Part 7

As she spoke, Thélénie handed Chamoureau a card, then hurriedly replaced her mask.

"What is this, fascinating woman! are you going to leave me?" said the Spaniard, tucking the card under his doublet. "I hoped--I dared to think that you would allow me to escort you to your home."

"No, monsieur, it's impossible; I have friends here, and I must join them again. The day after to-morrow, between two o'clock and five, I give you permission to call. Now, adieu; I forbid you to follow me."

And Thélénie ran rapidly downstairs.

"All the same," said Chamoureau, pulling up his boot-tops, "I have made a fine conquest!"

VII

THE DANGER OF FALLING ASLEEP IN COMPANY

Thélénie found Mademoiselle Héloïse in the balcony box; she motioned to her to come with her.

"Do you mean to say we are going already?" asked the little black domino.

"Already! why, it's very late. See, the dancers have plenty of room now, which means that the ball is nearing its end."

"Have you spoken to Monsieur Edmond?"

"No, no, it's of no use; I leave him with his mistress--a flower-maker, my dear; really, it makes me blush to think that I was jealous of such a creature."

"But there are some very pretty flower-makers!"

"What of that? she's a grisette, all the same, and that sort of an affair won't keep Edmond in chains for long. I say again that I regret having lowered myself by speaking to that girl. However, I have just made the acquaintance of a person who will keep me advised concerning my faithless lover's intrigues."

"It's that tall man dressed as a Spaniard, I suppose, that that woman came to tell you about?"

"Exactly; an idiot who thinks he's made a conquest of me.--Come this way, we'll get down more quickly."

As the two women started downstairs, the tall man who had talked with Thélénie in her box, happened to be directly in front of her. He stopped her, saying:

"How is this? you have left your hidalgo? Oh! my dear, you were very foolish to leave him, for you won't find his like at this ball."

"And I am not looking for him, you see, as I am going away."

"Without Edmond Didier?"

"Without Edmond Didier!"

"Whom you leave behind in the company of an extremely pretty little _débardeur_."

"I am absolutely indifferent to that, as you see!"

"Oh! you conceal your thoughts; it certainly was for some purpose that you consented to pass your arm through that fellow's,--that man had the appearance of a mustard sign."

"That doesn't concern you; adieu!"

"You are in a great hurry."

"I don't see that we have anything more to say to each other."

"Nothing more to say to each other! You always forget that we have, on the contrary, a very serious subject to discuss. But I will come to see you."

"Very well, I am horribly tired. Adieu!"

"You run away as if you had seen Paul Duronceray here."

The name of Duronceray caused the fair Thélénie a painful shock; despite the mask that covered her face it was easy to detect the perturbation which that name aroused in her mind.

She soon succeeded in recovering herself, however, and rejoined in a harsh voice:

"You are mistaken, Beauregard, I run away from nobody; and if Monsieur Duronceray were here, I should not be the one to run away--but you!"

"I! oh, no! for now he ought to thank me, instead of bearing me a grudge."

"Very well! hunt him up then!"

And the pearl-gray domino disappeared with her companion.

Monsieur Beauregard stood for some moments lost in thought; then he shrugged his shoulders and returned to the foyer, saying to himself:

"The fact remains that I have no one to sup with; it is time to be thinking about that."

Chamoureau, having discreetly allowed a few minutes to elapse, that he might not appear to be following the pearl-gray domino, who had forbidden him to do so, decided at last to descend from the amphitheatre passage. Now that he had an intrigue fairly started with a lady as elegant as she was lovely, the widower had none but contemptuous glances for all the women who passed him. He puffed himself out in his ruff, held his head erect with much dignity, squared his shoulders under his cloak, and no longer took the trouble to pull up his boot-tops. He was a man who had _arrived_; in other words, a man who had what he wanted and who no longer needed to put himself out in order to gain his ends.

Meanwhile he desired to find his intimate friend Freluchon and young Edmond, because he began to feel an inclination to sup.

In the corridor on the first floor a domino stopped him, and Chamoureau shuddered as he recognized the shoe-stitcher's false light hair.

"Ah! I have found you again at last, my dear monsieur!" cried the scrawny creature. "I am so glad! I have been looking for you ever since that unlucky galop, when I fell; you let go with your left arm, I was a little dizzy, and--_patatras_! And I lost my cap, too, and had hard work finding it; I bruised myself somewhere when I fell, but it won't amount to anything."

"But why were you looking for me, madame?" rejoined the Spaniard, wrapping himself in his cloak, with a savage glare. "I was not looking for you."

"Why, as it's pretty late, I was thinking about supper, as you asked me to take supper with your friends."

"I think I see myself taking you to supper! You had a stick of candy from me, and that's all you will get; for it's not decent to deceive everybody as you do. At your age, and with a face like yours--to try to make a conquest! Go and hide yourself!"

"Let me tell you that you're an impudent wretch, monsieur, and that a man don't talk like that to a woman. When a man has such spindleshanks as yours, he shouldn't put on so many airs. Did anyone ever hear of such a thing! This blockhead flinging a miserable stick of candy in my face! You might stuff it into your nose, your sweetmeat; it would go in. I'll show you what I think of it!"

And the domino hurled her stick of candy at Chamoureau's legs and angrily turned her back on him.

While the widower gazed in stupefaction at the shattered fragments of the bonbon, Freluchon took his arm.

"What the deuce are you doing here," he said, "in rapt contemplation before these broken bits of candy?"

"Faith! I was thinking, as I looked at them, what a pity it is to waste good stuff like that."

"Pshaw! let's go to supper; that will be better fun than staying here. We are just going; we are all downstairs, and I left my Marquise Pompadour to come in search of you; I should say that that was rather kind on my part, eh?"

"Parbleu! you couldn't leave me here and go off without me, when my clothes are at your rooms."

"Come, come; we are going to have supper at Vachette's."

"Why not at the Maison d'Or? it's nearer. You see I never thought to bring a cloak or an overcoat to wear over my disguise. You have a carriage, I trust?"

"A carriage, when there are eight of us! We will run; the weather's fine and that will warm us up."

Edmond was in the vestibule with his little _débardeur_ on his arm; two young men, friends of Freluchon and himself, each accompanied by an unmasked domino, and the little woman dressed as a Louis XV marchioness completed the party. The merry band walked away, shouting _oh!_ and _éh!_ as the custom is during the Carnival, each with his chosen companion on his arm; our widower alone had no one, which fact did not prevent his shouting louder than the others, for he said to himself:

"If I haven't a woman on my arm at this moment, I flatter myself that the one I have captivated is worth more alone than all four of their supper companions."

They arrived at Vachette's, where Freluchon, being a man of forethought, had engaged a private room beforehand. The table was laid; the ladies removed their hoods, caps, gloves, everything that would interfere with their eating; and they all whispered and laughed as they glanced at the Spaniard.

"Who on earth is this tall scarecrow without a lady?" they asked Freluchon; "is he a provincial on his first visit to Paris?"

"No, mesdames," Freluchon replied, "he's a widower who has sworn to remain faithful to his defunct spouse; he's a male Artemis; he is Orpheus, who has lost his Eurydice and is constantly looking for her. If you wish, I will make him weep in a moment."

"No, no, thanks! we prefer to laugh. But why does he wear a disguise if he's so grief-stricken?"

"To disguise his grief; he is persuaded that he has no right to divert himself except in that costume."

"Mesdames, don't you think Freluchon is stuffing us?"

"To table! to table!"

"See, there are ten places, and only nine of us," observed one of the young men.

"True," replied Freluchon, "I ordered supper for ten because I thought that Chamoureau would bring a lady."

"That's so!" cried Edmond; "I hadn't noticed. How's this, my dear Chamoureau, didn't you make a little acquaintance at the ball? What does this mean? how, then, did you pass the time?"

Chamoureau drank a glass of chablis and replied with a triumphant smile:

"I beg pardon, messieurs, I beg pardon! if I haven't brought a lady to supper, that doesn't prove by any means that I am not so highly favored as you are by--by Cupid!"

"The deuce! do you mean it, Chamoureau?" cried Freluchon; "you've been favored by Cupid! Come, tell us about it! When I found you in the foyer, looking, as if stupefied, at the remains of a stick of candy, I supposed that your presents had been repulsed with loss."

"Oh! not by any means! on the contrary my candy was not once repulsed; in fact, I have given away a great deal of it during the night!"

"Really! then you have had a number of intrigues."

"I have had nothing else all night long; I left one woman to take another, and vice versa!"

"What a Lovelace!"

"How is it, monsieur," said the little Pompadour, "that after making so many conquests at the ball, you haven't brought a single one to supper? That is not very gallant for a hidalgo!"

"Pardon me, pretty marchioness," rejoined Chamoureau, after tossing off another glass of chablis, with which he constantly watered his oysters, "my first conquests were worth little more than a stick of candy. Frankly, I found that they were not what I was looking for, so I dropped them, as Henri Monnier says in his _Famille Improvisée_. But the last--oh! the last----"

"She dropped you, I suppose," said Freluchon.

"No indeed! _Diantre!_ let us not joke about her! it's a very serious affair with her. Ah! Dieu!"

"Ha! ha! what a touching sigh!"

"Well, monsieur, why didn't you bring that one to supper--the one who is responsible for that groan?"

"I promise you that I would have asked nothing better; indeed, I invited her, but she refused--she couldn't come."

"Perhaps she was afraid of compromising herself?"

"I don't say that; and yet I can understand that in her position----"

"Ah! she's a woman with a position! Is she on the stage?"

"Well, hardly! no, no! she's a very great lady."

"About five feet six?"

"I am not joking; she's a lady of the very best society."

"Ha! ha! you rascal of a Chamoureau! I believe you are laughing at us."

"Or that she laughed at him!"

"I assure you that she did not laugh at me! In the first place, she unmasked, and I saw the most captivating face. These ladies are very pretty most assuredly, but my superb brunette would throw them all into the shade!"

"I say, Spaniard, do you know that you make us tired with your brunette!"

"If she wouldn't come to supper with you," said little Amélia, "that proves right away that she was intending to take supper with someone else, doesn't it, mesdames?"

"Yes, yes; Amélia is right."

"Oh! you are mistaken, mesdames; it isn't at all as you imagine."

"Well, Chamoureau, where do you expect to see your wonderful conquest again? has she given you an assignation?"

"She has done more, my dear fellow: she has given me her address, with permission to call on her--at her hôtel!"

"So she has a hôtel--furnished probably."

"And when he goes to ask for his charmer, the concierge will say: 'It's on such a floor, monsieur, such a number; the numbers are on the doors'--Ha! ha!"

"Laugh away! laugh all you please! 'He laughs best who laughs last!'"

"The moment you begin on proverbs, I haul down my flag. But where does your conquest live? Perhaps I know her house."

"Freluchon, ask me for my fortune, ask me for my life----"

"You wouldn't give 'em to me, I know; go on."

"I would give them to you rather than tell you the name and abode of my fascinating brunette!"

"Oho! is it as bad as that?"

"I have sworn to be discreet, and I shall keep my oath! If I hadn't promised, it would be a different matter."

"Inasmuch as you have sworn--you will tell us the whole thing at dessert!"

"Never!--better a thousand times to be a widower!"

"Bravo! that's not bad! I'll remember it!"

"You are making me talk nonsense, Freluchon; but in Carnival time----"

"Join me, mesdames and messieurs; I drink to Chamoureau's mysterious conquest!"

"Good! here's her health!"

"For my part, I won't drink it," said the marchioness; "don't you do it, mesdames; he had the face to say that she was prettier than we are!"

"Forgive him, mesdames; passion makes him blind."

"I am rather inclined to think that he's drunk."

Chamoureau did not stint himself while the young men were talking and laughing with their companions, but addressed himself constantly to the decanters within his reach, saying to himself:

"Ah! these strumpets won't drink to my conquest! All right! I'll drink to her myself, in madeira and champagne! To your health, seductive, enrapturing Sainte-Suzanne! You are as far above these lights-o'-love as the oak is above the weed! You could crush them by a single glance; your eyes shine like real diamonds, whereas all these creatures are simply white topazes--To your health again, divine woman! I drain my glass to you."

By dint of drinking of healths and draining his glass, Chamoureau fuddled himself completely; then his head grew heavy, his eyes closed, and he fell asleep.

Our sleeper was awakened by a succession of light taps on his shoulder. He opened his eyes and looked about him. He was still in the small room where he had supped, surrounded by the remains of the feast; but all his table companions had disappeared, and he saw nobody but the waiter who had roused him.

"Hallo! what's the meaning of this?" murmured Chamoureau, rubbing his eyes. "Where are my friends--those gentlemen--and their ladies?"

"They all went away just a minute ago, monsieur."

"What! they went away without me, without waking me!"

"Yes, monsieur, they did it on purpose. I was going to wake you, but Monsieur Freluchon said: 'No, don't wake him till we're gone; that will teach him to go to sleep in our company!'"

"Oh! how stupid! some silly nonsense, some wretched joke all the time! Why, bless my soul! it's broad daylight!"

"Parbleu! long ago, monsieur! it's nearly eight o'clock."

"Sapristi! and I have to go to Freluchon's to change my clothes! However, there are plenty of cabs, luckily. Is there anything for me to pay, waiter?"

"No, monsieur, it's all paid."

"Good!--To think that I haven't an overcoat to hide this costume! Freluchon is to blame for that; 'you won't be cold,' he said.--It isn't the cold I'm afraid of, but the street urchins.--Call a cab, waiter; have it come as near the door as possible."

"Bless me! monsieur, they ain't allowed to come on the sidewalk."

"Well, then, right in front of the door."

Chamoureau covered himself with his cloak as well as he could; he pulled his cap over his eyes, drew his chin inside his ruff, pulled up his boot-tops, and when the waiter announced that the cab was waiting below, rushed down the stairway and across the sidewalk so recklessly that he nearly overturned a woman carrying a tray of bread.

The woman shouted after Chamoureau, who had knocked off three loaves, calling him: "Beast, brute, dirty scum!" But he let her shout, for he was already out of sight inside the cab; he gave Freluchon's address and the cab drove away followed by the hoots of the urchins who had gathered to see a masker, and by the shrieks of the woman with the tray on her head, who was obliged to pick up her loaves.

They soon reached the house on Rue Saint-Georges in which Freluchon lived. Chamoureau leaped out of his cab under the porte cochère, and hastily paid the cabman and dismissed him; because, in his everyday clothes, he could easily walk home.

That transaction completed, the widower said to the concierge:

"I am going up to Freluchon's room."

"What for?" demanded the concierge, eyeing the Spaniard from head to foot.

"What for? why, don't you know me? I am Chamoureau, Freluchon's best friend."

"Yes, I recognize monsieur now, in spite of his masquerade."

"I am going up to my friend's room to get my clothes--unless Freluchon left them with you."

"Monsieur Freluchon left nothing with me, and it ain't worth while for you to go up, as there's no one there. Monsieur Freluchon didn't come home to sleep."

"What's that you say, concierge? it's impossible."

"It's the truth, monsieur."

"Then you have my clothes here?"

"No, monsieur. Last night, if you remember, Monsieur Freluchon came in with a boy who had a bundle--your clothes, no doubt."

"Well, yes; what then?"

"The boy was going to leave the bundle here, but Monsieur Freluchon had to go upstairs to get some money, so he took the bundle up, saying: 'Chamoureau would rather dress in my room than in yours.'"

"Very good; then my clothes are upstairs. Let's go and look for them; if Freluchon isn't there, you must have his key."

"That's just what I haven't got; sometimes he leaves it with me, but he generally takes it with him; and he didn't leave it last night."

"By Jove! this is too much! my clothes are in his room, he knows it, he has his key in his pocket, and he doesn't come home to sleep! What is going to become of me in my Spanish costume? It's an outrage to have to go home dressed like this!"

"Monsieur can take a cab."

"I know that well enough; it wasn't worth while to send the other one away. But I've got to get out of the cab; and I live on Carré Saint-Martin, where there are always lots of people passing. If my house had a porte cochère, I would have the cab drive under it; but no--it's a house-door; and my concierge and all the neighbors will see me come home in this state! Sapristi! this is an infernal trick for Freluchon to play on me.--But I have an idea. Concierge, suppose you lend me some of your clothes?"

"Oh! they wouldn't fit, monsieur; I am short and thin, and monsieur is tall and stout."

"That's so; I'm a fine man, and you are not. Well, I must swallow the absinthe. Concierge, be kind enough to step out and find me a cab."

"But I am all alone, you see, monsieur; my wife has gone out to work and I can't leave my post."

"I will look out for your post--never fear."

"But that isn't the same thing; you don't know the tenants."

"That's of no consequence. Go; my reputation is at stake. Here's forty sous for your trouble; I pay well, you see."

"All right, I'll go; I hope I'll find one on the stand."

"A cab I must have, dead or alive! do you hear?"

The concierge decided, albeit regretfully, to desert his post, and Chamoureau stepped inside.

"Luckily the porte cochère is open," he said, "I shall not have to pull the string!"

VIII

A FALSE CONCIERGE

Chamoureau concealed himself in the farthest corner of the concierge's room, in an old armchair that might have served the purpose of a couch. He placed himself with his back to the window through which visitors addressed the functionary whom he represented, and, in order that he might be observed less easily, he removed his plumed cap and replaced it with an old cap that he found on a table.

So long as people simply passed and repassed the lodge, the false concierge did not put himself out; he did not turn his head, but contented himself with cursing Freluchon, who had put him in that embarrassing position.

But soon someone opened the window, a man's head appeared, and a loud voice inquired:

"Is Monsieur Delaroche in?"

Chamoureau did not stir and did not say a word. The voice repeated, louder than before:

"Is Monsieur Delaroche in?"

The same immobility and the same silence on Chamoureau's part. Whereupon the voice assumed a formidable intonation, capable of breaking all the panes of the window.

"Sacrebleu! are you deaf? are you still asleep? This is the third time I've asked if Monsieur Delaroche was in, and you don't answer! What kind of a damned concierge is this!--Wait a bit, till I come into your lodge; I'll shake you and teach you to sleep at this time of day!"

Chamoureau, who was not at all anxious that that gentleman should enter the lodge and shake him, decided to answer without turning:

"He's in! yes, yes, he's in!"

"Why didn't you say so then, you old fool?"

"He's in! he's in!"

The loud-voiced individual went upstairs, and our widower hurled himself in his chair once more, muttering:

"After all, I was a great fool not to answer. Probably no one has gone out so early as this, and I don't risk anything by saying they're in; and then, even if they should be out, what do I care?"

Soon various other persons appeared at the window.

"Is Madame Duponceau visible?"

"Yes, yes, she's there."

"Is Monsieur Bretonneau in?"

"He's there, he's there."

"Is there anybody at Mademoiselle Crémailly's?"

"She's there, she's there."

"Then she's back from the country?"

"She's there!"

"In the country, or here?"

"She's there, she's there!"

"Sapristi! tell me what you mean, concierge: is Mademoiselle Crémailly still in the country, or has she come back to Paris?"

"She's there, she's there!"

"Very well, then I'll go up. Still on the fourth?"

"She's there!"

"Heavens! what a donkey that concierge is! one would say he was a parrot--repeating the same thing over and over again."

"I'm beginning to get infernally tired of this!" said Chamoureau to himself; "altogether too many people come to this house. The deuce! now it's raining great guns! and my cab doesn't come! Can it be that there wasn't one on the square? that's usually the way when it rains hard. O Freluchon! you shall pay me for this! The rascal probably went home with his Pompadour!"

Soon a lady's maid appeared at the window.

"Madame's paper, please, Monsieur Mignon," she said. "I am a little late--not that madame's hair is dressed yet, but I must have time to read the paper before she does, as usual; especially as there's a most intensely exciting _feuilleton_ just now. It's too splendid for anything, I tell you: four killed already, and one that they're getting ready to poison! and a woman who always has a dagger hidden in her belt! and a château where there are subterranean vaults with instruments of torture, and the author describes the way of using them! There's an interesting executioner and there's corpses and tortured people on every page! Oh! such a lovely novel! Now that's what I call literature, and I know what I'm talking about; I don't read all this mawkish stuff, not me! I want a crime, a murder, in every chapter; then I say: 'there's an author who has a wonderful talent and who has studied murders to some purpose.'--But look here! I believe you're not listening to me! And where's my paper? God bless my soul! he's still asleep! Well, I'll come in and get it myself."

The young servant entered the room, looked over several papers that lay on the table, and took her own, saying:

"You must have been kept up late last night, old Mignon? I'll bet it was because Madame Duponceau went to the ball. There's a woman who's up to snuff; she tells her old beau that she has a sick headache or one of her nervous attacks, and means to go to bed at nine o'clock; so she dismisses him with an: 'I'm going to dream of you, my loulou!' and he's no sooner out of sight than she skips off to the ball with another man. But still it's the custom, it's done everywhere, as the song says: