Part 5

Confused and frightened, I ran past houses and people and soon got ahead of the most advanced of the college boys. When I got in front of the Hospital, I saw two old men breathing a little fresh air at the door; as I passed them, one gave the other a slap on the back and cried out, “Hullo, look at Azor!” and I heard them bursting out into peals of laughter.

At the corner of one of the streets I had to pass by, there was a large grocer’s shop; one of the shop-boys was standing close to the pavement grinding coffee. As soon as I passed, the coffee-mill stopped and I heard the boy calling to the others, inside the shop, to come and look at “Azor!”

The work people, coming out of the manufactory to their dinners, began to bark at me, and hiss as if they were setting two dogs to fight.

At last, to my joy, I saw our house: I was safe! But no, not yet: my hands trembled so that I could not turn the handle of the door: my nervous stamping attracted the attention of a painter who was painting a signboard in front of a restaurant near. The moment he saw me, he left off whistling a popular air, and, coming towards me, held his paint-brush horizontally about two feet from the ground, and promised “Azor, good Azor,” a piece of sugar if he would jump over it nicely.

I rushed into the house and threw myself upon a chair, panting for breath.

XXXV.

THE THEORY OF SELF-DEFENCE.

“HAS anyone hurt you?” anxiously inquired my mother.

I shook my head.

“What has happened, then, my poor boy?” asked she.

Then I burst out, in a voice of despair, with the history of all my wrongs. I declared that I would _never_, _never_, go inside the college doors again! I must be sent back to Miss Porquet. That if I was not sent back there——

Here my father’s voice cut my passionate words short, and put a stop to my rage. I began to cry. My father looked at me and shrugged his shoulders.

When I told him of all my troubles, he replied, “Oh, is that all? When I was a boy, things were much worse than that. You must return laugh for laugh; and when anyone touches you, fall upon them and give it to them well. It should be a case of, ‘You pinch me, I pinch you back; you throw a pen full of ink at me, I throw my inkstand at you; you pull my nose, I pull your ears; you call me Azor, I call you Médor; and there we are quits! You run after me to frighten me, I throw my leg out, and you tumble over it into the mud.’ That’s the way to manage, my little Paul, with schoolboys; you do that, and you need no longer be afraid; and you can then laugh at them in your turn. Ah! if it had been me!”

Then he took my hand, and doubled it to feel my fist, and said: “Now, look at that; that is a fist like any other boy’s; even stronger and harder than many of your age and size have. Now I have told you before how easy it is to use it: you raise your arm like this, clenching your fist tightly; draw your wrist well back to your shoulder, and then strike out straight and hard. There you are, my son, that is all you have to do. Your adversary will be on his back most likely; then you must help him to get up, and to dust himself, shake hands with him, and it’s all over. Now see, my little man, how easy it is; will you not try?”

I replied, “Yes, papa;” but in such a piteous tone of voice, that my father could not help making a face at me. He then began walking up and down the room; and as he passed behind me, he suddenly cried out, “But what in the world have you got on your back?”

I shuddered. What could it be? Most likely some creeping thing; perhaps a caterpillar! But it was not; for my father now took from my back a placard, on which was written—“_My name is Azor!_” Those horrid boys had gummed it there!

My mother was most indignant at what she considered a great insult. The idea of giving me the name of a dog!

“An insult!” cried my father; “on the contrary, I consider it a compliment. For my part, I would much rather be a dog than a frog or a hare. A dog, at least, shows his teeth and bites. At any rate, in my time, dogs knew how to bite; but perhaps that is changed now, as so many other things are.” He frowned as he looked at the placard again, and muttered between his teeth, “Ah! if I had been in Azor’s place to-day, my friends, you should have discovered that he could show his teeth!”

XXXVI.

STILL A COWARD.

ALAS! my father’s advice bore no fruit. Each day brought me some new nickname; I had soon as many names and titles as a Spanish grandee. I suffered all the bullying that timid little boys endure at the hands of their bigger schoolfellows. And, shame be it to me to say it, even babies of eight and nine years old were not afraid to run after me, and join in any tricks that were played me. These children would troop after me when we came out of school, shrieking and yelling, driving me before them, brandishing their wallets as if they were tomahawks, and I used to fly! I, who was taller by a head than any of them! yes, I flew before them like a great, stupid stag hunted by a parcel of little curs. People would come to their doors to watch us and would laugh at me for a coward, and call me all sorts of names. And once, I remember, Colonel Boissot happened to see us, and he stood watching the hunt with his hat all on one side and a smile of contempt upon his face.

There was a little fellow at the college called Lehardy, he was only nine, but I had taken a great fancy to him because I thought I saw a likeness between him and Marc: we were great friends. He never joined the other little boys in chasing me, or behaving rudely to me, and as he lived near where I did we often walked to the college together.

One day when we were walking side by side and talking together, a little wretch of seven came up to Lehardy, and, seizing him by the ear, pulled it cruelly merely for the pleasure of hearing the poor little boy scream. I saw his eyes, filled with great tears, raised to me as if imploring my protection. Pity and indignation fought a fierce battle with cowardice, I trembled from head to foot, and was on the point of throwing myself upon Lehardy’s aggressor. But, unfortunately, my heart failed me, and I ran away, stopping my ears not to hear the cries of my poor little friend.

All school-time I was haunted by those pleading eyes, I heard those screams of pain, and I felt a kind of horror of myself. For the first time in my life I knew what it was to feel remorse. I could not attend to my lessons; all the professor’s explanations were lost upon me, and it was impossible for me to answer a single question. When we came out of school I kept behind, I would not have found myself face to face with little Lehardy for anything in the world. He had trusted to me to help him, and I had failed him.

I avoided him the next day and the day following. By chance we met, and I then saw that the good little fellow bore me no malice. This only increased my contempt for myself. No one accused me, but my conscience gave me no peace. I was miserable, the thought of what I had done was insupportable to me.

It is very difficult to make up one’s mind to have a tooth pulled out (at least when one is a bit of a coward). No amount of reasoning or advice seems to have much effect. One is always inclined to reply to kind friends, “I know you are right to advise me to have it out, but I dare not.” However, when toothache once sets in badly, it has more effect than all the advice in the world, and, much as we dread the operation, we fly to the dentist and have the tooth out, painful as it is. Now that was very like the situation in which I found myself. I felt now that I really could have the courage to fight with a boy of five or six, if by that means I could wipe out the recollection of my cowardice from my own memory and the memory of my poor little friend.

Unfortunately for my good resolutions, nobody else seemed inclined to torment Lehardy, and I felt that if I had to wait to display my courage, it would all evaporate like smoke.

XXXVII.

INCONSISTENCY.

MY courage did not go the length of making me cry out to my schoolfellows: “Whoever wishes to have a fight has only to touch Lehardy!” I only waited, determined that another time, should he need my protection, he would not have to look for it in vain.

My good resolutions, I need not say, had no effect in changing my appearance. My nose had always excited laughter, and it did so no less now; when the boys made jokes about me, and gave me nicknames, such as Azor and Toucan, I did not dream of using my fists against them. No; my courage, if you could call it courage at all, had nothing aggressive in it; it was expectant only. My schoolfellows saw no change in the unfortunate Bicquerot, at whom they were accustomed to poke their fun.

Still, come what might, I was decided that if any boy attempted to molest Lehardy, I would interfere, and would fight with all my strength in the cause of the poor little fellow whom I had deserted in such a cowardly way before. It was very strange that I should have felt so brave upon this one subject, and that my courage should have stopped there. The idea of resenting attacks upon myself never occurred to me. My thoughts were all taken up with the punishment of Lehardy’s aggressors.

I leave the trouble of deciding why my courage should have first appeared in this form, to any profound philosopher who may think it worth his while to consider the subject. Was it from a want of logic, or absence of selfishness?

XXXVIII.

MY PARENTS’ DEVOTION TO ME.

WHEN I first became one of Miss Porquet’s pupils, _The Count_ had taunted me with the poverty of my parents. This idea once put into my head made me reflect upon many circumstances which I should have allowed to pass unnoticed had it not been there.

One evening, I remember, I came home from school earlier than usual as I was not feeling well, and I found my father and mother at dinner. To my astonishment I found it consisted only of soup and salad! I understood now why I had always dined alone: my dinner was always substantial and most abundant. My father and mother stinted themselves for my sake, and wished to hide from me that they did so.

My father’s half-pay as a retired officer was all we had to live upon, and part of that was devoted to helping a friend of his who was in difficulties.

I was deeply touched; but I dared not make any remarks upon what I had seen: first of all I should not have known how to express my feelings; but my love and respect for my father and mother increased each day that I lived.

Sometimes in the evening, while I was learning my lessons for next day, at the table close to the little lamp, my father, who would be seated near me, would fall asleep over his newspaper, and his head lean more and more forwards as he slept. I remember one night in particular that he did so, and I then noticed that he had two great hollows at his temples, and that he had two deep lines down his cheeks. I felt heartbroken! My father was growing thin, and it was because he stinted himself in everything for my sake! I forgot my lessons, and I sat staring at my father as if I could never turn my eyes away from him.

Suddenly he woke up, and lifting his head, looked at me with surprise, and asked me what I was thinking about.

“Nothing, papa,” I replied, turning very red; and I stooped over my lesson-book and appeared to be working very hard.

If I had dared I would have thrown my arms round my father’s neck and have told him how I loved him, how I thanked him, yet how grieved I was.

Sometimes at night, when I had been in bed and asleep for some hours, I would awake suddenly. I would feel that I had slept a long time, and that it was very late; yet, through the door which led into my mother and father’s room and which stood ajar, I could see a light burning, and by that light I could always see my dear mother seated at a table, working, mending the household linen, and making or mending my clothes or my father’s. Then I would cough gently, and my mother coming to my bedside would ask me if I did not feel well or had been dreaming; then how I used to throw my arms round her neck and kiss her, twenty times, one after the other, and tell her how I loved her with all my heart.

XXXIX.

A HUNTING COAT OF FORMER DAYS.

ONE morning I saw my mother looking at my jacket. She appeared troubled and anxious. I could read her thoughts: she was thinking that I must soon have a new one, and of the means of getting it. We were so poor! She sighed as she looked at my worn-out jacket, and as she did so I coloured as if I had been found out in some grave fault. She then went to my father and consulted with him for a long while. After this consultation she went to her wardrobe—that wardrobe which was full of mysterious things—and from it she took a parcel, and laid it carefully on the table.

My father and I both came to the table, curious to see what was in the parcel: my mother took out the pins from the paper one by one, and put them in a little box. I felt very impatient to know what _could_ be in that wonderful parcel, and I thought my mother’s fingers moved very slowly. At last she uncovered a coat, carefully folded up, which she at first took to the window to examine, and then spread out upon the table. This coat was a most wonderful and beautiful garment in my eyes; it was a green velvet hunting coat, with brass buttons. My mother smoothed it gently with her hand to get rid of any creases that there might be in it; then turning to my father she said, “This will do beautifully!”

I had never seen this coat before, it must have lain for many many years buried in my mother’s wardrobe: it was no doubt a relic of better days: those days that I had heard my father talk of when some old friend chanced to come and see him.

When I looked carefully at this wonderful coat, I discovered that it was made of the richest and softest velvet, and that the head of a fox was engraved upon each of the brass buttons. The fox was full face, standing out in relief from each of the buttons, his sharp nose and cunning eyes wonderfully true to nature. At sight of these buttons my admiration knew no bounds; my mother, smiling, placed her hand caressingly on my head and said, “Now thank your father, he is going to let me make this coat fit you, and it shall be yours!”

I jumped for joy, I turned head over heels, I thanked my father, I kissed my mother, I clapped my hands, and I determined that I would try hard to deserve all the kindness that my parents showed me. Yes, thought I to myself, I will use my fists even if only to prove that I am worthy to wear that splendid coat, which my father has worn, and which my dear mother is going to make fit me, with her own hands, and which has such grand buttons!

XL.

THE EFFECT OF MY NEW COAT ON MY CHARACTER.

MY mother first carefully unpicked my father’s hunting coat, and then measuring me she cut out sundry patterns in grey paper, and then cut out the pieces of velvet from these patterns. With what anxiety, mingled with joy, did I watch her operations; it was delightful. The scissors went crac, crac, crac! as they cut through the velvet. What should I have done if they had cut too far? But no, there was no fear of that, my mother was too clever for that. All that she undertook was well done.

Every day when I returned from the college, I walked up softly behind my mother’s chair as she sat working, to look over her shoulder and see “how we were getting on” with the wonderful coat. I remember one day a gentleman called and remained talking to my mother for a long time. I was indeed wanting in charity towards that visitor! what angry looks I gave him as I sat in a corner studying my Latin grammar! What angry words I managed to think, without speaking! All my thoughts were taken up by that splendid coat. I was longing to wear it, and this tiresome visitor prevented my mother from working at it for hours.

With that coat a new era in my life began, with it I seemed somehow to gain courage and address. The thought of it seemed to make me think better of myself. At all events I determined to try to be worthy of it. When I went to bed that night, I did all I could to keep awake, in order to watch my mother working through the door which stood a little way open: I said nothing, I lay quiet as a mouse. The bed clothes were pulled up to my nose and I was perfectly happy; happy to feel myself so warm and comfortable, happy at seeing the bright lamp in the next room, which seemed to keep me company, happy at having such kind good parents, and above all was I not happy at possessing that beautiful velvet coat with those grand buttons! That night I was indeed a happy boy. Little by little my eyelids closed, and in spite of my efforts to keep awake, I was soon fast asleep.

The next morning when I awoke, the first thing I saw was the beautiful coat hanging on the back of one of the chairs. I sprang out of bed and soon had it on. Never had I been so delighted with anything before. It was a little too long and a little too wide; but it was all the better for that surely? I grew very fast, and this coat _must_ last a long, long time. Just over the shoulders the velvet was rather loose and puckered, and appeared somewhat like the wings of a swallow in shape. But that really made me look broader, and was therefore an improvement to my figure. The coat had been made considerably smaller, although it was still rather large for me; but the buttons of course could not be made smaller in proportion, and they therefore covered far more space than formerly in proportion to the velvet. I was however only the more delighted at this: they were so beautiful!

My curiosity satisfied about the fit of my coat, I now thought of my dear mother, who I feared must have sat up half the night working, in order to give me pleasure. My heart was touched beyond measure at this thought, and I was filled with gratitude towards her. I took the coat in my arms and kissed it. I then went to find my mother that I might thank her. How happy she was at seeing my delight! and when I started off to college, she stood at the window that she might watch me walking down the street dressed in my gorgeous new jacket.

XLI.

THE BEETLE.

THE first college boy that I met that morning begged me to give him the address of my tailor. The second came up to me with an expression of the most intense surprise, and passed his hand over my coat.

When I turned to him and asked him rather indignantly what he was about, he replied that he considered my jacket admirable! Now according to my idea this was not too strong an expression to apply to my velvet coat, but there was something in the tone in which it was said that annoyed me. Still more was I displeased when he walked round me two or three times, lifting his hands up in the air. He was joined almost immediately by half a dozen little rascals, who, following his example, raised their hands towards heaven, exclaiming in various tones: “Admirable!”

There were different groups of boys standing about in the street, and in one of these groups I heard a boy holding forth, apparently much to the amusement of the others, about a certain green coat which had been cut out by a carpenter with a few strokes of his hatchet. In another group a boy said that “some one” was a wonderful hand at making coats! And in a third group one of the scholars declared that “_somebody_, not a hundred miles off, was exactly like a great green beetle!” And then on every side I heard “Beetle, Beetle!” sung out to the tune of a polka.

This pastime, which began to cause no little annoyance to the passers-by, was suddenly put a stop to by the striking of the college clock, and in a few seconds the boys were all hard at work at their studies,—or supposed to be so.

During lesson-time I could not help asking myself what they could mean about the beetle? and alas! wounding as it was to my pride, I could not but come to the conclusion that Beetle was now to be added to the list of my nicknames. One more or less, what did it matter? so I reasoned: still, I could not help the feeling of annoyance this new name caused me. All doubt upon the subject was put an end to by the sight of a caricature which was passed from hand to hand along the forms, and which my eyes soon caught a glimpse of.

I easily recognised the absurd nose which had been so often drawn in imitation of my own. And now my coat, my beautiful coat, was caricatured too! I knew it was intended for my coat, but how shamefully caricatured! The buttons were made to look the size of dessert plates, and the whole coat appeared like the shell of a large green beetle with my face at the top. To prevent any mistakes upon the subject, the artist had written under the drawing—_Bicquerot, or the Green Beetle!_

Have you ever received a sudden and totally unexpected blow? If so, you know the feeling of stupefaction that follows—as if one were completely overpowered; then comes the pain which nearly makes one scream. And this is followed by a feeling of blind rage and a thirst for vengeance.

These are the sensations which I experienced on seeing the caricature and afterwards, while my schoolfellows were muttering their lessons round me.

I was astounded! that jacket which I was so proud of—which I thought so much of for many reasons—was caricatured and laughed at by everyone. I felt, too, acute pain at the thought that my mother’s work—that work which was one of the proofs of her great love for me—was made a subject of contemptuous ridicule. I was now wounded in the most sensitive part of my nature.

I felt the great tears rush to my eyes; I would not let them fall, but courageously forced them back. I would not betray the pain and humiliation I was suffering. I buried my head in my hands, and kept my eyes fixed upon my Latin grammar; but, with my mind’s eye, I saw over again my mother seated at work, busy over my jacket, smiling to herself as she stitched away so indefatigably, forgetting all her own weariness in the thought of the pleasure she would give me. Then, beside that picture, rose before me the laughing, the grimacing faces of the insolent boys!

The contrast made me furious! I was so wretched that I determined I would no longer bear it. At that moment my hand, unknown to myself, clenched the leg of the table nearest to me with such violence that the whole table shook; the boys raised their heads in surprise, and the professor begged the pupil “Bicquerot” to keep still.

The pupil Bicquerot said nothing; but when school was over, he walked out of college with his head in the air; his knees trembled with nervous emotion, but his heart was strong and determined.

XLII.

A FIGHT AT LAST.

“HISH! Swish! there goes the Beetle!” cried an impudent voice in my ear.

I turned round quickly, and grinding my teeth, asked: “Who said that?”

Brideau, nicknamed “Cock of the Walk,” who was walking just behind me, was so surprised at the expression of my face, that he retreated a step or two.

“Was it you?” I demanded.

He did not dare to deny it before all the other boys, lest they should think that he was afraid of me. So he replied in an insolent tone of voice, “Yes it _was_ me!”