CHAPTER II. AN ITALIAN PROVERB
Although the two sentiments which we have just indicated were thedominant ones, they did not manifest themselves to an equal degreein all present. The shades were graduated according to the sex, age,character, we may almost say, the social positions of the hearers. Thewine merchant, Jean Picot, the principal personage in the late event,recognizing at first sight by his dress, weapons, mask, one of themen who had stopped the coach on the preceding day, was at first sightstupefied, then little by little, as he grasped the purport of thismysterious brigand's visit to him, he had passed from stupefaction tojoy, through the intermediate phases separating these two emotions. Hisbag of gold was beside him, yet he seemingly dared not touch it; perhapshe feared that the instant his hand went forth toward it, it would meltlike the dream-gold which vanishes during that period of progressivelucidity which separates profound slumber from thorough awakening.
The stout gentleman of the diligence and his wife had displayed, liketheir travelling companions, the most absolute and complete terror.Seated to the left of Jean Picot, when the bandit approached the winemerchant, the husband, in the vain hope of maintaining a respectabledistance between himself and the Companion of Jehu, pushed his chairback against that of his wife, who, yielding to the pressure, in turnendeavored to push back hers. But as the next chair was occupied bycitizen Alfred de Barjols, who had no reason to fear these men whomhe had just praised so highly, the chair of the stout man's wifeencountered an obstacle in the immovability of the young noble; so,as at Marengo, eight or nine months later, when the general in commandjudged it time to resume the offensive, the retrograde movement wasarrested.
As for him--we are speaking of the citizen Alfred de Barjols--hisattitude, like that of the abbe who had given the Biblical explanationabout Jehu, King of Israel, and his mission from Elisha, his attitude,we say, was that of a man who not only experiences no fear, but who evenexpects the event in question, however unexpected it may be. His lipswore a smile as he watched the masked man, and had the guests not beenso preoccupied with the two principal actors in this scene, they mighthave remarked the almost imperceptible sign exchanged between the eyesof the bandit and the young noble, and transmitted instantly by thelatter to the abbe.
The two travellers whom we introduced to the table d'hote, and who aswe have said sat apart at the end of the table, preserved an attitudeconformable to their respective characters. The younger of the two hadinstinctively put his hand to his side, as if to seek an absent weapon,and had risen with a spring, as if to rush at the masked man's throat,in which purpose he had certainly not failed had he been alone; butthe elder, who seemed to possess not only the habit but the right ofcommand, contented himself by regrasping his coat, and saying, in animperious, almost harsh tone: "Sit down, Roland!" And the young man hadresumed his seat.
But one of the guests had remained, in appearance at least, the mostimpassible during this scene. He was a man between thirty-three andthirty-four years of age, with blond hair, red beard, a calm, handsomeface, with large blue eyes, a fair skin, refined and intelligent lips,and very tall, whose foreign accent betrayed one born in that island ofwhich the government was at that time waging bitter war against France.As far as could be judged by the few words which had escaped him, hespoke the French language with rare purity, despite the accent we havejust mentioned. At the first word he uttered, in which that Englishaccent revealed itself, the elder of the two travellers started. Turningto his companion, he asked with a glance, to which the other seemedaccustomed, how it was that an Englishman should be in France when theuncompromising war between the two nations had naturally exiled allEnglishmen from France, as it had all Frenchmen from England. No doubtthe explanation seemed impossible to Roland, for he had replied with hiseyes, and a shrug of the shoulders: "I find it quite as extraordinaryas you; but if you, mathematician as you are, can't solve the problem,don't ask me!"
It was evident to the two young men that the fair man with theAnglo-Saxon accent was the traveller whose comfortable carriage awaitedhim harnessed in the courtyard, and that this traveller hailed fromLondon, or, at least, from some part of Great Britain.
As to his remarks, they, as we have stated, were infrequent, so laconic,in reality, that they were mere exclamations rather than speech. Buteach time an explanation had been asked concerning the state of France,the Englishman openly drew out a note-book and requested those abouthim, the wine merchant, the abbe, or the young noble to repeat theirremarks; to which each had complied with an amiability equal to thecourteous tone of the request. He had noted down the most important,extraordinary and, picturesque features of the robbery of the diligence,the state of Vendee, and the details about the Companions of Jehu,thanking each informant by voice and gesture with the stiffness peculiarto our insular cousins, replacing his note-book enriched each time by anew item in a side pocket of his overcoat.
Finally, like a spectator enjoying an unexpected scene, he had given acry of satisfaction at sight of the masked man, had listened with allhis ears, gazed with all his eyes, not losing him from sight until thedoor closed behind him. Then drawing his note-book hastily from hispocket--
"Ah, sir," he said to his neighbor, who was no other than the abbe,"will you be so kind, should my memory fail me, as to repeat what thatgentleman who has just gone out said?"
He began to write immediately, and the abbe's memory agreeing withhis, he had the satisfaction of transcribing literally and verbatim thespeech made by the Companion of Jehu to citizen Jean Picot. Then, thisconversation written down, he exclaimed with an accent that lent asingular stamp of originality to his words:
"Of a truth! it is only in France that such things can happen; Franceis the most curious country in the world. I am delighted, gentlemen, totravel in France and become acquainted with Frenchmen."
The last sentence was said with such courtesy that nothing remained saveto thank the speaker from whose serious mouth it issued, though he wasa descendant of the conquerors of Crecy, Poitiers and Agincourt. It wasthe younger of the two travellers who acknowledged this politeness inthat heedless and rather caustic manner which seemed habitual to him.
"'Pon my word! I am exactly like you, my lord--I say my lord, because Ipresume you are English."
"Yes, sir," replied the gentleman, "I have that honor."
"Well! as I was saying," continued the young man, "I am delighted totravel in France and see what I am seeing. One must live under thegovernment of citizens Gohier, Moulins, Roger Ducos, Sieyes and Barrasto witness such roguery. I dare wager than when the tale is told, fiftyyears hence, of the highwayman who rode into a city of thirty thousandinhabitants in broad day, masked and armed with two pistols and a swordat his belt, to return the two hundred louis which he had stolen the dayprevious to the honest merchant who was then deploring their loss, andwhen it is added that this occurred at a table d'hote where twenty ortwenty-five people were seated, and that this model bandit was allowedto depart without one of those twenty or twenty-five people daring tomolest him; I dare wager, I repeat, that whoever has the audacity totell the story will be branded as an infamous liar."
And the young man, throwing himself back in his chair, burst intolaughter, so aggressive, so nervous, that every one gazed at him inwonderment, while his companion's eyes expressed an almost paternalanxiety.
"Sir," said citizen Alfred de Barjols, who, moved like the others bythis singular outburst, more sad, or rather dolorous, than gay, hadwaited for its last echo to subside. "Sir, permit me to point out to youthat the man whom you have just seen is not a highwayman."
"Bah! Frankly, what is he then?"
"He is in all probability a young man of as good a family as yours ormine."
"Count Horn, whom the Regent ordered broken on the wheel at the Placede Greve, was also a man of good family, and the proof is that all thenobility of Paris sent their carriages to his execution."
"Count Horn, if I remember rightly, murdered a Jew to steal a noteof hand which he w
as unable to meet. No one would dare assert that aCompanion of Jehu had ever so much as harmed the hair of an infant."
"Well, be it so. We will admit that the Company was founded upon aphilanthropic basis, to re-establish the balance of fortunes, redressthe whims of chance and reform the abuses of society. Though he may bea robber, after the fashion of Karl Moor, your friend Morgan--was it notMorgan that this honest citizen called himself?"
"Yes," said the Englishman.
"Well, your friend Morgan is none the less a thief."
Citizen Alfred de Barjols turned very pale.
"Citizen Morgan is not my friend," replied the young aristocrat; "but ifhe were I should feel honored by his friendship."
"No doubt," replied Roland, laughing. "As Voltaire says: 'The friendshipof a great man is a blessing from the gods.'"
"Roland, Roland!" observed his comrade in a low tone.
"Oh! general," replied the latter, letting his companion's rank escapehim, perhaps intentionally, "I implore you, let me continue thisdiscussion, which interests me in the highest degree."
His friend shrugged his shoulders.
"But, citizen," continued the young man with strange persistence, "Istand in need of correction. I left France two years ago, and during myabsence so many things have changed, such as dress, morals, and accents,that even the language may have changed also. In the language of the dayin France what do you call stopping coaches and taking the money whichthey contain?"
"Sir," said the young noble, in the tone of a man determined to sustainhis argument to its end, "I call that war. Here is your companion whomyou have just called general; he as a military man will tell you that,apart from the pleasure of killing and being killed, the generals ofall ages have never done anything else than what the citizen Morgan isdoing?"
"What!" exclaimed the young man, whose eyes flashed fire. "You dare tocompare--"
"Permit the gentleman to develop his theory, Roland," said the darktraveller, whose eyes, unlike those of his companion, which dilated asthey flamed, were veiled by long black lashes, thus concealing all thatwas passing in his mind.
"Ah!" said the young man in his curt tone, "you see that you, yourself,are becoming interested in the discussion." Then, turning to the youngnoble, whom he seemed to have selected for his antagonist, he said:"Continue, sir, continue; the general permits it."
The young noble flushed as visibly as he had paled a moment before.Between clinched teeth, his elbow on the table, his chin on his clinchedhand, as if to draw as close to his adversary as possible, he said witha Provencal accent, which grew more pronounced as the discussion waxedhotter: "Since _the general_ permits"--emphasizing the two words--"Ishall have the honor to tell him and you, too, citizen, that I believeI have read in Plutarch that Alexander the Great, when he started forIndia, took with him but eighteen or twenty talents in gold, somethinglike one hundred or one hundred and twenty thousand francs. Now, doyou suppose that with these eighteen or twenty talents alone he fed hisarmy, won the battle of Granicus, subdued Asia Minor, conquered Tyre,Gaza, Syria and Egypt, built Alexandria, penetrated to Lybia, hadhimself declared Son of Jupiter by the oracle of Ammon, penetratedas far as the Hyphases, and, when his soldiers refused to follow himfurther, returned to Babylon, where he surpassed in luxury, debaucheryand self-indulgence the most debauched and voluptuous of the kingsof Asia? Did Macedonia furnish his supplies? Do you believe that KingPhilip, most indigent of the kings of poverty-stricken Greece, honoredthe drafts his son drew upon him? Not so. Alexander did as citizenMorgan is doing; only, instead of stopping the coaches on the highroads,he pillaged cities, held kings for ransom, levied contributions fromthe conquered countries. Let us turn to Hannibal. You know how he leftCarthage, don't you? He did not have even the eighteen or twenty talentsof his predecessor; and as he needed money, he seized and sacked thecity of Saguntum in the midst of peace, in defiance of the fealty oftreaties. After that he was rich and could begin his campaign. Forgiveme if this time I no longer quote Plutarch, but Cornelius Nepos. I willspare you the details of his descent from the Pyrenees, how he crossedthe Alps and the three battles which he won, seizing each time thetreasures of the vanquished, and turn to the five or six years he spentin Campania. Do you believe that he and his army paid the Capuans fortheir subsistence, and that the bankers of Carthage, with whom he hadquarrelled, supplied him with funds? No; war fed war--the Morgan system,citizen. Let us pass on to Caesar. Ah, Caesar! That's another story. Heleft for Spain with some thirty millions of debt, and returned withpractically the same. He started for Gaul, where he spent ten years withour ancestors. During these ten years he sent over one hundred millionsto Rome, repassed the Alps, crossed the Rubicon, marched straight to theCapitol, forced the gates of the Temple of Saturn, where the treasurywas, seized sufficient for his private needs--and not for those of theRepublic--three thousand pounds of gold in ingots; and died (he whomcreditors twenty years earlier refused to allow to leave his littlehouse in the Suburra) leaving two or three thousand sesterces per headto the citizens, ten or twelve millions to Calpurnia, and thirty orforty millions to Octavius; always the Morgan system, save that Morgan,I am sure, would die sooner than subvert to his personal needs eitherthe silver of the Gauls or the gold of the capital. Now let us springover eighteen centuries and come to the General Buonaparte." And theyoung aristocrat, after the fashion of the enemies of the Conqueror ofItaly, affected to emphasize the _u_, which Bonaparte had eliminatedfrom his name, and the _e_, from which he had removed the accent.
This affectation seemed to irritate Roland intensely. He made a movementas if to spring forward, but his companion stopped him.
"Let be," said he, "let be, Roland. I am quite sure that citizen Barjolswill not say the General Buonaparte, as he calls him, is a thief."
"No, I will not say it; but there is an Italian proverb which says itfor me."
"What is the proverb?" demanded the general in his companion's stead,fixing his calm, limpid eye upon the young noble.
"I give it in all its simplicity: 'Francesi non sono tutti ladroni, mabuona parte'; which means: 'All Frenchmen are not thieves, but--"
"A good part are?" concluded Roland.
"Yes, 'Buonaparte,'" replied Alfred de Barjols.
Scarcely had these insolent words left the young aristocrat's lips thanthe plate with which Roland was playing flew from his hands and struckDe Barjols full in the face. The women screamed, the men rose to theirfeet. Roland burst into that nervous laugh which was habitual with him,and threw himself back in his chair. The young aristocrat remained calm,although the blood was trickling from his brow to his cheek.
At this moment the conductor entered with the usual formula:
"Come! citizen travellers, take your places."
The travellers, anxious to leave the scene of the quarrel, rushed to thedoor.
"Pardon me, sir," said Alfred de Barjols to Roland, "you do not go bydiligence, I hope?"
"No, sir, I travel by post; but you need have no fear; I shall notdepart."
"Nor I," said the Englishman. "Have them unharness my horses; I shallremain."
"I must go," sighed the dark young man whom Roland had addressed asgeneral. "You know it is necessary, my friend; my presence yonder isabsolutely imperative. But I swear that I would not leave you if I couldpossibly avoid it."
In saying these words his voice betrayed an emotion of which, judgingfrom its usual harsh, metallic ring, it had seemed incapable. Roland, onthe contrary, seemed overjoyed. His belligerent nature seemed to expandat the approach of a danger to which he had perhaps not given rise, butwhich he at least had not endeavored to avoid.
"Good! general," he said. "We were to part at Lyons, since you have hadthe kindness to grant me a month's furlough to visit my family at Bourg.It is merely some hundred and sixty miles or so less than we intended,that is all. I shall rejoin you in Paris. But you know if you need adevoted arm, and a man who never sulks, think of me!"
"You may rest easy on that score, Roland,"
exclaimed the general.Then, looking attentively at the two adversaries, he added with anindescribable note of tenderness: "Above all, Roland, do not letyourself be killed; but if it is a possible thing don't kill youradversary. Everything considered, he is a gallant man, and the day willcome when I shall need such men at my side."
"I shall do my best, general; don't be alarmed." At this moment thelandlord appeared upon the thresh-hold of the door.
"The post-chaise is ready," said he.
The general took his hat and his cane, which he had laid upon the chair.Roland, on the contrary, followed him bareheaded, that all might seeplainly he did not intend to leave with his friend. Alfred de Barjols,therefore, offered no opposition to his leaving the room. Besides, itwas easy to see that his adversary was of those who seek rather thanavoid quarrels.
"Just the same," said the general, seating himself in the carriage towhich Roland had escorted him, "my heart is heavy at leaving you thus,Roland, without a friend to act as your second."
"Good! Don't worry about that, general; seconds are never lacking. Thereare and always will be enough men who are curious to see how one man cankill another."
"Au revoir, Roland. Observe, I do not say farewell, but au revoir!"
"Yes, my dear general," replied the young man, in a voice that revealedsome emotion, "I understand, and I thank you."
"Promise that you will send me word as soon as the affair is over, orthat you will get some one to write if you are disabled."
"Oh, don't worry, general. You will have a letter from me personallyin less than four days," replied Roland, adding, in a tone of profoundbitterness: "Have you not perceived that I am protected by a fatalitywhich prevents me from dying?"
"Roland!" exclaimed the general in a severe tone, "Again!"
"Nothing, nothing," said the young man, shaking his head and assumingan expression of careless gayety which must have been habitual with himbefore the occurrence of that unknown misfortune which oppressed hisyouth with this longing for death.
"Very well. By the way, try to find out one thing."
"What is that, general?"
"How it happens that at a time when we are at war with England anEnglishman stalks about France as freely and as easily as if he were athome."
"Good; I will find out."
"How?"
"I do not know; but when I promise you to find out I shall do so, thoughI have to ask it of himself."
"Reckless fellow! Don't get yourself involved in another affair in thatdirection."
"In any case, it would not be a duel. It would be a battle, as he is anational enemy."
"Well, once more--till I see you again. Embrace me."
Roland flung himself with passionate gratitude upon the neck of thepersonage who had just given him this permission.
"Oh, general!" he exclaimed, "how happy I should be--if I were not sounhappy!"
The general looked at him with profound affection, then asked: "One dayyou will tell me what this sorrow is, will you not, Roland?"
Roland laughed that sorrowful laugh which had already escaped his lipsonce or twice.
"Oh! my word, no," said he, "you would ridicule me too much."
The general stared at him as one would contemplate a madman.
"After all," he murmured, "one must accept men as they come."
"Especially when they are not what they seem to be."
"You must mistake me for OEdipe since you pose me with these enigmas,Roland."
"Ah! If you guess this one, general, I will herald you king of Thebes!But, with all my follies, I forgot that your time is precious and that Iam detaining you needlessly with my nonsense."
"That is so! Have you any commissions for Paris?"
"Yes, three; my regards to Bourrienne, my respects to your brotherLucien, and my most tender homage to Madame Bonaparte."
"I will deliver them."
"Where shall I find you in Paris?"
"At my house in the Rue de la Victoire, perhaps."
"Perhaps--"
"Who knows? Perhaps at Luxembourg!" Then throwing himself back as ifhe regretted having said so much, even to a man he regarded as hisbest friend, he shouted to the postilion, "Road to Orange! As fast aspossible."
The postilion, who was only waiting for the order, whipped up hishorses; the carriage departed rapidly, rumbling like a roll of thunder,and disappeared through the Porte d'Oulle.