The Mysteries of Paris, Volume 2 of 6

"But yourself, my mother, and all the children had but part of a loaf among you all yesterday. You cannot go on in this way; you will be starved to death. It is all your fault that we are not on the books of the charitable institution this year."

"They will not admit any persons without they possess furniture, or some such property; and you know we have nothing in the world. We are looked upon as though we lived in furnished apartments, and, consequently, ineligible. Just the same if we tried to get into any asylum, the children are required to have at least a blouse, while our poor things have only rags. Then, as to the charitable societies, one must go backwards and forwards twenty times before we should obtain relief; and then what would it be? Why, a loaf once a month, and half a pound of meat once a fortnight.5 I should lose more time than it would be worth."

"But, still, what are we to do?"

"Perhaps the lady who came yesterday will not forget us!"

"Perhaps not. But don't you think Madame Mathieu would lend us four or five francs, just to keep us from starving? You have worked for her upwards of ten years; and surely she will not see an honest workman like you, burthened with a large and sickly family, perish for want of a little assistance like that?"

"I do not think it is in her power to aid us. She did all in her power when she advanced me little by little 120 francs. That is a large sum for her. Because she buys diamonds, and has sometimes 50,000 francs in her reticule, she is not the more rich for that. If she gains 100 francs a month, she is well content, for she has heavy expenses, – two nieces to bring up; and five francs is as much to her as it would be to me. There are times when one does not possess that sum, you know; and being already so deeply in her debt, I could not ask her to take bread from her own mouth and that of her family to give it to me."

"This comes of working for mere agents in jewelry, instead of procuring employment from first-hand master jewellers. They are sometimes less particular. But you are such a poor, easy creature, you would almost let any one take the eyes out of your head. It is all your fault that – "

"My fault!" exclaimed the unhappy man, exasperated by this absurd reproach. "Was it or was it not your mother who occasioned all our misfortunes, by compelling me to make good the price of the diamond she lost? But for that we should be beforehand with the world; we should receive the amount of my daily earnings; we should have the 1,100 francs in our possession we were obliged to draw out of the savings-bank to put to the 1,300 francs lent us by M. Jacques Ferrand. May every curse light on him!"

"And you still persist in not asking him to help you? Certainly he is so stingy that I daresay he would do nothing for you; but then it is right to try. You cannot know without you do try."

"Ask him to help me!" cried Morel. "Ask him! I had rather be burnt before a slow fire. Hark ye, Madeleine! Unless you wish to drive me mad, mention that man's name no more to me."

As he uttered these words, the usually mild, resigned expression of the lapidary's countenance was exchanged for a look of gloomy energy, while a slight suffusion coloured the ordinarily pale features of the agitated man, as, rising abruptly from the pallet beside which he had been sitting, he began to pace the miserable apartment with hurried steps; and, spite of the deformed and attenuated appearance of poor Morel, his attitude and action bespoke the noblest, purest indignation.

"I am not ill-disposed towards any man," cried he, at length, pausing of a sudden; "and never, to my knowledge, harmed a human being. But, I tell you, when I think of this notary, I wish him – ah! I wish him – as much wretchedness as he has caused me." Then pressing both hands to his forehead, he murmured, in a mournful tone: "Just God! what crime have I committed that a hard fate should deliver me and mine, tied hand and foot, into the power of such a hypocrite? Have his riches been given him only to worry, harass, and destroy those his bad passions lead him to persecute, injure, and corrupt?"

"That's right! that's right!" said Madeleine; "go on abusing him. You will have done yourself a great deal of good, shall you not, when he puts you in prison, as he can do any day, for that promissory note of 1,300 francs on which he obtained judgment against you? He holds you fast as a bird at the end of a string. I hate this notary as badly as you do; but since we are so completely in his power, why you should – "

"Let him ruin and dishonour my child, I suppose?" burst from the pale lips of the lapidary, with violent and impatient energy.

"For heaven's sake, Morel, don't speak so loud; the children are awake, and will hear you."

"Pooh, pooh!" returned Morel, with bitter irony; "it will serve as a fine example for our two little girls. It will instruct them to expect that, one of these days, some villain or other like the notary may take a fancy to them, – perhaps the same man; and then, I suppose, you would tell me, as now, to be careful how I offended him, since he had me in his power. You say, if I displease him, he can put me in prison. Now, tell the truth: you advise me, then, to leave my daughter at his mercy, do you not?"

And then, passing from the extreme of rage at the idea of all the wickedness practised by the notary to tender recollections of his child, the unhappy man burst into a sort of convulsive weeping, mingled with deep and heavy sobs, for his kindly nature could not long sustain the tone of sarcastic indignation he had assumed.

"Oh, my children!" cried he, with bitter grief; "my poor children! My good, my beautiful, too – too beautiful Louise! 'Tis from those rich gifts of nature all our troubles proceeded. Had you been less lovely, that man would never have pressed his money upon me. I am honest and hard-working; and if the jeweller had given me time, I should never have been under the obligation to the old monster, of which he avails himself to seek to dishonour my child. I should not then have left her a single hour within his power; but I dare not remove her, – I dare not! For am I not at his mercy? Oh, want! oh, misery! What insults do they not make us endure!"

"But what can you do?" asked Madeleine. "You know he threatens Louise that if she quits him he will put you in prison directly."

"Oh, yes! He dares address her as though she were the very vilest of creatures."

"Well, you must not mind that; for should she leave the notary, there is no doubt he would instantly throw you into prison, and then what would become of me, with these five helpless creatures and my mother? Suppose Louise did earn twenty francs a month in another place, do you think seven persons can live on that?"

"And so that we may live, Louise is to be disgraced and left to ruin?"

"You always make things out worse than they are. It is true the notary makes offers of love to Louise; she has told us so repeatedly. But then you know what a good girl she is; she would never listen to him."

"She is good, indeed; and so right-minded, active, and industrious! When, seeing how badly we were off in consequence of your long illness, she insisted upon going to service that she might not be a burthen to us, did I not say what it cost me to part with her? To think of my sweet Louise being subjected to all the harshness and humiliation of a servant's life, – she who was naturally so proud that we used jokingly – ah, we could joke then! – to call her the Princess, because she always said that, by dint of care and cleanliness, she would make our little home like a palace! Dear Louise! It would have been my greatest happiness to have kept her with me, though I had worked all day and all night too. And when I saw her blooming face, with her bright eyes glancing at me as she sat beside my work-table, my labour always seemed lightened; and when she sung like a bird those little songs she knew I liked to hear, I used to fancy myself the happiest father alive. Poor dear Louise! so hard-working, yet always so gay and lively! Why, she could even manage your mother, and make her do whatever she wished. But I defy any one to resist her sweet words or winning smile. And how she watched over and waited upon you! What pains she would take to try and divert you from thinking of what you suffered! And how tenderly she looked after her little brothers and sisters, finding time for everything! Ah, with our Louise all our joy and happiness – all – all – left us!"

"Don't go on so, Morel. Don't remind me of all these things, or you will break my heart," cried Madeleine, weeping bitterly.

"And, then, when I think that perhaps that old monster – Do you know, when that idea flashes across my brain, my senses seem disturbed, and I have but one thought, that of first killing him and then killing myself?"

"What would become of all of us if you were to do so? Besides, I tell you again, you make things worse than they really are. I dare say the notary was only joking with Louise. He is such a pious man, and goes so regularly to mass every Sunday, and only keeps company with priests folks say. Why, many people think that he is safer to place money with than the bank itself."

"Well, and what does all that prove? Merely that he is a rich hypocrite, instead of a poor one. I know well enough what a good girl Louise is; but then she loves us so tenderly that it breaks her heart to see the want and wretchedness we are in. She knows well enough that if anything were to happen to me you would all perish with hunger; and by threatening to put me into prison he might work on the dear child's mind, – like a villain as he is, – and persuade her, on our account! O, God, my brain burns! I feel as though I were going mad."

"But, Morel, if ever that were the case, the notary would be sure to make her a great number of fine presents or money, and, I am sure, she would not have kept them all to herself. She would certainly have brought part to us."

"Silence, woman! Let me hear no more such words escape your lips. Louise touch the wages of infamy! My good, my virtuous girl, accept such foul gifts! Oh, wife!"

"Not for herself, certainly. But to bring to us perhaps she would – "

"Madeleine," exclaimed Morel, excited almost to frenzy, "again, I say, let me not hear such language from your lips; you make me shudder. Heaven only knows what you and the children also would become were I taken away, if such are your principles."

"Why, what harm did I say?"

"Oh, none."

"Then what makes you uneasy about Louise?"

The lapidary impatiently interrupted his wife by saying:

"Because I have noticed for the last three months that, whenever Louise comes to see us, she seems embarrassed, and even confused. When I take her in my arms and embrace her, as I have been used to do from her birth, she blushes."

"Ah, that is with delight at seeing you, or from shame."

"She seems sadder and more dejected, too, each visit she pays us."

"Because she finds our misery constantly increasing. Besides, when I spoke to her concerning the notary, she told me he had quite ceased his threats of putting you in prison."

"But did she tell you the price she has paid to induce him to lay aside his threats? She did not tell you that, I dare say, did she? Ah, a father's eye is not to be deceived; and her blushes and embarrassments, when giving me her usual kiss, make me dread I know not what. Why, would it not be an atrocious thing to say to a poor girl, whose bread depended on her employer's word, 'Either sacrifice your virtuous principles, and become what I would have you, or quit my house? And if any one should inquire of me respecting the character you have with me, I shall speak of you in such terms that no one will take you into their service.' Well, then, how much worse is it to frighten a fond and affectionate child into surrendering her innocence, by threatening to put her father into prison if she refused, when the brute knows that upon the labour of that father a whole family depends? Surely the earth contains nothing more infamous, more fiendlike, than such conduct."

"Ah," replied Madeleine, "and then only to think that with the value of one, only one of those diamonds now lying on your table, we might pay the notary all we owe him, and so take Louise out of his power and keep her at home with us. Don't you see, husband?"

"What is the use of your repeating the same thing over and over again? You might just as well tell me that if I were rich I should not be poor," answered Morel, with sorrowful impatience. For such was the innate and almost constitutional honesty of this man, that it never once occurred to him that his weak-minded partner, bowed down and irritated by long suffering and want, could ever have conceived the idea of tempting him to a dishonourable appropriation of that which belonged to another.

With a heavy sigh, the unfortunate man resigned himself to his hard fate. "Thrice happy those parents who can retain their innocent children beneath the paternal roof, and defend them from the thousand snares laid to entrap their unsuspecting youth. But who is there to watch over the safety of the poor girl condemned at an early age to seek employment from home? Alas, no one! Directly she is capable of adding her mite to the family earnings, she leaves her dwelling at an early hour, and repairs to the manufactory where she may happen to be engaged. Meanwhile, both father and mother are too busily employed to have leisure to attend to their daughter's comings or goings. 'Our time is our stock in trade,' cry they, 'and bread is too dear to enable us to lay aside our work while we look after our children.' And then there is an outcry raised as to the quantity of depraved females constantly to be met with, and of the impropriety of conduct among those of the lower orders, wholly forgetting that the parents have neither the means of keeping them at home, nor of watching over their morals when away from them."

Thus mentally moralised Morel. Then, speaking aloud, he added:

"After all, our greatest privation is when forced to quit our parents, wives, or children. It is to the poor that family affection is most comforting and beneficial. Yet, directly our children grow up, and are capable of becoming our dearest companions, we are forced to part with them."

At this moment some one knocked loudly at the door.

CHAPTER XIII

JUDGMENT AND EXECUTION

The lapidary, much astonished, rose and opened the door. Two men entered the garret. One, tall, lanky, with an ill-favoured and pimply face, shaded by thick grizzly whiskers, held in his hand a thick cane, loaded at the head; he wore a battered hat, and a long-tailed and bespattered green coat, buttoned up close to his throat. Above the threadbare velvet collar was displayed his long neck, red and bald like that of a vulture. This man's name was Malicorne. The other was a shorter man, with a look as low-lived, and red, fat, puffed features, dressed with a great effort at ridiculous splendour. Shiny buttons were in the folds of the front of his shirt, whose cleanliness was most suspicious, and a long chain of mosaic gold serpentined down a faded plaid waistcoat, which was seen beneath his seedy Chesterfield, of a yellowish gray colour. This gentleman's name was Bourdin.

"How poverty-stricken this hole smells," said Malicorne, pausing on the threshold.

"Why, it does not scent of lavender-water. Confound it, but we have a lowish customer to deal with," responded Bourdin, with a gesture of disgust and contempt, and then advanced towards the artisan, who was looking at him with as much surprise as indignation.

Through the door, left a little ajar, might be seen the villainous, watchful, and cunning face of the young scamp Tortillard, who, having followed these strangers unknown to them, was sneaking after, spying, and listening to them.

"What do you want?" inquired the lapidary, abruptly, disgusted at the coarseness of these fellows.

"Jérome Morel?" said Bourdin.

"I am he!"

"Working lapidary?"

"Yes."

"You are quite sure?"

"Quite sure. But you are troublesome, so tell me at once your business, or leave the room."

"Really, your politeness is remarkable! Much obliged! I say, Malicorne," said the man, turning to his comrade, "there's not so much fat to cut at here as there was at that 'ere Viscount de Saint-Rémy's."

"I believe you; but when there is fat, why the door's kept shut in your face, as we found in the Rue de Chaillot. The bird had hopped the twig, and precious quick, too, whilst such vermin as these hold on to their cribs like a snail to his shell."

"I believe you; well, the stone jug just suits such individuals."

"The sufferer (creditor) must be a good fellow, for it will cost him more than it's worth; but that's his lookout."

"If," said Morel, angrily, "you were not drunk, as you seem to be, I should be angry with you. Leave this apartment instantly!"

"Ha! ha! He's a fine fellow with his elegant curve," said Bourdin, making an insulting allusion to the contorted figure of the poor lapidary. "I say, Malicorne, he has cheek enough to call this an apartment, – a hole in which I would not put my dog."

"Oh, dear! oh, dear!" exclaimed Madeleine, who had been so frightened that she could not say a word before. "Call for assistance; perhaps they are rogues. Take care of your diamonds!"

And, seeing these two ill-looking strangers come closer to his working-bench, on which his precious stones were still lying, Morel, fearful of some evil intentions, ran towards the table, and covered the jewels with his two hands.

Tortillard, still on the watch, caught at Madeleine's words, observed the movement of the artisan, and said to himself:

"Ha! ha! ha! So they said he was a lapidary of sham stones; if they were mock he would not be afraid of being robbed; this is a good thing to know. So Mother Mathieu, who comes here so often, is a matcher of real stones, after all, and has real diamonds in her basket; this is a good thing to know, and I'll tell the Chouette," added Bras Rouge's brat.

"If you do not leave this room, I will call in the guard," said Morel.

The children, alarmed at this scene, began to cry, and the idiotic mother sat up in her bed.

"If any one has a right to call for the guard, it is we, you Mister Twistabout," said Bourdin.

"And the guard would lend us a hand to carry you off to gaol if you resist," added Malicorne. "We have not the magistrate with us, it is true; but if you have any wish for his company, we'll find you one, just out of bed, hot and heavy; Bourdin will go and fetch him."

"To prison! me?" exclaimed Morel, struck with dismay.

"Yes, to Clichy."

"To Clichy?" repeated the artisan, with an air of despair.

"It seems a hardish pill," said Malicorne.

"Well, then, to the debtors' jail, if you like that better," said Bourdin.

"You – what – indeed – why – the notary – ah, mon Dieu!"

And the workman, pale as death, fell on his stool, unable to add another word.

"We are bound bailiffs, come to lay hold of you; now are you fly?"

"Morel, it is the note of Louise's master! We are undone!" exclaimed Madeleine, in a tone of agony.

"Hear the judgment," said Malicorne, taking from his dirty and crammed pocketbook a stamped writ.

After having skimmed over, according to custom, a part of this document in an unintelligible tone, he distinctly articulated the last words, which were, unfortunately, but too important to the artisan:

"Judgment finally given. The Tribunal condemns Jérome Morel to pay to Pierre Petit-Jean, merchant,6 by every available means, even to the arrest of body, the sum of 1,300 francs, with interest from the day of protest, and to pay all other and extra costs. Given and judged at Paris, 13 September, etc., etc."

"And Louise! Louise!" cried Morel, almost distracted in his brain, and apparently unheeding the long preamble which had just been read. "Where is Louise, then, for, doubtless, she has quitted the notary, since he sends me to prison? My child! My Louise! What has become of you?"

"Who the devil is Louise?" asked Bourdin.

"Let him alone!" replied Malicorne, brutally; "don't you see the respectable old twaddler is not right in his nonsense-box?" Then, approaching Morel, he added: "I say, my fine fellow, right about file! March on! Let us get out of here, will you, and have a little fresh air. You stink enough to poison a cat in this here hole!"

"Morel!" shrieked Madeleine, wildly, "don't go! Kill those wretches! Oh, you coward, not to knock them down! What! are you going to let them take you away? Are you going to abandon us all?"

"Pray don't put yourself out of the way, ma'am," said Bourdin, with an ironical grin. "I've only just got to remark that if your good man lays his little finger on me, why I'll make him remember it," continued he, swinging his loaded stick round and round.

Entirely occupied with thoughts of Louise, Morel scarcely heard a word of what was passing. All at once an expression of bitter satisfaction passed over his countenance, as he said:

"Louise has doubtless left the notary's house; now I shall go to prison willingly." Then, casting a troubled look around him, he exclaimed: "But my wife! Her mother! The children! Who will provide for them? No one will trust me with stones to work at in prison, for it will be supposed my bad conduct has sent me there. Does this hard-hearted notary wish the destruction of myself and all my family also?"

"Once, twice, old chap," said Bourdin, "will you stop your gammon? You are enough to bore a man to death. Come, put on your things, and let us be off."

"Good gentlemen, kind gentlemen," cried Madeleine, from her sick-bed, "pray forgive what I said just now! Surely you will not be so cruel as to take my husband away; what will become of me and my five poor children, and my old mother, who is an idiot? There she lies; you see her, poor old creature, huddled up on her mattress; she is quite out of her senses, my good gentlemen; she is, indeed, quite mad!"

"La! what, that old bald-headed thing a woman? Well, hang me if that ain't enough to astonish a man!"

"I'll be hanged if it isn't, then!" cried the other bailiff, bursting into a horse-laugh; "why, I took it for something tied up in an old sack. Look! her old head is shaved quite close; it seems as though she had got a white skull-cap on."

"Go, children, and kneel down, and beg of these good gentlemen not to take away your poor father, our only support," said Madeleine, anxious by a last effort to touch the hearts of the bailiffs. But, spite of their mother's orders, the terrified children remained weeping on their miserable mattress.

At the unusual noise which prevailed, added to the aspect of two strange men in the room, the poor idiot turned herself towards the wall, as though striving to hide from them, uttering all the time the most discordant cries and moans. Morel, meanwhile, appeared unconscious of all that was going on; this last stroke of fate had been so frightful and unexpected, and the consequences of his arrest were so dreadful, that his mind seemed almost unequal to understanding its reality. Worn out by all manner of privations, and exhausted by over-toil, his strength utterly forsook him, and he remained seated on his stool, pale and haggard, and as though incapable of speech or motion, his head drooping on his breast, and his arms hanging listlessly by his side.

"Deuce take me," cried Malicorne, "if that old patterer is not going fast asleep! Why, I say, my chap, you seem to think nothing of keeping gen'l'men like us waiting; just remember, will you, our time is precious! You know this is not exactly a party of pleasure, so march, or I shall be obliged to make you."

Suiting the action to the word, the man grasped the artisan by the shoulder, and shook him roughly; which so alarmed the children, that, unable to restrain their terror, the three little boys emerged from their paillasse, and, half naked as they were, came in an agony of tears to throw themselves at the feet of the bailiffs, holding up their clasped hands, and crying, in tones of touching earnestness:

"Pray, pray don't hurt our dear father!"

At the sight of these poor, shivering, half-clad infants, weeping with affright, and trembling with cold, Bourdin, spite of his natural callousness and long acquaintance with scenes of this sort, could not avoid a feeling almost resembling compassion from stealing over him, while his pitiless companion, brutally disengaging himself from the grasp of the small, weak creatures who were clinging to him, exclaimed: