The Conspirators, Alexandre Dumas père [books to read this summer TXT] 📗

fourth floor with Nanette, and he on the fifth. This was rather a recommendation to Bathilde. For some time she had begun to feel it inconvenient that her room should be only separated by a door from that of a man still young and who was neither her father nor her husband. She therefore assured Buvat that the lodging must suit him admirably, and advised him to secure it at once. Buvat was delighted, and at once gave notice to quit his old lodgings, and at the half-term he moved. Bathilde was right; for since her black mantle sketched her beautiful shoulders--since her mittens showed the prettiest fingers in the world--since of the Bathilde of former times there was nothing left but her childish feet, every one began to remark that Buvat was young--that the tutor and the pupil were living under the same roof. In fact, the gossips who, when Bathilde was six years old, worshiped Buvat's footsteps, now began to cry out about his criminality because she was fifteen. Poor Buvat! If ever echo was innocent and pure, it was that of the room which adjoined Bathilde's, and which for ten years had sheltered his good round head, into which a bad thought had never entered, even in dreams.

But on arriving at the Rue du Temps-Perdu it was still worse. In the Rue Pagevin, where his admirable conduct to the child was known, this remembrance had protected him against calumny; but in their new quarter this was quite unknown, and their inscribing themselves under two different names prevented any idea of very near relationship. Some supposed that they saw in Bathilde the result of an old passion which the Church had forgotten to consecrate, but this idea fell at the first examination. Bathilde was tall and slender, Buvat short and fat; Bathilde had brilliant black eyes, Buvat's were blue and expressionless; Bathilde's face was white and smooth, Buvat's face was bright red. In fact, Bathilde's whole person breathed elegance and distinction, while poor Buvat was the type of vulgar good-nature. The result of this was, that the women began to look at Bathilde with contempt, and that men called Buvat a lucky fellow. The previsions of the clerk who resigned were realized. For eighteen months Buvat had not touched a sou of his pay, and yet had not relaxed for a moment in his punctuality. Moreover, he was haunted with a fear that the ministry would turn away a third of the clerks for the sake of economy. Buvat would have looked on the loss of his place as a great misfortune, although it took him six hours a day which he might have employed in a lucrative manner. They took care not to dismiss a man who worked the better the less they paid him.

Bathilde began to think that there was something passing of which she was ignorant. She thought it would be no use to ask Buvat, and addressing herself to Nanette, who, after a short time, avowed all to her, Bathilde learned for the first time all she owed to Buvat; and that to pay her masters, and to amass her dowry, Buvat worked from morning till night; and that in spite of this, as his salary was not paid, he would be obliged sooner or later to tell Bathilde that they must retrench all expenses that were not absolutely necessary.

Bathilde's first impulse on learning this devotion was to fall at Buvat's feet and express her gratitude; but she soon understood that, to arrive at her desired end, she must feign ignorance.

The next day Bathilde told Buvat, laughing, that it was throwing away money to keep her masters any longer, for she knew as much as they did; and as, in Buvat's eyes, Bathilde's drawings were the most beautiful things in the world, and as, when she sang, he was in the seventh heaven, he found no difficulty in believing her, particularly as her masters, with unusual candor, avowed that their pupil knew enough to study alone; but Bathilde had a purifying influence on all who approached her. Bathilde was not satisfied with saving expense, but also wished to increase his gains. Although she had made equal progress in music and drawing, she understood that drawing was her only resource, and that music could be nothing but a relaxation. She reserved all her attention for drawing; and as she was really very talented, she soon made charming sketches. At last one day she wished to know what they were worth; and she asked Buvat, in going to his office, to show them to the person from whom she bought her paper and crayons, and who lived at the corner of the Rue de Clery. She gave him two children's heads which she had drawn from fancy, to ask their value. Buvat undertook the commission without suspecting any trick, and executed it with his ordinary naivete. The dealer, accustomed to such propositions, turned them round and round with a disdainful air, and, criticising them severely, said that he could only offer fifteen francs each for them. Buvat was hurt not by the price offered, but by the disrespectful manner in which the shopkeeper had spoken of Bathilde's talent. He drew them quickly out of the dealer's hands, saying that he thanked him.

The man, thinking that Buvat thought the price too small, said that, for friendship's sake, he would go as high as forty francs for the two; but Buvat, offended at the slight offered to the genius of his ward, answered dryly that the drawings which he had shewn him were not for sale, and that he had only asked their value through curiosity. Every one knows that from the moment drawings are not for sale they increase singularly in value, and the dealer at length offered fifty francs; but Buvat, little tempted by this proposition, by which he did not even dream of profiting, took the drawings and left the shop with all the dignity of wounded pride. When he returned, the dealer was standing, as if by chance, at his door. Buvat, seeing him, kept at a distance; but the shopkeeper came to him, and, putting his two hands on his shoulders, asked him if he would not let him have the two drawings for the price he had named. Buvat replied a second time, sharply, that they were not for sale. "That is a pity," replied the dealer, "for I would have given eighty francs." And he returned to his door with an indifferent air, but watching Buvat as he did so. Buvat, however, went on with a pride that was almost grotesque, and, without turning once, went straight home. Bathilde heard him, as he came up the staircase, striking his cane against the balusters, as he was in the habit of doing. She ran out to meet him, for she was very anxious to hear the result of the negotiation, and, with the remains of her childish habits, throwing her arms round his neck--

"Well, my friend," asked she, "what did M. Papillon say?"

"M. Papillon," replied Buvat, wiping his forehead, "is an impertinent rascal."

Poor Bathilde turned pale.

"How so?" asked she.

"Yes; an impertinent rascal, who, instead of admiring your drawings, has dared to criticise them."

"Oh! if that is all," said Bathilde, laughing, "he is right. Remember that I am but a scholar. But did he offer any price?"

"Yes," said Buvat; "he had impertinence enough for that."

"What price?" asked Bathilde, trembling.

"He offered eighty francs."

"Eighty francs!" cried Bathilde. "Oh! you must be mistaken."

"I tell you he offered eighty francs for the two," replied Buvat, laying a stress on each syllable.

"But it is four times as much as they are worth," said the young girl, clapping her hands for joy.

"It is possible, though I do not think so; but it is none the less true that M. Papillon is an impertinent rascal!"

This was not Bathilde's opinion; but she changed the conversation, saying that dinner was ready--an announcement which generally gave a new course to Buvat's ideas. Buvat gave back the drawings to Bathilde without further observation, and entered the little sitting-room, singing the inevitable, "Then let me go," etc.

He dined with as good an appetite as if there had been no M. Papillon in the world. The same evening, while Buvat was making copies, Bathilde gave the drawings to Nanette, telling her to take them to M. Papillon and ask for the eighty francs he had offered to Buvat. Nanette obeyed, and Bathilde awaited her return with great anxiety, for she still believed there must be some mistake as to the price. Ten minutes afterward she was quite assured, for the good woman entered with the money. Bathilde looked at it for an instant with tears in her eyes, then kneeling before the crucifix at the foot of her bed, she offered up a thanksgiving that she was enabled to return to Buvat a part of what he had done for her.

The next day Buvat, in returning from the office, passed before Papillon's door, but his astonishment was great when, through the windows of the shop, he saw the drawings. The door opened and Papillon appeared.

"So," said he, "you thought better of it, and made up your mind to part with the two drawings which were not for sale? Ah! I did not know you were so cunning, neighbor. But, however, tell Mademoiselle Bathilde, that, as she is a good girl, out of consideration for her, if she will do two such drawings every month, and promise not to draw for any one else for a year, I will take them at the same price."

Buvat was astonished; he grumbled out an answer which the man could not hear, and went home. He went upstairs and opened the door without Bathilde having heard him. She was drawing; she had already begun another head, and perceiving her good friend standing at the door with a troubled air, she put down her paper and pencils and ran to him, asking what was the matter. Buvat wiped away two great tears,

"So," said he, "the child of my benefactors, of Clarice Gray and Albert du Rocher, is working for her bread!"

"Father," replied Bathilde, half crying, half laughing; "I am not working, I am amusing myself."

The word "father" was substituted on great occasions for "kind friend," and ordinarily had the effect of calming his greatest troubles, but this time it failed.

"I am neither your father, nor your good friend," murmured he, "but simply poor Buvat, whom the king pays no longer, and who does not gain enough by his writing to continue to give you the education you ought to have."

"Oh! you want to make me die with grief," cried Bathilde, bursting into tears, so plainly was Buvat's distress painted on his countenance.

"I kill you with grief, my child?" said Buvat, with an accent of profound tenderness. "What have I done? What have I said? You must not cry. It wanted nothing but that to make me miserable."

"But," said Bathilde, "I shall always cry if you do not let me do what I like."

This threat of Bathilde's, puerile as it was, made Buvat tremble; for, since the day when the child wept for her mother, not a tear had fallen from her eyes.

"Well," said Buvat, "do as you like, but promise me that when the king pays my arrears--"

"Well, well," cried Bathilde, interrupting him, "we shall see all that later; meanwhile, the dinner is getting cold." And, taking him by the arm, she led him into the little room, where, by her jokes and gayety, she soon