“Ah, Monsieur, how he did gorge!
“ ‘For heaven’s sake!’ said I to myself, ‘what a storeroom!’ And I stuffed him, Monsieur, I stuffed him. He did not resist, either.
“When he had devoured everything, it was five in the morning. I was on pins and needles. I drew him along another hour still, with the coffee and all the rinsings; but finally he rose.
“ ‘Let me see your lodging,’ said he.
“I was lost, and I followed, thinking of throwing myself out of the window. As I entered the bedroom ready to faint, waiting for something to occur, a last hope made my heart leap.
“The brave girl had closed the bed-curtains. Ah, if he only should not open them! But alas! Monsieut, he approached the bed immediately, with a candle in his hand, and suddenly he raised the curtains of the bed. It was warm, we had drawn down the bedclothes, and there was left only the sheet, which she had pulled up over her head; but her outlines, Monsieur, her outlines could be seen! I trembled in all my limbs, with my throat compressed, choking. Then my uncle turned toward me, laughing heartily, so that I almost jumped to the ceiling from astonishment.
“ ‘Ah! you joker, you did not want to wake up your brother. Well, you’ll see how I shall awake him.’
“And I saw his peasant’s hand rising; and while he was choking with laughter, his hand fell like a thunderbolt on—on—well—on the outlines that could be seen, Monsieur.
“There was a terrible cry in the bed; and then something like a tempest under the sheet. The form moved. She could not disentangle herself. Finally, almost at one jump, she appeared, with eyes like lanterns, and she stared at my uncle, who backed out, his mouth gaping, and puffing, Monsieur, as if he were going to be ill!
“Then I lost my head and fled. I wandered about for six days not daring to go back to my quarters. Finally, when I did pluck up courage to return, nobody was there.”
Patissot, shaking with laughter, said: “I should think not!” which made his neighbor stop talking.
But in a second, the man resumed:
“I never saw my uncle again. He disinherited me, persuaded that I took advantage of the absence of my brother to play my tricks.
“I never saw Victorine again, either. All my family turned their backs upon me; and my brother himself, who had profited by the situation, as he inherited one hundred thousand francs at the death of my uncle, seems to consider me an old libertine. And yet, Monsieur, I swear to you that never since that moment, never, never!—There are, you see, minutes that a man never forgets.”
“And what are you doing here?” asked Patissot.
The other swept the horizon with a glance, as if he feared to be overheard by some unseen ear; then he murmured, with a sound of terror in his voice:
“I am flying from the women, Monsieur!”
VIII
A Trial of Love
Many poets think that nature is not complete without woman, and from that idea, without doubt, came all the flowery comparisons in their songs, which make in turn of our natural companion a rose, a violet, a tulip, and other charming objects.
The need of tenderness that overcomes us at the hour of twilight, when the mist of evening begins to float over the hillsides, and when all the perfumes of the earth intoxicate us, overflows into lyric invocations; and Monsieur Patissot, like others, was seized with a longing for tenderness, for soft kisses, given along paths where the sunshine falls, with hands clasped, and plump figures pliant to his embrace.
He began by regarding love as a delectation without limits, and in his hours of reverie, he thanked the great Unknown for placing so much charm in the caresses of humanity. He felt that he must have a companion, but did not know where to find her.
Upon the advice of a friend, he went to the Folies-Bergères. He saw a complete assortment there, and became greatly perplexed to choose between them, for the desires of his heart sprang, above all, from poetic impulses, and a love of poetic things did not seem exactly the principal attribute of the young ladies with blackened eyelashes who cast disturbing smiles at him, showing the enamel of their false teeth.
Finally his choice rested upon a young débutante, who appeared poor and timid, and whose unhappy look seemed to announce a nature that might be easily poetized.
He agreed to meet her on the following day at the Saint-Lazare station.
She did not keep the appointment, but she had the grace to send a friend in her stead.
The friend was a tall, red-haired girl, dressed patriotically in three colors, and covered with an immense tunnel-hat, of which her head occupied the center. Monsieur Patissot was a little disappointed, but courteously accepted the substitute. And they started for Maisons-Laffitte, where regattas and a grand Venetian festival had been announced.
As soon as they were in the car, already occupied by two gentlemen who wore decorations, and their ladies, who must at least have been marquises, so dignified did they appear, the tall, red-haired girl, who answered to the name of Octavie, announced to Patissot, with the voice of a parrot, that she was a very good girl, fond of joking, and that she adored the country because one could pluck flowers and eat fried fish there. She laughed with a shrillness that threatened to break the windows, calling her companion, familiarly, “My big wolf.”
A sense of shame came over Patissot, upon whom his title of government employee imposed a certain reserve. After a time, however, Octavie became silent, looking sidewise at her neighbors, and felt herself seized with the strong desire that haunts all women of a certain class to make the acquaintance of respectable women. At the end of five minutes she
