“When we were traveling,” said she, “you replied to every difficulty by saying, ‘Paz will see to that!’ You never wrote to anybody but Paz. On my return, everyone refers me to the Captain. I want to go out.—The Captain! Is there a bill to be paid?—The Captain. If my horse’s pace is rough, they will speak to Captain Paz. In short, here I feel as if it were a game of dominoes; everywhere Paz! I hear no one talked of but Paz, but I can never see Paz. What is Paz? Let our Paz be brought to see me.”
“Then is not everything as it ought to be?” said the Count, relinquishing the mouthpiece of his narghileh.
“Everything is so quite what it ought to be, that if we had two hundred thousand francs a year, we should be ruined by living in the way we do with a hundred and ten thousand,” said she. She pulled the bell-handle embroidered in tent-stitch, a marvel of skill. A manservant dressed like a Minister at once appeared.
“Tell Monsieur le Capitaine Paz that I wish to speak to him,” said she.
“If you fancy you will find anything out in that way—” said Count Adam with a smile.
It may be useful to say that Adam and Clémentine, married in December 1835, after spending the winter in Paris, had during 1836 traveled in Italy, Switzerland, and Germany. They returned home in November, and during the winter just past the Countess had for the first time received her friends, and then had discovered the existence—the almost speechless and unacknowledged, but most useful presence—of a factotum whose person seemed to be invisible—this Captain Paz or Paç.
“Monsieur le Capitaine Paz begs Madame le Comtesse to excuse him; he is round at the stables, and in a dress which does not allow of his coming at this minute. But as soon as he is dressed Count Paz will come,” said the manservant.
“Why, what was he doing?”
“He was showing Constantine how to groom the Countess’ horse; the man did not do it to his mind,” replied the servant.
The Countess looked at the man; he was quite serious, and took good care not to imply by a smile that comment which inferiors so often allow themselves on a superior who seems to have descended to their level.
“Ah, he was brushing down Cora?”
“You are not riding out this morning, madame?” said the servant; but he got no answer, and went.
“Is he a Pole?” asked Clémentine of her husband, who bowed affirmatively.
Clémentine lay silent, examining Adam. Her feet, almost at full length on a cushion, her head in the attitude of a bird listening on the edge of its nest to the sounds of the grove, she would have seemed charming to the most blasé of men. Fair and slight, her hair curled à l’Anglaise, she looked like one of the almost fabulous figures in Keepsakes, especially as she was wrapped in a morning gown of Persian silk, of which the thick folds did not so effectually disguise the graces of her figure and the slenderness of her waist, as that they could not be admired through the thick covering of flowers and embroidery. As she crossed the brightly colored stuff over her chest, the hollow of her throat remained visible, the white skin contrasting in tone with the handsome lace trimming over the shoulders. Her eyes, fringed with black lashes, emphasized the expression of curiosity that puckered a pretty mouth. On her well-formed brow were traced the characteristic curves of the Paris woman, wilful, lighthearted, well-educated, but invulnerable to vulgar temptations. Her hands, almost transparent, hung from each arm of her deep chair; the taper fingers, curved at the tips, showed nails like pink almonds that caught the light.
Adam smiled at his wife’s impatience, gazing at her with a look which conjugal satiety had not yet made lukewarm. This slim little Countess had known how to be mistress in her own house, for she scarcely acknowledged Adam’s admiration. In the glances she stole at him there was perhaps a dawning consciousness of the superiority of a Parisienne to this spruce, lean, and red-haired Pole.
“Here comes Paz,” said the Count, hearing a step that rang in the corridor.
The Countess saw a tall, handsome man come in, well built, bearing in his features the marks of the grief which comes of strength and misfortune. Paz had dressed hastily in one of those tightly-fitting coats, fastened by braid straps and oval buttons, which used to be called polonaises. Thick, black hair, but ill-kempt, covered his squarely-shaped head, and Clémentine could see his broad forehead as shiny as a piece of marble, for he held his peaked cap in his hand. That hand was like the hand of the Hercules carrying the infant Mercury. Robust health bloomed in a face equally divided by a large Roman nose, which reminded Clémentine of the handsome Trasteverini. A black silk stock put a finishing touch of martial appearance to this mystery of near six feet high, with jet-black eyes as lustrous as an Italian’s. The width of his full trousers, hiding all but the toes of his boots, showed that Paz still was faithful to the fashions of Poland. Certainly, to a romantic woman, there must have been something burlesque in the violent contrast observable between the Captain and the Count, between the little Pole with his narrow frame and this fine soldier, between the carpet-knight and the knight servitor.
“Good morning, Adam,” he said to the Count with familiarity.
Then he bowed gracefully, asking Clémentine in what way he could serve
