by Parry, Owen
The old fellow closed his eyes for a moment, rallying the strength to continue his tale. “He does not go. Instead, he meets a young Englishman in contemplation of a désolé painting of Caravaggio. How do they become friends? Who can say? Perhaps the Frenchman finds the passion of the Englishman for this dirty city and its hopeless people amusant, a good entertainment? Or perhaps he needs to believe again? In anything. Perhaps the object does not matter, only the belief.”
He consumed a younger man’s gulp of liquor. His eyes cleared again, but in a troubling way.
“And the Englishman? What does he wish? Only for a fifth conspirator. The Frenchman sees at once that the younger man is a fool, if a charming one. Perhaps the Frenchman thinks it is all folly, that the folly will soon pass. But he is given his cane with great ceremony, he is sworn to make the revolution and free the people. And the truth is that he will fight, if it comes to blows, because he hardly cares for the life he is leading. He will fight, if only to be alive for a little time again.”
The old man shook his head mournfully. “But there is no revolution. It is Italy. There is only jealousy and betrayal. One of the brothers who are also cousins is stupidly in love. Perhaps both of them are in love. But one tells his love to the magnificent young woman who is not beautiful as we think of such things. He cannot live without her, he will die, she is more important than the revolution, than all things that exist! But she scorns him, she is annoyed. She tells him that her heart is given elsewhere, that there is no hope for him. He goes then to her brother, who does not think, who speaks before he thinks, who smiles and says that Marcella is in love with the Englishman, of course, only and always with the foolish, pretty Englishman, but perhaps things will be different after the revolution. Such a mad thing to say! And to laugh! The boy who has confessed his love is angry, he is furious. He goes at once to the Englishman, to challenge him! But the Englishman understands nothing of this matter of love. So the Italian who is in love thinks he is mocked, he draws his secret blade from the cane. The Englishman fights only to defend himself, he does not kill the Italian, but wounds him and the boy is carried off. His wound is not, perhaps, serious. Still, he confesses all, he tells everything to his brother. To his brother who is also in love with this sirène. And this second brother, who loves so much that he wishes them all dead, even his own flesh and blood, if only he will have this young woman for himself, this brother goes to the authorities and betrays the plot, even though it is hardly a plot at all, but only the foolishness of young men who have no power and no sense.”
The proprietor sat as still as the wares that slumbered on his shelves, his white hair damp and limp. “They were, I am told, terrible times. With the secret police, secret prisons, torture still in use, as if the clock has gone backward. Instead of being rewarded, the brother who has informed is put in the prison, too, where he will die, I think. When the soldiers come to his bed of convalescence, the brother who is wounded attempts to fight. From his pillows. He swings his sword. The soldiers use their bayonets. The Italian count who is the Englishman’s first friend is surprised in the garden of his palazzo. He has with him only his conspirator’s sword-cane. But he, too, fights. With thirty, perhaps forty soldiers. They do not want to kill him, because they are only poor soldiers and his family is very old. They do not want trouble with anyone, only to do what they must. But he fights madly. In front of his sister, his mother. So they must kill him, too.”
His eyes grew moist with the effort of his tale. “It is terrible. The sister who breaks so many hearts must watch her brother die. It is all miserable, useless. But she knows, she understands many things, even though she is a woman. She hurries to warn the Englishman, who is not at home. He has been sailing with the Frenchman, who does not think there will be so much seriousness, but who does not fear it. Perhaps he is glad when the young woman who is greater than beauty is waiting on the shore for her Englishman who even now understands nothing of love, whose only romance is the dream of his own republic. She weeps. She warns him, both of them. They must flee. But of course she has been followed. The authorities are no fools, the secret police are angry that they themselves have detected nothing, even though the plot is not a serious one. But they make a mistake. They come with too few. There are six of them, I think. Only six. And the Englishman and the Frenchman have their sword-canes, which they must always carry, it is in the silly oath. Oh, there are pistols in the hands of the authorities. But the Frenchman has been an officer of the cavalry, not a mere policeman. He cuts the pistols from their hands, one-two! He cries to the Englishman to take the girl and flee. But the English must be gentlemen always! The foolish young man draws his own blade and attempts to fight. He kills one, wounds another, but is shot through his brain, making the young woman scream and fall to her knees. The foolish policeman reaches for her. But she picks up the conspirator’s blade herself. The Frenchman cries that she must not do this and he himself is wounded, only lightly, because he has let his eyes stray. But the young woman grasps the hilt with one hand, the blade itself with another, and thrusts it up into the policeman’s belly. She is like a tiger, so fierce. The secret policeman, he shoots her in the throat before he falls.”
The old fellow stopped for a moment. Perhaps his age was telling and he had to labor to recall the fable’s details.
“The Frenchman becomes a mad animal! He kills them all, even those who are wounded and cannot fight again. He kills them like a beast. Because he has a secret in his heart, a secret he himself has only learned that day upon the jetty. He, too, has loved the woman! In his soul he has known always that he was to receive her … her … how must it be said? Her authentic love. Somehow that I cannot say, he has known that her love for the Englishman was—will I call it a rehearsal? Now he sees before him this future that has been murdered for nothing. She dies with her dark eyes open to Heaven and her black hair cast over the stones. He knows then that she was the only woman who could have surpassed the wife he had loved so dearly, the only possibility left for him in all the world. But she is dead. Of this stupidity.”
The old man smiled, exposing ruined teeth. “C’est la vie, eh? The Frenchman escapes, of course. The men who do not care about life often escape, I think. And where does he go, this only survivor of so great a folly? This man who has indulged in the games of children, only to see the children murdered before his eyes? He goes to Damascus. Not fast, he does not go. He wanders. Slowly. I will not say he goes like a man in a dream, because his life is emptier than any dream. But this wandering takes him to Damascus. It is not to be avoided, why he cannot say. And he stays many months. That is how long it takes to find the old man of whom the Englishman has spoken with his little English laugh. He finds the old man, who looks fragile and mad, standing by his tiny forge at the back of a stinking lane. The Frenchman has been there so long he understands some of the Arab tongue, more than a little. So he understands when the old man looks at the cane, then at his face, and nods. ‘i knew you would come,’ the old Saracen says to him. ‘Did the English giaour die well?’”
The proprietor touched my knee. Just once. “He told the Frenchmen many things as they sat in his filthy den, of how the blade that had been possessed by the betrayer would always be cursed. The other swords would be worthy of heroes, they would find their way to men who deserved to carry them. All this seemed almost magical, intoxicating to the Frenchman, who had been ill with one of the many sicknesses of the East. Then the old Arab told him other tales. Complicated stories. Perhaps the Frenchman could understand only part of all this, because the language of the Arab twists and turns, it is not straight like the blade, and he did not know so much of their tongue as that. But he gathered in scraps of the tales, bits about secret societies and hidden fortresses, about dungeons full of joy and the happiness that devours the soul like leprosy, of journeys to places still unknown to maps, of voyages and secrets destroyed in the telling. As the afternoon passed, the Frenchman began to see that the old Saracen was a madman,
demented. He spoke of great wealth buried in the desert, of heresies and wars, of the twilight of the Arabs. Then, just when the Frenchman longed for an excuse to bid him goodbye, the old swordsmith smiled in a way that was the opposite of happiness. He told the Frenchman that he would live to a great age, but that his true life was over, that all of his happinesses would be small happinesses, and that he would never marry again. He told him that he would one day pass his sword-cane to another who would wield it more wisely than he had done, who would use it in the cause of justice. He would give it to someone who had killed many men, yet who loved the good. Of course, the Frenchman knew it was all madness. Perhaps the old Arab saw that and was insulted. Anyway, he told him, ‘Go now. Go away. Go far. And await your destiny.’”
Using the edge of a cabinet for leverage, the old fellow hoisted himself to his feet. “But I think that was a long story, non? Too long for these times that go so fast. Too long for you.”
But it had not been too long. Even if it was all made up to raise the price of the sword-cane, I admit I had been caught.
“What became of the Frenchmen?” I demanded. I never had thought to feel such concern for a Frenchy, not even in a made-up tale.
The old fellow shrugged. “Who knows? Perhaps it is only a pretty story.”
“But … the cane. How did you get it? Who sold it to you? The Frenchman?”
“Oh, monsieur! I am an old man! I cannot remember such things clearly, you understand. It came into my possession long ago.”
“But you said that two of the other sticks were in royal collections … that one might be in Persia …”
“I will be honest, Monsieur le Major. In my business, many things are said, for many purposes. When I tell you I have heard that one cane lies in St. Petersburg in the private collection of the czar, that another is in the collection of the King of Prussia … or that one may have gone to Persia … I am honest in what I tell to you, but do not know the honesty of those who have told these things to me.” He smiled oddly, but then old men have quirks. “Perhaps there never were five of the blades? I like to believe the story, you see. But I cannot prove a thing.”
The queer thing was that I wished to believe the tale. And I realized, with a shock, that the telling had even drawn my thoughts from my jaw.
I braced for the inevitable. High time it was to move along and return to my proper doings. I wanted that sword-cane dearly. Yet, I promised myself that I would not be extravagant. I had already spent money like a rogue on my clothing. If his price was mad, I would simply walk back through the shop’s front door.
“How much?” I asked.
The old fellow liked to draw things out, like a cat toying with a mouse.
“It has been with me many years, Monsieur le Major. Do you think I should part with it now? At any price?”
I did not like the sound of his last three words.
“Look you, Mr. Beyle. It should be in use. It does no good to anyone in a drawer.”
“But such a weapon … might do harm, as well as good. Perhaps it is safest left in the cabinet?”
“I would not use it to do harm.” I felt like a naughty child being questioned.
“But would you use it to do good? What if this was the blade that belonged to that Frenchman in his tristesse?”
“Then,” I said, “that old Arab’s pronouncement has proven false. He said it was to be passed to someone deserving. But it found its way to you and lay in a drawer.”
“Well, then,” the shopkeeper said with a smile, “perhaps this is not the blade that belonged to that Frenchman. But at least I do not think it belonged to the betrayer. No, I do not think it is the cursed blade, the bad one.”
“How much, then?”
“Nothing. You may take it for no money.”
I was nonplussed.
“Take it,” he continued. “I could not set a price. There is no reference. I am so old … there is wealth enough. Take the blade. And we will have a bargain between us. Before you leave this city, you will return to visit me, monsieur. Or perhaps I will come to you? If the blade has been unhappy, if things have not gone well, you will return it. As if it has only gone on an outing. For the fresh air, let us say. But if we find that it must belong to you, I will ask you a favor. Oh, do not be alarmed. It will be nothing against your laws. Nor against God’s laws, I assure you. I do not yet know what the favor will be. But it will come to me. We will meet again and I will ask a single favor, nothing too grand. Something virtuous, let us say. If any man may presume to call his whims virtuous.”
The old fellow yawned, tapping his mouth with translucent fingers. “Je suis fatigué! How the years take their toll! To be a man of forty again! But I must rest, you must go. Monsieur Barnaby looks at me as if you have already stayed too long! Go now. Go along. The blade is like a prisoner. Locked away these many years. It longs for the fresh air, for the clear sky …”
It sounded like some Frenchy trick to me. Nor was the city’s air fresh in the least. Drab and smoky it was. And the “Quarter,” as they call it, stank to Hades.
Yet, I took the sword-cane with me. My covetousness would not let me do otherwise.
I left the shop with a sense of intoxication, despite the wicked sensation in my jaw. We passed a thousand people, but their faces remained vague. White, brown, maroon and pitch-black smears they were. I marked no details beyond those I needed to navigate my way beside Mr. Barnaby.
I wondered if any part of the tale were true. An old fellow like that must get frightfully bored sitting there day after day. Perhaps he had composed stories about every item he offered for sale? Perhaps he was no better than a novelist?
I veered between suspicion and a childish delight that the cane was in my hand.
What if the old fellow had meant his gesture well? What if it was not a business trick, but a heartfelt act on the part of a lonely, old man? The truth is that I rather liked the merchant. And not just because he had not demanded cash. Twas the first time I ever suspected myself of fondness for a Frenchman, Lord forgive me.
SEVEN
“ONE FOUND MISS PEABODY’S ATTITUDE AS UNWHOLESOME as her behavior was unfortunate,” Mrs. Aubrey announced in her immaculate voice. The years had not annoyed her pipes, but burnished them like silver. Splendid in her widow’s weeds and weepers, our hostess seemed as unlike that withered Frenchy shopkeeper as a duchess is from a dairymaid. Sitting straight-backed in a parlor that would have sparked the envy of my Mary, she maintained the impassive look with which the wealthy adorn themselves. “Indeed, one found it necessary to ask her to leave this house.”
“And why might that be, mum?” I asked as clearly as my jaw allowed.
Had she not received us immediately, I would have liked to have a poke about the place. Twas a child’s delight, with models of clipper ships proud on the mantle and nautical paintings hung high on the walls. Brass shone in the lamplight and a tall clock ticked the time. Hung with brocade, the room was upholstered in velvet. My son would have found it a lovely place to play hide-and-go-seek.
Mr. Barnaby had been right. We were not offered so much as a cup of tea. That is how the rich stay rich, I fancy.
Mrs. Aubrey paused before answering my question, seeking words to suit a lady’s modesty. Although the hair was white beneath her widow’s cap, her face was free of wrinkles and unblemished by those nasty spots that serve as mortality’s freckles. Pale and neat of feature, she doubtless had been striking in her youth. I well could imagine the bygone romance between her and some braided sailor.
Slowly, almost warily, she spoke again. “Miss Peabody was … how might one best express it? She was … to put things gently … indiscreet.”
“How so, mum? How was she indiscreet?”
The widow lowered her eyes. The gesture made me expect a blush, but her face remained white as powder. Although I do not think the lady painted.
“Really, Major Jones, this is all so … so terribly uncomfortable. One doesn’t speak about such
matters. From a lady to a gentleman.” She cast a moment’s glance at Mr. Barnaby, as if to dismiss him from our nobler society. Indeed, she was the first resident of New Orleans who did not seem to think him worth attention.
I found the taste of blood in my mouth again. My stitches had not been done snugly, that was certain. I spoke as cautiously as I could and as clearly as I could manage.
“Look you, mum … I do not wish to offend. It is only that this is a Federal matter, a high investigation. I must know all the facts that you can offer. In service to the law, not idle prying.”
She shuddered like a curtain faintly stirred. “The details are mortifying.”
“Your words will not become a public matter,” I assured her. “But the law requires the truth, see.”
“One should think so poorly of oneself. One doesn’t wish to be cruel, you understand.”
“No, mum.” As daintily as I could, I patted the corner of my mouth with the handkerchief Mr. Barnaby had loaned me.
Staring into the field of her Brussels carpet, she inhaled from an invisible bottle of salts. “Miss Peabody was … indiscreet …” she whispered. “With negroes. One had to receive her initially, of course. You do know of our family relationship? A marriage between lesser cousins. Still, one has responsibilities. When her father wrote, asking that Miss Peabody be provided a measure of social guidance, one was obliged. And I must allow Mr. Peabody his honesty. He warned us the girl was headstrong. With her notions regarding the negro—I suppose they’re quite the fashion in New York?”
The widow returned her eyes to mine. They were not as soft as her speech. “Pray do not mistake us, Major Jones. One needn’t champion the views of our firebrands to grasp the insurmountable nature of the negro’s inferiority. One needn’t condone the whip to acknowledge the creature’s anxiety for humane regimentation. One may see well-behaved sorts in this very city, yet one recognizes that the morally aware negro is an exception—a rare exception, sir—and hardly representative of its race.” She lowered her voice again. “Should you pry a quarter of an inch behind its pretense of civilization, you will find that even the most developed negro remains best fitted to servitude, to a program of merciful supervision. Left to its own devices, the negro succumbs to indolence and viciousness. It apes our manners, but cannot fathom the essence. You understand me, of course.”
