“The rank is but the guinea stamp,
The man’s the gowdior a’ that.”
“WHO is that knocking at the door? Cannot a man be left in peace even in his bed at midnight?” The voice was that of Jules Prosper; the time Monday night; the place an “appartement garni,” yet more comfortless than that of Gerard.
“What! in bed already? Are you ill, friend?” said Gerard’s cheerful voice.
“Oh, is it you? Let yourself in then; you know how.” Gerard obeyed. “There’s flint and steel on the table. Light the lamp, if you like,” said Prosper.
With some trouble Gerard did so, and the light fell on his own handsome figure, set off to great advantage by a coat of fine dark cloth, trimmed with gold lace. That coat was the occasion of his visit. “I have come to return your loan, with thanks,” he said.
“You might have waited; I don’t want my coat at midnight. However, since you are here, take a chair, if you can find one. I am glad to see you.”
“Do you rise with the sun, that you go to bed with the lark, Prosper?”
“No; but the night is wet and dark and cold, and as I was crossing the Rue St. Honoré, on my way home from the Opera Comique, the plank over the gutter in the middle of the street gave way with me, and I slipped in. Dry clothes, hot coffee, and a fire not being luxuries for a poor poet―here I am!”
“I wish you had been with me instead.”
“So did I last night. How did you enjoy your walk on the Boulevards with the pretty little lace maker?”
“Lace maker?” Gerard repeated, flushing hotly.
“I presume Mademoiselle understands her mother’s business, and will one day succeed to it. No bad fortune either.”
“Oh!” said Gerard, with evident annoyance. “Then you allude to Mademoiselle Bairdon? You entirely mistake the young lady’s position. Madame Bairdon is only her stepmother. Her father is noble―a Scottish Jacobite, exiled for his politics. But enough of this,” he added, recovering himself, and purposely dismissing the subject. “I have a great deal to tell you. Today I waited by appointment on M. le Comte de Caylus.”
“How did you find him?”
“Kind and gracious, though a very pompous gentleman, evidently more anxious to seem than to be. He lectured me upon the advantages of simplicity in architecture and all the other arts, including my own (of which he knows nothing), until I began to think the simplicity was mine in having hoped anything from him, and to fear he had forgotten his promise to introduce me to Madame Geoffrin.”
“And had he?”
“If he had, I managed to remind him by a flattering hint, which was well received.”
“So you are learning to flatter at last. I begin to have hopes of you.”
“I should like men to say of me as they do of M. Duelos, ‘Droit et adroit.’ But not the last without the first, Prosper. M. de Caylus invited me to accompany him to the hotel of Madame Geoffrin, and presented me to that lady. We were in time for her levée. She received me very graciously, talked to me of my plans and prospects with genuine kindness, and invited me to dinner.”
“Pretty well for a beginning.”
“There’s more to come,” said Gerard. “The room was full. Near the couch of Madame sat a gentleman, evidently a foreigner, with whom I thought at first nature had dealt rather hardly. I have seldom seen plainer features, but by way of compensation every detail of his dress betrayed exquisite care and finish. His red heels marked the nobility of the wearer, and I suspect there was rouge on his cheeks as well. When I first noticed him, he was conversing with a tall, coarse-looking man, whose massive head, enormous neck, and round shoulders―”
“That was Diderot!” Prosper interrupted with interest and enthusiasm.
“Even so. I had the honor of looking on and speaking to that prince of the philosophers, that guiding spirit of the Encyclopædia. Madame Geoffrin had turned from me to address some newcomer, no doubt of higher rank and pretensions than I. Thus I was left free to gaze around the room, so simple in its appointments, yet so exquisitely luxurious. Every sense was gratified. There were rare perfumes, fair colors, cushions of down, a thousand costly elegancies of which I scarce could surmise the use.
“Somehow, my heart sank. What right had I to be there? I, without title, fame, or riches. I, the son of ―An old proverb, learned I know not where, about a bird wandering from its nest and a man from his place, began to haunt me. Suddenly I heard the owner of the talons rouges say to his companion, ‘Call it simply, “The Gambler―a Tragedy,” because it is the gambler, a tragedy. What is the meaning of that stupid expression, “Bourgeois Tragedy?” Is it intended to intimate that the feelings of the bourgeoisie are different from those of other people, and that what would be a comedy to their betters is a tragedy to them? All that kind of insolence is perfectly insufferable.’ More followed, but that was enough for me. I remembered I was not bourgeois, roturier, non-noble―but man. The king on his throne cannot be more, whatever less he may be. And I thought I had to do with men and women who recognize that truth, as the world shall recognize it ere long. The Baron de Grimm (I soon learned his name) passed from the discussion of The Gambler ‘to that of a pastoral called Daphnis and Alcinodore,’ written in the dialect of Languedoc. He had it with him, and showed it to M. Diderot; they began to examine it, but the dialect perplexed them; and while I hesitated about offering my assistance, Madame Geoffrin with ready tact introduced me, saying I was a native of the South, and perhaps might be able to interpret. Nothing was easier, as I used the patois myself in childhood. They seemed pleased with my translations, especially M. le Baron, who asked me many questions afterward. This was a golden opportunity of making known my views to the most distinguished patron of Italian music in France. I suspect we shall suit each other, for he seems to want a protégé, and certainly I want a patron. He has offered me a seat in his box at the Opéra Française―in ‘the Queen’s correr,’ the great rendezvous of all friends and favorers of the music of Italy.”
“You seem to have made your fortune today,” said Prosper, half pleased, half envious.
“The day was not over then,” Gerard continued. “M. le Baron took his leave of Madame Geoffrin, kindly hinting that I might accompany him. As we walked together, he was good enough to give me some valuable advice. What he said of music I pass over, though it was full of sense and knowledge of the world; but he congratulated me on having, as he was pleased to say, made such a favorable impression upon Madame Geoffrin. ‘She is an invaluable friend for a young artist,’ said he; ‘but if you wish to retain her friendship, you must remember two things. First, she expects, and with reason, a good deal of submission and deference. And next, those who wish to stand well with her must respect all that is respectable. On this account there are free spirits, “friends of joy,” who feel themselves more at ease in other houses than in hers, but the loss is their own.’”
“Of course, you were charmed at the last hint,” laughed Prosper. “I can bear witness that no young lady, fresh from a convent boarding school, was ever more timidly precise than Claude Gerard, the musician.”
Gerard bit his lip. “My way of life suits me,” he said proudly; “and I see not why it should offend you, or any man. If I have succeeded in gaining the suffrage of Madame Geoffrin, wherein have I hurt you? And I may help you. You know well, Prosper, that if I can―”
“Yes, yes, I know all that. You are a good child, though perhaps a little wanting in courage. AH the better for Madame Geoffrin. Whom did you meet at dinner?”
“A choice company of artists, with a few of their most distinguished patrons. The Comte de Caylus, of course, Vanloo, Vernet, Boucher―”
“The Raphael of our days! Gerard, I envy you more and more.”
“Raphael!” cried Gerard with supreme contempt. “Have you ever seen a painting of Raphael’s?”
“No; but the Venus of Boucher―”
“Is not the Madonna of Raphael,” said Gerard, as the face of Griselle rose before him. “At dinner, Boucher hazarded one of those coarse jests which some of our philosophers are apt to mistake for arguments against the Catholic faith. You should have heard Madame Geoffrin’s low and quiet ‘Voilá qui est bien,’ and seen its instant effect. It was the signal of a queen to her subjects, as gentle and as peremptory. ‘Thus we are held, as by an invisible thread,’ said my neighbor, one M. Marmontel, an habitué of the house, the only man of letters admitted to the artists’ dinner. Very charming he was, drawing us all out upon our favorite topics; and as he had himself no artist vanity to feed, no position to maintain, he was like the quiet neutral shade, which claims nothing for itself, but throws out into fine relief every color placed beside it.
At first he was reserved with me, because, as I afterward guessed, I had been introduced by M. de Caylus, whom he does not like. But the ice soon thawed; and I think I am partly indebted to him for the honor of an invitation for Wednesday; for Madame Geoffrin receives the men of letters on that day, as she does the artists on Monday. M. Marmontel hinted that I am more likely to find amusing companions and useful friends amongst the men of letters than amongst the artists.”
“If true, at least scarce courteous, as addressed to you.”
“Very courteously said, however. He comes from the mountains of Auvergne, and remembers a happy, virtuous, humble home,”
“The less a man remembers the better,” said Prosper. “Nature has given us eyes before, not behind us. Gerard, my friend, you will need my coat a little longer; and you can keep it, if you will. Your new patroness is one who will respect you for appearing twice at her table in the same suit, when she knows you cannot afford another.”
“Thank you,” said Gerard. “And I am sure you are right, Prosper.”
“If he should ruin my coat as he ruined his own,” Prosper thought, “there is no great harm done. Gold lace is quite passé; people are taking it to pieces for the bullion. And I shall have established a claim upon his gratitude.”
“Have you any more adventures to tell?” he asked aloud.
“No―yes―I forgot. Yesterday I had a long argument with a priest, a relative of Madame Bairdon’s.”
“What a loss of time! I pity you.”
“No occasion for pity. I gave him my mind about the Holy Catholic Church. Not my whole mind―not all I know, or the worst―but enough to prove that the ‘ark of God,’ as they call it, is a foul and hideous galley, crammed with guilt and misery, and resounding with curses and blows and shrieks of pain. If the crazy old craft does not go down of itself, may the Philosophers give it a well-aimed shot or two, and sink it beneath the waters of oblivion, in mercy to Humanity! From the depths of my heart I echo Voltaire’s cry, ‘Écrasez l’infâme!’”
“Say that to Madame Geoffrin, if you dare. What said your priest in answer?”
“Left the Catholic Church to her fate, and boldly assumed the offensive. He said I needed religion, that I could not live, above all that I could not die, without it.”
“Oh, yes!” scoffed Prosper. “The old, worn out platitudes! Since the priests can no longer burn us in this world, they kindly tell us we shall be burned in the next if we disobey them. The old taunts too! ‘Wait till you are M. le Philosophe, and you will be quick enough in sending for the sacraments.’ Or, again, ‘You are destroying public morality. When your valet steals your purse, he will tell you he too is a philosopher, and the Ten Commandments are exploded.’”
“Wish I had a purse and a valet to steal it!” said Gerard. “But these were not M. Goudin’s argumenta. His was an appeal, not to my selfishness, but to myself―my whole nature. It was this, Your body needs food, without it, you perish. You take food, you live and are strengthened by it. So your whole man―heart, soul, mind―needs religion. Take, accept, live by it; and the Life it sustains proves it true. Bread that nourishes is good bread.”
“My dear friend, I am dying with sleep. Goodnight to you.”