy man for a few louis. Monsieur draws his pension every six months, and he could not make you an assignment of it for such a paltry sum. I am willing to advance the money, if you absolutely insist on having it.”

  “Monsieur Bernard drew his pension two weeks ago, and has not paid me. I am sorry to trouble him, of course.”

  “Have you furnished him with plants all along?”

  “Yes, monsieur, for six years, and he has always paid me.”

  Monsieur Bernard, who was listening to some sound in his own rooms and paying no attention to what was being said, now heard a cry through the partitions and hurried away without a word.

  “Come, come, my good man,” said Godefroid, taking advantage of the old man’s absence, “bring some nice flowers, your best flowers, this very morning, and tell your wife to send the eggs and milk as usual; I will pay you this evening.”

  Cartier looked oddly at Godefroid.

  “Then you must know more than Madame Vauthier does; she sent me word to hurry if I hoped to be paid,” he said. “Neither she nor I can make out why folks who eat nothing but bread and the odds and ends of vegetables, bits of carrots, turnips, and such things, which they get at the back-doors of restaurants, — yes, monsieur, I assure you I came one day on the little fellow filling an old handbag, — well, I want to know why such persons spend nearly forty francs a month on flowers. They say the old man’s pension is only three thousand francs.”

  “At any rate,” said Godefroid, “it is not your business to complain if they ruin themselves in flowers.”

  “That’s true, monsieur, — provided they pay me.”

  “Bring your bill to me.”

  “Very good, monsieur,” said the gardener, with a tinge of respect. “Monsieur no doubt wants to see the mysterious lady.”

  “My good friend,” said Godefroid, stiffly, “you forget yourself. Go home now and bring fresh plants for those you are to take away. If you can also supply me with good cream and fresh eggs I will take them, and I will go this morning and take a look at your establishment.”

  “It is one of the finest in Paris, monsieur. I exhibit at the Luxembourg. My garden, which covers three acres, is on the boulevard, behind the garden of La Grande-Chaumiere.”

  “Very good, Monsieur Cartier. You are, I see, much richer than I. Have some consideration for us, therefore. Who knows how soon we may have mutual need of each other?”

  The gardener went away, much puzzled as to who and what Godefroid might be.

  “And yet I was once just like that,” thought Godefroid, blowing his fire. “What a fine specimen of the bourgeois of to-day! — gossiping, inquisitive, crazy for equality, jealous of his customers, furious at not knowing why a poor sick woman stays in her room without being seen; concealing his wealth, and yet vain enough to betray it when he thinks it will put him above his neighbor. That man ought to be the lieutenant of his company. I dare say he is. With what ease he plays the scene of Monsieur Dimanche! A little more and I should have made a friend of Monsieur Cartier.”

  The old man broke into this soliloquy, which proves how Godefroid’s ideas had changed in four months.

  “Excuse me, neighbor,” said Monsieur Bernard, in a troubled voice; “I see you have sent that gardener away satisfied, for he bowed civilly to me on the landing. It seems, young man, as if Providence had sent you to me at the very moment when I was about to succumb. Alas! the hard talk of that man must have shown you many things! It is true that I received the half-yearly payment of my pension two weeks ago; but I had more pressing debts than his, and I was forced to put aside my rent for fear of being turned out of the house. I have told you the state my daughter is in, and you have probably heard her.”

  He looked uneasily at Godefroid, who made him an affirmative sign.

  “Well, then, you know it would be her death warrant, for I should then be compelled to put her in a hospital. My grandson and I were fearing that end this morning; but we do not dread Cartier so much as we do the cold.”

  “My dear Monsieur Bernard,” said Godefroid, “I have plenty of wood; take all you want.”

  “Ah!” said the old man, “but how can I ever return such services?”

  “By accepting them without difficulty,” said Godefroid, quickly, “and by giving me your confidence.”

  “But what are my claims to so much generosity?” asked Monsieur Bernard, becoming once more distrustful. “Ah! my pride and that of my grandson are lowered indeed!” he cried bitterly. “We are compelled to offer explanations to the few creditors — only two or three — whom we cannot pay. The utterly unfortunate have no creditors; to have them one must needs present an exterior of some show, and that we have now lost. But I have not yet abdicated my common-sense, — my reason,” he added, as if he were talking to himself.

  “Monsieur,” replied Godefroid, gravely, “the history you gave me yesterday would touch even a usurer.”

 
“No, no! for Barbet, that publisher, the proprietor of this house, is speculating on my poverty, and has sent the Vauthier woman, his former cook, to spy upon it.”

  “How can he speculate upon you?” asked Godefroid.

  “I will tell you later,” replied the old man. “My daughter is cold, and since you offer it, I am reduced to accept alms, were it even from my worst enemy.”

  “I will carry in some wood,” said Godefroid, gathering up ten or a dozen sticks, and taking them into Monsieur Bernard’s first room. The old man took as many himself; and when he saw the little provision safely deposited, he could not restrain the silly, and even idiotic smile with which those who are saved from a mortal danger, which has seemed to them inevitable, express their joy; for terror still lingers in their joy.

  “Accept things from me, my dear Monsieur Bernard, without reluctance; and when your daughter is safe, and you are once more at ease, we will settle all. Meantime, let me act for you. I have been to see that Polish doctor; unfortunately he is absent; he will not be back for two days.”

  At this moment a voice which seemed to Godefroid to have, and really had, a fresh, melodious ring, cried out, “Papa, papa!” on two expressive notes.

  While speaking to the old man, Godefroid had noticed that the jambs of a door leading to another room were painted in a delicate manner, altogether different from that of the rest of the lodging. His curiosity, already so keenly excited, was now roused to the highest pitch. He was conscious that his mission of benevolence was becoming nothing more than a pretext; what he really wanted was to see that sick woman. He refused to believe for an instant that a creature endowed with such a voice could be an object of repulsion.

  “You do, indeed, take too much trouble, papa!” said the voice. “Why not have more servants? — and at your age, too! Good God!”