Ever since their schooldays the two had been close friends, profoundly and loyally devoted to each other.
Jean de Servigny, small, slim, slightly bald, and frail, very elegant, with a curled moustache, bright eyes, and thin lips, was one of those night-birds who seem to have been born and bred on the boulevards; inexhaustible, though he wore a perpetual air of fatigue, vigorous despite his pallor—one of those slender Parisians to whom gymnastics, fencing, the cold plunge, and the Turkish bath have given an artificial nervous strength. He was as well known for his conviviality as for his wit, his wealth, and his love affairs, and for that geniality, popularity, and fashionable gallantry which are the hallmark of a certain type of man.
In other ways too he was a true Parisian, quick-witted, sceptical, changeable, impulsive, energetic yet irresolute, capable of anything and of nothing, an egoist on principle and a philanthropist on impulse. He kept his expenditure within his income, and amused himself without ruining his health. Cold and passionate by turns, he was continually letting himself go and pulling himself up, a prey to conflicting impulses, and yielding to all of them, following his instinct like any hardened pleasure-seeker whose weathercock logic bids him follow every wind and profit from any train of events, without taking the trouble to set a single one of them in motion.
His companion, Léon Saval, rich also, was one of those superb giants who compel women to turn round and stare after them in the street. He had the air of a statue come to life, of a racial type: he was like one of those models which are sent to exhibitions. Too handsome, too tall, too broad, too strong, all his faults were those of excess. He had broken innumerable hearts.
As they reached the Vaudeville, he inquired:
“Have you let this lady know that you’re bringing me?”
Servigny laughed.
“Let the Marquise Obardi know! Do you let a bus-driver know in advance that you’re going to get on to his bus at the corner of the boulevard?”
“Well, then, exactly who is she?” asked Saval, slightly perplexed.
“A parvenue,” replied his friend, “a colossal fraud, a charming jade, sprung from Lord knows where, who appeared one day, Lord knows how, in the world of adventurers, in which she is well able to make herself prominent. Anyhow, what does it matter? They say her real name, her maiden-name—for she has remained a maiden in every sense but the true one—is Octavie Bardin, whence Obardi, retaining the first letter of the Christian name and dropping the last letter of the surname. She’s an attractive woman, too, and with your physique you’re certain to become her lover. You can’t introduce Hercules to Messalina without something coming of it. I ought to add, by the way, that though admission to the place is as free as to a shop, you are not obliged to buy what is on sale. Love and cards are the stock-in-trade, but no one will force you to purchase either. The way out is as accessible as the way in.
“It is three years now since she took a house in the Quartier de l’Étoile, a rather shady district, and opened it to all the scum of the Continent, which comes to Paris to display its most diverse, dangerous, and vicious accomplishments.
“I went to the house. How? I don’t remember. I went, as we all go, because there’s gambling, because the women are approachable and the men scoundrels. I like this crowd of decorated buccaneers, all foreign, all noble, all titled, all, except the spies, unknown to their ambassadors. They all talk of their honour on the slightest provocation, trot out their ancestors on no provocation at all, and present you with their life-histories on any provocation. They are braggarts, liars, thieves, as dangerous as their cards, as false as their names, brave because they must be, like footpads who cannot rob their victims without risking their necks. In a word, the aristocracy of the galleys.
“I adore them. They’re interesting to study, interesting to meet, amusing to listen to, often witty, never commonplace like the dregs of French officialdom. Their wives too are always pretty, with a little flavour of foreign rascality, and the mystery of their past lives, half of which were probably spent in a penitentiary. Most often they have glorious eyes and wonderful hair, the real professional physique, a grace which intoxicates, a seductive charm that drives men mad, a vicious but wholly irresistible fascination! They’re the real old highway robbers, female birds of prey. And I adore them too.
“The Marquise Obardi is a perfect type of these elegant jades. A little overripe, but still beautiful, seductive, and feline, she’s vicious to the marrow. There’s plenty of fun in her house—gambling, dancing, supper … all the distractions of the world, the flesh, and the devil, in fact.”
“Have you been, or are you, her lover?” asked Léon Saval.
Servigny answered:
“I haven’t been, am not, and never shall be. It’s the daughter I go there for.”
“Oh, there’s a daughter, then, is there?”
“There is indeed! She’s a marvel. At present she’s the principal attraction. A tall, glorious creature, just the right age, eighteen, as fair as her mother is dark, always merry, always ready for fun, always laughing at the top of her voice, and dancing like a thing possessed. Who’s to have her? Who has had her? No one knows. There are ten of us waiting and hoping.
“A girl like that in the hands of a woman like the Marquise is a fortune. And they don’t show their hands, the rogues. No one can make it out. Perhaps they’re waiting for a catch, a better one than I am. Well, I can assure you that if the chance comes my way I’ll take it.
“This girl, Yvette, absolutely nonplusses me. She’s a mystery. If she isn’t the most finished monster of perverse ingenuity that I’ve ever seen, she’s certainly the most extraordinary
