Part 4

"There should be a bulletin in the concierge's lodge," he said to Auguste; "get down, copy it, leave my name and come back quickly. We haven't five minutes to waste."

The chauffeur jumped down from his seat, with the reckless haste of a servant who seeks to earn forgiveness for a fault. He disappeared like a gust of wind behind the door of the enormous porte-cochère which imparted a seignorial aspect to the abode of the unique personality, untitled, but of the most unexceptional elegance, that Charles Jaubourg had been. In order that his name should have been so much as mentioned in connection with Madame de Claviers-Grandchamp, it must have been that he, who came of such a widely different social caste, had been able to win for himself an exceptional position in society. Of that supremely refined man, of the great bourgeois, who had become, by dint of adaptability of manners, and, in due time, of wit, a notable member of Society, there remained only a poor tattered remnant, an old man at the point of death with pneumonia, behind those high windows. The straw spread upon the pavement to deaden the noise of passing vehicles attested the gravity of a condition of which Landri had a more decisive proof. His messenger reappeared, holding in his hand a paper on which was written this laconic and ill-boding bulletin: "A very bad night. Condition stationary.--Professor Louvet, Dr. Pierre Chaffin."

The officer read these words in an undertone; and with an indifference which, under the circumstances, was of an irony no less unintentional than cruel, he folded the paper and slipped it into his pocket, saying: "All right. Let's be off!"

"The concierge told me to tell Monsieur le Comte," interposed the chauffeur, "that Monsieur Jaubourg had given special orders to send Monsieur le Comte up to him when he came."

"Me?" exclaimed the young man, with unfeigned surprise and vexation. There was a gleam of hesitation in his eyes, and he started to get down. "But no, I really haven't time!" And with this exclamation, the irony of which was even more cruel, he started the automobile once more. It had already crossed the Seine, turned into Rue des Tuileries, passed the Opéra, the Gare du Nord, the barrier, and Saint-Denis, and entered upon the road through the forest of Hez, beyond which is the château of Grandchamp, before the mind of Madame de Claviers' son had even begun to detect behind that second little sign the mystery which was destined, a few hours later, to revolutionize his career forever.

"Jaubourg dying and wanting to see me? Why, when he has never in his whole life shown anything but antipathy to me? It's easily explained. My father had told him I would call. Really, I ought to have gone up. But what more should I have had to take to Grandchamp than this bulletin? And then, Chaffin is there. He must have been sent by my father, and he'll keep him posted."

Pierre Chaffin was the son of Landri's former tutor, become, under the more distinguished title of secretary, the marquis's steward and man of business. The younger man, formerly intern at a hospital, and very eminent in his profession, was now the head of the clinical staff of Louvet, who had been the Claviers-Grandchamps' physician from time immemorial.

"Besides," continued the lover, "I promised"; and his mouth, which was open to inhale the cool breeze caused by their speed, closed as if to place, despite the distance, a last kiss on his friend's burning hands. That recollection sent the blood coursing more hotly through his veins, and the automobile flew the faster through the wild flight of the houses, already beplumed with smoke, of the autumn crops, of the misty fields, of that whole landscape, which ordinarily was to Landri the source of reflections rather than of sensations. How many times, on his way to Grandchamp, had he noticed that multiplicity of small estates, which checker the land, isolate the châteaux, surround them, as if determined to conquer them! A symbol of the upward progress of the lower classes. To-day he saw nothing save space to be devoured, at the end of which he would stand face to face with his father and his promise. He had chosen to drive, in order not to think; and, despite himself, he formed and unformed in his mind the plan of that interview, while he drove on, leaving behind him, one after another, Saint-Denis and its basilica, Groslay and its moss-covered roofs, the forest of l'Isle-Adam and its white quarries, Beaumont and the long blue ribbon of the Oise, the charming nosegay of Cahet, the wood of Saint-Vaast, Cires-lès-Mello and its mills, Balagny, and peaceful Thérain, Mouny and its graceful gables.

"Thirty-three minutes past one," said the chauffeur, looking at his watch, when the first houses of Thury appeared at the end of the road, and the oaks of the forest of Hez. "That is travelling! And Monsieur le Comte never drove better."

"Now all we have to do is find the hunt," Landri replied. "It hasn't been a bad run, that's a fact. Take the wheel now, Auguste, please. I am going to search the avenues with my glass. Let's go toward La Neuville, and drive slowly, so as not to lose any sound."

The forest, over whose gravel roads they were now driving, told no less clearly than the fields the story of the parcelling out of old France. It formerly joined the forests of Compiègne and of Carnelle, and the whole formed, between the Seine and the Oise, a vast region teeming with game, of which only fragments remain. This of Hez occupies a plateau, of a slightly irregular surface, which the automobile traversed at a very slow pace. There were constant halts, to ask information of some passer-by, to investigate with the glass the interstices in the hedges, and above all to listen for the baying of the hounds. Several times Landri had thought that he detected a "Vue!" or a "Bien allé." Suddenly he put his hand on the chauffeur's arm. He heard distinctly a blast of the horn.

"Why, that's a _hallali_!" he exclaimed. "So soon?--Yes.--And it's not far away. To the left, and a little speed. There we are. I see the hunt. Stop a moment while I look! Oh! what a beautiful sight!"

A sharp turn of the road had disclosed a depression in the ground. At the end of the avenue appeared one of the infrequent clearings of that dense forest. In a frame formed to perfection by the horn-beams and beeches, which blended their rusty foliage with the pale gold of the birches and the dark verdure of the firs, was being enacted the final scene of that too short day. Victorias and automobiles were arriving at the cross-roads. They drew up in line along one of the roads. In the centre a considerable crowd had already gathered in a circle, composed of country people come to assist at the finish, guests who had followed the hunt in carriages, and hunters, whose costumes in the colors of the hunt--Spanish snuff-color with blue lapels--heightened with a dash of brilliancy that truly charming and picturesque little tableau. Here grooms were covering with blankets the horses heated by the ardor of the chase. Farther on servants were bringing baskets filled with provisions for the lunch. The mellow autumn light bathed with its invigorating rays those groups, over whose heads rang out blasts of the horn, blended with the baying of the restless hounds; and each blast, by its few notes, explained to Landri the movements which were taking place in the crowd, and which he amused himself by following with his glass.--The horns blew the _mort_. The dogs were led away from the game. The first huntsman cut off the right fore-foot and handed it to the master of the hunt. The horns blew the honors of the foot. The master presented the foot to one of the ladies whose three-cornered hats could be seen beside the velvet caps of the men. The horns blew the _mort_ anew. The baying of the pack redoubled. From his post of observation Landri could distinguish quite plainly all the details of the _curée_: the whipper-in, standing astride the stag, waved the head, by the antlers, before the slavering jaws, held in respect by the raised whip of the huntsman. Another blast. The whips had fallen. The dogs had hurled themselves on the bleeding mass of which already nothing remained.

In the front rank of the spectators of this ancient and savage ceremony, the young man had had no difficulty in making out his father's imposing profile. In his costume of master of the hunt, completed according to the old fashion by a three-cornered hat turned back with a copper button, the Marquis de Claviers-Grandchamp instantly justified, by his aspect alone, the sobriquet of "Émigré" which his son often bestowed upon him. He inevitably recalled the image of one of those sportsmen represented in the charming paintings of the staircase at Fontainebleau, or that exquisite picture at Versailles which depicts one of the hunting-parties of the Prince de Conti in the neighborhood of l'Isle-Adam.

The marquis was a man of sixty-five, whose sturdy old age put to shame the worn-out middle-aged men of to-day. He was very tall, very straight, and was still slender, although powerfully built, with a handsome face, high-colored, of which his snow-white hair intensified the ruddy hue. His long, delicate, tapering nose, a little too near the epicurean and clever mouth, gave to his profile a vague resemblance to that of François I. He was conscious of it, and he emphasized the likeness by the cut of his beard, which was snow-white, like his hair. His face did not need that adventitious aid to make even the most ignorant say of him when they first saw him: "He's a walking portrait." Everything in him was eloquent of race, the prolonged existence of a family in the constant enjoyment of energy, wealth, and domination. His whole person was instinct with kindliness of nature, and yet there emanated from it an indescribable atmosphere of dignity, and the self-assurance of one who has always maintained his rank, not only through himself, but through all his kindred.

At this moment his eyes, deep-blue and piercing none the less, expressed, as did his whole haughty countenance, the most complete and heartfelt satisfaction. His lips laughed gaily and disclosed his large white teeth, of which not one was missing. He had beside him two men of his circle whom Landri knew very well, a M. de Bressieux and a M. de Charlus. The latter, who was very small, almost puny, seemed a dwarf beside the superb master of the hunt. His refined features also savored of race, but of a meagre and worn-out type. He was only fifty-five, but he was the older man. Bressieux, who was younger, was more comely of aspect, and yet there was in his face a something which vitiated it, and his cold arrogance contrasted no less strangely with the simple grand manners of the marquis.

At that short distance Landri was able to study the group in detail with almost photographic accuracy, and he felt once more the sentiment of which he had told Madame Olier, a heartfelt admiration for his father. Monsieur de Claviers-Grandchamp realized in every respect the physically and mentally superior type of aristocrat, of the best. He was built of a more ample, richer human material. What a difference between his generous, his magnificent way of carrying off his rank, and the bickerings of Charlus about questions of precedence! That was the sole, contemptible occupation of that most refined and upright man, who was nevertheless hypnotized by trivial details concerning his nobility, though it was of the most authentic! What a difference, too, between the spontaneous geniality of Monsieur de Claviers and the obsequiousness of a semi-sharper which Bressieux displayed beneath his assumption of importance, in order to maintain the course of an ultra fashionable life by doubtful expedients. Very well born and well connected, endowed moreover with taste, education, shrewdness and much dexterity, he acted as intermediary between people of his own station, who were straitened in their circumstances, and the dealers in curios or wealthy collectors. Upon what terms? No one had ever dreamed of asking the question of that individual with the face of a gambler and duellist, ruined by cards and women, but who had retained the most impeccable manners and the most virile courage of his race.

In Charlus and in Bressieux their caste was drawing near its end. In the marquis, however, caste might be unemployed, but it was intact. To his son he seemed so perfectly the _grand seigneur_ in his bearing even at that moment, when the picturesque amusement of the day came to an end in the most bourgeois of occupations: a cold luncheon eaten in the open air! He went from one to another of his guests, from carriage to carriage, assisted in that hospitable duty by a young woman in a riding habit, who had followed the hunt on horseback, without taking part in it. Landri recognized one of his partners at the infrequent balls which he had attended during the last two winters.

"Poor Marie de Charlus!" he muttered; "she hasn't grown beautiful!" And he added, aloud, to his chauffeur: "I am going inside, and we will go on. I have certainly earned my luncheon."

The limousin began to descend the slope, while the young man removed the mask, the cap, the gloves and the cloak in which he had arrayed himself. If the marquis had arrived at that stage of concession at which he recognized the existence of the automobile, he was still savagely hostile to the hideous accessories which that style of locomotion multiplies from day to day. This childlike precaution against the possible ill humor of his father would have made Landri himself smile under other circumstances. But the sight of Mademoiselle de Charlus had suddenly rearoused his preoccupation, which had been somewhat allayed, in spite of everything, by the fatigue and distractions of the journey. He foresaw an additional reason for sparing the marquis's least prejudices. The monomaniacal gentleman's daughter in no wise deserved the contemptuous apostrophe with which he had saluted her. To be sure, Marie de Charlus had not regular features. Her mouth was too large, her nose too short, her forehead too protuberant, but her eyes saved all the rest by their brilliancy, and, if she was not beautiful, she possessed that charm of the "ugly-pretty girl" which so many men prefer to beauty. Rather small, like her father, but of a very good figure, dancing and riding with a grace at once bold and maidenly, she too had, in her original physiognomy, that "portrait" aspect which is so frequent in stationary classes. Those who are most impervious to the theory of heredity must needs resort, in spite of themselves, in the face of this fact, to the vulgarized, indefinite and indefinable, yet accurate term, "atavism."

Landri was more capable than most men of grasping the interesting character of that young girl's face, closely resembling one of those eighteenth-century faces of which La Tour has noted the intelligent expression,--but he was in love with another woman, he had come to Grandchamp with the purpose of disarming his father's hostility to a marriage which he passionately desired, and already well-meaning persons had spoken to him of Marie de Charlus more than once in a very significant tone. Did not her presence at this hunt, after the marquis had insisted so earnestly that he should attend it, accord with these hints? Certain it is that she was the first to espy the young man, even before the motor had stopped. A faint blush rose to her cheeks. She said a word to the marquis. He turned. He saw his son descending from the heavy vehicle, and at the wave of his hand over the surrounding heads, Landri felt, as usual, the warm blood rush to his heart. This was perhaps the strangest detail of their strange relations--never had the son approached the father without an impulse of enthusiasm and affection; and the next instant he recoiled, withdrew within himself. He literally bore in his breast two hearts: one which felt a thrill of emotion upon contact with that powerful vitality, another which was, as it were, terrified and thrown into confusion by it. This time, however, the second impulse did not follow at once. The young man, in his anxiety, felt a too grateful surprise when he realized that there was no trace of reproach in that greeting, although he arrived when the hunt was over, after a downright objurgation to be prompt. He passed through the line of carriages, exchanging hand-shakes, and salutations with the hat. M. de Claviers' first words to him were accompanied by one of those hearty laughs which always rang true--the old nobleman would not have been the admirable and knightly person that he was, if his frankness had not been absolute, in the most trivial no less than in the most important circumstances.

"Well, Landri, you won't boast again of the convenience of the automobile! Your train arrived at Paris at nine o'clock, and now it's two. Ah! the horse! the horse! The four good post-horses that made the trip without a stop! However, here you are. It's a pity. You have missed a fine run. It was hotter than the result would indicate. The attack was sharp. But Tonnerre has an admirable scent for doublings. He did not allow the dogs to make a mistake, and the stag was in sight almost all the time. He was in the water only a few moments. The beast was winded by the pace. We finished with a run of a kilometre. That's what your trouble-machine has made you miss."

"I'll make him change his mind about the automobile, Monsieur de Claviers," said Mademoiselle de Charlus gaily, addressing Landri, "I pledge myself to do it. On the next _circuit_ I am going to take him with me, and we shall go a bit fast. He'll find that it's as amusing as a fine run to hounds. I have sworn to make him _up-to-date_."

She looked at the new arrival with a glance most desirous to please, as she uttered that untranslatable Americanism, which, indeed, might well have been her motto. Marie had that characteristic common to certain women of her class, which is traceable to a reaction against the monotonies of their environment: an unwillingness to go slow. While Landri was a modernist, she prided herself on being ultra modern. "Not in the train, in the express," she would say; "in all the expresses"; which did not prevent her thinking about the substance of things exactly as her father and the marquis did. By an unexpected contrariety the young man disliked her and the "Émigré" liked her. Behind her poses the marquis divined the immutable "one does not mix with the canaille when one has a name like ours," of the pure-blooded aristocrat; and then, too, she loved his son, and he knew it. Landri, for his part, blamed the young woman for that defiant air, that radicalism which was like a caricature of his own ideas. And above all, he guessed that she loved him, and he loved Valentine! He replied neither to her glance nor to her words, but said to the marquis:--

"I had no trouble, father. I was simply detained in Paris a little longer than I expected."

"Did you go to Jaubourg's?" asked M. de Claviers. "Did you see him?"

"I didn't see him," Landri answered. He too was incapable of lying well. It was his turn to blush as he added, evasively: "He is so ill! But I have brought you the bulletin."

"Give it to me," said M. de Claviers eagerly. He read the ominous lines aloud. "Pierre Chaffin!" he repeated. "I am glad Chaffin's son is there. His father must have sent him, on my account, because he knows how fond I am of Jaubourg. He didn't tell me anything in order not to disturb me. Good Chaffin! And good Jaubourg! I dined with him at the club last Wednesday--not a week ago. He complained of lassitude and headache. I said to him: 'You've taken a little cold. Don't worry about it. It's nothing.' It was the first symptoms of pneumonia and perhaps he will die of it!"

"He'll have a fine sale," said Bressieux. He had the affectation of speaking with the ends of his teeth, as if he nibbled at his words. "I know of two Fragonards that he has, of the very choicest. Those that were in the poor Duc de Fleury's collection, don't you remember, Geoffroy?" This other Merovingian name was borne by the marquis, but few persons were privileged to call him by it; Bressieux never lost an opportunity. "He was a good buyer," he continued; "he had a deal of taste."

"And for a man who was not _born_," interposed Charlus, "he was wonderfully well brought up. I knew of but one fault that he had: he was not religious."

"A man so _comme il faut_!" said Marie sarcastically; "it's surprising. Never fear, papa, he won't have a civil burial. He won't inflict that on you." As she was really kind-hearted, she was a little ashamed of having scratched a dying man on the petty absurdities of his life, and she added: "No matter, even if he was a bit of a 'snob', he was an excellent man."

"Excellent!" echoed the marquis; and with the simple benignity which had always touched his son so deeply, he continued, with tears in his eyes: "I have known him more than thirty years. He has been a perfect friend to me. A friend, that is something not to be replaced at my age, nor at any age! We are happy, breathing freely, going our ways; I see him suffering, and--" He paused, then continued in a deep voice: "If he must go, I wish I had bade him adieu." He paused again, and as the wonderful vitality of his blood naturally inspired his brain with optimistic thoughts, he said: "But we are in a great hurry to bury him, and the bulletin does not suggest an aggravated case. Let us hope. I couldn't go to Paris to-day, on account of the hunt. To-morrow we shall shoot a few partridges. I will go day after to-morrow."

Plainly he had felt a twinge of remorse because he was not at the bedside of the friend he loved. He had yielded, he yielded again to the hereditary passion which decreed that Louis XVI should hunt the stag while the Jacobins were taking away his throne. And, shaking off his sad thoughts definitively, he said to his son:--

"You must be tired, my boy. You must have something to eat."--And, to a servant: "A plate.--Some foie gras? Here." He began to serve Landri himself.--"The liver of my own birds, mademoiselle, and I am proud of it!--A glass of champagne? I am hungry too."--He ate again.--"But it's a healthy hunger, of the sort that your circuit in an automobile won't give me, mademoiselle, no. A four hours' gallop in my forest, and I breathe in life through every pore. These woods have been ours for three hundred years. That's a long lease!--Ah! so you propose to make me _up-to-date_! On the contrary I will make you 'old France.' You recited some decadent verses to me just now. I am going to recite you some of the sixteenth century. They're by Jacques Grévin, the physician of Marguerite de France. It's a description of this very forest of ours:--

"'Dedans ces bois et forests ombrageuses Sont les sangliers et les biches peureuses, Les marcassins, fans de biches et daims, Les cerfs cornus, familiers aux silvains, Bref, le plaisir et soulas et bonheur Que peut avoir ès forests le veneur.'"[2]