"Of course it is me; who did you expect it was?"
""Tis you, indeed! My senses do not deceive me!"
"Alfred, what is the matter with you? Why do you stand there, staring and opening your mouth, as if you meant to swallow me?"
"Because your presence reveals to me that strange things are pa.s.sing here, so strange that--"
"Oh, stuff and nonsense! Give me the key of the lodge! What made you leave it when I was out? I have just come from the office where the diligence starts from for Normandy. I went there in a coach to take M.
Bradamanti"s trunk, as he did not wish that little rascal, Tortillard, to know anything about it, since, it seems, he had rather no one should be acquainted with the fact of his leaving Paris this evening; and, as for his mistrusting the boy, why, I don"t wonder at it."
Saying these words, Madame Pipelet took the key from her husband"s hand, opened the lodge, and entered it before her partner; but scarcely were they both safe within its dark recesses, than an individual, lightly descending the staircase, pa.s.sed swiftly and un.o.bserved before the lodge. This personage was Cabrion, who, having managed to steal up-stairs, had so powerfully worked upon the porter"s tender susceptibilities. M. Pipelet threw himself into his chair, saying to his wife, in a voice of deep emotion:
"Anastasie; I do not feel myself comfortable to-day; strange and mysterious things are going on in this house."
"What! Are you going to break out again? What an old fool you are! Why, strange things happen in every house. What has come over you? Come, let"s look at you! Well, I declare, you are all of a sweat, just as if you had been dragged out of the water! What have you been doing since I left you? Overexerting yourself, I am sure, and I forbid you ever doing so. La! Look how the great drops pour from him, poor old chick!"
"And well they may!" exclaimed M. Pipelet, pa.s.sing his hand over his face, bathed in its own dew; "well may I sweat,--ay, even blood and water,--for there are facts connected with this house past belief or comprehension. First, you summon me up-stairs, and, at the same moment, I find you waiting below! Oh, it is too, too much for my poor brain!"
"Deuce take me, if I can comprehend one word of all you are saying!
Lord, help us! It is to be hoped your poor old brain is not cracked. I tell you what, if you go on so, I shall just set you down for cracked; and all through that scamp of a Cabrion,--the devil take him! Ever since that last trick he played the other day, I declare you have not been yourself, so fl.u.s.tered and bewildered! Do you mean to live in fear and dread of that abominable painter all your days?"
But scarcely had Anastasie uttered these words than a fearful thing occurred. Alfred continued sitting, with his face turned towards the bed, while the lodge was dimly illumined by the faint glimmer of a winter"s afternoon and a lamp that stood burning on the table, near Alfred"s work. By these doubtful lights, M. Pipelet, just as his wife p.r.o.nounced the name of Cabrion, imagined he saw, in the shadow of the recess, the half stolid, half chuckling features of his enemy. Alas! Too truly, there he was. His steeple-crowned hat, his flowing locks, thin countenance, sardonic smile, pointed beard, and look of fiendish malice, all were there, past all mistake. For a moment, M. Pipelet believed himself under the influence of a dream, and pa.s.sed his hand across his eyes, in hopes that the illusion might disperse; but no; there was nothing illusive in what his eyes glared so fearfully upon,--nothing could be more real or positive. Yet, horror of horrors! This object seemed merely to possess a head, which, without allowing any part of the body to appear, grinned a satanic smile from the dark draperies of the recess in which stood the bed. At this horrific vision M. Pipelet fell back, without uttering a word. With uplifted arm he pointed towards the source of his terrors, but with so strong a manifestation of intense alarm that Madame Pipelet, spite of her usual courage and self-possession, could not help feeling a dread of--she knew not what.
She staggered back a few steps, then, seizing Alfred by the hand, exclaimed:
"Cabrion!"
"I know it!" groaned forth M. Pipelet, in a deep, hollow voice, shutting his eyes to exclude the frightful spectre.
Nothing could have borne more flattering tribute to the talent which had so admirably delineated the features of Cabrion than the overwhelming terror his pasteboard likeness occasioned to the worthy couple in the lodge; but the first surprise of Anastasie over, she, bold as a lioness, rushed to the bed, sprang upon it, and, though not without some trepidation, tore the painting from the wall, against which it had been nailed; then, crowning her valiant deed by her accustomed favourite expression, the amazon triumphantly exclaimed:
"Get along with you!"
Alfred, on the contrary, remained with closed eyes and extended hands, fixed and motionless, according to his wont during the most critical pa.s.sages of his life; the continued oscillation of his bell-crowned hat alone revealing, from time to time, the violence of his internal emotions.
"Open your eyes, my old duck!" cried Madame Pipelet, triumphantly. "It is nothing to be afraid of, only a picture, a portrait of that scoundrel Cabrion. Look here, lovey,--look at "Stasie stamping on it!" continued the indignant wife, throwing the painting on the ground, and jumping upon it with all her force; then added, "Ah, I wish I had the villain here, to serve the same! I"ll warrant I"d mark him for life!" Then, picking up the portrait, she said, "Well, I"ve served you out, anyhow!
Just look, old dear, if I haven"t!"
But poor Alfred, with a disconsolate shake of the head, made signs that he had rather not, and further intimating, by expressive gestures, his earnest desire that his wife would remove the detested likeness of his bitter foe far from his view.
"Well," cried the porteress, examining the portrait by the aid of the lamp, "was there ever such imperance? Why, Alfred, the vile feller has presumed to write in red letters at the bottom of the picture, "To my dear friend Pipelet; presented by his friend for life, Cabrion!""
"For life!" groaned Pipelet; then, heaving a deep sigh, he added, "Yes, "tis my life he aims at; and he will finish by taking it. I shall exist, from this day forward, in a state of continual alarm, believing that the fiend who torments me is ever near,--hid, perhaps, in the floor, the wall, the ceiling, and thence watches me throughout the day; or even at night, when sleeping in the chaste arms of my wife, his eye is still on me. And who can tell but he is at this very instant behind me, gazing with that well-known sardonic grin; or crouched down in some corner of the room, like a deadly reptile! Say, you monster, are you there? Are you there, I demand?" cried M. Pipelet, accompanying this furious adjuration by a sort of circular motion of the head, as though wishing to interrogate every nook and corner of the lodge.
"Yes, dear friend, here I am!" answered the well-known voice of Cabrion, in blandly affectionate tones.
By a simple trick in ventriloquism, these words were made to appear as though issuing from the recess in which stood the bed; but the malicious joker was in reality close to the door of the lodge, enjoying every particular look and word that pa.s.sed within. However, after uttering the last few words, he prudently disappeared with all haste, though not (as will be seen) without leaving his victim a fresh subject for rage, astonishment, and meditation.
Madame Pipelet, still skeptical and courageous, carefully examined under the bed, as well as in every corner of the lodge, but, discovering no trace of the enemy, actually went out into the alley to prosecute her researches; while M. Pipelet, completely crushed by this last blow, fell back into his chair in a state of boundless despair.
"Never mind, Alfred!" said Anastasie, who always exhibited great determination upon all critical occasions. "Bless you! The villain had managed to hide himself somewhere near the door, and, while we were looking in one direction, he managed to slip out in another. But just wait a bit: I shall catch him one of these days, and then see if I don"t make him taste my broomstick! Let him take care, that"s all!"
The door opened as she concluded this animating address, and Madame Seraphin, the housekeeper of the notary, Jacques Ferrand, entered the lodge.
"Good day, Madame Seraphin," said Madame Pipelet, who, in her extreme anxiety to conceal her domestic troubles from a stranger, a.s.sumed all at once a most gracious and winning manner; "what can I have the pleasure of doing for you?"
"Why, first of all, tell me what is the meaning of your new sign?"
"Our new sign?"
"Yes; the small printed board."
"Printed board!"
"To be sure; that black board with red letters, hung over the door leading from the alley up to your lodge."
"What, out in the street?"
"In the street, I tell you, precisely over your door."
"I wish I may die if I understand a single word of what you are talking about! Do you, old dear?"
Alfred spoke not.
"Certainly," continued Madame Seraphin, "since it relates to M. Pipelet, he can best explain to me what this board means."
Alfred uttered a sort of heavy, inarticulate groan, while his bell-crowned hat recommenced its convulsive agitations. This pantomimic action was meant to express that Alfred was in no condition to explain anything to anybody, having his mind already sufficiently burdened with an infinity of problematical questions he sought in vain to solve.
"Don"t take any notice of poor dear Alfred, Madame Seraphin; he has got the cramp in his stomach, and that makes him so very--But what is this board of which you were speaking? Very likely it has just been put up by the man who keeps the wine-shop at the corner."
"I tell you again it is no such thing. It is a small painted board, hung up over your door,--I mean the door leading from the alley to the street."
"Ah, you are laughing at us!"
"Indeed I am not. I saw it just now, as I came in; on it is written, in large letters, "Pipelet and Cabrion, dealers in Friendship and similar Articles. Inquire of the Porter.""
"Gracious goodness! Do you hear that, Alfred? Do you hear what is written up over our door?"
Alfred gazed at Madame Seraphin with a bewildered look, but he neither understood nor sought to understand her meaning.
"Do you mean to say," continued Madame Pipelet, confounded by this fresh audacity, "that you positively saw a little board out in the street with all that about Alfred and Cabrion, and dealing in friendship?"
"I tell you I have just seen it, and read with my own eyes what I described to you. "Well," said I to myself, "this is droll enough! M.
Pipelet is a shoemaker by trade, but here he writes up publicly that he is a dealer in friendship along with a M. Cabrion! What can all this mean? There is something meant more than meets the eye!" Still, as the board further directed all persons desirous of knowing more to apply to the porter, "Oh," thinks I, "Madame Pipelet can explain all this to me!"
But, look, look!" cried Madame Seraphin, suddenly breaking off in her remarks. "Your husband is taken ill! Mind what you are about, or he will fall backwards!"
Madame Pipelet flew to her afflicted partner, and was just in time to receive him, half fainting, in her arms. The last blow had been too overwhelming,--the man in the bell-crowned hat had but just strength left to murmur forth, "The scoundrel has, then, publicly placarded me!"
"I told you, Madame Seraphin, that poor Alfred was suffering dreadful with the cramp in his stomach, besides being worried to death by a crack-brained vagabond, who is at him night and day: he"ll be the death of my poor old duck at last. Never mind, darling, I"ve got a nice little drop of aniseed to give you; so drink it, and see if you can"t shake your old feathers and be yourself again!"