“Shall bid each righteous heart exult to see
Peace to the slave and vengeance on the free.”
THE room was small, “petits appartements” were the taste of the day; but it was luxurious. A sofa covered with crimson silk, a fauteuil, a Buhl table, and a few curiously wrought high-backed chairs, composed the furniture; the adornments were Sèvres china of the fashionable “pâté tendre,” a picture or two of Boucher’s, and half a dozen mirrors.
Wealth, rather than taste, was visible everywhere, except perhaps in the dress of the solitary occupant, Désiré Gerard. And even he looked as if he had purposely made himself as striking an example as he could of the anomalies of the time. A powdered perruque surmounted his young, fresh, handsome face; and although his habiliments were à la Grecque, according to the sense attached by Parisian tailors to that much abused term, he wore his lace ruffles and his dainty sword, like Buffon, who always wrote in full dress. He had frequent recourse to a golden snuff box (the gift of some admirer of his art), perhaps to counteract the effects of the heavy perfume of amber that pervaded the room. He was busily noting down some music, pausing every now and then to try over a melody on his harpsichord, or to refer to the large volume that lay open on the table before him―strangest anomaly of all, this was De Sacy’s Bible.
A valet, in the gaudy livery of his host, M. Pelletier, knocked at the door and announced a visitor.
Gerard looked up, and seeing his friend Jules Prosper, sprang from his seat, kissed him on both cheeks, embraced him, and was embraced by him with true French effusion.
After many compliments and mutual civilities, Gerard inquired, “How did you come hither, my friend?”
“Fortune was unusually kind to me, and found me a place in a carriage going to Fontainebleau. Bah! it is cold, and wet, and dreary outside,” he added, with a shudder. “What a charming abode you have found friend Gerard! Truly your life must glide along like a dream.”
“So it does,” said Gerard, as he rose to ring for refreshments.
In a short time a repast was served, consisting of coffee and costly liqueurs, with fruit and ices, and cakes of various kinds. A healthy appetite might have craved less luxury and more solid nutriment; as a healthy spirit would have pined unsatisfied amidst the unwholesome sweets and stimulants with which the moral atmosphere of the place was overladen. Nor was Gerard quite unconscious of this.
Whilst he drank coffee and Prosper curacoa, talk went on briskly. “I am like a prisoner in an enchanted castle,”
Gerard said laughingly. “Whenever I speak of quitting his hospitable roof, M. Pelletier only asks what I want, and tells me he will send to Paris for it immediately. ‘Why go fetch it yourself, my dear Gerard,’ he says, ‘when there are all these idle people here, dying of ennui?’”
“And you,” said Prosper, “with all your courage, you cannot exactly say to him, ‘My dear Pelletier, I am dying of ennui myself.’”
“Nor would it be true, if I did. More like the truth to say, ‘Monsieur, the air of your delightful abode is so soft, so delicious, so charming, that it is lulling me to sleep, and, if some very startling occurrence does not happen á propos to arouse me, I shall sleep on forever.’”
“What matter how long you sleep, if you dream music?” said Prosper, drawing his friend’s papers towards him.
“Oh, that is nothing―a mere sketch,” said Gerard a little shyly. “I am only just trying my wings.”
“For a lofty flight, it seems,” said Prosper, as a few words scrawled by way of memorandum caught his eye. “As far as Egypt and the Red Sea. An oratorio, I presume?”
“Well, oratorios are the newest thing now,” said Gerard, adopting the worldly, tone of his companion, and thereby denying his own higher nature, which reveled in the grand and solemn harmonies of sacred song. Yet his words were true. Oratorios were then a novelty, and, as such, were the passion of the hour with the frivolous Parisian world.
“Oratorios may be in very good tone, but Moses and the Children of Israel are decidedly passé,” Prosper objected.
“Indeed they are not,” Gerard replied more gravely. “Any day, you may see the slaves of the brick kiln, whom no man pities, in our fields and by our roadsides, making bricks without straw for the seigneur or the king. Moses, it is true, has not appeared yet. But I hope you and I may live to see him.”
“I had rather be excused. Moses, of all men! At whom M. de Voltaire had learned to scoff ere he was three years old! A bigoted, barbarous, cruel―”
“Softly, Prosper! I am growing fond of my hero, and I will not have him abused. I don’t know what you mean by applying bigoted, as a term of reproach, to a man who made the promulgation of a religion the work of his life. But, barbarous? Look at his laws! They have influenced the mind of humanity from his days to our own; and still, in the midst of our highest civilization, they meet us at every turn. Look at the people those laws educated! Were they a mere ‘set of barbarians?’ Why, even in their degradation and misery, during the Middle Ages, they were the forerunners of modern science and the prophets of modem enlightenment. The Jew was the merchant, the physician, the astronomer―ay, often the philosopher―of his generation. And, cruel? There is not, in the whole code of Moses, a single cruel or degrading punishment. Death was inflicted―pretty often, perhaps because it was not known in those ages of ignorance that man has but one life to lose. But torture, never! Stoning was the national form of capital punishment; and we know, from other sources, that it was quick and painless, one or two blows killing the victim. It is true that the Jewish history, like all other authentic ancient histories, abounds in wars, murders, and massacres; but it is remarkable for the absence of all nameless horrors worse than these. Does the whole Bible contain one story half as revolting as that of the execution of Damiens, which took place the other day in civilized Paris, while some of those very philosophers and fine ladies, who profess themselves horrified by the cruelties of Moses and Joshua, looked on with unshrinking eye? I repeat it, in no other history is there the same total absence of that fiendish propensity that gloats over the infliction of agony.”
“A fierce tirade, most eloquent of musicians! I fear you are growing devout. Has your friend, Madame Geoffrin, converted you?”
“Spare your sneers, Prosper. I am neither fierce nor eloquent, still less devout; but I am in earnest. And the philosophers sometimes talk such very unphilosophic nonsense, that, as M. Duclos said the other day, they are almost enough to make a man go to mass.”
“No man is a philosopher when he is angry,” Prosper answered. “Lay that to heart for yourself, M. Gerard. Though why men should get angry about religion, any more than about mathematics or astronomy, I confess I cannot imagine.”
“Because, while no man need meddle with mathematics or astronomy unless he pleases, religion is every man’s business, and will let no man alone. Because too, most unhappily, in our country the ministers of religion have played into the hands of despotism, and sold the people to their oppressors. This brings me back to my Israelitish hero. Moses will outlast your time and mine, Prosper. Perhaps, wherein you think he is behind the age, he may prove to have been before it. And in one thing, certainly, he is fairly ahead of us―in his heroic resistance to an abominable tyranny.”
“Oh, I begin to understand! The object of your admiration is not Moses of the Ten Commandments, but Moses of the Ten Plagues of Egypt. Not Moses the legislator, but Moses the patriot.”
“Moses, the Israelitish slave, who stood undaunted in the presence of the Egyptian tyrant, saying, ‘Let my people go!’”
“I suppose the subject has capabilities,” Prosper admitted candidly. “But why not try an opera instead of one of those dull, heavy oratorios? I might write the libretto, and you, of course, the music.”
For a moment Gerard looked indignant; then the absurdity of the notion overcame his vexation, and he laughed. “What a Moses you would give us, Prosper! A philosophic marquis, in perruque and powder, fresh from the salons!”
“Let those laugh who win,” said Prosper, in a tone of pique. “Gerard, have you heard anything lately of your lace-making friend?”
“Do you mean Madame Bairdon?” Gerard asked, flushing hotly in spite of his will.
“Of her, or her interesting family?”
“Well, not very lately. Why do you ask?” said Gerard, trying to look indifferent.
“Oh, for no particular reason,” Prosper answered, helping himself again to curacoa.
Gerard kept silence. Prosper’s manner made him uneasy; but he was too proud to ask for an explanation. He knew besides that, if Prosper had anything to say, he would not long be able to deny himself the gratification of saying it.
He was right. “The bourgeoisie are growing more and more high-minded every day,” said Prosper, as he set down his empty glass. “One is sometimes glad when they get a downfall. But the Bairdons have always behaved so well, it seems a pity.”
“What seems a pity?”
“That the son should turn out a mauvais sujet―in fact, a perfectly incorrigible scamp. You knew he was always a good-for-nothing. And now he has absconded with some of his mother’s lace.”
“I don’t believe it,” said Gerard.
“It is true, nevertheless. You may wish now you had spared yourself the trouble of picking him up from under the horse hoofs. And I dare say his father and mother wish the same.”
“I tell you I don’t believe it,” Gerard reiterated.
“Will this convince you, O most philosophic of musicians?” He placed before Gerard’s eyes Gustave’s hapless note of excuse and apology to his mother.
“Did you forge that precious document?” cried Gerard with angry contempt.
“You are courtesy itself this morning! But I forgive you; for you rather liked the little wretch, and used to patronize him; so, naturally, you feel disappointed. Moreover, you must wonder how such a paper could possibly have fallen into my hands. He had evidently written me a note of some kind (I am sure I cannot guess what induced him to do me the honor; unless, perhaps, he wanted to ask your address), and then in his haste and confusion exchanged the papers, and sent me the wrong one. I threw it aside, and had forgotten all about it; when it was recalled to my mind by the rumor of the boy’s escapade. That explained it, with a vengeance. The family try to hide their misfortune; and you may believe, if you please, that Gustave Bairdon has been sent to Lyons on business by his mother; I don’t.”
It occurred to Gerard, as he listened, that, although a tolerable marksman, he had never yet been engaged in an affair of honor, and that it would afford him singular gratification to take his stand twenty paces from Prosper, with a loaded pistol in his hand.
“Of course,” Prosper resumed, alter a long pause― “of course you will drop your acquaintance with the family.”
“There are acquaintances I should drop with far greater pleasure,” said Gerard, with a look and manner that gave point to his words.
But Prosper was determined not to quarrel. Indeed in his own way he was sincerely desirous of benefiting Gerard. He was aware that the brilliant young musician had it in his power to form an alliance much more advantageous to his prospects than the one he contemplated at present; and he therefore used all his influence and all his art to discredit the Bairdons. His friendship was zealous, and up to a certain point it was genuine―as genuine at least as any other part of his character―although perhaps it was not wholly disinterested. Rightly judging that upon this occasion he had gone quite far enough, he apologized, assured Gerard in effusive terms of his unalterable affection, and tried in every way to restore him to his wonted good-humour.
And Gerard was not implacable. “Come with me,” he said, “and I will show you this enchanted castle. It is worth seeing; so are the pleasure grounds.”
Prosper’s admiration of their fantastic and artificial splendors fully satisfied him; and he asked him to remain for dinner, knowing that such an invitation would be very agreeable to the wishes of his host.
Prosper was glad to accept it, for several reasons. As he told one of his intimates the next day, “I made two friends and one enemy; pretty well for an evening’s work, was it not, mon cher? Better still, I made the acquaintance of M. Gerard’s special confidant, a gay little abbé called Arboissère. He tells me there is no doubt at all of Mademoiselle Zélie de Lioncourt’s conquest. What should he stay there for, ad this time, away from the delights of Paris, except to be in her neighborhood? The demoiselle and her preux chevalier have quarreled just now, it is true―but that goes for nothing. We are likely to see our handsome young musician lord of M. de Lioncourt’s tumble-down owl’s nest of a château one of these days―an alliance which will reflect glory on art and letters, besides bringing down the pride of ‘la petite noblesse.’ Moreover, the father, poor though he is, has influence, and could do something for me. And, at all events, there’s the right of shooting over his lands. Voilà, mon enfant!”