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The Ink-Stain (Tache D'encre: A Spot of Ink), a novel by Rene Bazin |
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BOOK I - CHAPTER VII. A WOODLAND SKETCH |
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_ April 27th. The end of April. Students, pack and be off! The first warm breezes burst the buds. Meudon is smiling; Clamart breaks into song; the air in the valley of Chevreuse is heavy with violets; the willows shower their catkins on the banks of the Yvette; and farther yet, over yonder beneath the green domes of the forest of Fontainebleau, the deer prick their ears at the sound of the first riding-parties. Off with you! Flowers line the pathways, the moors are pink with bloom, the undergrowth teems with darting wings. All the town troops out to see the country in its gala dress. The very poorest have a favorite nook, a recollection of the bygone year to be revived and renewed; a sheltered corner that invited sleep, a glade where the shade was grateful, a spot beside the river's brink where the fish used to bite. Each one says, "Don't you remember?" Each one seeks his nest like a home-coming swallow. Does it still hold together? What havoc has been made by the winter's winds, and the rain, and the frost? Will it welcome us, as of old? I, too, said to Lampron, "Don't you remember?" for we, too, have our nest, and summer days that smile to us in memory. He was in the mood for work, and hesitated. I added in a whisper, "The blackbird's pool!" He smiled, and off we went. Again, as of old, our destination was St. Germain--not the town, nor the Italian palace, nor yet the terrace whence the view spreads so wide over the Seine, the country dotted with villas, to Montmartre blue in the distance--not these, but the forest. "Our forest," we call it; for we know all its young shoots, all its giant trees, all its paths where poachers and young lovers hide. With my eyes shut I could find the blackbird's pool, the way to which was first shown us by a deer. Imagine at thirty paces from an avenue, a pool--no, not a pool (the word is incorrect), nor yet a pond--but a fountain hollowed out by the removal of a giant oak. Since the death of this monarch the birches which its branches kept apart have never closed together, and the fountain forms the centre of a little clearing where the moss is thick at all seasons and starred in August with wild pinks. The water, though deep, is deliciously clear. At a depth of more than six feet you can distinguish the dead leaves at the bottom, the grass, the twigs, and here and there a stone's iridescent outline. They all lie asleep there, the waste of seasons gone by, soon to be covered by others in their turn. From time to time out of the depths of these submerged thickets an eft darts up. He comes circling up, quivering his yellowbanded tail, snatches a mouthful of air, and goes down again head first. Save for these alarms the pool is untroubled. It is guarded from the winds by a juniper, which an eglantine has chosen for its guardian and crowns each year with a wreath of roses. Each year, too, a blackbird makes his nest here. We keep his secret. He knows we shall not disturb him. And when I come back to this little nook in the woods, which custom has endeared to us, merely by looking in the water I feel my very heart refreshed. "What a spot to sleep in!" cried Lampron. "Keep sentry, Fabien; I am going to take a nap." We had walked fast. It was very hot. He took off his coat, rolled it into a pillow, and placed it beneath his head as he lay down on the grass. I stretched myself prone on a velvety carpet of moss, and gave myself up to a profound investigation of the one square foot of ground which lay beneath my eyes. The number of blades of grass was prodigious. A few, already awned, stood above their fellows, waving like palms-meadowgrass, fescue, foxtail, brome-grass--each slender stalk crowned with a tuft. Others were budding, only half unfolded, amid the darker mass of spongy moss which gave them sustenance. Amid the numberless shafts thus raised toward heaven a thousand paths crisscrossed, each full of obstacles-chips of bark, juniper-berries, beech-nuts, tangled roots, hills raised by burrowing insects, ravines formed by the draining off of the rains. Ants and beetles bustled along them, pressing up hill and down to some mysterious goal. Above them a cunning red spider was tying a blade of grass to an orchid leaf, the pillars it had chosen for its future web; and when the wind shook the leaves and the sun pierced through to this spot, I saw the delicate roof already mapped out. I do not know how long my contemplation lasted. The woods were still. Save for a swarm of gnats which hummed in a minor key around the sleeping Lampron, nothing stirred, not a leaf even. All nature was silent as it drank in the full sunshine. A murmur of distant voices stole on my ear. I rose, and crept through the birches and hazels to the edge of the glade. At the top of the slope, on the green margin of the glade, shaded by the tall trees, two pedestrians were slowly advancing. At the distance they still were I could distinguish very little except that the man wore a frock-coat, and that the girl was dressed in gray, and was young, to judge by the suppleness of her walk. Nevertheless I felt at once that it was she! I hid at they came near, and saw her pass on her father's arm, chatting in low tones, full of joy to have escaped from the Rue de l'Universite. She was looking before her with wide-open eyes. M. Charnot kept his eyes on his daughter, more interested in her than in all the wealth of spring. He kept well to the right of the path as the sun ate away the edge of the shadows; and asked, from time to time: "Are you tired?" "Oh, no!" "As soon as you are tired, my dear, we will sit down. I am not walking too fast?" She answered "No" again, and laughed, and they went on. Soon they left the avenue and were lost in a green alley. Then a sudden twilight seemed to have closed down on me, an infinite sadness swelled in my heart. I closed my eyes, and--God forgive my weakness, but the tears came. "Hallo! What part do you intend me to play in all this?" said Lampron behind me. "'What part'?" "Yes. It's an odd notion to invite me to your trysting-place." "Trysting-place? I haven't one." "You mean to tell me, perhaps, that you came here by chance?" "Certainly." "And chanced upon the very moment and the spot where she was passing?" "Do you want a proof? That young lady is Mademoiselle Charnot." "Well?" "Well, I never have said another word to her since my one visit to her father; I have only seen her once, for a moment, in the street. You see there can be no question of trysting-places in this case. I was wondering at her appearance when you awoke. It is luck, or a friendly providence, that has used the beauty of the sunlight, the breeze, and all the sweets of April to bring her, as it brought us, to the forest." "And that is what fetched the tears?" "Well, no." "What, then?" "I don't know." "My full-grown baby, I will tell you. You are in love with her!" "Indeed, Sylvestre, I believe you're right. I confess it frankly to you as to my best friend. It is an old story already; as old, perhaps, as the day I first met her. At first her figure would rise in my imagination, and I took pleasure in contemplating it. Soon this phantom ceased to satisfy; I longed to see her in person. I sought her in the streets, the shops, the theatre. I still blinded myself, and pretended that I only wanted to ask her pardon, so as to remove, before I left Paris, the unpleasant impression I had made at our first meeting. But now, Sylvestre, all these false reasons have disappeared, and the true one is clear. I love her!" "Not a doubt of it, my friend, not a doubt of it. I have been through it myself." He was silent, and his eyes wandered away to the faroff woods, perhaps back to those distant memories of his. A shadow rested on his strong face, but only for an instant. He shook off his depression, and his old smile came back as he said: "It's serious, then?" "Yes, very serious." "I'm not surprised; she is a very pretty girl." "Isn't she lovely?" "Better than that, my friend; she is good. What do you know about her?" "Only that she is a bad dancer." "That's something, to be sure." "But it isn't all." "Well, no. But never mind, find out the rest, speak to her, declare your passion, ask for her hand, and marry her." "Good heavens, Sylvestre, you are going ahead!" "My dear fellow, that is the best and wisest plan; these vague idyls ought to be hurried on, either to a painless separation or an honorable end in wedlock. In your place I should begin to-morrow." "Why not to-day?" "How so?" "Let's catch them up, and see her again at least." He began to laugh. "Run after young girls at my age! Well, well, it was my advice. Come along!" We crossed the avenue, and plunged into the forest. Lampron had formerly acquired a reputation for tireless agility among the fox-hunters of the Roman Campagna. He still deserves it. In twenty strides he left me behind. I saw him jumping over the heather, knocking off with his cane the young shoots on the oaks, or turning his head to look at me as I struggled after, torn by brambles and pricked by gorse. A startled pheasant brought him to a halt. The bird rose under his feet and soared into the full light. "Isn't it beautiful?" said he. "Look out, we must be more careful; we are scaring the game. We should come upon the path they took, about sixty yards ahead." Five minutes later he was signalling to me from behind the trunk of a great beech. "Here they are." Jeanne and M. Charnot were seated on a fallen trunk beside the path, which here was almost lost beneath the green boughs. Their backs were toward us. The old man, with his shoulders bent and his goldknobbed cane stuck into the ground beside him, was reading out of a book which we could not see, while Jeanne, attentive, motionless, her face half turned toward him, was listening. Her profile was outlined against a strip of clear sky. The deep silence of the wood wrapped us round, and we could hear the old scholar's voice; it just reached us. "Straightway the godlike Odysseus spake these cunning words to the fair Nausicaa: 'Be thou goddess or mortal, O queen, I bow myself before thee! If thou art one of the deities who dwell in boundless heaven, by thy loveliness and grace and height I guess thee to be Artemis, daughter of high Zeus. If thou art a mortal dwelling upon earth, thrice blessed thy father and thy queenly mother, thrice blessed thy dear brothers! Surely their souls ever swell with gladness because of thee, when they see a maiden so lovely step into the circle of the dance. But far the most blessed of all is he who shall prevail on thee with presents and lead thee to his home!'" I turned to Lampron, who had stopped a few steps in front of me, a little to the right. He had got out his sketch-book, and was drawing hurriedly. Presently he forgot all prudence, and came forth from the shelter of a beech to get nearer to his model. In vain I made sign upon sign, and tried to remind him that we were not thereto paint or sketch. It was useless; the artist within him had broken loose. Sitting down at the required distance on a gnarled root, right in the open, he went on with his work with no thought but for his art. The inevitable happened. Growing impatient over some difficulty in his sketch, Lampron shuffled his feet; a twig broke, some leaves rustled-Jeanne turned round and saw me looking at her, Lampron sketching her. What are the feelings of a young girl who in the middle of a forest suddenly discovers that two pairs of eyes are busy with her? A little fright at first; then--when the idea of robbers is dismissed, and a second glance has shown her that it is her beauty, not her life, they want--a touch of satisfied vanity at the compliment, not unmixed with confusion. This is exactly what we thought we saw. At first she slightly drew back, with brows knitted, on the verge of an exclamation; then her brows unbent, and the pleasure of finding herself admired, confusion at being taken unawares, the desire of appearing at ease, all appeared at once on her rosy cheeks and in her faintly troubled smile. I bowed. Sylvestre pulled off his cap. M. Charnot never stirred. "Another squirrel?" he said. "Two this time, I think, father," she answered, in a low voice. He went on reading. "'My guest,' made answer the fair Nausicaa, 'for I call thee so since thou seemest not base nor foolish, it is Zeus himself that giveth weal to men--'" Jeanne was no longer listening. She was thinking. Of what? Of several things, perhaps, but certainly of how to beat a retreat. I guessed it by the movement of her sunshade, which was nervously tracing figures in the turf. I signalled to Lampron. We retired backward. Yet it was in vain; the charm was broken, the peace had been disturbed. She gave two coughs--musical little coughs, produced at will. M. Charnot broke off his reading. "You are cold, Jeanne?" "Why, no, father." "Yes, yes, you're cold. Why did you not say so before? Lord, Lord, these children! Always the same--think of nothing!" He rose without delay, put his book in his pocket, buttoned up his coat, and, leaning on his stick, glanced up a moment at the tree-tops. Then, side by side, they disappeared down the path, Jeanne stepping briskly, upright and supple, between the young branches which soon concealed her. Still Lampron continued to watch the turning in the path down which she had vanished. "What are you thinking about?" said I. He stroked his beard, where lurked a few gray hairs. "I am thinking, my friend, that youth leaves us in this same way, at the time when we love it most, with a faint smile, and without a word to tell us whither. Mine played me this trick." "What a good idea of yours to sketch them both. Let me see the sketch." "No!" "Why not?" "It can scarcely be called a sketch; it's a mere scratch." "Show it, all the same." "My good Fabien, you ought to know that when I am obstinate I have my reasons, like Balaam's ass. You will not see my sketch-book to-day, nor to-morrow, nor the day after." I answered with foolish warmth: "Please yourself; I don't care." Really I was very much annoyed, and I was rather cool with Lampron when we parted on the platform. What has come to the fellow? To refuse to show me a sketch he had made before my eyes, and a sketch of Jeanne, too! April 28th, 9 A.M. Hide your sketches, Sylvestre; stuff them away in your portfolios, or your pockets; I care little, for I bear Jeanne's image in my heart, and can see it when I will, and I love her, I love her, I love her! What is to become of her and of me I can not tell. I hope without knowing what or why, or when, and hope alone is comforting. 9 P.M. This afternoon, at two o'clock, I met Lampron in the Boulevard St. Michel. He was walking fast with a portfolio under his arm. I went up to him. He looked annoyed, and hardly seemed pleased when I offered to accompany him. I grew red and angry. "Oh, very well," I said; "good-by, then, since you don't care to be seen with me." He pondered a moment. "Oh, come along if you like; I am going to my framemaker's." "A picture?" "Something of the kind." "And that's all the mystery! Yesterday it was a sketch I mustn't look at; to-day it's a picture. It is not nice of you, Sylvestre; no, decidedly it is not nice." He gave me a look of friendly compassion. "Poor little chap!" said he. Then, in his usual clear, strong voice: "I am in a great hurry; but come if you like. I would rather it were four days later; but as it is, never mind; it is never too soon to be happy." When Lampron chooses to hold his tongue it is useless to ask him questions. I gave myself up to meditating on the words, "It is never too soon to be happy." We went down the boulevard, past the beer-houses. There is distinction in my friend's walk; he is not to be confused with the crowd through which he passes. You can tell, from the simple seriousness of the man, his indifference to the noise and petty incidents of the streets, that he is a stout and noble soul. Among the passers-by he is a somebody. I heard from a group of students seated before a cafe the following words, which Sylvestre did not seem to notice: "Look, do you see the taller of those two there? That's Sylvestre Lampron." "Prix du Salon two years ago?" "A great gun, you know." "He looks it." "To the left," said Lampron. We turned to the left, and found ourselves in the Rue Hautefeuille, before a shabby house, within the porch of which hung notices of apartments to let; this was the framemaker's. The passage was dark, the walls were chipped by the innumerable removals of furniture they had witnessed. We went upstairs. On the fourth floor a smell of glue and sour paste on the landing announced the tenant's profession. To make quite certain there was a card nailed to the door with "Plumet, Frame-Maker." "Plumet? A newly-married couple?" But already Madame Plumet is at the door. It is the same little woman who came to Boule's office. She recognizes me in the dim light of the staircase. "What, Monsieur Lampron, do you know Monsieur Mouillard?" "As you apparently do, too, Madame Plumet." "Oh, yes! I know him well; he won my action, you know." "Ah, to be sure-against the cabinet-maker. Is your husband in?" "Yes, sir, in the workshop. Plumet!" Through the half-opened door giving access to an inner room w e could see-in the midst of his molders, gilders, burnishers, and framers--a little dark man with a beard, who looked up and hurriedly undid the strings of his working-apron. "Coming, Marie!" Little Madame Plumet was a trifle upset at having to receive us in undress, before she had tidied up her rooms. I could see it by her blushes and by the instinctive movement she made to smooth her disordered curls. The husband had hardly answered her call before she left us and went off to the end of the room, into the obscure recesses of an alcove overcrowded with furniture. There she bent over an oblong object, which I could not quite see at first, and rocked it with her hand. "Monsieur Mouillard," said she, looking up to me--"Monsieur Mouillard, this is my son, Pierre!" What tender pride in those words, and the smile which accompanied them! With a finger she drew one of the curtains aside. Under the blue muslin, between the pillow and the white coverlet, I discovered two little black eyes and a tuft of golden hair. "Isn't he a little rogue!" she went on, and began to caress the waking baby. Meanwhile Sylvestre had been talking to Plumet at the other end of the room. "Out of the question," said the frame-maker; "we are up to our knees in arrears; twenty orders waiting." "I ask you to oblige me as a friend." "I wish I could oblige you, Monsieur Lampron; but if I made you a promise, I should not be able to keep it." "What a pity! All was so well arranged, too. The sketch was to have been hung with my two engravings. Poor Fabien! I was saving up a surprise for you. Come and look here." I went across. Sylvestre opened his portfolio. "Do you recognize it?" At once I recognized them. M. Charnot's back; Jeanne's profile, exactly like her; a forest nook; the parasol on the ground; the cane stuck into the grass; a bit of genre, perfect in truth and execution. "When did you do that?" "Last night." "And you want to exhibit it?" "At the Salon." "But, Sylvestre, it is too late to send in to the Salon. The Ides of March are long past." "Yes, for that very reason I have had the devil of a time, intriguing all the morning. With a large picture I never should have succeeded; but with a bit of a sketch, six inches by nine--" "Bribery of officials, then?" "Followed by substitution, which is strictly forbidden. I happened to have hung there between two engravings a little sketch of underwoods not unlike this; one comes down, the other is hung instead--a little bit of jobbery of which I am still ashamed. I risked it all for you, in the hope that she would come and recognize the subject." "Of course she will recognize it, and understand; how on earth could she help it? My dear Sylvestre, how can I thank you?" I seized my friend's hand and begged his forgiveness for my foolish haste of speech. He, too, was a little touched and overcome by the pleasure his surprise had given me. "Look here, Plumet," he said to the frame-maker, who had taken the sketch over to the light, and was studying it with a professional eye. "This young man has even a greater interest than I in the matter. He is a suitor for the lady's hand, and you can be very useful to him. If you do not frame the picture his happiness is blighted." The frame-maker shook his head. "Let's see, Antoine," said a coaxing little voice, and Madame Plumet left the cradle to come to our aid. I considered our cause as won. Plumet repeated in vain, as he pulled his beard, that it was impossible; she declared it was not. He made a move for his workshop; she pulled him back by the sleeve, made him laugh and give his consent. "Antoine," she insisted, "we owe our marriage to Monsieur Mouillard; you must at least pay what you owe." I was delighted. Still, a doubt seized me. "Sylvestre," I said to Lampron, who already had his hand upon the door-handle, "do you really think she will come?" "I hope so; but I will not answer for it. To make certain, some one must send word to her: 'Mademoiselle Jeanne, your portrait is at the Salon.' If you know any one who would not mind taking this message to the Rue de l'Universite--" "I'm afraid I don't." "Come on, then, and trust to luck." "Rue de l'Universite, did you say?" broke in little Madame Plumet, who certainly took the liveliest interest in my cause. "Yes; why?" "Because I have a friend in the neighborhood, and perhaps--" I risked giving her the number and name under the seal of secrecy; and it was a good thing I did so. In three minutes she had concocted a plan. It was like this: her friend lived near the hotel in the Rue de l'Universite, a porter's wife of advanced years, and quite safe; by means of her it might be possible to hint to Mademoiselle Jeanne that her portrait, or something like it, was to be seen at the Salon--discreetly, of course, and as if it were the merest piece of news. What a plucky, clever little woman it is! Surely I was inspired when I did her that service. I never thought I should be repaid. And here I am repaid both capital and interest. Yet I hesitated. She snatched my consent. "No, no," said she, "leave me to act. I promise you, Monsieur Mouillard, that she shall hear of it, and you, Monsieur Lampron, that the picture shall be framed." She showed us to the top of the stairs, did little Madame Plumet, pleased at having won over her husband, at having shown herself so cunning, and at being employed in a conspiracy of love. In the street Lampron shook me by the hand. "Good-by, my friend," he said; "happy men don't need company. Four days hence, at noon, I shall come to fetch you, and we will pay our first visit to the Salon together." Yes, I was a happy man! I walked fast, without seeing anything, my eyes lost in day dreams, my ears listening to celestial harmonies. I seemed to wear a halo. It abashed me somewhat; for there is something insolent in proclaiming on the housetops: "Look up at me, my heart is full, Jeanne is going to love me!" Decidedly, my brain was affected. Near the fountain in the Luxembourg, in front of the old palace where the senate sits, two little girls were playing. One pushed the other, who fell down crying, "Naughty Jeanne, naughty girl!" I rushed to pick her up, and kissed her before the eyes of her astonished nurse, saying, "No, Mademoiselle, she is the most charming girl in the world!" And M. Legrand! I still blush when I think of my conversation with M. Legrand. He was standing in a dignified attitude at the door of his shop. "ITALIAN WAREHOUSE; DRESSED PROVISIONS; He and I are upon good terms; I buy oranges, licorice from him, and rum when I want to make punch. But there are distinctions. Well, to-day I called him "Dear Monsieur Legrand;" I addressed him, though I had nothing to buy; I asked after his business; I remarked to him, "What a heavenly day, Monsieur Legrand! We really have got fine weather at last!" He looked up to the top of the street, and looked down again at me, but refrained from differing, out of respect. And, as a matter of fact, I noticed afterward that there was a most unpleasant drizzle. To wind up with, just now as I was coming home after dinner, I passed a workman and his family in the Rue Bonaparte, and the man pointed after me, saying: "Look! there goes a poet." He was right. In me the lawyer's clerk is in abeyance, the lawyer of to-morrow has disappeared, only the poet is left--that is to say, the essence of youth freed from the parasitic growths of everyday life. I feel it roused and stirring. How sweet life is, and what wonderful instruments we are, that Hope can make us thus vibrate by a touch of her little finger! ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS: Happy men don't need company |
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