CHAPTER II. MORNING TALK
Doctor Desprez always rose early. Before the smoke arose, before thefirst cart rattled over the bridge to the day's labour in the fields, hewas to be found wandering in his garden. Now he would pick a bunch ofgrapes; now he would eat a big pear under the trellice; now he would drawall sorts of fancies on the path with the end of his cane; now he wouldgo down and watch the river running endlessly past the timber landing-place at which he moored his boat. There was no time, he used to say,for making theories like the early morning. 'I rise earlier than any oneelse in the village,' he once boasted. 'It is a fair consequence that Iknow more and wish to do less with my knowledge.'
The Doctor was a connoisseur of sunrises, and loved a good theatricaleffect to usher in the day. He had a theory of dew, by which he couldpredict the weather. Indeed, most things served him to that end: thesound of the bells from all the neighbouring villages, the smell of theforest, the visits and the behaviour of both birds and fishes, the lookof the plants in his garden, the disposition of cloud, the colour of thelight, and last, although not least, the arsenal of meteorologicalinstruments in a louvre-boarded hutch upon the lawn. Ever since he hadsettled at Gretz, he had been growing more and more into the localmeteorologist, the unpaid champion of the local climate. He thought atfirst there was no place so healthful in the arrondissement. By the endof the second year, he protested there was none so wholesome in the wholedepartment. And for some time before he met Jean-Marie he had beenprepared to challenge all France and the better part of Europe for arival to his chosen spot.
'Doctor,' he would say--'doctor is a foul word. It should not be used toladies. It implies disease. I remark it, as a flaw in our civilisation,that we have not the proper horror of disease. Now I, for my part, havewashed my hands of it; I have renounced my laureation; I am no doctor; Iam only a worshipper of the true goddess Hygieia. Ah, believe me, it isshe who has the cestus! And here, in this exiguous hamlet, has sheplaced her shrine: here she dwells and lavishes her gifts; here I walkwith her in the early morning, and she shows me how strong she has madethe peasants, how fruitful she has made the fields, how the trees grow uptall and comely under her eyes, and the fishes in the river become cleanand agile at her presence.--Rheumatism!' he would cry, on some malapertinterruption, 'O, yes, I believe we do have a little rheumatism. Thatcould hardly be avoided, you know, on a river. And of course the placestands a little low; and the meadows are marshy, there's no doubt. But,my dear sir, look at Bourron! Bourron stands high. Bourron is close tothe forest; plenty of ozone there, you would say. Well, compared withGretz, Bourron is a perfect shambles.'
The morning after he had been summoned to the dying mountebank, theDoctor visited the wharf at the tail of his garden, and had a long lookat the running water. This he called prayer; but whether his adorationswere addressed to the goddess Hygieia or some more orthodox deity, neverplainly appeared. For he had uttered doubtful oracles, sometimesdeclaring that a river was the type of bodily health, sometimes extollingit as the great moral preacher, continually preaching peace, continuity,and diligence to man's tormented spirits. After he had watched a mile orso of the clear water running by before his eyes, seen a fish or two cometo the surface with a gleam of silver, and sufficiently admired the longshadows of the trees falling half across the river from the oppositebank, with patches of moving sunlight in between, he strolled once moreup the garden and through his house into the street, feeling cool andrenovated.
The sound of his feet upon the causeway began the business of the day;for the village was still sound asleep. The church tower looked veryairy in the sunlight; a few birds that turned about it, seemed to swim inan atmosphere of more than usual rarity; and the Doctor, walking in longtransparent shadows, filled his lungs amply, and proclaimed himself wellcontented with the morning.
On one of the posts before Tentaillon's carriage entry he espied a littledark figure perched in a meditative attitude, and immediately recognisedJean-Marie.
'Aha!' he said, stopping before him humorously, with a hand on eitherknee. 'So we rise early in the morning, do we? It appears to me that wehave all the vices of a philosopher.'
The boy got to his feet and made a grave salutation.
'And how is our patient?' asked Desprez.
It appeared the patient was about the same.
'And why do you rise early in the morning?' he pursued.
Jean-Marie, after a long silence, professed that he hardly knew.
'You hardly know?' repeated Desprez. 'We hardly know anything, my man,until we try to learn. Interrogate your consciousness. Come, push methis inquiry home. Do you like it?'
'Yes,' said the boy slowly; 'yes, I like it.'
'And why do you like it?' continued the Doctor. '(We are now pursuingthe Socratic method.) Why do you like it?'
'It is quiet,' answered Jean-Marie; 'and I have nothing to do; and then Ifeel as if I were good.'
Doctor Desprez took a seat on the post at the opposite side. He wasbeginning to take an interest in the talk, for the boy plainly thoughtbefore he spoke, and tried to answer truly. 'It appears you have a tastefor feeling good,' said the Doctor. 'Now, there you puzzle me extremely;for I thought you said you were a thief; and the two are incompatible.'
'Is it very bad to steal?' asked Jean-Marie.
'Such is the general opinion, little boy,' replied the Doctor.
'No; but I mean as I stole,' explained the other. 'For I had no choice.I think it is surely right to have bread; it must be right to have bread,there comes so plain a want of it. And then they beat me cruelly if Ireturned with nothing,' he added. 'I was not ignorant of right andwrong; for before that I had been well taught by a priest, who was verykind to me.' (The Doctor made a horrible grimace at the word 'priest.')'But it seemed to me, when one had nothing to eat and was beaten, it wasa different affair. I would not have stolen for tartlets, I believe; butany one would steal for baker's bread.'
'And so I suppose,' said the Doctor, with a rising sneer, 'you prayed Godto forgive you, and explained the case to Him at length.'
'Why, sir?' asked Jean-Marie. 'I do not see.'
'Your priest would see, however,' retorted Desprez.
'Would he?' asked the boy, troubled for the first time. 'I should havethought God would have known.'
'Eh?' snarled the Doctor.
'I should have thought God would have understood me,' replied the other.'You do not, I see; but then it was God that made me think so, was itnot?'
'Little boy, little boy,' said Dr. Desprez, 'I told you already you hadthe vices of philosophy; if you display the virtues also, I must go. Iam a student of the blessed laws of health, an observer of plain andtemperate nature in her common walks; and I cannot preserve my equanimityin presence of a monster. Do you understand?'
'No, sir,' said the boy.
'I will make my meaning clear to you,' replied the doctor. 'Look thereat the sky--behind the belfry first, where it is so light, and then upand up, turning your chin back, right to the top of the dome, where it isalready as blue as at noon. Is not that a beautiful colour? Does it notplease the heart? We have seen it all our lives, until it has grown inwith our familiar thoughts. Now,' changing his tone, 'suppose that skyto become suddenly of a live and fiery amber, like the colour of clearcoals, and growing scarlet towards the top--I do not say it would be anythe less beautiful; but would you like it as well?'
'I suppose not,' answered Jean-Marie.
'Neither do I like you,' returned the Doctor, roughly. 'I hate all oddpeople, and you are the most curious little boy in all the world.'
Jean-Marie seemed to ponder for a while, and then he raised his headagain and looked over at the Doctor with an air of candid inquiry. 'Butare not you a very curious gentleman?' he asked.
The Doctor threw away his stick, bounded on the boy, clasped him to hisbosom, and kissed him on both cheeks. 'Admirable, admirable imp!' hecried. 'What a morning, what an hour for a theo
rist of forty-two! No,'he continued, apostrophising heaven, 'I did not know such boys existed; Iwas ignorant they made them so; I had doubted of my race; and now! It islike,' he added, picking up his stick, 'like a lovers' meeting. I havebruised my favourite staff in that moment of enthusiasm. The injury,however, is not grave.' He caught the boy looking at him in obviouswonder, embarrassment, and alarm. 'Hullo!' said he, 'why do you look atme like that? Egad, I believe the boy despises me. Do you despise me,boy?'
'O, no,' replied Jean-Marie, seriously; 'only I do not understand.'
'You must excuse me, sir,' returned the Doctor, with gravity; 'I am stillso young. O, hang him!' he added to himself. And he took his seat againand observed the boy sardonically. 'He has spoiled the quiet of mymorning,' thought he. 'I shall be nervous all day, and have a febriculewhen I digest. Let me compose myself.' And so he dismissed hispre-occupations by an effort of the will which he had long practised, andlet his soul roam abroad in the contemplation of the morning. He inhaledthe air, tasting it critically as a connoisseur tastes a vintage, andprolonging the expiration with hygienic gusto. He counted the littleflecks of cloud along the sky. He followed the movements of the birdsround the church tower--making long sweeps, hanging poised, or turningairy somersaults in fancy, and beating the wind with imaginary pinions.And in this way he regained peace of mind and animal composure, consciousof his limbs, conscious of the sight of his eyes, conscious that the airhad a cool taste, like a fruit, at the top of his throat; and at last, incomplete abstraction, he began to sing. The Doctor had but one air--,'Malbrouck s'en va-t-en guerre;' even with that he was on terms of merepoliteness; and his musical exploits were always reserved for momentswhen he was alone and entirely happy.
He was recalled to earth rudely by a pained expression on the boy's face.'What do you think of my singing?' he inquired, stopping in the middle ofa note; and then, after he had waited some little while and received noanswer, 'What do you think of my singing?' he repeated, imperiously.
'I do not like it,' faltered Jean-Marie.
'Oh, come!' cried the Doctor. 'Possibly you are a performer yourself?'
'I sing better than that,' replied the boy.
The Doctor eyed him for some seconds in stupefaction. He was aware thathe was angry, and blushed for himself in consequence, which made himangrier. 'If this is how you address your master!' he said at last, witha shrug and a flourish of his arms.
'I do not speak to him at all,' returned the boy. 'I do not like him.'
'Then you like me?' snapped Doctor Desprez, with unusual eagerness.
'I do not know,' answered Jean-Marie.
The Doctor rose. 'I shall wish you a good morning,' he said. 'You aretoo much for me. Perhaps you have blood in your veins, perhaps celestialichor, or perhaps you circulate nothing more gross than respirable air;but of one thing I am inexpugnably assured:--that you are no human being.No, boy'--shaking his stick at him--'you are not a human being. Write,write it in your memory--"I am not a human being--I have no pretension tobe a human being--I am a dive, a dream, an angel, an acrostic, anillusion--what you please, but not a human being." And so accept myhumble salutations and farewell!'
And with that the Doctor made off along the street in some emotion, andthe boy stood, mentally gaping, where he left him.
The Merry Men, and Other Tales and Fables Page 13
