“Oh! Paz is really my superior,” replied Adam simply. “I have no advantage over him but that of luck.”
His wife kissed him for this generous avowal.
“The perfect skill with which he conceals the loftiness of his soul is an immense superiority,” the Count went on. “I say to him, ‘You are a sly fellow; you have vast domains in your mind to which you retire.’ He has a right to the title of Count Paz; in Paris he will only be called Captain.”
“In short, a Florentine of the Middle Ages has resuscitated after three centuries,” said the Countess. “There is something of Dante in him, and something of Michelangelo.”
“Indeed, you are right; he is at heart a poet,” replied Adam.
“And so I am married to two Poles,” said the young Countess, with a gesture resembling that of a genius on the stage.
“Darling child!” said Adam, clasping Clémentine to him, “you would have distressed me very much if you had not liked my friend. We were both afraid of that, though he was delighted at my marrying. You will make him very happy by telling him that you love him—oh! as an old friend.”
“Then I will go to dress; it is fine, we will all three go out,” said Clémentine, ringing for her maid.
Paz led such an underground life that all the fashion of Paris wondered who it was that accompanied Clémentine Laginski when they saw her driving to the Bois and back between him and her husband. During the drive Clémentine had insisted that Thaddeus was to dine with her. This whim of a despotic sovereign compelled the Captain to make an unwonted toilet. On returning from her drive Clémentine dressed with some coquettish care, in such a way as to produce as effect even on Adam as she entered the room where the two friends were awaiting her.
“Count Paz,” said she, “we will go to the opera together.”
It was said in the tone which from a woman conveys, “If you refuse, we shall quarrel.”
“With pleasure, madame,” replied the Captain. “But as I have not a Count’s fortune, call me Captain.”
“Well, then. Captain, give me your arm,” said she, taking it and leading him into the dining-room with a suggestion of the caressing familiarity which enraptures a lover.
The Countess placed the Captain next her, and he sat like a poor sublieutenant dining with a wealthy general. Paz left it to Clémentine to talk, listening to her with all the air of deference to a superior, contradicting her in nothing, and waiting for a positive question before making any reply. In short, to the Countess he seemed almost stupid, and her graces all fell flat before this icy gravity and diplomatic dignity. In vain did Adam try to rouse him by saying, “Come, cheer up. Captain. It might be supposed that you were not at home. You must have laid a bet that you would disconcert Clémentine?” Thaddeus remained heavy and half asleep.
When the three were alone at dessert the Captain explained that his life was planned diametrically unlike that of other people; he went to bed at eight o’clock, and rose at daybreak; and he thus excused himself, saying he was very sleepy.
“My intention in taking you to the opera was only to amuse you, Captain; but do just as you please,” said Clémentine, a little nettled.
“I will go,” said Paz.
“Duprez is singing in William Tell,” said Adam. “Would you prefer the Variétiés?”
The Captain smiled and rang the bell; the manservant appeared. “Tell Constantine,” said Paz, “to take out the large carriage instead of the coupe.—We cannot sit comfortably in it,” he added, turning to the Count.
“A Frenchman would not have thought of that,” said Clémentine, smiling.
“Ah, but we are Florentines transplanted to the North,” replied Thaddeus, with a meaning and an expression which showed that his dullness at dinner had been assumed.
But by a very conceivable want of judgment, there was too great a contrast between the involuntary self-betrayal of this speech and the Captain’s attitude during dinner. Clémentine examined him with one of those keen flashes by which a woman reveals at once her surprise and her observancy. Thus, during the few minutes while they were taking their coffee in the drawing-room, silence reigned—an uncomfortable silence for Adam, who could not divine its cause. Clémentine no longer disturbed Thaddeus. The Captain, for his part, retired again into military rigidity, and came out of it no more, either on the way, or in the box, where he affected to be asleep.
“You see, madame, that I am very dull company,” said he, during the ballet in the last act of William Tell. “Was I not right to ‘stick to my last,’ as the proverb says?”
“On my word, my dear Captain, you are neither a coxcomb nor a chatterbox; you are perhaps a Pole.”
“Leave me then to watch over your pleasures,” he replied, “to take care of your fortune and your house; that is all I am good for.”
“Tartufe! begone!” cried Adam, smiling. “My dear, he is full of heart, well informed—he could, if he chose, hold his own in any drawing-room. Clémentine, do not believe what his modesty tells you.”
“Good night, Countess. I have proved my willingness, and now will avail myself of your carriage to go to bed at once. I will send it back for you.”
Clémentine bowed slightly, and let him go without replying.
“What a bear!” said she to the Count. “You are much, much nicer.”
Adam pressed his wife’s hand unseen.
“Poor, dear Thaddeus, he has endeavored to be a foil when many men would have tried to seem more attractive than I.”
“Oh!” said she, “I am not sure that was not intentional; his behavior would have mystified an ordinary
