"Poor girl! she is indeed most kind,--and why is she so? Because she knows what poverty is. As I said to you just now, if the rich only knew--"
"And then that nice-looking lady who came, seeming so frightened all the while, to ask us if we wanted anything. Well, now she knows that we do want everything, will she ever come again, think you?"
"I dare say she will; for, spite of her uneasy and terrified looks, she seemed very good and kind."
"Oh, yes; if a person be but rich, they are always right in your opinion. One might almost suppose that rich folks are made of different materials to poor creatures like us."
"Stop, wife!" said Morel, gently; "you are getting on too fast. I did not say that; on the contrary, I agree that rich people have as many faults as poor ones; all I mean is, that, unfortunately, they are not aware of the wretchedness of one-half of the world. Agents in plenty are employed to hunt out poor wretches who have committed any crime, but there are no paid agents to find out half-starving families and honest artisans, worn-out with toil and privations, who, driven to the last extremity of distress, are, for want of a little timely succour, led into sore temptation. It is quite right to punish evil-doers; it would, perhaps, be better still to prevent ill deeds. A man may have striven hard to remain honest for fifty years; but want, misery, and utter dest.i.tution put bad thoughts in his head, and one rascal more is let loose on the world; whilst there are many who, if they had but known of his distressed condition--However, it is no use talking of that,--the world is as it is: I am poor and wretched, and therefore I speak as I do; were I rich, my talk would be of fetes, and happy days, and worldly engagements--And how do you find yourself now, wife?"
"Much the same; I seem to have lost all feeling in my limbs. But how you shiver! Here, take your jacket, and pray put it on. Blow out that candle, which is burning uselessly,--see, it is nearly day!"
And, true enough, a faint, glimmering light began to struggle through the snow with which the skylight was enc.u.mbered, and cast a dismal ray on the interior of this deplorable human abode, rendering its squalidness still more apparent; the shade of night had at least concealed a part of its horrors.
"I shall wait now for the daylight before I go back to work," said the lapidary, seating himself beside his wife"s _pailla.s.se_, and leaning his forehead upon his two hands.
After a short interval of silence, Madeleine said:
"When is Madame Mathieu to come for the stones you are at work upon?"
"This morning. I have only the side of one false diamond to polish."
"A false diamond! How is that?--you who only make up real stones, whatever the people in the house may believe."
"Don"t you know? But I forgot, you were asleep the other day when Madame Mathieu came about them. Well, then, she brought me ten false diamonds--Rhine crystals--to cut exactly to the same size and form as the like number of real diamonds she also brought. There, those are them mixed with the rubies on my table. I think I never saw more splendid stones, or of purer water, than those ten diamonds, which must, at least, be worth 60,000 francs."
"And why did she wish them imitated?"
"Because a great lady to whom they belonged--a d.u.c.h.ess, I think she said--had given directions to M. Baudoin, the jeweller, to dispose of her set of diamonds, and to make her one of false stones to replace it.
Madame Mathieu, who matches stones for M. Baudoin, explained this to me, when she gave me the real diamonds, in order that I might be quite sure to cut the false ones to precisely the same size and form. Madame Mathieu gave a similar job to four other lapidaries, for there are from forty to fifty stones to cut; and I could not do them all, as they were required by this morning, because M. Baudoin must have time to set the false gems. Madame Mathieu says that grand ladies, very frequently unknown to anybody but the jeweller, sell their valuable diamonds, and replace them with Rhenish crystals."
"Why, don"t you see, the mock stones look every bit as well as the real stones? Yet great ladies, who only use such things as ornaments, would never think of sacrificing one of their diamonds to relieve the distress of such unfortunate beings as we are."
"Come, come, wife! Be more reasonable than this; sorrow makes you unjust. Who do you think knows that such people as Morel and his family are in existence, still less that they are in want?"
"Oh, what a man you are, Morel! I really believe, if any one were to cut you in pieces, that, while they were doing it, you would try to say, "Thank you!""
Morel compa.s.sionately shrugged his shoulders.
"And how much will Madame Mathieu owe you this morning?" asked Madeleine.
"Nothing; because you know I have already had an advance of 120 francs."
"Nothing! Why, our last sou went the day before yesterday. We have not a single farthing belonging to us!"
"Alas, no!" cried Morel, with a dejected air.
"Well, then, what are we to do?"
"I know not."
"The baker refuses to let us have anything more on credit,--will he?"
"No; and I was obliged yesterday to beg Madame Pipelet to lend me part of a loaf."
"Can we borrow anything more of Mother Burette?"
"She has already every article belonging to us in pledge. What have we to offer her to lend more money on,--our children?" asked Morel, with a smile of bitterness.
"But yourself, my mother, and all the children had but part of a loaf among you all yesterday. You cannot go on in this way; you will be starved to death. It is all your fault that we are not on the books of the charitable inst.i.tution this year."
"They will not admit any persons without they possess furniture, or some such property; and you know we have nothing in the world. We are looked upon as though we lived in furnished apartments, and, consequently, ineligible. Just the same if we tried to get into any asylum, the children are required to have at least a blouse, while our poor things have only rags. Then, as to the charitable societies, one must go backwards and forwards twenty times before we should obtain relief; and then what would it be? Why, a loaf once a month, and half a pound of meat once a fortnight.[5] I should lose more time than it would be worth."
[5] Such is the ordinary allowance made at charitable societies, in consequence of the vast number of applicants for relief.
"But, still, what are we to do?"
"Perhaps the lady who came yesterday will not forget us!"
"Perhaps not. But don"t you think Madame Mathieu would lend us four or five francs, just to keep us from starving? You have worked for her upwards of ten years; and surely she will not see an honest workman like you, burthened with a large and sickly family, perish for want of a little a.s.sistance like that?"
"I do not think it is in her power to aid us. She did all in her power when she advanced me little by little 120 francs. That is a large sum for her. Because she buys diamonds, and has sometimes 50,000 francs in her reticule, she is not the more rich for that. If she gains 100 francs a month, she is well content, for she has heavy expenses,--two nieces to bring up; and five francs is as much to her as it would be to me. There are times when one does not possess that sum, you know; and being already so deeply in her debt, I could not ask her to take bread from her own mouth and that of her family to give it to me."
"This comes of working for mere agents in jewelry, instead of procuring employment from first-hand master jewellers. They are sometimes less particular. But you are such a poor, easy creature, you would almost let any one take the eyes out of your head. It is all your fault that--"
"My fault!" exclaimed the unhappy man, exasperated by this absurd reproach. "Was it or was it not your mother who occasioned all our misfortunes, by compelling me to make good the price of the diamond she lost? But for that we should be beforehand with the world; we should receive the amount of my daily earnings; we should have the 1,100 francs in our possession we were obliged to draw out of the savings-bank to put to the 1,300 francs lent us by M. Jacques Ferrand. May every curse light on him!"
"And you still persist in not asking him to help you? Certainly he is so stingy that I daresay he would do nothing for you; but then it is right to try. You cannot know without you do try."
"Ask him to help me!" cried Morel. "Ask him! I had rather be burnt before a slow fire. Hark ye, Madeleine! Unless you wish to drive me mad, mention that man"s name no more to me."
As he uttered these words, the usually mild, resigned expression of the lapidary"s countenance was exchanged for a look of gloomy energy, while a slight suffusion coloured the ordinarily pale features of the agitated man, as, rising abruptly from the pallet beside which he had been sitting, he began to pace the miserable apartment with hurried steps; and, spite of the deformed and attenuated appearance of poor Morel, his att.i.tude and action bespoke the n.o.blest, purest indignation.
"I am not ill-disposed towards any man," cried he, at length, pausing of a sudden; "and never, to my knowledge, harmed a human being. But, I tell you, when I think of this notary, I wish him--ah! I wish him--as much wretchedness as he has caused me." Then pressing both hands to his forehead, he murmured, in a mournful tone: "Just G.o.d! what crime have I committed that a hard fate should deliver me and mine, tied hand and foot, into the power of such a hypocrite? Have his riches been given him only to worry, hara.s.s, and destroy those his bad pa.s.sions lead him to persecute, injure, and corrupt?"
"That"s right! that"s right!" said Madeleine; "go on abusing him. You will have done yourself a great deal of good, shall you not, when he puts you in prison, as he can do any day, for that promissory note of 1,300 francs on which he obtained judgment against you? He holds you fast as a bird at the end of a string. I hate this notary as badly as you do; but since we are so completely in his power, why you should--"
"Let him ruin and dishonour my child, I suppose?" burst from the pale lips of the lapidary, with violent and impatient energy.
"For heaven"s sake, Morel, don"t speak so loud; the children are awake, and will hear you."
"Pooh, pooh!" returned Morel, with bitter irony; "it will serve as a fine example for our two little girls. It will instruct them to expect that, one of these days, some villain or other like the notary may take a fancy to them,--perhaps the same man; and then, I suppose, you would tell me, as now, to be careful how I offended him, since he had me in his power. You say, if I displease him, he can put me in prison. Now, tell the truth: you advise me, then, to leave my daughter at his mercy, do you not?"
And then, pa.s.sing from the extreme of rage at the idea of all the wickedness practised by the notary to tender recollections of his child, the unhappy man burst into a sort of convulsive weeping, mingled with deep and heavy sobs, for his kindly nature could not long sustain the tone of sarcastic indignation he had a.s.sumed.
"Oh, my children!" cried he, with bitter grief; "my poor children! My good, my beautiful, too--too beautiful Louise! "Tis from those rich gifts of nature all our troubles proceeded. Had you been less lovely, that man would never have pressed his money upon me. I am honest and hard-working; and if the jeweller had given me time, I should never have been under the obligation to the old monster, of which he avails himself to seek to dishonour my child. I should not then have left her a single hour within his power; but I dare not remove her,--I dare not! For am I not at his mercy? Oh, want! oh, misery! What insults do they not make us endure!"
"But what can you do?" asked Madeleine. "You know he threatens Louise that if she quits him he will put you in prison directly."