One day, when mad notions were fermenting in Malaga’s brain, Paz having laid his gold pieces on the velvet chimney-shelf, she snatched up the money and flung it in his face, saying, “I will not take stolen money!”
The Captain gave the gold to the Chapuzots, and came no more.
Clémentine was spending the summer on the estate of her uncle, the Marquis de Ronquerolles, in Burgundy.
When the troupe at the circus no longer saw Thaddeus in his seat, there was a great talk among the artists. Malaga’s magnanimity was regarded as folly by some, as cunning by others. The Pole’s behavior, as explained to the most experienced of the women, seemed inexplicable. In the course of a single week, Thaddeus received thirty-seven letters from women of the town. Happily for him, his singular reserve gave rise to no curiosity in fashionable circles, and remained the subject of discussion in the flash set only.
Two months later, the handsome rider, swamped in debt, wrote to Count Paz the following letter, which the dandies of the day regarded as a masterpiece:—
“You, whom I still venture to call my friend, will you not take pity on me after what passed between us, which you took so ill? My heart disowns everything that could hurt your feelings. If I was so happy as to make you feel some charm when you sat near me, as you used to do, come again … otherwise, I shall sink into despair. Poverty has come upon me already, and you do not know what stupid things it brings with it. Yesterday I lived on a herring for two sous and one sou’s worth of bread. Is that a breakfast for the woman you love? The Chapuzots have left me after seeming so devoted to me. Your absence has shown me the shallowness of human attachment. A bailiff, who turned a deaf ear to me, has seized everything on behalf of the landlord, who has no pity, and of the jeweler, who will not wait even ten days; for with you men, credit vanishes with confidence. What a position for a woman who has nothing to reproach herself for but a little amusement! My dear friend, I have taken everything of any value to my uncle’s; I have nothing left but my memory of you, and the hard weather is coming on. All through the winter I shall have no fire, since nothing but melodrama is played at the Boulevard, in which I have nothing to do but tiny parts, which do not show a woman off. How could you misunderstand my noble feelings towards you, for, after all, we have not two ways of expressing our gratitude? How is it that you, who seemed so pleased to see me comfortable, could leave me in misery? Oh, my only friend on earth, before I go back to travel from fair to fair with the Bouthors—for so, at any rate, I can make my living—forgive me for wanting to know if I have really lost you forever. If I should happen to think of you just as I was jumping through the hoop, I might break my legs by missing time. Come what may, I am yours for life.
“This letter,” exclaimed Thaddeus, shouting with laughter, “is well worth my ten thousand francs.”
Clémentine came home on the following day, and Paz saw her once more, lovelier and more gracious than ever. During dinner the Countess preserved an air of perfect indifference towards Thaddeus, but a scene took place between the Count and his wife after their friend had left. Thaddeus, with an affectation of asking Adam’s advice, had left Malaga’s letter in his hands, as if by accident.
“Poor Thaddeus!” said Adam to his wife, after seeing Paz make his escape. “What a misfortune for a man of his superior stamp to be the plaything of a ballet-girl of the lowest class! He will love anything; he will degrade himself; he will be unrecognizable before long. Here, my dear, read that,” and he handed her Malaga’s letter.
Clémentine read the note, which smelt of tobacco, and tossed it away with disgust.
“However thick the bandage over his eyes may be, he must have found something out. Malaga must have played him some faithless trick.”
“And he is going back to her!” cried Clémentine. “He will forgive her! You men can have no pity for any but those horrible women.”
“They want it so badly!” said Adam.
“Thaddeus did himself justice—by keeping to himself!” said she.
“Oh, my dearest, you go too far,” said the Count, who, though he was at first delighted to lower his friend in his wife’s eyes, would not the death of the sinner.
Thaddeus, who knew Adam well, had begged for absolute secrecy; he had only spoken, he said, as an excuse for his dissipations, and to beg his friend to allow him to have a thousand crowns for Malaga.
“He is a man of great pride,” Adam went on.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, to have spent no more than ten thousand francs on her, and to wait for such a letter as that to rouse him before taking her the money to pay her debts! For a Pole, on my honor! …”
“But he may ruin you!” said Clémentine in the acrid tone of a Parisian woman when she expresses
