Gil Blas, Alain-René Lesage [best romance ebooks .txt] 📗

master through, laid him helpless on the ground, and made his escape, with apparent satisfaction at the severe reprisal. I ran up to the unfortunate Don Matthias, and found him in a most desperate situation. The sight melted me. I could not help weeping at a catastrophe to which I had been an involuntary contributor. Nevertheless, with all sympathy, I had still my little wits about me. Home went I, in a hurry, without saying a word. I made up a bundle of my own goods and chattels, inadvertently slipping in some odd articles, belonging to my master: and when I had deposited this with the barber, where my dress, as a fine gentleman, was still lodged, I published the news of the fatal accident. Any gaper might have it for the trouble of listening; and, above all, I took care to make Rodriguez acquainted with it. He would have been extremely afflicted, but that his own proceedings in this delicate case required all his attention. He called the servants together, ordered them to follow him, and we went all together, to Saint Jerome’s meadow. Don Matthias was taken up alive, but he died three hours after he was brought home. Thus ended the life of Señor Don Matthias de Silva, only for having taken a fancy to reading supposititious love-letters unseasonably. IX

A new service after the death of Don Matthias de Silva.

Some days after the funeral, the establishment was paid up and discharged. I fixed my headquarters with the little barber, in a very close connection, with whom I began to live. It seemed to promise more pleasure than with Meléndez. As I was in no want of money, it was time enough to think of another place; besides, I had got to be rather nice on that head. I would not go into service any more, but in families above the vulgar. In short, I was determined to inquire, very strictly, into the character of a new place. The best would not be too good; such high pretensions did the late valet of a young nobleman think himself entitled to assume above the common herd of servants.

Waiting till fortune should throw a situation in my way, worthy to be honored by my acceptance, I thought I could not do better than to devote my leisure to my charming Laura, whom I had not seen since the pleasant occurrence of our double discovery. I could not venture on dressing as Don Caesar de Ribera; it would have been an act of madness to have assumed that style but as a disguise. Besides that, my own suit was not much out of condition; all smaller articles had propagated miraculously in the aforesaid bundle. I made myself up, therefore, with the barber’s aid, as a sort of middle man, between Don Caesar and Gil Blas. In this demi-character, I knocked at Arsenia’s door. Laura was alone in the parlor where we had met last.

“Ah! is it you,” cried she, as soon as she saw me; “I thought you were lost. You have had leave to come and see me for this week; but it seems you are modest, and do not presume too much on your license.”

I made my apology on the score of my master’s death, with my own engagements consequent thereupon; and I added, in the spirit of gallantry, that in my greatest perplexities my lovely Laura had always been foremost in my thoughts.

“That being so,” said she, “I have no more reproaches to make; and I will frankly own that I have thought of you. As soon as I was acquainted with the untimely end of Don Matthias, a plan occurred to me, probably not quite displeasing to you. I have heard my mistress say, some time ago, that she wanted a sort of man of business⁠—a good arithmetician⁠—to keep an exact account of our outgoings. I fixed my affections on your lordship; you seem exactly calculated for such an office.”

“I feel myself,” answered I, “a steward by inspiration. I have read all that Aristotle has written on finance; and, as for reducing it to the modern system of bookkeeping.⁠ ⁠… But, my dear girl, there is one impediment in the way.”

“What impediment?” said Laura.

“I have sworn,” replied I, “never again to live with a commoner; I have sworn by Styx, or something else as binding. If Jupiter could not burst the links of such an oath, judge whether a poor servant ought not to be bound by it.”

“What do you mean by a commoner?” rejoined the impetuous abigail; “for what do you take us actresses? Do you take us for the ribs of the limbs of the law! for attorney’s wives? I would have you to know, my friend, that actresses rank with the first nobility; being only common to the uncommon, and, therefore, though common, uncommonly illustrious.”

“On that footing, my uncommon commoner,” said I, “the post you have destined for me is mine; I shall not lower my dignity by accepting it.”

“No; to be sure,” said she; “backwards and forwards between a puppy of fashion, and a she-wolf of the stage; why, it is exactly preserving an equilibrium of rank in the creation. We are sympathetic animals, just on a level with the people of quality. We have our equipages in the same style; we give our little suppers on the same scale; and, on the broad ground, we are just of as much use in civil society. In fact, to draw a parallel between a marquis and a player through the space of four and twenty hours, they are just on a par. The marquis, for three fourths of the time, ranks above the player by political courtesy and sufferance; the player, during his hour on the stage, overtops the marquis in the part of an emperor or a king, which he better knows how to enact. Thus, there seems to be a balance between natural and political nobility, which places us