“Well! all the same, one is right in availing oneself of every opportunity when one is young!”
But Satin was already rolling about on the bear-skins of the bed-room and calling her.
“Come quick! come quick!”
Nana undressed herself in the dressing-room. To be ready quicker, she took her thick light hair in both hands, and shook it over the silver basin, whilst a shower of long hair-pins fell from it, ringing a chime on the shining metal.
CHAPTER XI
On that Sunday, beneath the cloudy sky of one of the first warm days of June, the race for the Grand Prize of Paris was to be run in the Bois de Boulogne. In the morning the sun had risen enveloped in a reddish mist; but towards eleven o’clock, at the moment when the first vehicles reached the Longchamps racecourse, a wind from the south swept the clouds before it. Long flakes of greyish vapour passed slowly away, whilst patches of dark blue sky gradually showed larger and larger from one end of the horizon to the other. And in the bursts of sunshine which kept appearing through the breaks in the clouds, everything sparkled abruptly—the green turf, which was little by little being covered by a crowd of vehicles, and of persons on horseback and on foot; the course still free, with the judge’s stand, the winning-post, and the starting-place; then opposite, in the middle of the enclosure, the five symmetrical stands, with their storeys of brick and wood. Bathed in the midday light, the vast plain extended beyond, bordered by little trees, and confined in the west by the wooded hills of Saint-Cloud and Suresnes, which were crowned by the sharp outline of Mont Valérien.
Nana, as excited as if the race for the Grand Prize was to decide her own fortune, wished to have a place as near as possible to the winning-post. She arrived very early, one of the first, in her silver-mounted landau, to which were harnessed four magnificent white horses, a present from Count Muffat. When she appeared, with two postillions on the near side horses, and two grooms seated immovably behind the carriage, there was quite a rush on the part of the crowd, the same as at the passage of a queen. She wore the colours of the Vandeuvres stable, blue and white, intermingled in a most extraordinary costume. The little body and the tunic, in blue silk, were very tight fitting, and raised behind in an enormous puff which gave all the more prominence to the tightness in front; the skirt and sleeves were in white satin, as well as a sash that passed over the shoulder, and the whole was trimmed with silver braid which sparkled in the sunshine. Whilst, the more to resemble a jockey, she had placed a flat blue cap, ornamented with a feather, on the top of her chignon, from which a long switch of her golden hair hung down the middle of her back like an enormous yellow tail.
Twelve o’clock struck. There were still three hours to wait for the race for the Grand Prize. As soon as the landau had taken up its position, Nana put herself at her ease, as though at home. She had amused herself by bringing Bijou and little Louis. The dog, asleep amongst her skirts, was shivering in spite of the heat, whilst the child, dressed up in ribbons and lace, remained as though dumb, and had become so pale from the force of the wind that he looked like a wax figure. The young woman, without troubling herself about her neighbours, talked very loud with Philippe and George Hugon, seated opposite to her amidst such a pile of bouquets, white roses and blue forget-me-nots, that they were invisible below the shoulders.
“So,” she was saying, “as he was becoming quite unbearable I showed him the door; and for the last two days he hasn’t been near me.
She was speaking of Muffat, only she did not tell the two young men the real cause of the quarrel. One night he had found a man’s hat in her room; it had merely been a stupid fancy of hers, a mere nobody she had picked up just to enliven her.
“You don’t know how peculiar he’s becoming,” she continued, amused at the details she was giving. “He’s a regular bigot. For instance, he says his prayers every night. Oh! it’s quite true. He thinks I don’t notice it, as I go to bed first so as not to be in his way; but I have my eye on him. He mutters, he makes the sign of the cross as he turns round to step over me to get to the inside of the bed.”
“How artful!” murmured Philippe. “Does he do it before and after them?”
She laughed aloud.
“Yes, that’s it; before and after. When I doze off, I can hear him muttering again. But what annoys me is that we can’t have the least dispute without his immediately talking of the priests. Now, I’ve always been religious. Oh! laugh as much as you like, it won’t prevent me believing what I believe. Only, he’s too bad; he sobs, he talks of his remorse. For instance, the day before yesterday, after our row, he had quite an attack; I began to feel very anxious—” But she interrupted herself to say, “Look, there are the Mignons. Why, they’ve brought the children. Aren’t they dressed up, those youngsters?”
The Mignons were in a very quiet coloured landau, with the substantial air of people who had made their fortune. Rose, in a grey silk dress, trimmed with little cerise puffs and bows, was smiling, pleased at the evident delight of Henri and Charles, sitting on the front seat, in their rather too ample collegian uniforms. But when the landau had taken up its position, and she caught sight of Nana, triumphing in the midst of her bouquets, with her four horses, her postillions and her grooms in livery, she bit her lips, and sitting bolt upright, turned away her head. Mignon, on the contrary, looking very well and lively, waved his hand. It was one of his principles always to keep out of women’s quarrels.
“By the way,” resumed Nana, “do you know a little old fellow, very tidy in his appearance, and with very bad teeth? A Monsieur Venot. He called on me this morning.”
“Monsieur Venot!” echoed George in amazement. “It can’t be! He’s a Jesuit.”
“Precisely, I soon found that out. Oh! you’ve no idea what we talked about! It was so funny! He spoke of the count, and of his disunited family, the happiness of which he implored me to restore. He was very polite, too, and smiling all the time. Then I told him I should be only too pleased to do as he wished; and in the end I promised to make the count return to his wife. You know, it’s not a joke; for I shall be delighted to see the whole lot of them happy! Besides, it will give me a rest, for there are days when he is really too tiresome!”
Her weariness of the last few months escaped her in that cry from her heart. With all that, too, the count appeared to be in great straits for money. He was careworn; the bill he had given to Labordette was coming due, and he did not see his way to meet it.
“Why, there is the countess over there,” said George, who had been glancing along the stands.
“Where?” exclaimed Nana. “What eyes he has, that baby! Hold my parasol, Philippe.”
But George, with a quick movement, forestalled his brother, and was quite delighted at holding the blue silk parasol, with silver fringe. Nana looked through an enormous field-glass.
“Ah, yes! I see her,” said she at length. “In the stand to the right, close to a pillar, is she not? She is in mauve, with her daughter in white beside her. Why! there’s Daguenet going up to them.”
Then Philippe talked of Daguenet’s approaching marriage with that stick Estelle. It was a settled thing; they were publishing the banns. The countess objected at first, but the count, so it was said, had insisted. Nana smiled.
“I know, I know,” murmured she. “So much the better, Paul. He’s a nice fellow—he deserves it”; and leaning towards little Louis, she added, “Well, are you amusing yourself? How serious the child looks!”
The child, without a smile, watched the crowd about him, looking very old, and as though full of sad reflections on what he saw. Bijou, driven from the skirts of the young woman, who was always moving about, had gone to shiver against the little one.
The space around was rapidly filling up. Vehicles of all sorts continuously arrived in a compact, interminable line. There were enormous omnibuses, like the “Pauline” which had started from the Boulevard des Italiens with its fifty passengers and which took up a position near the stands. Then there w
ere dog-carts, victorias, and most elegant landaus, which mingled with old tumble-down cabs dragged by the most wretched horses; and four-in-hands and stage-coaches, with their owners seated on the top, and the servants inside taking care of the hampers of champagne; and light traps of every description, some driven tandem fashion, and accompanied by a jingling of bells. Now and again a gentleman on horseback passed, or a crowd of persons on foot rushed in amongst the vehicles. The rumbling noise which accompanied the latter all along the winding turnings of the Bois de Boulogne ceased as they drove on to the grass. Nothing was heard but the murmur of the ever-increasing crowd, shouts and calls and cracking of whips, which resounded in the open air. And each time the sun appeared from out the clouds scattered by the wind, a blaze of golden light lit up the mounted harnesses and the varnished panels, and brought out the brilliant colours of the costumes; whilst in that flood of sunshine the coachmen on their high seats were conspicuous with their long whips.
Labordette was alighting from an open carriage in which Gaga, Clarisse, and Blanche de Sivry had reserved him a place. As he was hastening to cross the course and enter the enclosure, Nana got George to call him. Then when he came up,
“What’s my price?” she asked with a laugh.
She was speaking of Nana, the filly—that Nana which had been ignominiously defeated in the race for the Diana Prize, and which, even in the months just past—April and May—had not even been placed in the races for the Des Cars Prize and the Grand Poule des Produits, both of which had fallen to Lusignan, the other thoroughbred of the Vandeuvres stable. Lusignan had at once become chief favourite, and had latterly been freely taken at two to one.
“Still at fifty,” replied Labordette.
“The devil! then I’m not worth much,” resumed Nana, who was amused at the joke. ”Then I sha’n’t back myself. No, I’ll be hanged if I do! I won’t put a single louis on myself.”
Labordette, who was in a great hurry, was starting off again; but she called him back. She wanted a piece of advice. He who knew a number of trainers and jockeys, had the best information respecting the different stables. Twenty times already his tips had come off. He was nicknamed the king of the sporting prophets.
“Come now, which horses ought I to back?” asked the young woman. “At what price is the English one?”
“Spirit? at three to one; Valerio II. also at three to one. Then the others—Cosinus at twenty-five, Hasard at forty, Boum at thirty, Pichenette at thirty-five, Frangipane at ten.”
“No, I won’t back the English horse. I’m patriotic. Well, what do you say? Shall it be Valerio II.? The Duke de Corbreuse looked quite beaming just now. Well, no! I’d rather not. Fifty louis on Lusignan—what do you say?”
Labordette looked at her in a peculiar manner. She leant forward and questioned him in a low voice, for she knew that Vandeuvres instructed him to bet for him with the bookmakers, so as to be more free in his own betting. If he had learnt anything, he might as well tell her; but Labordette, without explaining why, advised her to trust to his instinct. He would lay out her fifty louis as he thought best, and she should not regret it.
“All the horses you like,” he cried gaily, as he went off, “but not Nana—she’s a jade!”az
They all laughed madly in the carriage. The young men thought it very funny, whilst little Louis, without understanding, raised his pale eyes to his mother, the loud accents of whose voice surprised him. Labordette, however, was still unable to get off. Rose Mignon had beckoned him, and she gave him some instructions which he wrote down in his note-book; then Clarisse and Gaga called him back, as they wished to modify their bets; they had heard different things in the crowd, and would no longer back Valerio II., but went in for Lusignan; he, quite impassible, made notes of what they required. At length he got away, and was seen to disappear between two of the stands on the other side of the course.
Carriages still continued to arrive. They now comprised five rows along the barrier bordering the course, and formed quite a dense mass streaked here and there by the light hue of the white horses. Then beyond, there were numerous other isolated vehicles, looking as though they had stuck in the grass, a medley of wheels and of teams in every possible position, side by side, slantwise, crosswise, and head to head; and horsemen trotted across the plots of grass that were still comparatively free, whilst foot-passengers appeared in black groups continually on the move. Overtopping this kind of fair-ground, amidst the strangely mixed crowd, rose the grey refreshment tents, to which the sunshine imparted a white appearance. But the greatest crush, an ever-moving sea of hats, was around the bookmakers, who were standing up in open vehicles, gesticulating like quack dentists, with their betting lists stuck up on boards beside them.
“All the same, it’s awfully stupid not to know what horse one’s backing,” Nana was saying. “I must venture a few louis myself.”
She stood up to select a book-maker whose face should take her fancy. But she forgot her intention as she caught sight of a crowd of acquaintances around her. Besides the Mignons, and Gaga, and Clarisse and Blanche, there were on the right, and the left, and behind, in the midst of the mass of vehicles which had now quite shut in her landau, Tatan Néné with Maria Blond in a victoria, Caroline Hequet with her mother and two gentlemen in a calash, Louise Violaine, all alone, and driving a little basket chaiseba bedecked with orange and green ribbons, the colour of the Méchain stable, Léa de Horn on the box seat of a stage-coach, with a crowd of young men who were making a great noise. Farther off, Lucy Stewart, in a very simple black silk dress, was looking most distinguished beside a young man wearing the uniform of a midshipman, in a carriage of most aristocratic appearance. But what really astounded Nana was to see Simone arrive in a trap that Steiner was driving tandem fashion, with a tiger sitting bolt upright behind, bb his arms folded, and quite immovable; she was resplendent, all in white satin striped with yellow, and sparkling with diamonds from her waist to her bonnet, whilst the banker, with a long whip, urged on the two horses, the first a little chestnut, which trotted like a mouse, and the other, a tall bay, a stepper which raised its legs very high.
“By Jove!” said Nana, “that old thief Steiner must have made another haul at the Bourse! Doesn’t Simone look smart? It’s too much, he’ll get copped one of these days.”
But, all the same, she exchanged a bow with them from a distance. She kept waving her hand, smiling, and turning about, forgetting no one so as to be seen by all. And she continued talking.
“But it’s her son that Lucy is dragging about with her! He looks very nice in his uniform. That’s why she’s trying to be so grand! You know that she’s afraid of him, and pretends she’s an actress. Poor young man, all the same! He doesn’t seem to have an idea of the truth.”
“Pooh!” murmured Philippe, laughing, “whenever she chooses she will find him a country heiress.”
Nana left off talking. She had just caught sight of old Tricon, in the thick of the vehicles. Having come in a cab from which she could see nothing, the old lady had quietly mounted the driver’s seat. And there, standing up to the full height of her tall figure, with her noble-looking face and long curls, she commanded a full view of the crowd, and seemed to be reigning over her women people. They all discreetly smiled to her. She, as a superior being, pretended not to know them. She was not there to work, she came to see the races for pleasure, for she was an inveterate gambler, and was mad about horses.
“Look! there’s that idiot La Faloise!” said George suddenly.
It was a surprise to all of them. Nana no longer recognised her La Faloise. Since he had inherited his uncle’s fortune, he had become an extraordinarily fashionable young man. With his collar slightly turned down in front, dressed in a light coloured suit, which fitted tightly to his bony shoulders, and with his hair curled, he affected a jog-trot of weariness, a feeble tone of voice, slang words, and phrases which he never took the trouble to finish.
“But he looks very well!” declared Nana, f
ascinated.
Gaga and Clarisse called La Faloise, throwing themselves at his head, so to say, trying to hook him again. But he left them at once, with an air of pity, mingled with disdain. Nana attracted him, and hastening to her, he stood on the step of the carriage; and as she chaffed him about Gaga, he murmured:
“Oh, no! no more of the old guard! It’s no use their trying! Besides, you know, you’re now my Juliet—”
He placed his hand on his heart. Nana laughed immensely at that abrupt declaration before everyone. But she resumed:
“There, that’ll do. You’re making me forget that I want to bet. George, you see that book-maker over there, the fat red one, with curly hair? He has the head of a dirty rascal, which takes my fancy. You go and bet with him. Well, what shall I back?”
“I’m no patriot!—oh, no!” stuttered La Faloise; “all my money is on the English horse. What a lark if he wins! All the French will go mad!”
Nana thought his language disgraceful. Then they discussed the merits of the different horses. La Faloise, to make everyone think that he was a judge of horse-flesh, pretended they were all sorry animals. Baron Verdier’s Frangipane, was by Truth out of Lenore; It was a big bay, and might have had a chance if it had not been lamed during training. As for Valerio II., from the Corbreuse stable, it was not in condition, it had had the gripes in April; oh! they were keeping that dark, but he was sure of it, on his word of honour! And he ended by recommending Hasard, a horse belonging to the Méchain stable, the worst beast of the lot, and which no one would look at. The deuce! Hasard showed superb form, and such a style! There was an animal that would surprise everyone!