"One dies, in full content, of sorrow past."
"Monsieur Sariette," said Maurice, "you remember that time when your books were disarranged every night, how armfuls disappeared, how they were dragged about, turned over, ruined, and sent rolling helter-skelter as far as the gutter in the Rue Palatine. Those were great days! Point out to me, Monsieur Sariette, the books which suffered most."
This proposition threw Monsieur Sariette into a melancholy stupor, and Maurice had to repeat his request three times before he could make the aged librarian understand. At length he pointed to a very ancient Talmud from Jerusalem as having been frequently touched by those unseen hands.
An apocryphal Gospel of the third century, consisting of twenty papyrus sheets, had also quitted its place time after time. Ga.s.sendi"s Correspondence too seemed to have been well thumbed.
"But," added Monsieur Sariette, "the book to which the mysterious visitant devoted the most particular attention was undoubtedly a little copy of _Lucretius_ adorned with the arms of Philippe de Vendome, Grand Prieur de France, with autograph annotations by Voltaire, who, as is well known, frequently visited the Temple in his younger days. The fearsome reader who caused me such terrible anxiety never grew weary of this _Lucretius_ and made it his bedside book, as it were. His taste was sound, for it"s a gem of a thing. Alas! the monster made a blot of ink on page 137 which perhaps the chemists with all the science at their disposal will be powerless to erase."
And Monsieur Sariette heaved a profound sigh. He repented having said all this when young d"Esparvieu asked him for the loan of the precious _Lucretius_. Vainly did the jealous custodian affirm that the book was being repaired at the binder"s and was not available. Maurice made it clear that he wasn"t to be taken in like that. He strode resolutely into the abode of the philosophers and the globes and seating himself in an arm-chair said:
"I am waiting."
Monsieur Sariette suggested his having another edition. There were some that, textually, were more correct, and were, therefore, preferable from the student"s point of view. He offered him Barbou"s edition, or Coustelier"s, or, better still, a French translation. He could have the Baron des Coutures" version--which was perhaps a little old-fashioned--or La Grange"s, or those in the Nisard and Panckouke series; or, again, there were two versions of striking elegance, one in verse and the other in prose, both from the pen of Monsieur de Pongerville of the French Academy.
"I don"t need a translation," said Maurice proudly. "Give me the Prior de Vendome"s copy."
Monsieur Sariette went slowly up to the cupboard in which the jewel in question was contained. The keys were rattling in his trembling hand. He raised them to the lock and withdrew them again immediately and suggested that Maurice should have the common _Lucretius_ published by Garnier.
"It"s very handy," said he with an engaging smile.
But the silence with which this proposal was received made it clear that resistance was useless. He slowly drew forth the volume from its place, and having taken the precaution to see that there wasn"t a speck of dust on the table-cloth, he laid it tremblingly thereon before the great-grandson of Alexandre d"Esparvieu.
Maurice began to turn the leaves, and when he got to page 137 he saw the stain which had been made with violet ink. It was about the size of a pea.
"Ay, that"s it," said old Sariette, who had his eye on the _Lucretius_ the whole time; "that"s the trace those invisible monsters left behind them."
"What, there were several of them, Monsieur Sariette?" exclaimed Maurice.
"I cannot tell. But I don"t know whether I have a right to have this blot removed since, like the blot Paul Louis Courier made on the Florentine ma.n.u.script, it const.i.tutes a literary doc.u.ment, so to speak."
Scarcely were the words out of the old fellow"s mouth when the front door bell rang and there was a confused noise of voices and footsteps in the next room. Sariette ran forward at the sound and collided with Pere Guinardon"s mistress, old Zephyrine, who, with her tousled hair sticking up like a nest of vipers, her face aflame, her bosom heaving, her abdominal part like an eiderdown quilt puffed out by a terrific gale, was choking with grief and rage. And amid sobs and sighs and groans and all the innumerable sounds which, on earth, make up the mighty uproar to which the emotions of living beings and the tumult of nature give rise, she cried:
"He"s gone, the monster! He"s gone off with her. He"s cleared out the whole shanty and left me to shift for myself with eighteenpence in my purse."
And she proceeded to give a long and incoherent account of how Michel Guinardon had abandoned her and gone to live with Octavie, the bread-woman"s daughter, and she let loose a torrent of abuse against the traitor.
"A man whom I"ve kept going with my own money for fifty years and more.
For I"ve had plenty of the needful and known plenty of the upper ten and all. I dragged him out of the gutter and now this is what I get for it.
He"s a bright beauty, that friend of yours. The lazy scoundrel. Why, he had to be dressed like a child, the drunken contemptible brute. You don"t know him yet, Monsieur Sariette. He"s a forger. He turns out Giottos, Giottos, I tell you, and Fra Angelicos and Grecos, as hard as he can and sells them to art-dealers--yes, and Fragonards too, and Baudouins. He"s a debauchee, and doesn"t believe in G.o.d! That"s the worst of the lot, Monsieur Sariette, for without the fear of G.o.d...."
Long did Zephyrine continue to pour forth vituperations. When at last her breath failed her, Monsieur Sariette availed himself of the opportunity to exhort her to be calm and bring herself to look on the bright side of things. Guinardon would come back. A man doesn"t forget anyone he"s lived and got on well with for fifty years----
These two observations only goaded her to a fresh outburst, and Zephyrine swore she would never forget the slight that had been put on her; she swore she would never have the monster back with her any more.
And if he came to ask her to forgive him on his knees, she would let him grovel at her feet.
"Don"t you understand, Monsieur Sariette, that I despise and hate him, that he makes me sick?"
Sixty times she voiced these lofty sentiments; sixty times she vowed she would never have Guinardon back with her again, that she couldn"t bear the sight of him, even in a picture.
Monsieur Sariette made no attempt to oppose a resolve which, after protestations such as these, he regarded as unshakable. He did not blame Zephyrine in the least. He even supported her. Unfolding to the deserted one a purer future, he told her of the frailty of human sentiment, exhorted her to display a spirit of renunciation and enjoined her to show a pious resignation to the will of G.o.d.
"Seeing, in truth, that your friend is so little worthy of affection ..."
He was not suffered to continue. Zephyrine flew at him, and shaking him furiously by the collar of his frock-coat, she yelled, half choking with rage: "So little worthy of affection! Michel! Ah! my boy, you find another more kind, more gay, more witty, you find another like him, always young, yes, always. Not worthy of affection! Anyone can see you don"t know anything about love, you old duffer."
Taking advantage of the fact that Pere Sariette was thus deeply engaged, young d"Esparvieu slipped the little _Lucretius_ into his pocket, and strolled deliberately past the crouching librarian, bidding him adieu with a little wave of the hand.
Armed with his talisman, he hastened to the Place des Ternes, to interview Madame Mira. She received him in a red drawing-room where neither owl nor frog nor any of the paraphernalia of ancient magic were to be found. Madame Mira, in a prune-coloured dress, her hair powdered, though already past her prime, was of very good appearance. She spoke with a certain elegance and prided herself on discovering hidden things by the help alone of Science, Philosophy, and Religion. She felt the morocco binding, feigning to close her eyes, and looking meanwhile through the narrow slit between her lids at the Latin t.i.tle and the coat of arms which conveyed nothing to her.
Accustomed to receive as tokens such things as rings, handkerchiefs, letters, and locks of hair, she could not conceive to what sort of individual this singular book could belong. By habitual and mechanical cunning she disguised her real surprise under a feigned surprise.
"Strange!" she murmured, "strange! I do not see quite clearly ... I perceive a woman...."
As she let fall this magic word, she glanced furtively to see what sort of an effect it had and beheld on her questioner"s face an unexpected look of disappointment. Perceiving that she was off the track, she immediately changed her oracle:
"But she fades away immediately. It is strange, strange! I have a confused impression of some vague form, a being that I cannot define,"
and having a.s.sured herself by a hurried glance that, this time, her words were going down, she expatiated on the vagueness of the person and on the mist that enveloped him.
However, the vision grew clearer to Madame Mira, who was following a clue step by step.
"A wide street ... a square with a statue ... a deserted street,--stairs. He is there in a bluish room--he is a young man, with pale and careworn face. There are things he seems to regret, and which he would not do again did they still remain undone."
But the effort at divination had been too great. Fatigue prevented the clairvoyante from continuing her transcendental researches. She spent her remaining strength in impressively recommending him who consulted her to remain in intimate union with G.o.d if he wished to regain what he had lost and succeed in his attempts.
On leaving Maurice placed a louis on the mantelpiece and went away moved and troubled, persuaded that Madame Mira possessed supernatural faculties, but unfortunately insufficient ones.
At the bottom of the stairs he remembered he had left the little _Lucretius_ on the table of the pythoness, and, thinking that the old maniac Sariette would never get over its loss, went up to recover possession of it.
On re-entering the paternal abode his gaze lighted upon a shadowy and grief-stricken figure. It was old Sariette, who in tones as plaintive as the wail of the November wind began to beg for his _Lucretius_. Maurice pulled it carelessly out of his great-coat pocket.
"Don"t flurry yourself, Monsieur Sariette," said he. "There the thing is."
Clasping the jewel to his bosom the old librarian bore it away and laid it gently down on the blue table-cloth, thinking all the while where he might safely hide his precious treasure, and turning over all sorts of schemes in his mind as became a zealous curator. But who among us shall boast of his wisdom? The foresight of man is short, and his prudence is for ever being baffled. The blows of fate are ineluctable; no man shall evade his doom. There is no counsel, no caution that avails against destiny. Hapless as we are, the same blind force which regulates the courses of atom and of star fashions universal order from our vicissitudes. Our ill-fortune is necessary to the harmony of the Universe. It was the day for the binder, a day which the revolving seasons brought round twice a year, beneath the sign of the Ram and the sign of the Scales. That day, ever since morning, Monsieur Sariette had been making things ready for the binder. He had laid out on the table as many of the newly purchased paper-bound volumes as were deemed worthy of a permanent binding or of being put in boards, and also those books whose binding was in need of repair, and of all these he had drawn up a detailed and accurate list. Punctually at five o"clock, old Amedee, the man from Leger-Ma.s.sieu"s, the binder in the Rue de l"Abbaye, presented himself at the d"Esparvieu library and, after a double check had been carried out by Monsieur Sariette, thrust the books he was to take back to his master into a piece of cloth which he fastened into knots at the four corners and hoisted on to his shoulder. He then saluted the librarian with the following words, "Good night, all!" and went downstairs.
Everything went off on this occasion as usual. But Amedee, seeing the _Lucretius_ on the table, innocently put it into the bag with the others, and took it away without Monsieur Sariette"s perceiving it. The librarian quitted the home of the Philosophers and Globes in entire forgetfulness of the book whose absence had been causing him such horrible anxiety all day long. Some people may take a stern view of the matter and call this a lapse, a defection of his better nature. But would it not be more accurate to say that fate had decided that things should come to pa.s.s in this manner, and that what is called chance, and is in fact but the regular order of nature, had accomplished this imperceptible deed which was to have such awful consequences in the sight of man? Monsieur Sariette went off to his dinner at the _Quatre eveques_, and read his paper _La Croix_. He was tranquil and serene. It was only the next morning when he entered the abode of the Philosophers and Globes that he remembered the _Lucretius_. Failing to see it on the table he looked for it everywhere, but without success. It never entered his head that Amedee might have taken it away by mistake. What he did think was that the invisible visitant had returned, and he was mightily disturbed.
The unhappy curator, hearing a noise on the landing, opened the door and found it was little Leon, who, with a gold-braided _kepi_ stuck on his head, was shouting "Vive la France" and hurling dusters and feather-brooms and Hippolyte"s floor polish at imaginary foes. The child preferred this landing for playing soldiers to any other part of the house, and sometimes he would stray into the library. Monsieur Sariette was seized with the sudden suspicion that it was he who had taken the _Lucretius_ to use as a missile and he ordered him, in threatening tones, to give it back. The child denied that he had taken it, and Monsieur Sariette had recourse to cajolery.
"Leon, if you bring me back the little red book, I will give you some chocolates."
The child grew thoughtful; and in the evening, as Monsieur Sariette was going downstairs, he met Leon, who said:
"There"s the book!"
And, holding out a much-torn picture-book called _The Story of Gribouille_, demanded his chocolates.
A few days later the post brought Maurice the prospectus of an enquiry agency managed by an ex-employee at the Prefecture of Police; it promised celerity and discretion. He found at the address indicated a moustached gentleman morose and careworn, who demanded a deposit and promised to find the individual.