Chapter 4

Yes, he fell in love--with her beauty, her grace--perhaps also with the circumstances. The theatre rang with plaudits; the curtain hid her; and he went out, dizzy with romance. He could not hope to speak to her to-night, but he was curious to see her when she left. He decided that on the morrow he would call upon de Fronsac, whom she doubtless knew now, and ask him for an introduction. Promising himself this, he reached the stage door--where de Fronsac, with trembling limbs, stood giving thanks for his self-control.

"My friend!" cried Pitou enthusiastically, "how rejoiced I am to meet you!" and nearly wrung his hand off.

"Aie! Gently!" expostulated de Fronsac, writhing. "Aie, aie! I did not know you loved me so much. So you are back from Sweden, hein?"

"Yes. I have not been there, but why should we argue about geography? What were you doing as I came up--reciting your poems? By the way, I have a favour to ask; I want you to introduce me to Florozonde."

"Never!" answered the poet firmly; "I have too much affection for you-- I have just resolved not to see her again myself. Besides, I thought you knew her in the circus?"

"I never spoke to her there--I simply admired her from the plank. Come, take me inside, and present me!"

"It is impossible," persisted de Fronsac; "I tell you I will not venture near her any more. Also, she is coming out--that is her coupe that you see waiting."

She came out as he spoke, and, affecting not to recognise him, moved rapidly towards the carriage. But this would not do for Pitou at all. "Mademoiselle!" he exclaimed, sweeping his hat nearly to the pavement.

"Yes, well?" she said sharply, turning.

"I have just begged my friend de Fronsac to present me to you, and he feared you might not pardon his presumption. May I implore you to pardon mine?"

She smiled. There was the instant in which neither the man nor the woman knows who will speak next, nor what is to be said--the instant on which destinies hang. Pitou seized it.

"Mademoiselle, I returned to France only this evening. All the journey my thought was--to see you as soon as I arrived!"

"Your friend," she said, with a scornful glance towards de Fronsac, who sauntered gracefully away, "would warn you that you are rash."

"I am not afraid of his warning."

"Are you not afraid of _me_?"

"Afraid only that you will banish me too soon."

"Mon Dieu! then you must be the bravest man in Paris," she said.

"At any rate I am the luckiest for the moment."

It was a delightful change to Florozonde to meet a man who was not alarmed by her; and it pleased her to show de Fronsac that his cowardice had not left her inconsolable. She laughed loud enough for him to hear.

"I ought not to be affording you the luck," she answered. "I have friends waiting for me at the Cafe de Paris." "I expected some such blow," said Pitou. "And how can I suppose you will disappoint your friends in order to sup with me at the Cafe du Bel Avenir instead?"

"The Cafe du--?" She was puzzled.

"Bel Avenir."

"I do not know it."

"Nor would your coachman. We should walk there--and our supper would cost three francs, wine included."

"Is it an invitation?"

"It is a prayer."

"Who are you?"

"My name is Nicolas Pitou,"

"Of Paris?"

"Of bohemia."

"What do you do in it?"

"Hunger, and make music."

"Unsuccessful?"

"Not to-night!"

"Take me to the Bel Avenir," she said, and sent the carriage away.

De Fronsac, looking back as they departed, was distressed to see the young man risking his life.

At the Bel Avenir their entrance made a sensation. She removed her cloak, and Pitou arranged it over two chairs. Then she threw her gloves out of the way, in the bread-basket; and the waiter and the proprietress, and all the family, did homage to her toilette.

"Who would have supposed?" she smiled, and her smile forgot to be mysterious.

"That the restaurant would be so proud?"

"That I should be supping with you in it! Tell me, you had no hope of this on your journey? It was true about your journey, hein?"

"Ah, really! No, how could I hope? I went round after your dance simply to see you closer; and then I met de Fronsac, and then--"

"And then you were very cheeky. Answer! Why do I interest you? Because of what they say of me?"

"Not altogether."

"What else?"

"Because you are so beautiful. Answer! Why did you come to supper with me? To annoy some other fellow?"

"Not altogether."

"What else?"

"Because you were not frightened of me. Are you sure you are not frightened? Oh, remember, remember your horrible fate if I should like you too much!"

"It would be a thumping advertisement for you," said Pitou. "Let me urge you to try to secure it."

"Reckless boy!" she laughed, "Pour out some more wine. Ah, it is good, this! it is like old times. The strings of onions on the dear, dirty walls, and the serviettes that are so nice and damp! It was in restaurants like this, if my salary was paid, I used to sup on fete days."

"And if it was not paid?"

"I supped in imagination. My dear, I have had a cigarette for a supper, and the grass for a bed. I have tramped by the caravan while the stars faded, and breakfasted on the drum in the tent. And you--on a bench in the Champs Elysees, hein?"

"It has occurred."

"And you watched the sun rise, and made music, and wished _you_ could rise, too? I must hear your music some day. You shall write me a dance. Is it agreed?"

"The contract is already stamped," said Pitou.

"I am glad I met you--it is the best supper I have had in Paris. Why are you calculating the expenses on the back of the bill of fare?"

"I am not. I am composing your dance," said Pitou. "Don't speak for a minute, it will be sublime! Also it will be a souvenir when you have gone."

But she did not go for a long while. It was late when they left the Cafe du Bel Avenir, still talking--and there was always more to say. By this time Pitou did not merely love her beauty--he adored the woman. As for Florozonde, she no longer merely loved his courage--she approved the man.

Listen: he was young, fervid, and an artist; his proposal was made before they reached her doorstep, and she consented!

Their attachment was the talk of the town, and everybody waited to hear that Pitou had killed himself. His name was widely known at last. But weeks and months went by; Florozonde's protracted season came to an end; and still he looked radiantly well. Pitou was the most unpopular man in Paris.

In the rue Dauphine, one day, he met de Fronsac.

"So you are still alive!" snarled the poet.

"Never better," declared Pitou. "It turns out," he added confidentially, "there was nothing in that story--it was all fudge."

"Evidently! I must congratulate you," said de Fronsac, looking bomb-shells.

THE OPPORTUNITY OF PETITPAS

In Bordeaux, on the 21st of December, monsieur Petitpas, a clerk with bohemian yearnings, packed his portmanteau for a week's holiday. In Paris, on the same date, monsieur Tricotrin, poet and pauper, was commissioned by the Editor of _Le Demi-Mot_ to convert a rough translation into literary French. These two disparate incidents were destined by Fate--always mysterious in her workings--to be united in a narrative for the present volume.

Three evenings later the poet's concierge climbed the stairs and rapped peremptorily at the door.

"Well?" cried Tricotrin, raising bloodshot eyes from the manuscript; "who disturbs me now? Come in!"

"I have come in," panted madame Dubois, who had not waited for his invitation, "and I am here to tell you, monsieur, that you cannot be allowed to groan in this agonised fashion. Your lamentations can be heard even in the basement."

"Is it in my agreement, madame, that I shall not groan if I am so disposed?" inquired the poet haughtily.

"There are things tacitly understood. It is enough that you are in arrears with your rent, without your doing your best to drive away the other tenants. For two days they have all complained that it would be less disturbing to reside in a hospital."

"Well, they have my permission to remove there," said Tricotrin. "Now that the matter is settled, let me get on with my work!" And with the groan of a soul in Hades, he perused another line.

"There you go again!" expostulated the woman angrily, "It is not to be endured, monsieur. What is the matter with you, for goodness' sake?"

"With me, madame, there is nothing the matter; the fault lies with an infernal Spanish novel. A misguided editor has commissioned me to rewrite it from a translation made by a foreigner. How can I avoid groans when I read his rot? Miranda exclaims, 'May heaven confound you, bandit!' And the fiance of the ingenue addresses her as 'Angel of this house!'"

"Well, at least groan quietly," begged the concierge; "do not bellow your sufferings to the cellar."

"To oblige you I will be as Spartan as I can," agreed Tricotrin. "Now I have lost my place in the masterpiece. Ah, here we are! 'I feel she brings bad tidings--she wears a disastrous mien.' It is sprightly dialogue! If the hundred and fifty francs were not essential to keep a roof over my head, I would send the Editor a challenge for offering me the job."

Perspiration bespangled the young man's brow as he continued his task. When another hour had worn by he thirsted to do the foreign translator a bodily injury, and so intense was his exasperation that, by way of interlude, he placed the manuscript on the floor and jumped on it. But the climax was reached in Chapter XXVII; under the provocation of the love scene in Chapter XXVII frenzy mastered him, and with a yell of torture he hurled the whole novel through the window, and burst into hysterical tears.

The novel, which was of considerable bulk, descended on the landlord, who was just approaching the house to collect his dues.

"What does it mean," gasped monsieur Gouge, when he had recovered his equilibrium, and his hat; "what does it mean that I cannot approach my own property without being assaulted with a ton of paper? Who has dared to throw such a thing from a window?"

"Monsieur," stammered the concierge, "I do not doubt that it was the top-floor poet; he has been behaving like a lunatic for days."

"Aha, the top-floor poet?" snorted monsieur Gouge. "I shall soon dispose of _him_!" And Tricotrin's tears were scarcely dried when _bang_ came another knock at his door.

"So, monsieur," exclaimed the landlord, with fine satire, "your poems are of small account, it appears, since you use them as missiles? The value you put upon your scribbling does not encourage me to wait for my rent!"

"Mine?" faltered Tricotrin, casting an indignant glance at the muddy manuscript restored to him; "you accuse _me_ of having perpetrated that atrocity? Oh, this is too much! I have a reputation to preserve, monsieur, and I swear by all the Immortals that it was no work of mine."

"Did you not throw it?"

"Throw it? Yes, assuredly I threw it. But I did not write it."

"Morbleu! what do I care who wrote it?" roared monsieur Gouge, purple with spleen. "Does its authorship improve the condition of my hat? My grievance is its arrival on my head, not its literary quality. Let me tell you that you expose yourself to actions at law, pitching weights like this from a respectable house into a public street."

"I should plead insanity," said Tricotrin; "twenty-seven chapters of that novel, translated into a Spaniard's French, would suffice to people an asylum. Nevertheless, if it arrived on your hat, I owe you an apology."

"You also owe me two hundred francs!" shouted the other, "and I have shown you more patience than you deserve. Well, my folly is finished! You settle up, or you get out, right off!"

"Have you reflected that it is Christmas Eve--do we live in a melodrama, that I should wander homeless on Christmas Eve? Seriously, you cannot expect a man of taste to lend himself to so hackneyed a situation? Besides, I share this apartment with the composer monsieur Nicolas Pitou. Consider how poignant he would find the room's associations if he returned to dwell here alone!"

"Monsieur Pitou will not be admitted when he returns--there is not a pin to choose between the pair of you. You hand me the two hundred francs, or you go this minute--and I shall detain your wardrobe till you pay. Where is it?"

"It is divided between my person and a shelf at the pawnbroker's," explained the poet; "but I have a soiled collar in the left-hand corner drawer. However, I can offer you more valuable security for this trifling debt than you would dare to ask; the bureau is full of pearls --metrical, but beyond price. I beg your tenderest care of them, especially my tragedy in seven acts. Do not play jinks with the contents of that bureau, or Posterity will gibbet you and the name of 'Gouge' will one day be execrated throughout France. Garbage, farewell!"

"Here, take your shaving paper with you!" cried monsieur Gouge, flinging the Spanish novel down the stairs. And the next moment the man of letters stood dejected on the pavement, with the fatal manuscript under his arm.

"Ah, Miranda, Miranda, thou little knowest what mischief thou hast done!" he murmured, unconsciously plagiarising. "She brought bad tidings indeed, with her disastrous mien," he added. "What is to become of me now?"

The moon, to which he had naturally addressed this query, made no answer; and, fingering the sou in his trouser-pocket, he trudged in the direction of the rue Ravignan. "The situation would look well in print," he reflected, "but the load under my arm should, dramatically, be a bundle of my own poems. Doubtless the matter will be put right by my biographer. I wonder if I can get half a bed from Goujaud?"

Encouraged by the thought of the painter's hospitality, he proceeded to the studio; but he was informed in sour tones that monsieur Goujaud would not sleep there that night.

"So much the better," he remarked, "for I can have all his bed, instead of half of it! Believe me, I shall put you to no trouble, madame."

"I believe it fully," answered the woman, "for you will not come inside--not monsieur Goujaud, nor you, nor any other of his vagabond friends. So, there!"

"Ah, is that how the wind blows--the fellow has not paid his rent?" said Tricotrin. "How disgraceful of him, to be sure! Fortunately Sanquereau lives in the next house."

He pulled the bell there forthwith, and the peal had scarcely sounded when Sanquereau rushed to the door, crying, "Welcome, my Beautiful!"

"Mon Dieu, what worthless acquaintances I possess!" moaned the unhappy poet. "Since you are expecting your Beautiful I need not go into details."

"What on earth did you want?" muttered Sanquereau, crestfallen.

"I came to tell you the latest Stop Press news--Goujaud's landlord has turned him out and I have no bed to lie on. Au revoir!"

After another apostrophe to the heavens, "That inane moon, which makes no response, is beginning to get on my nerves," he soliloquised. "Let me see now! There is certainly master Criqueboeuf, but it is a long journey to the quartier Latin, and when I get there his social engagements may annoy me as keenly as Sanquereau's. It appears to me I am likely to try the open-air cure to-night. In the meanwhile I may as well find Miranda a seat and think things over."

Accordingly he bent his steps to the place Dancourt, and having deposited the incubus beside him, stretched his limbs on a bench beneath a tree. His attitude, and his luxuriant locks, to say nothing of his melancholy aspect, rendered him a noticeable figure in the little square, and monsieur Petitpas, from Bordeaux, under the awning of the cafe opposite, stood regarding him with enthusiasm.

"Upon my word of honour," mused Petitpas, rubbing his hands, "I believe I see a Genius in the dumps! At last I behold the Paris of my dreams. If I have read my Murger to any purpose, I am on the verge of an epoch. What a delightful adventure!"

Taking out his Marylands, Petitpas sauntered towards the bench with a great show of carelessness, and made a pretence of feeling in his pockets for a match. "Tschut!" he exclaimed; then, affecting to observe Tricotrin for the first time, "May I beg you to oblige me with a light, monsieur?" he asked deferentially. A puff of wind provided an excuse for sitting down to guard the flame; and the next moment the Genius had accepted a cigarette, and acknowledged that the weather was mild for the time of year.

Excitement thrilled Petitpas. How often, after business hours, he had perused his well-thumbed copy of _La Vie de Boheme_ and in fancy consorted with the gay descendants of Rodolphe and Marcel; how often he had regretted secretly that he, himself, did not woo a Muse and jest at want in a garret, instead of totting up figures, and eating three meals a day in comfort! And now positively one of the fascinating beings of his imagination lolled by his side! The little clerk on a holiday longed to play the generous comrade. In his purse he had a couple of louis, designed for sight-seeing, and, with a rush of emotion, he pictured himself squandering five or six francs in half an hour and startling the artist by his prodigality.

"If I am not mistaken, I have the honour to address an author, monsieur?" he ventured.

"Your instincts have not misled you," replied the poet; "I am Tricotrin, monsieur--Gustave Tricotrin. The name, however, is to be found, as yet, on no statues."

"My own name," said the clerk, "is Adolphe Petitpas. I am a stranger in Paris, and I count myself fortunate indeed to have made monsieur Tricotrin's acquaintance so soon."

"He expresses himself with some discretion, this person," reflected Tricotrin. "And his cigarette was certainly providential!"

"To meet an author has always been an ambition of mine," Petitpas continued; "I dare to say that I have the artistic temperament, though circumstances have condemned me to commercial pursuits. You have no idea how enviable the literary life appears to me, monsieur!"

"Its privileges are perhaps more monotonous than you suppose," drawled the homeless poet. "Also, I had to work for many years before I attained my present position."

"This noble book, for instance," began the clerk, laying a reverent hand on the abominable manuscript.

"Hein?" exclaimed its victim, starting.

"To have written this noble book must be a joy compared with which my own prosperity is valueless."

"The damned thing is no work of mine," cried Tricotrin; "and if we are to avoid a quarrel, I will ask you not to accuse me of it! A joy, indeed? In that block of drivel you view the cause of my deepest misfortunes."

"A thousand apologies!" stammered his companion; "my inference was hasty. But what you say interests me beyond words. This manuscript, of seeming innocence, is the cause of misfortunes? May I crave an enormous favour; may I beg you to regard me as a friend and give me your confidence?"

"I see no reason why I should refuse it," answered Tricotrin, on whom the boast of "prosperity" had made a deep impression. "You must know, then, that this ineptitude, inflicted on me by an eccentric editor for translation, drove me to madness, and not an hour ago I cast it from my window in disgust. It is a novel entirely devoid of taste and tact, and it had the clumsiness to alight on my landlord's head. Being a man of small nature, he retaliated by demanding his rent."

"Which it was not convenient to pay?" interrupted Petitpas, all the pages of _La Vie de Boheme_ playing leapfrog through his brain.

"I regret to bore you by so trite a situation. 'Which it was not convenient to pay'! Indeed, I was not responsible for all of it, for I occupied the room with a composer named Pitou. Well, you can construct the next scene without a collaborator; the landlord has a speech, and the tragedy is entitled 'Tricotrin in Quest of a Home.'"

"What of the composer?" inquired the delighted clerk; "what has become of monsieur Pitou?"

"Monsieur Pitou was not on in that Act. The part of Pitou will attain prominence when he returns and finds himself locked out."

"But, my dear monsieur Tricotrin, in such an extremity you should have sought the services of a friend."

"I had that inspiration myself; I sought a painter called Goujaud. And observe how careless is Reality in the matter of coincidences! I learnt from his concierge that precisely the same thing had befallen monsieur Goujaud. He, too, is Christmassing alfresco."

"Mon Dieu," faltered the clerk, "how it rejoices me that I have met you! All my life I have looked forward to encountering a genius in such a fix."

"Alas!" sighed Tricotrin, with a pensive smile, "to the genius the fix is less spicy. Without a supper--"

"Without a supper!" crowed Petitpas.

"Without a bed--"

"Without a bed!" babbled Petitpas, enravished.

"With nothing but a pen and the sacred fire, one may be forgiven sadness."

"Not so, not so," shouted Petitpas, smacking him on the back. "You are omitting _me_ from your list of assets! Listen, I am staying at an hotel. You cannot decline to accord me the honour of welcoming you there as my guest for the night. Hang the expense! I am no longer in business, I am a bohemian, like yourself; some supper, a bed, and a little breakfast will not ruin me. What do you say, monsieur?"

"I say, drop the 'monsieur,' old chap," responded Tricotrin. "Your suggestions for the tragedy are cordially accepted. I have never known a collaborator to improve a plot so much. And understand this: I feel more earnestly than I speak; henceforth we are pals, you and I."

"Brothers!" cried Petitpas, in ecstasy. "You shall hear all about a novel that I have projected for years. I should like to have your opinion of it."

"I shall be enchanted," said Tricotrin, his jaw dropping.

"You must introduce me to your circle--the painters, and the models, and the actresses. Your friends shall be _my_ friends in future."

"Don't doubt it! When I tell them what a brick you are, they will be proud to know you."

"No ceremony, mind!"

"Not a bit. You shall be another chum. Already I feel as if we had been confidants in our cradles."

"It is the same with me. How true it is that kindred spirits recognise each other in an instant. What is environment? Bah! A man may be a bohemian and an artist although his occupations are commercial?"

"Perfectly! I nearly pined amid commercial occupations myself."

"What an extraordinary coincidence! Ah, that is the last bond between us! You can realise my most complex moods, you can penetrate to the most distant suburbs of my soul! Gustave, if I had been free to choose my career, I should have become a famous man." "My poor Adolphe! Still, prosperity is not an unmixed evil. You must seek compensation in your wealth," murmured the poet, who began to think that one might pay too high a price for a bed.

"Oh--er--to be sure!" said the little clerk, reminded that he was pledged to a larger outlay than he had originally proposed. "That is to say, I am not precisely 'wealthy.'" He saw his pocket-money during the trip much curtailed, and rather wished that his impulse had been less expansive.

"A snug income is no stigma, whether one derives it from Parnassus or the Bourse," continued Tricotrin. "Hold! Who is that I see, slouching over there? As I live, it's Pitou, the composer, whose dilemma I told you of!"

"Another?" quavered the clerk, dismayed.

"He, Nicolas! Turn your symphonic gaze this way! 'Tis I, Gustave!"

"Ah, mon vieux!" exclaimed the young musician joyfully; "I was wondering what your fate might be. I have only just come from the house. Madame Dubois refused me admission; she informed me that you had been firing Spanish novels at Gouge's head. Why Spanish? Is the Spanish variety deadlier? So the villain has had the effrontery to turn us out?"

"Let me make your affinities known to each other," said Tricotrin. "My brother Nicolas--my brother Adolphe. Brother Adolphe has received a scenario of the tragedy already, and he has a knack of inventing brilliant 'curtains.'"