Part II: Chapters VI-X
Contents
Chapter VI: The Result of a Snowstorm.
Chapter VII: In Which This Novel Justifies its Title.
Chapter VIII: Matters Become Complicated.
Chapter IX: Swords, Sticks, and Other Goings-On.
Chapter X: A Face at the Window.
Chapter VI: The Result of a Snowstorm
As one might imagine, the actors were highly satisfied with their stay at the Château de Bruyères. Such windfalls did not often come their way in that nomadic life; the Tyrant had doled out to each their share of the fee, and their fingers’ affectionate titillations stirred a few pistoles in the depths of pockets often accustomed to serve as inns for the devil. Zerbina, radiating a restrained, mysterious joy, accepted, with good humour, her comrades’ mocking comments as to the power of her charms. She triumphed, and thereby enraged Serafina. Only Leander, still quite exhausted from the nocturnal beating he had received, seemed reluctant to share in the general gaiety, though he affected a smile, even if it was only that of a dog, at the tips of his teeth, so to speak. His movements were constrained, and the jolts the carriage experienced sometimes forced a significant grimace from him. When he judged that no one was looking, he rubbed his shoulders and arms with his palms; concealed manouevres which might have deceived the other actors, but failed to escape the inquisitive, and sarcastic eyes of Scapin, always on the lookout for misadventures on the part of Leander, whose conceit was particularly unbearable to him.
The collision of a wheel with a rather large stone, which the wagon-driver had failed to see, made the gallant fellow utter an ‘Ouch!’ of anguish and pain, whereupon Scapin began a little speech, under the pretence of pitying him.
— ‘My poor Leander, why are you moaning and lamenting so? You seem as worn out as the Knight of the Woeful Countenance (Don Quixote) when he capered naked in the Sierra Morena as a love-penance (see Cervantes’ ‘Don Quixote’, Chapter XXV), in imitation of Amadis of Gaul on the Rock of the Hermitage (see ‘Amadis de Gaula’, revised and published by Garcí Rodríguez de Montalvo, 1508, Chapter 3). You act as if your bed was made of sticks, and not soft mattresses with sheets, quilts, and pillows, a bed in short more likely to break limbs than grant them rest, so downtrodden are you, so sickly your complexion, and so blackened your eyes. From all this, it appears that Morpheus failed to visit you last night.’
— ‘Morpheus may have lingered in his cave, but that little god Cupid is a prowler who needs no lantern to locate a door in a corridor,’ replied Leander, hoping to divert the suspicions of his enemy Scapin.
— ‘I am a mere valet in Comedy,’ Scapin replied, ‘and have no experience as regards matters of gallantry. I myself have never made love to beautiful women; but I know enough to be aware that the god Cupid, according to the poets and writers of romances, uses his arrows on those he wishes to cause distress, and not thumps from his bow.’
— ‘What on earth do you mean,’ Leander hastened to interrupt, worried by the turn the conversation was taking, ‘by such subtlety, and mythological reference?’
— ‘Not a thing, except that you have there on your neck, a little above your collarbone, though you try to hide it with your handkerchief, a black mark which tomorrow will be blue, the day after that green, and then yellow, until it fades to leave the natural colour behind, a mark which looks devilishly like the authentic signature of a blow from a stick, as if writ on calfskin or vellum, if you prefer that image.’
— ‘Doubtless,’ replied Leander, whose pallid complexion had turned red up to the tips of his ears, ‘some dead beauty, in love with me during her life, must have kissed me in dream while I slept. The kisses of the dead leave bruises on the flesh, as all know, which astonish us when we wake.’
— ‘This dead, and somewhat fantastical, beauty, arrives at just at the right moment,’ replied Scapin; ‘but I would have sworn that vigorous kiss was applied by lips of wood.’
— ‘Wicked mocker, and jester that you are,’ said Leander, ‘you infringe on my sense of modesty. I attributed to the dead, modestly, what might be more aptly claimed by the living. Unlearned and rustic as you affect to be, you have surely heard of such pretty signs, spots, bruises, and teeth-marks; traces of the playful frolics that lovers are accustomed to indulge in together?
— ‘Memorem dente labris notum’, interrupted the Pedant, happy to quote Horace (‘the usual mark of tooth on lip’, see the ‘Odes’ Book I, 13).
— ‘The explanation appears rational,’ replied Scapin, ‘and is supported by suitable authorities. Yet the mark is of such a length, that this nocturnal beauty, dead or alive, must have had in her mouth the single tooth which the Phorkyads (in Greek mythology) lent each other in turn.’
Leander, filled with fury, wanted to hurl himself at Scapin, and punish him, but the pain from the beating, which his sore ribs still felt so keenly as did his back striped like a zebra, was such that he seated himself again, postponing his revenge until a more fitting time. The Tyrant and the Pedant, accustomed to these quarrels, which amused them, encouraged the pair to reconcile. Scapin promised never to allude to the matter. ‘I will absent,’ he said, ‘from my discourse, all mention of wood in any of its forms, whether cut-logs, estate-trees, bed-frames, or even heartwood.’
During this interesting altercation, the cart rumbled on, and they shortly arrived at a crossroads. A crude wooden cross, split by the sun and rain, supporting a Christ whose one arm had detached itself from his body and, attached only by a rusty nail, hung sinisterly, occupied a grassy mound, and marked the junction of the roads.
A pair of men, leading a trio of mules, had halted at the crossroads, seemingly waiting for someone to pass by. One of the mules, as if impatient at standing still, shook its head, which was adorned with pompoms and tassels of every colour and a silvery frisson of bells. Although leather blinkers embroidered with studs prevented it from looking to right or left, it had sensed the approach of the wagon; the anxious twitching of its long ears testified to its curiosity, its curling lips revealing its teeth.
— ‘The Colonel is pricking her ears, and showing her gums,’ said one of the men. ‘Their cart must be near, now.’
Indeed, the actors’ wagon quickly reached the crossroads. Zerbina, seated at the front of the cart, glanced swiftly at the men and animals whose presence in this place seemed not to surprise her.
— ‘By God! There’s gallant equipage,’ said the Tyrant, ‘and fine Spanish mules that will cover fifteen or twenty leagues a day. If we had mules like that, we’d soon reach Paris or thereabouts. But who the Devil are they waiting for? Doubtless it’s a relay arranged for some lord or other.’
— ‘No,’ answered the Duenna, ‘that lead-mule is saddled with blanket and cushion as if for a woman.’
— ‘Then,’ said the Tyrant, ‘it’s a kidnap they plan, for those two squires in grey livery seem very suspicious.’
— ‘Perhaps it is,’ replied Zerbina with a smile, an equivocal expression on her face.
— ‘Is the lady they seek among us?’ said Scapin, as one of the two squires approached the wagon, as if wishing to parley before resorting to violence.
— ‘Oh! Why ask?’ added Serafina, casting a disdainful glance at the Soubrette, which the latter sustained with quiet impudence: ‘There are those who willingly leap into the arms of their captors.’
— ‘It’s not everybody who can be kidnapped so,’ replied the Soubrette; ‘the wish is not enough, one also needs prior agreement.’
The conversation had reached this point, when the squire, signalling to the wagon-driver to rein in his horses, asked, beret in hand, if Mademoiselle Zerbina was not in the carriage.
Zerbina, lively and nimble as a snake, poked her little brown head out of the awning, and answered the question herself; then she jumped to the ground.
— ‘Mademoiselle, I am at your command,’ said the squire in a gallant and respectful tone.
The Soubrette puffed out her skirts, ran her finger around her bodice, as if to give some ease to her chest, and, turning towards the actors, deliberately gave them this little speech:
— ‘My dear comrades, forgive me if I must leave you like this. Sometimes passing Fortune demands one seizes the lock of hair she presents to one’s eyes, in so opportune a manner that it would be pure foolishness not to grasp it with both hands; for the chance once lost is gone forever. Her face, which until now had only shown itself to me as sullen and gloomy, grants me a graceful smile. I shall profit by her goodwill, doubtless fleeting. In my humble role of maid, I could only aspire to a Mascarilla (a thieving valet in Italian comedy) or a Scapin. Only the valets court me, while their masters make love to the Lucindas, the Leonoras, and the Isabellas; the lords hardly deign, as they pass, to seize my face and plant a kiss on my cheek, as they slip a silver half-louis into the pocket of my apron. I have found a mortal of finer taste, who considers that, off-stage, the maid is as good as the mistress, and as the role of Zerbina does not require too absolute a show of virtue, I judged it unnecessary to drive that gallant man to despair whom my departure greatly annoyed. Come then, let me unload my trunks from the back of the cart, and receive my farewells. I will meet you some day or other in Paris, for I am an actress at heart, and could never be unfaithful to the theatre for very long.’
The men took Zerbina’s trunks, and balanced them carefully on the pack mules; the Soubrette, aided by the squire who held her foot, jumped on the Colonel’s back as lightly as if she had studied the art in some equestrian academy, then striking her heel against the flank of her mount, set off, giving a little wave of her hand to her comrades.
— ‘Good luck, Zerbina,’ shouted the members of the troupe, all except Serafina, who held a grudge against her.
— ‘Her departure is unfortunate,’ said the Tyrant, ‘I would have liked to retain the services of that excellent maid; but she gave no other commitment to us than mere whim. We will have to amend the role of maid to duenna or chaperone in our performances, though somewhat less pleasing to the eye than a roguish face; but Dame Leonarda has a sense of comedy, and knows the art thoroughly. We shall manage all the same.’
The wagon set off again at a pace somewhat faster than that of the previous oxcart. It crossed a stretch of countryside that contrasted in appearance with the physiognomy of the moorland they had navigated. White tracts of sand had been replaced by reddish soil providing more nourishment for vegetation. Stone houses, announcing a degree of prosperity, appeared here and there, surrounded by gardens enclosed by hedges already stripped of leaves, in which the fruit of the wild roses, their rosehips, were turning red, while the sloe berries were turning blue. At the edge of the road, trees of fine stature raised their vigorous trunks, stretching out strong branches, whose yellow spoils littered the surrounding grass or fled at the whim of the breeze before Isabella and Sigognac, who, tired of the cramped pose they were obliged to maintain in the wagon, were relaxing by walking a little. Matamore had taken the lead, and in the red glow of evening could be seen on the crest of the hill, his frail skeleton a dark silhouette, which, from a distance, seemed as if skewered on his rapier.
‘Matamore had taken the lead…’
— ‘How is it,’ Sigognac said to Isabella as he walked, ‘that you, who have all the manners of a young lady of high lineage, as is seen by the modesty of your conduct, your sober language, and fine choice of words, are thus attached to this wandering troupe of actors, good people, no doubt, but not of the same ilk as yourself?’
— ‘Please do not think,’ Isabella replied, ‘however gracious I may appear, that I am some unfortunate queen or princess driven from her kingdom, and reduced to the sad condition of earning her living on the stage. My story is quite a simple one, and since I have aroused your curiosity somewhat, I will tell you something of my life. Far from having been brought to the state I am in by some fatal catastrophe, some unheard-of disaster or romantic adventure, I was born so, being, as they say, a child of the theatre. Thespis’ chariot was my birthplace, and my travelling home. My mother, who played tragic princesses on the stage, was a most beautiful woman. She took her roles seriously, and even off-stage would hear only of kings, princes, dukes, and other grand folk, treating her tinsel crown and gilded wooden sceptre as if they were real. When she exited to the wings, she trailed the false velvet of her dresses so majestically one would have thought it a river of purple, or the train of a royal mantle. Being proud then, she stubbornly closed her ears to the confessions, requests, and promises of those lovers who always flutter around actresses like moths around a flame. One evening, in her dressing room, when some blond boy sought to take liberties with her, she even rose, and cried out, as if she were Tomyris, queen of Scythia: ‘Guards! Let him be seized!’, in so sovereign, disdainful, and solemn a tone that the young gallant, completely speechless, shrank back in fear, not daring to advance his suit. Now, this unusual show of pride, and the constant rebuffs meted out by an actress, one of a tribe always suspected of loose morals, having come to the attention of a noble and powerful prince, were thought by him to show good taste, and he said to himself that contempt for the common and profane could only proceed from a generous soul. As his rank in society matched that of a queen in the theatre, in her eyes, he was received in a gentler manner and with less fierce a frown. He was young, handsome, spoke well, was insistent, and possessed the great advantage of being nobly-born. What more can I say? On that occasion the queen did not call for her guards, and you see in me the fruit of their beautiful love.’
— ‘That,’ said Sigognac, gallantly, ‘perfectly explains the unparalleled grace you command. Princely blood flows in your veins. I might have guessed!’
— ‘The affair,’ Isabella continued, ‘lasted longer than theatrical intrigues usually do. The prince found in my mother a fidelity that stemmed as much from pride as from love, but which never wavered. Unfortunately, matters of state intervened; he was involved in wars or embassies abroad. An illustrious marriage, which he delayed as long as he could, was negotiated in his name by his family. He had to yield, as he had no right to disrupt, because of a lover’s whim, an ancestral line, established as far back as Charlemagne, or end that lineage in himself. My mother was offered quite large sums of money to soften the rupture which had become necessary, protect her from want, and provide for my upbringing and education. But she would hear none of it, saying that she would never accept the purse without the heart, and that she preferred that the prince be indebted to her rather than she be indebted to him; for she had given him, in her extreme generosity, what he could never repay. ‘Nothing before, nothing after,’ such was her motto. So, she continued her role as a tragic princess, but with a heavy heart, and languished till her death, which was not long in arriving. I was then a little girl of eight years old; I played children, and cupids, and other little roles appropriate to my age and intelligence. The death of my mother caused me grief beyond my years, and I remember I had to be whipped one time when I was forced to play one of Medea’s children. Yet the pain was soothed by the cajoling of the actors and actresses who pampered me as best they could, and as if by chance, always placed some treats in my little basket. The Pedant, who was part of our troupe, and seemed to me then just as old and wrinkled as he is today, took an interest in me, teaching me about recitation, harmony, and poetic metre, ways of speaking and listening, poses, gestures, facial expressions congruent with speech, and all the secrets of the art in which he excels, although only a provincial actor, for he possesses learning, having been a schoolteacher, though expelled for incorrigible drunkenness. Amidst the apparent disorder of a vagabond life, I remained pure and innocent, for to my companions who had seen me in the cradle, I was a sister or a daughter, and as for the gallants I knew how to keep them at an appropriate distance, by adopting a cold, reserved, and discreet manner, so maintaining, off-stage, my role as an ingénue, without hypocrisy or false modesty.’
Thus, as they walked, Isabella told the charmed Sigognac the story of her life and adventures.
— ‘And the name of this nobleman,’ said Sigognac, ‘do you know it, or is it forgotten?’
— ‘It might be dangerous for my peace of mind to repeat it,’ replied Isabella, ‘but it has remained engraved in my memory.’
— ‘Is there any evidence of his affair with your mother?’
— ‘I have a decorative shield with his coat of arms,’ said Isabella, ‘it is the only valuable gift of his that my mother kept, because of its noble and heraldic significance which offset in her mind the notion of material value, and if it would interest you, I will show it to you some day.’
It would be too tedious to follow the Chariot of Comedy yard by yard, especially since the journey was made in a short space of time, without the occurrence of any adventure worth remembering. I will therefore skip a few days, and join the troupe again near Poitiers. The receipts had been insubstantial, and hard times were upon them. The Marquis de Bruyères payment had finally been exhausted, as well as Sigognac’s pistoles, his sense of delicacy obliging him to relieve, to the extent of his meagre resources, his comrades in distress. The chariot, drawn by four vigorous beasts at the start, was now dragged forward by a single horse, and what a horse! A wretched nag who seemed to have been fed on barrel-hoops, instead of hay and oats, so prominent were his ribs. His hip-bones pierced the skin, and the relaxed muscles of his thighs were outlined by large flabby wrinkles; bony growths, spavins, swelled his legs bristling with long hair. On his withers, due to the pressure of a collar whose padding had vanished, bloodstained scratches were ever more vivid, and marks of the whip scarred the bruised flanks of the poor creature. His face was a complete poem of melancholy and suffering. Behind his eyes, one would have thought the deep sockets had been hollowed out with a scalpel. His bluish orbs had the dull, resigned, reflective look of an overworked animal. The result of those careless and useless blows, was sadly visible there, and a snap of the reins could no longer draw a spark of life from him. His tremulous ears, one of which was split at the tip, hung piteously on either side of his brow and, with their oscillations, punctuated the uneven rhythm of his progress. The threads of a lock of mane, turned from white to yellow, were entangled in the headpiece, the leather of which was badly worn due to the bony protuberances of the cheeks, highlighted by their meagreness. The cartilages of the nostrils oozed moisture from laboured breathing, and the worn jaws pouted in sullen lips.
On his white coat, speckled with red, sweat had traced streaks like those with which rain makes on plastered walls, agglutinised the flakes of hair beneath his belly, stained his lower limbs, and made a pitiful cement of his droppings. Nothing could be more lamentable to see, and the horse Death rides in the Book of Revelation would have seemed a dashing beast, fit to parade at equestrian displays, beside this pitiful and disastrous animal whose shoulders seemed to become more disjointed at every step, and who, with painful gaze, seemed to invoke the crowning mercy of the knacker’s final blow. The temperature falling rapidly, he walked amidst the steam rising from his flanks and nostrils.
There were now only three women in the cart. The men went on foot so as not to overload the wagon, which it was not difficult for them to keep up with, and even outpace. With only unpleasant thoughts to express, they remained silent, and walked in solitary fashion, wrapping themselves in their cloaks as best they could.
Sigognac, well-nigh discouraged, wondered if he would not have done better to remain in the dilapidated castle of his fathers, even if he died of hunger there beside his crude coat of arms, in silence and solitude, than wander the roads with these bohemians.
He thought of brave Pierre, of Bayard, Miraut, and Beelzebub, his faithful companions in that tedious existence. His heart sank regardless, and a nervous spasm rose from his chest to his throat, the kind which usually resolves itself in tears; but a glance at Isabella, seated on the front of the wagon, and wrapped tightly in her cloak, strengthened his courage. The young woman smiled at him; she did not seem upset by their state of misery; her mind was content; what did the sufferings and fatigues of the body matter?
The landscape which they traversed was hardly likely to dispel his melancholy. In the foreground writhed the convulsive skeletons of old elm trees, tormented, twisted, lopped, whose black branches like capricious filaments were highlighted against a low sky, yellowish-grey in colour, and dense with snow, which allowed only a livid light to filter through; in the middle-distance, stretched plains devoid of cultivation, bordered near the horizon by bare hills, or lines of russet-hued woods. From time to time, a cottage like a chalky stain, sending upwards a slight spiral of smoke, appeared between the close mesh of twigs that constituted its fencing. The ravine created by a gutter furrowed the earth with a long scar. In spring, this countryside, dressed in verdure, might have seemed pleasant; but, clad in the grey livery of winter, it appeared merely monotonous, impoverished, and sad. From time to time, a farmhand, or an old woman bent beneath a bundle of dead wood, passed by, haggard-looking and ragged, who, far from animating this desert, on the contrary accentuated its solitude. Magpies, hopping over the brown earth, their tails sticking from their rumps like closed fans, seemed to be its true inhabitants. They chattered at the sight of the wagon as if communicating their thoughts about the actors, and danced in front of them in a derisory way, like the wicked, heartless birds they are, insensitive to the misery of the poor world.
A bitter breeze whistled about the troupe, plastering their thin capes to their bodies, and slapping their faces with its chapped fingers. Snowflakes soon mingled with the whirlwinds of air, rising, falling, criss-crossing each other without reaching the ground, or lodging anywhere, so strong were the gusts. They became so densely crowded that they formed a kind of white fog a few steps from the blinded pedestrians. Through this silvery swarming cloud, the nearest objects lost their true appearance, or were no longer distinguishable.
— ‘It seems,’ said the Pedant, who was walking behind the cart to shelter himself a little, ‘that the heavenly housekeeper is plucking geese up there and shaking the down from her apron all over us. Their flesh would please me more, and I would be man enough to eat it even without lemon or spices.’
— ‘Even without salt,’ added the Tyrant, ‘for my stomach no longer recalls that omelette whose eggs chirped when they were broken on the edge of the pan, and which I swallowed under the sarcastic and fallacious title of breakfast, despite the little beaks that bristled within it.’
Sigognac had also taken refuge behind the wagon, and the Pedant said to him: ‘This is dreadful weather, Monsieur le Baron, and I regret your having to share our bad fortune, yet this is but a temporary reversal, and though we are not progressing swiftly, we are nonetheless nearing Paris.’
— ‘I was not raised to a life of comfort,’ replied Sigognac, ‘so I am scarcely one to be troubled by a few snowflakes. It is these poor women whom I pity, obliged, despite their gender, to endure fatigue and privations like country cart-drivers.’
— ‘They have been accustomed to do so for a long while, and what would be challenging for ladies of quality, or bourgeois women, no longer seems painful to them.’
The storm was intensifying. Driven by the wind, the snow blew like white smoke, skimming the ground, and only halting when it was blocked by some obstacle, the slope of a hill, a pile of scree, a hedge, or the bank of a ditch. There, it piled up prodigiously quickly, overflowing in a cascade on the other side of the temporary dike. At other times it formed spirals like a hurricane, and rose in whirls to the sky, to descend again creating heaped masses which the storm immediately dispersed. A few minutes had been long enough for it to powder Isabella, Serafina and Leonarda with its whiteness, beneath the fluttering canvas of the cart, though they had taken refuge at the very back, sheltered by a wall of luggage.
Stunned by the whiplash from this driven snow and air, the horse was barely able to advance. He was panting, his flanks were heaving, and his hooves slipped at every step. The Tyrant took him by the bridle and, walking beside him, supported him somewhat with hand and arm. The Pedant, Sigognac, and Scapin pushed against the wheels. Leander cracked the whip to excite the poor beast: to strike him would have been pure cruelty. As for Matamore, he had lagged somewhat behind, for he was so light in weight, given his phenomenal leanness, that the wind prevented his moving forward, though he grasped a stone in each hand, and had filled his pockets with pebbles for ballast.
The snowstorm, far from abating, raged more furiously, driving onwards the mass of white flakes which was agitated with a thousand eddies like the foaming crests of an ocean wave. The gale waxed so furious that the actors were forced, though they were in haste to reach the village, to halt the wagon, and steer it away from the wind. The poor nag could stand it no longer; his legs stiffened; shivers ran over his steaming skin bathed in sweat. One more effort, and he would have fallen dead; already a drop of blood was pearling in his nostrils, widely dilated due to the pressure on his chest, and glassy gleams traversed the orbs of his eyes.
In the dark it is easy to imagine terrible things. Darkness readily prompts dread, but the horror of whiteness is less generally appreciated. However, nothing could have felt more sinister than the situation our poor actors were in, pale with hunger, blue with cold, blinded by snow, and lost somewhere on the road, amidst the dizzying whirlwind of icy grains enveloping them on every side. They huddled beneath the tarpaulin to allow the snowstorm to pass, pressing against each other to benefit from one another’s warmth. At last, the gusts faded, and the snow, suspended in the air, fell less tumultuously to the ground. As far as the eye could see, the countryside had disappeared beneath a silvery shroud.
— ‘Where’s Matamore,’ said Blazius; ‘has the storm perchance blown him as high as the moon?’
— ‘Indeed,’ added the Tyrant, ‘I don’t see him. He may be huddled beneath our scenery in the depths of the cart. Hey! Braggart! Shake a leg if you’re slumbering there, and answer the call.’
Matamore spoke not a word. No human shape stirred beneath the heap of old canvas.
— ‘Ho there! Braggart!’ the Tyrant bellowed repeatedly, in his loudest tragedian’s voice, and in a tone that would have awakened the Seven Sleepers, and their dog, in that cave of theirs.
— ‘We’ve not seen him, for a while,’ said the actresses, ‘blinded as we were by whirling snow, but we were not much concerned by his absence, thinking he was but a few steps from the wagon.’
— ‘Lord!’ said Blazius, ‘This is odd! I hope nothing serious has happened.’
— ‘Doubtless he took shelter behind some tree trunk during the worst of the storm,’ said Sigognac, ‘and will soon rejoin us.’
They decided to wait a few minutes, before setting out in search of him. Nothing could be seen on the road, though against the background whiteness, even if it was twilight, a human form should have been readily visible even at a considerable distance. Night, which descends so swiftly after the few brief hours of December daylight, had fallen, but without bringing with it complete darkness. The glimmer of snow fought with the shadows, and by a strange visual reversal it seemed as if what light there was shone from the ground. The horizon betrayed itself as a line of white, and was still apparent in the far distance. The forms of the darkened trees, powdered with snow, appeared in outline like those arboreal patterns with which the frost coats window panes and, from time to time, snowflakes, shaken from some branch or other, fell like the silver tears adorning funeral palls, from the shadowy canopy. It was a spectacle full of melancholy; a dog began to howl like a lost soul, as if to give voice to the desolation of the landscape and express the heartbreaking desolation of the scene. Sometimes it seems that Nature, growing weary of silence, confides her secret sorrows to the moans of the wind, or the lamentations of some creature.
How lugubrious, in the silence of the night, is such desperate barking which ends in a moan, and which seems to be provoked by the passage of spectres invisible to the human eye! The instinct of the beast, in communion with the soul of things, senses impending misfortune, and deplores it before it is known. There is in such a howling interspersed with sobs, a terror of the future, the anguish of death, and a voice of dismay provoked by the supernatural. The most steadfastly courageous cannot hear it without being moved, and the cry makes the hair on one’s flesh stand on end, like the passage of that spirit of which Job speaks (see Job 4:15).
The barking, at first distant, drew nearer, and they eventually distinguished in the midst of the plain, seated on its rear in the snow, a large black dog, muzzle raised to the heavens, seemingly whining this gargled lament.
— ‘Something has happened to our poor comrade,’ cried the Tyrant. ‘That cursed beast is howling as if for the dead.’
The women, their hearts heavy with a sinister foreboding, made the sign of the cross, most devoutly. Isabella, virtuously, murmured the beginning of a prayer.
— ‘We must search for him without further delay,’ said Blazius, ‘bearing the lantern; its light will serve as his guide, his pole star, if he has strayed from the road, and wandered into the fields; for amidst such snow which has shrouded the highway in white, it is easy to go astray.’
A flint was struck, and the candle-end, in the belly of the lantern, once lit, cast a bright enough light through its panes made of thin horn to be seen from afar.
The Tyrant, Blazius, and Sigognac set out on their quest. Scapin and Leander remained to guard the wagon and reassure the women, who were increasingly concerned about the whole venture. To add to the gloom of the scene, the black dog was still howling desperately, and the wind driving its aerial chariot over the countryside with a dull murmur, as if bearing souls on a journey.
The storm had so stirred the snow as to erase all traces, or at least to render imprints uncertain. Darkness made the search difficult, and when Blazius angled the lantern towards the ground, he sometimes found the Tyrant’s large hollow footprints moulded in the white dust, but never those of Matamore, which, had he come that far, being no heavier than that of a bird, would scarcely have marked it.
They walked thus for half a mile or more, raising the lantern to attract the attention of the lost actor, shouting at the top of their lungs: ‘Matamore! Matamore! Matamore!’
This cry, similar to that which the ancients addressed to the deceased’s corpse before leaving the place of burial, was met with silence, or some bird flew in fear, chirping with a sudden flutter of wings, to lose itself deeper in the night. Sometimes an owl, offended by the light, hooted in a lamentable manner. Finally, Sigognac, who had keen eyesight, thought he could make out amidst the shadows, at the foot of a tree, a figure of phantasmal appearance, strangely stiff, and sinisterly motionless. He warned his companions, who hastened with him in that direction.
It was, indeed, poor Matamore. His back was leaning against the tree, and his long legs were stretched on the ground, half-concealed under a covering of snow. His long rapier, which he never removed, formed an odd angle with his torso, a thing which would have appeared laughable in any other circumstance. He moved no more than a tree-stump does, as his comrades approached. Troubled by his motionless attitude, Blazius directed the beam of light onto Matamore’s face, and almost let the lantern fall, so much terror did the sight cause him.
‘It was, indeed, poor Matamore.’
The mask, thus illuminated, no longer displayed the colours of life. It was pale as wax. The nose, pinched at the sides by Death’s gnarled fingers, gleamed like a cuttlefish bone; the skin was stretched taut over the temples. Snowflakes had caught on the eyebrows and eyelashes, and the dilated staring eyes looked like orbs of glass. At each end of the whiskers glittered an icicle whose weight made the hair curve downwards. The stamp of eternal silence sealed those lips from which so many joyous boasts had flown, and the skull, sculpted in all its leanness, was already apparent beneath that pallid face, in which the habit of grimacing had dug terrifying comedic folds, which the corpse retained, for it is one of the miserable results of such a life, that such actors lack gravity even in death.
Still harbouring a degree of hope, the Tyrant tried to raise Matamore’s hand, but the arm already stiff, fell back again, solidly, with a noise like a puppet’s wooden arm the string to which has snapped. The poor devil had left the theatre of life for that of the after-world. However, unable to accept that he was dead, the Tyrant asked Blazius if he had not his flask about him. The Pedant never parted with that precious piece of equipment. There were still a few drops of wine left in its depths, and he introduced its neck between the Braggart’s violet lips; but the teeth remained stubbornly clenched, and the liquor spurted out in red drops from the corners of the mouth. Vital breath had forever abandoned the frail clay, for the slightest sign of it would have produced visible steam in that chill air.
— ‘Don’t torment his poor remains,’ said Sigognac, ‘don't you see that he’s dead?’
— ‘Alas! Yes,’ replied Blazius, ‘as dead as Cheops beneath his Great Pyramid. No doubt, stunned by the snowstorm and unable to fight its fury, he halted beneath this tree, and as he had not two ounces of flesh on his bones, his marrow will soon have frozen. In order to make an impression on the Paris stage, he reduced his ration every day, and was thinner from fasting than a greyhound after the race. Poor Braggart, now you are safe from the malice, the beating, kicks, and blows which your role obliged you to suffer! No one will laugh in your face again.’
— ‘What shall we do with his body? interrupted the Tyrant. ‘We cannot leave him here on the edge of this ditch to be torn to pieces by wolves, dogs, and carrion birds, though there is little flesh for even the worms to dine on.’
— ‘No, indeed,’ said Blazius; ‘he was a good and loyal comrade, and since he is light enough, you take his head, I’ll take his feet, and we’ll carry him to the cart. Tomorrow at daylight we’ll bury him in some corner as decently as possible; for, to us histrions, our stepmother of a Church closes the gates of the cemetery, and refuses us the blessing of resting in holy ground. We must rot on the gallows, as dead dogs or horses rot, after entertaining the decent people all our lives. You, Monsieur Baron, you will lead us, and hold the lamp.’
Sigognac nodded his agreement. The two actors bent down and cleared the snow that already cloaked Matamore like a premature shroud, lifted the slender corpse which weighed less than that of a child, and set off preceded by the Baron, who directed the lantern beam in front of them to light the way.
Fortunately, no one was passing by the road at that hour, for it would have appeared a somewhat frightening and mysterious spectacle to the traveller, this funereal group, lit strangely by the reddish rays of the lantern, and casting long, deformed shadows on the white expanse of snow behind them. The thought that some crime or deed of witchcraft was afoot, would doubtless have come to them.
The black dog, as if its role as a crier of doom was over, had ceased its howling. A deathly silence reigned over the distant countryside, for snow has the property of muffling all sound.
For some time Scapin, Leander, and the actresses had been aware of the reddened beam of the little lantern swinging from Sigognac’s hand, casting sudden light on objects and drawing them forth from the shadows in strange or formidable guise till they vanished into the darkness once more. Revealed and hidden, alternately, by this wavering light, the Tyrant and Blazius, linked by the horizontal corpse of poor Matamore, like two words joined by a hyphen, took on an enigmatically lugubrious appearance. Scapin and Leander, moved by anxious curiosity, went to meet the procession.
— ‘Well! What’s this?’ said the valet, once he had reached his comrades. ‘Is Matamore ill that you carry him like this, as stiff as if he’d swallowed his rapier?’
— ‘He’s not ill,’ replied Blazius, ‘indeed, he now enjoys permanent health. Gout, fever, catarrh, gallstones, can no longer afflict him.’
— ‘Then, he’s dead!’ cried Scapin in a tone indicating painful surprise, as he leant over the corpse’s face.
— ‘Very dead, in fact as dead as can be, if there are degrees of that state, for added to the natural chill of death is that of the frost,’ replied Blazius in a troubled voice that betrayed more emotion than the words suggested.
— ‘He has lived his life, as the prince’s companion always declares, in the last act of a tragedy!’ added the Tyrant. ‘But relieve us of this burden a little, if you please. It’s your turn. We have carried our dear comrade far enough without hope of pay or reward.’
Scapin replaced the Tyrant, Leander took over from Blazius, though an undertaker’s work was scarcely to his liking, and the procession resumed its march. In a few minutes, they reached the wagon which had halted in the middle of the road. Despite the cold, Isabella and Serafina had jumped down from the cart, where the Duenna alone still crouched, her owlish eyes open wide. At the sight of Matamore, pale, stiff, and frozen, his face a motionless mask through which the spirit no longer looked forth, the actresses uttered cries of terror and pain. Two tears even sprang from Isabella’s clear eyes, which promptly froze in the harsh nocturnal breeze. Her beautiful hands, red with cold, were clasped together, devoutly, and a fervent prayer for the man, who had so suddenly been swallowed by the trap-door of eternity, rose on wings of faith into the depths of the dark sky.
What was to be done? Their situation was still troublesome. The village where they were to sleep was still four or five miles distant, and when they reached it all the house-doors would have been locked a long time ago and the countryfolk would be asleep; on the other hand, they could not remain in the middle of the road, in the snow, without wood to light a fire, or food to comfort themselves, in the sinister and gloomy company of a corpse, waiting for dawn, which does not break till very late at that time of year.
They decided to advance. The hour’s rest, and a bag of oats Scapin had provided, had restored a little of his vigour to the poor, weary old horse. He seemed refreshed and capable of doing what was required. Matamore’s corpse was placed in the depths of the cart, beneath a piece of canvas. The actresses, not without a certain shudder of fear, seated themselves at the front of the wagon, for death makes a spectre of the friend with whom one was talking but a few hours ago, and he who once amused you now frightens you like a ghost or a monster.
The men walked, Scapin lighting the way with the lantern whose candle had been renewed, the Tyrant holding the horse’s bridle to prevent it from straying. They progressed quite slowly, for the route was difficult; however, after two hours they began to distinguish, at the foot of a fairly steep descent, the first of the village’s houses. The snow had added white sheets to the roofs, which highlighted them, despite it still being night, against the dark background of the sky. Hearing the cart’s iron wheels clanking from afar, the dogs, once disturbed, made a row, and their barking woke others on isolated farms, deep in the countryside. It was a concert of howls, some muffled, others loud, with solo flights, responses, and choruses in which all the canine inhabitants of the neighbourhood took part. Thus, when the cart arrived there, the village was fully awake. More than one head wrapped in a nightcap showed itself at a skylight, or framed in the upper leaf of a half-open door, which made it easier for the Pedant to seek, audibly, lodgings for the troupe. The inn was pointed out to him, or at least the house that served as one, the village being little frequented by travellers, who usually journeyed on farther. This inn was at the other end of the village, and the poor nag had to drag the cart for a little longer; but he smelt the stable, and with a supreme effort, his hooves, tore sparks from the pebbles beneath the layer of snow. There was no mistaking the house; a branch of holly, not unlike those used to sprinkle holy water, hung over the door, and Scapin, raising his lantern, noted the presence of that hospitable symbol. The Tyrant drummed his heavy fists on the door, and soon a clatter of wooden shoes descending a staircase was heard within. A ray of reddish light filtered through the cracks in the wood. The door opened, and an old woman, sheltering, with a wrinkled hand that seemed alight, the flickering flame of a taper, appeared in all the horror of her indelicate negligee. Her two hands being fully occupied, she held between her teeth or rather between her gums, the edges of her coarse linen smock, with the modest intention of hiding from libertine eyes charms that would have made the he-goat at a Witches’ Sabbath flee in terror. She led the actors to the kitchen, planted the candle on the table, rummaged through the ashes of the hearth to awaken some slumbering embers, and soon set a handful of brushwood to crackling; then she ascended to her room to put on a petticoat and a jacket. A fat boy, rubbing his eyes with filthy hands, went to open the gate to the courtyard, led in the cart, removed the horse’s harness, and stabled the poor beast.
— ‘We cannot, however, leave poor Matamore in the carriage, like the body of a deer borne back from the hunt,’ said Blazius, the Pedant, ‘the farmyard dogs would worry at him. He has been baptised, after all; and we must hold a wake over him like the good Christian he was.’
The body of the deceased actor was lifted out, laid out on the table, and covered respectfully with a cloak. Beneath the fabric, the rigidity of death was sculpted in great folds, and the sharp profile of the face was outlined, perhaps more frighteningly so, than if it had been uncovered. Thus, when the innkeeper returned, she almost fell backward with fright at the sight of the corpse which she took to be that of some man the actors had murdered. She held out her aged trembling hands, and began begging the Tyrant, whom she judged to be the leader of the troupe, not to have her slain, promising him absolute secrecy, even under torture. Isabella reassured her, and told her in a few words what had happened. Then the old woman went off to fetch two more candles, and arranged them at the dead man’s head and foot, offering to keep watch with Dame Leonarda, for she had often dealt with the village dead, and knew what had to be performed as regards those sad offices.
These arrangements made, the actors retired to another room, where, with appetites little whetted by the gloomy scenes they had encountered, and touched by the loss of the brave Matamore, they ate only half-heartedly. For perhaps the first time in his life, although the wine was good, Blazius left his glass half-full, forgetting to drink. He must have been heartbroken, indeed, for he was one of those drinkers who wished to be buried beneath the barrel’s tap, so the wine would drip into their mouths, and would have risen from the coffin to cry ‘Santé!’ over a brimming glass of red.
Isabella and Serafina arranged a pallet for themselves in the next room. The men lay down on bales of straw which the stable boy brought. They all slept badly, their slumber interrupted by painful dreams, and rose early, for it was time to proceed with Matamore’s funeral.
For lack of a burial cloth, Leonarda and the hostess had wrapped him in a scrap of old scenery representing a forest, a shroud worthy of an actor, akin to a military coat if a soldier’s corpse had been involved. Some remnants of green paint simulated, on the worn canvas, wreaths and foliage, and gave the effect of a scattering of greenery to honour the body, which was stitched and bundled up like an Egyptian mummy.
A board set on two poles, the ends of which were held by the Tyrant, Blazius, Scapin, and Leander, formed the bier. A large black velvet robe, studded with stars and half-moon shaped spangles, employed for the roles of pontiff or necromancer, served as a decent enough funeral pall.
Organised thus, the procession left by a back door opening onto the fields, to avoid the glances and gossip of the curious, so as to reach a vacant lot that the hostess had designated as a serviceable burial plot for Matamore, and one which none would query, the custom being to dispose there of animals that had died of disease; a place unworthy and unsuitable for human remains, mortal clay modelled in the likeness of God above, but the rules of religion are strict, and an excommunicated histrion cannot be buried in holy ground, unless he has renounced the theatre, its works, and its pomp, which was not Matamore’s case.
Grey-eyed morning was awake, and was descending the hill slopes with snow underfoot. A cold light spread over the plain, whose whiteness made the pale tint of the sky appear livid. Astonished by the sudden appearance of the procession, which was preceded by neither cross nor priest, and was not on the path that led to the church, a group of countrymen on their way to gather wood halted, and looked askance at the actors, suspecting them of being heretics, sorcerers, or protestants, but nevertheless dared say nothing. Finally, they arrived at a fairly open spot, and the stable boy, who was carrying a spade with which to dig the grave, said that they would do well to stop there. Animal carcasses half-covered with snow littered the ground all about. Equine skeletons, anatomised by vultures and crows, stretched out long, emaciated heads with hollow eye-sockets, at the end of a row of vertebrae, their ribs laid open and stripped of flesh, like the ribs of a fan from which the paper has been torn away. Touches of snow, as if fancifully placed, added to the horror of this charnel-house spectacle by emphasising the projections and articulation of the bones. These spectral creatures seemed those that demons and ghouls ride in their Sabbath cavalcades.
The actors laid the body on the ground, and the boy began to dig vigorously throwing black clods of earth onto the snow, a particularly gloomy scene, as it seemed to the living that the poor deceased, even though he felt nothing, would be colder still on his first night in a grave amidst the frost.
The Tyrant relieved the boy, and the pit was rapidly deepened It already gaped wide enough to swallow the lean corpse in a single bite, when the gathered peasants began to shout ‘Huguenots’ and made as if to attack the actors. A few stones were even thrown, which happily hit no one. Enraged by this rabble, Sigognac raised his sword and ran at the scoundrels, striking them with the flat of his blade, and threatening them with the point. At the sound of the altercation, the Tyrant had leapt from the grave, seized one of the poles from the bier, and was flailing the backs of those who had been knocked down by the Baron’s impetuous rush. The troupe dispersed, shouting and cursing, and Matamore’s funeral rites were then completed.
‘Matamore’s Funeral.’
Lying at the bottom of the hole, the body, sewn into its sylvan canvas, looked more like an arquebus wrapped in green serge, buried so as hide it, than like a human corpse to be interred. When the first shovelfuls pattered down over the meagre remains of the actor, the Pedant, deeply moved, and unable to hold back the tear that fell from the tip of his reddened nose into the pit, like a pearl issuing from the heart, sighed in a doleful voice, by way of a funeral oration, this sentence which was all the eulogy and myriologue (an improvised Greek lament) uttered there: ‘Alas! poor Matamore!’
The honest Pedant, in speaking so, little suspected that he was imitating the words of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, as he handled the skull of the former court jester, Yorick, in Shakespeare’s tragedy.
In a short while the grave was filled. The Tyrant scattered snow over it to conceal the spot, for fear that some insult might be visited on the corpse. This task completed: ‘Now,’ he said, ‘let us leave the place quickly, as we have no more to do here, and return to the inn. Let us hitch up the cart, and take to the open road; for these rascals, if they return in strength, might well assail us. Your sword, and my fists would not suffice. A host of pygmies can overcome a giant, while victory over them would be inglorious, and of scant benefit to us. Even if we disembowelled a half-dozen of these rascals, our loss would be no less, while their death would place us in a difficult position. There would be a lamentation of widows, and a wailing of orphans, which are tiresome and pitiful things that lawyers take advantage of to influence the judge.’
The advice was sound, and was followed. An hour later, the reckoning settled, the wagon was on its way once more.
Chapter VII: In Which This Novel Justifies its Title
At first, they progressed as quickly as the old horse’s strength, restored by a good night’s stay in the stable, and the state of the road, covered with the snow that had fallen the day before, allowed. The country folk challenged by Sigognac and the Tyrant might return to the attack in greater numbers, and it was a matter of putting enough space between themselves and the village to render pursuit useless. Five long miles were travelled in silence, for Matamore’s sad end added funereal thoughts to the melancholy of their situation. Their sole reflection was that one fine day they too might be buried on the side of the road, among the carcasses, and abandoned to remorseless desecration. The wagon, continuing its journey meanwhile, symbolised life, which ever advances without concern for those who fail to maintain the pace, and are left behind, dead or dying, in the ditch. A symbol merely renders the hidden meaning more visible, and Blazius, whose tongue was itching, began to moralise on the theme with many quotations, apophthegms, and maxims that he had memorised in his role as a pedant.
The Tyrant listened silently, with a sullen air. His thoughts were elsewhere, such that Blazius, noticing his comrade’s distracted expression, asked him what he was thinking.
— ‘I am thinking,’ replied the Tyrant, ‘of Milo of Croton, who with a blow of his fist slew an ox, and ate it in a single day. The exploit pleases me, and I feel capable of repeating it.’
— ‘Unfortunately, the ox is lacking,’ said Scapin, entering the conversation.
— ‘Indeed,’ replied the Tyrant, ‘I possess only the fist, and the stomach, for it. Oh, blessed are ostriches who live on pebbles, shards, gaiter-buttons, knife-handles, belt-buckles, and other victuals indigestible to humans. At this very moment, I could even swallow our theatre props. It seems to me that, in digging the hole for poor Matamore, I dug one deep in myself so wide, long, and profound, that nothing can fill it. The ancients were most wise, who followed funerals with a meal, with abundant meat and copious wine, for the greater glory of the dead and the better health of the living. I wish, right now, I could perform that philosophical rite so suitable for drying tears.’
— ‘In other words,’ said Blazius, you desire to eat, you gluttonous ogre. Polyphemus, Gargantua, you disgust me.
— ‘And you, like sand or a sponge, you long to drink,’ replied the Tyrant. ‘You funnel, you siphon, you wineskin, nay wine-barrel, you excite my pity.’
— ‘How sweet and profitable a fusion of our two passions would be!’ said Scapin with a conciliatory air. ‘Here, by the side of the road is a small coppice wonderfully suited to a halt. We could divert the wagon to the spot, and if there are still some provisions left, lunch as best we can, sheltered from the north wind behind a natural screen. The stop will allow the horse time to rest, and permit us to converse, while nibbling a morsel, about the course of action to be taken as regards the troupe’s future, which seems to me devilishly hazy.’
— ‘Your speech is golden, friend Scapin,’ said the Pedant, ‘and we shall indeed exhume from the entrails of the knapsack, which is flatter alas and more deflated than the purse of the prodigal son, a few remnants, the remains of the splendour of former times; pie-crusts, ham-bones, sausage-skins, and scraps of bread. There are still two or three flasks of wine in the chest, the last of a valiant troop. With all that, we can not only stave off but satisfy our hunger and thirst. What a pity that the soil of this inhospitable canton is not like the clay with which certain natives of South America weight their stomachs when their hunting and fishing fails!’ (In the Peruvian and Bolivian Andes, a type of clay called ‘chaco’ or’ pasa’ is eaten, to counter toxins)
The wagon’s course was diverted; it halted amidst the thicket; and the horse once unharnessed began to search beneath the snow for a few scant patches of grass which he tore at with his long yellow teeth. A carpet was spread in an open place. The actors sat around this improvised tablecloth in the Turkish fashion, and Blazius symmetrically arranged the leftovers taken from the carriage, as if it were a bounteous feast.
— ‘Oh, what a beautiful sight,’ cried the Tyrant, in delight. ‘A prince’s butler could not have arranged things better. Though you are a wonderful Pedant, Blazius, your true vocation is that of victualler.’
— ‘I did harbour such an ambition, but adverse fortune thwarted it,’ replied the Pedant modestly. ‘Above all, little bellies, don’t go throwing yourselves at the food greedily. Chew slowly, and with care. Besides, I shall ration the fare, as is done by sailors on rafts after shipwrecks. To you, Tyrant, this ham bone from which a shred of flesh still hangs. With your strong teeth you will crack it open, and philosophically extract the marrow. To you, ladies, this pâté base coated with stuffing in its corners, and basted internally with a very substantial layer of lard. It is a delicate, tasty, and nutritious dish that will make you desire no other. To you, Baron de Sigognac, this piece of sausage; just be careful not to swallow the string tying the skin tight like a purse. It must be set aside for supper, for dinner is an indigestible, excessive and superfluous meal that we may do without. Leander, Scapin and I will be content with this venerable piece of cheese, scowling and bearded like a hermit in his cave. As for the bread, those who find it too hard will have the option of dipping it in water, and removing the crust to carve toothpicks. For the wine, everyone is entitled to a goblet, and as sommelier I ask you to lick your fingernails, so that none is lost.’
Sigognac had long been accustomed to this more than Spanish frugality, and had consumed, in his Castle of Misery, more than one meal whose crumbs the mice would have been embarrassed to nibble, for he himself had played the mouse. However, he could not help admiring the good humour and comic verve of the Pedant, who found something amusing where others would have moaned like calves, and groaned like cattle. What concerned him was Isabella’s state. A marble-like pallor covered her cheeks, and, in the intervals between bites, her teeth chattered like castanets with a feverish movement that she tried in vain to repress. Her thin clothes protected her poorly against the bitter cold, and Sigognac, sitting near her, threw half of his cape over her shoulders, although she resisted, drawing her close to his body to warm her and transfer a little of his vital heat. Isabella warmed herself at this kindly hearth, and a faint blush of modesty appeared on her face.
While the actors were eating, a rather singular noise was heard, to which they paid no attention, at first, taking it to be the effect of the wind whistling through the bare branches of the coppice. Soon the noise became more distinct. It was a sort of hoarse, strident hiss, both non-human and angry, the nature of which was difficult to explain. The women showed a degree of fear.
— ‘If it’s a snake,’ cried Serafina, ‘I will die, so much do those dreadful things inspire my aversion!’
— ‘In these temperatures,’ said Leander, ‘snakes are numbed and, rigid as sticks, they sleep in the depths of their lairs.’
— ‘Leander is right,’ said the Pedant, ‘it must be something else; some creature that haunts groves, that our presence frightens or disturbs. Let’s not interrupt our meal.’
At the sound of this hissing, Scapin had pricked his fox-like ears, which, despite being red with cold, were nonetheless sharp of hearing, and he looked closely in the direction from which it came. Blades of grass rustled as they moved, as if at the passage of some animal. Scapin signalled to the actors to remain motionless, and soon a magnificent gander, neck outstretched, head held high, and waddling with majestic stupidity on his broad webbed feet emerged from the thicket. Two geese, his wives, followed him, trustingly and naively.
— ‘Here’s a roast offering itself up to the spit,’ said Scapin in a low voice, ‘one which heaven, touched by our pangs of starvation, has sent us most opportunely.’
The cunning fellow rose, moved away from the troupe, and executed a semicircle so light-footedly that the snow emitted never a creak beneath his feet. The gander’s attention was fixed on the group of actors whom he looked at with mistrust mingled with curiosity, and whose presence in this usually deserted place, lacked an explanation as far as his limited brain was concerned. Seeing him fully occupied in his contemplation, the histrion, who seemed to be accustomed to such marauding, approached the gander from behind, and flung his cape over him with a movement so precise, so dexterous, and so rapid, that the action lasted less time than it takes to describe it.
Once it was hooded, he rushed upon the bird, and seized it by the neck beneath his cape, which the fluttering wings of the poor, suffocating animal would quickly have sent flying. Scapin, in this pose, resembled that much-admired ancient group called The Child with a Goose (a Hellenistic sculpture, attributed to Boethus of Chalcedon; see the Roman copy in marble of the bronze original, in the Louvre). Soon the gander, strangled, ceased to struggle. Its head bowed limply in Scapin’s clenched fist. Its wings no longer jerked. Its orange morocco-leather booted feet stretched out with a final quiver. It was dead. The geese, its widows, fearing a similar fate, gave a lamentable cluck by way of funeral oration, and returned to the woods.
— ‘Bravo, Scapin, a clever move,’ exclaimed the Tyrant, ‘and as good as any you execute on the stage. Geese are harder to surprise than Gerontes (the French version of Pantalone, a commedia dell’arte character) or Truffaldino (a character likewise derived from Harlequin), being by nature very vigilant and on their guard, as appears from the story where we find that the geese of the Roman Capitol sensed the nocturnal approach of the Gauls, and thus saved Rome (in 390BC, according to the legend). Master goose here, has saved us, in another way, it is true, but one no less providential.’
The goose was bled and plucked by old Leonarda. While she was tearing away its down as best she could, Blazius, the Tyrant, and Leander, plunged into the thicket, gathered pieces of wood, shook off the snow, and piled it in a dry place. Scapin used his knife to carve a stick, stripping it of bark, to serve as a spit. Two forked branches cut short above the knot were planted in the ground as its supports. Thanks to a handful of straw taken from the cart, to which the spark from a flint was applied, the fire was soon alight, and glowing cheerfully, tinting the skewered gosling red, and reviving, with its invigorating warmth, the troupe seated in a circle round the improvised hearth.
Scapin, with a modest air, as befitted the hero of the situation, stood stock still, eyes lowered, his expression softened, turning the goose from time to time, which, in the heat from the embers, took on a beautiful golden colour, very appetising to witness, and gave off an odour of such succulence that it would have made Bonaventure- Catalagironne (General of the Franciscan Order, and one of the negotiators of the Peace of Vervins, 1598) fall into ecstasy, who, in all the great city of Paris, admired nothing so much as the rotisseries of the Rue aux Oües (‘Street of the Geese’, later corrupted to Rue Aux Ours: see Henri Sauval’s ‘Histoire et Recherches des Antiquites de la Ville de Paris, 1724, Volume II, Book II, page 142), and the Rue de la Huchette.
The Tyrant had risen, and was walking about briskly to distract himself and thereby avoid, he said, the temptation to throw himself upon the half-cooked roast, and swallow it spit and all. Blazius was at the cart, extracting from a trunk a large pewter dish used for feasts on stage. The goose was solemnly placed upon it, and around it, beneath the attentions of the knife, spread a blood-stained juice with a most delicious aroma.
The bird was butchered into equal portions, and lunch began anew. This time it was no longer an imaginary or illusory feast. No one, since hunger silenced every conscience, expressed any qualms about Scapin’s actions. The Pedant, who was a fastidious man as regards cuisine, apologised for the lack of slices of bitter orange to seat the goose on, which is an obligatory and regular addition, but was forgiven wholeheartedly for this culinary solecism.
— ‘Now that we are sated,’ said the Tyrant, wiping his beard with his hand, ‘it would be appropriate to consider what to do. There are barely three or four pistoles left in the purse, and my job as treasurer is very close to becoming a sinecure. Our troupe has lost two valuable members, Zerbina and Captain Matamore, nor can we act a comedy in the open air for the amusement of crows, rooks, and magpies. They would decline to pay for their seats, lacking cash, with the possible exception of the magpies, who, it is said, steal coins, jewels, spoons, and tumblers. But it would be unwise to count on such takings. With a horse of the Apocalypse dying between the shafts of our cart, it is quite impossible to reach Poitiers in under two days. Which is most tragic, because by then we risk dying of hunger or cold beside some ditch. Geese don’t emerge from the bushes every day to be roasted.’
— ‘You explain the evil of our situation very eloquently,’ said the Pedant, ‘but fail to suggest a remedy.’
— ‘I think,’ replied the Tyrant, ‘that we should stop at the first village we come across; work in the fields is over. It is the season of long nocturnal vigils. They will gladly let us lodge in some barn or stable. Scapin will rattle the box in front of the doors, and promise an extraordinary and magnificent spectacle to the astonished rustics with the offer of their paying for their seats in kind. A chicken, a joint of ham or beef, a jug of wine, will entitle them to a seat at the front. For them to secure one in the second row, we’ll accept a brace of pigeons, a dozen eggs, an armful of vegetables, a loaf of bread, or any other similar victuals. Country folk, stingy with money, are seldom stingy with provisions, which they have in store, and which cost them nothing, being supplied by good Mother Nature. Though this will not fill our purse, it will assuage our appetites, a vital matter, since the whole economy and health of the body politic depends on the stomach, as Menenius wisely remarked (Agrippa Menenius Lanatus, was a Roman consul in 503 BC. In 494/3 he reputedly used a Greek parable of the limbs refusing to feed the stomach to convince the plebs of the futility of secession, see Livy ‘Ab Urbe Condita’ 2. 32. 8). Then there will be little difficulty in our reaching Poitiers, where I know an innkeeper who will grant us credit.’
— ‘But what play can we perform,’ said Scapin, ‘if the village folk gather at the time appointed? Our repertoire is highly varied. Tragedy or tragicomedy would be pure Hebrew to these rustics, ignorant of history and fable, who have no grasp of the beauty of the French language. We need some good, joyous farce, sprinkled not with Attic salt but with the coarse variety, with plenty of beatings, kicks in the backside, clownish tumbles, and buffoonish Italian-style scurrilities. Captain Matamore’s Rodomontades would have been marvellously suitable. Sadly, Matamore has lived his life, and will deliver his tirades now only in the lines he left behind.’
When Scapin had finished, Sigognac signalled with his hand that he wished to speak. A slight blush, a flow of blood sent by yielding though noble pride from the heart to the face, coloured his features, despite the bitter assault of the north wind. The actors remained silent and expectant.
— ‘Though I lack the talent of poor Matamore, I am almost as thin as he was. I will act his role, and replace him as best I can. I am your comrade, and wish to be so completely. Also, I am ashamed to profit from your good fortune yet prove useless to you in adversity. Besides, who in the world cares about the Sigognacs? My manor crumbles in ruins over the tomb of my ancestors. Oblivion cloaks our once glorious name, and ivy erases the coat of arms on our deserted porch. Perhaps one day those three storks which adorn it will shake their silvery wings joyously, and life and happiness will return to that sad hovel, where my youth, devoid of hope, was being wasted. Instead, you who held out your hand to me and urged me to leave that vault, please accept me, frankly, as one of your own. My name shall no longer be Sigognac.’
Isabella placed her hand on the Baron’s arm as if to interrupt him; but Sigognac paid no attention to the young girl’s pleading expression and continued:
— ‘I shall roll up my title-deed to the baronetcy, and hide it at the bottom of my trunk, like a garment that’s no longer worn. Please don’t address me by it again. Let us see if, in disguise, I will be recognised by Fortune. Thus, I succeed Matamore, and will adopt as my nom de guerre: Captain Fracasse!’
— ‘Long live Captain Fracasse!’ shouted the whole troupe, in acceptance. ‘Let applause greet him everywhere!’
His decision, which had astonished the actors at first, was not as sudden as it seemed. Sigognac had already been thinking of it for a long while. He had blushed at behaving in a parasitic manner towards these honest performers who had shared their own resources with him so generously, without ever making him feel that his presence was inconvenient, and he judged it less unworthy of a gentleman to act on stage and bravely earn his share than accept it as an idler, like alms or a stipend. The thought of returning to Sigognac had indeed presented itself to him, but he had rejected the idea as cowardly and shameful. It is not in times of defeat that a soldier should retire from service. Besides, even if he had sought to leave, his love for Isabella would have held him back, and moreover, though he was not given to fantasising, he glimpsed in vague perspective all sorts of intriguing adventures, reversals, and strokes of fortune, which he would have had to renounce in confining himself to his manor house.
Matters thus settled, the horse was hitched to the wagon, and they set off again. Their excellent meal had revived the whole troupe, and all except the Duenna and Serafina, who were unwilling to walk, followed the carriage on foot, thus relieving the poor nag. Isabella leaned on Sigognac’s arm, turning her tender eyes, furtively, towards him on occasion, not doubting that it was for love of her that he had taken the decision to become an actor, something so inimical to the pride of a well-born person. She would have liked to reproach him, but felt she lacked the strength to scold him for a proof of devotion that she would have prevented him from granting if she could have foreseen it, for she was one of those women who ignore their own interests when they love, and only pursue those of their beloved. After a while, finding herself becoming a little weary, she remounted the carriage and curled up under a blanket next to the Duenna.
On either side of the road, a whitened and deserted countryside stretched as far as the eye could see; with no sign of a town, village, or hamlet.
— ‘There goes our chance of a good showing,’ said the Pedant, after having gazed around at the horizon, ‘theatre-goers scarcely seem to be flocking to us in large numbers, and that recipe involving salt-pork, poultry, and bunches of onions, with which the Tyrant whetted our appetites seems to me to be quite compromised. Not even a smoking chimney in sight. Not one traitor of a rooster revealing a steeple below, as far as the eye can see.’
— ‘Have a little patience, Blazius,’ replied the Tyrant, ‘dwellings pollute the air, and it is most healthy to space the villages widely.’
— ‘Well, as regards that, the inhabitants round here have nothing to fear from epidemics, whether of the bubonic plague, termed the Black Death, or sweating sickness, or malignant and confluent smallpox, all of which, according to the medical men, arise from overcrowding. I’m afraid, if this continues, that our Captain Fracasse won't be making his debut anytime soon.’
While he was speaking, the day was rapidly fading, and beneath a thick curtain of leaden cloud one could barely distinguish the faint reddish glow that marked the place where the sun was setting, tired of illuminating the livid, gloomy landscape dotted with crows.
An icy wind had hardened and glazed the snow. The poor old horse advanced with extreme difficulty; on the least slope his hooves slipped, and though he planted his scarred legs like stakes, and tried to sink onto his lean rump, the momentum of the carriage pushed him forward, despite Scapin, who was walking beside him, supporting him by gripping the bridle.
‘The poor old horse advanced with extreme difficulty.’
Despite the cold, streams of sweat trickled over the horse’s gaunt ribs, and down his weak limbs, sweat beaten to a white foam by the friction of the harness. His lungs panted like the bellows of a forge. Vague terror dilated his bluish eyes, which seemed fixed on something spectral before him, and now and then he sought to turn away as if obstructed by some invisible obstacle. His swaying, tottering frame struck against one shaft, then the other. He raised his head, revealing his gums, then lowered it as if he wished to bite at the snow. His hour had come; he was dying though as yet still upright like the brave horse he was. Finally, he fell, and with a weak defensive kick against death, lay on his side, never to rise again.
Frightened by this sudden shock, which almost spilled them to the ground, the women began to cry out in distress. The actors rushed to their aid, and soon freed them. Leonarda and Serafina were uninjured, but the violence of the shock and the fright had caused Isabella to faint, and Sigognac lifted her, unconscious and inert, in his arms, while Scapin, bending, felt the ears of the horse, which lay flat on the ground like a paper cut-out.
— ‘He’s quite dead,’ said Scapin, raising himself again with a discouraged air. ‘The ears have lost their heat, and the pulse in the vein there is no longer beating.’
— ‘We shall be obliged,’ cried Leander piteously, ‘to harness ourselves to ropes, like beasts of burden or sailors hauling a boat, and pull our own cart. Oh! Curse the fancy I pursued of becoming an actor!’
— ‘What a time to moan and lament!’ roared the Tyrant, irritated by this untimely jeremiad, ‘let us instead consider, more manfully, as fellows whom fortune can never confound, what should be done, and firstly let us see if our good Isabella is seriously harmed; but no, here, she is opening her eyes again, and regaining her senses, thanks to the care of Sigognac, and Dame Leonarda. Therefore, let the troupe divide into two parties. One shall remain near the wagon with the women, and the other traverse the countryside in search of help. We cannot like the Russians, accustomed to Scythian frosts, winter here until dawn, our rumps in the snow. We lack the furs for that, and morning would find us crippled, frozen and white with frost, like candied fruit. Come, Captain Fracasse, Leander and you Scapin, who are the lightest, and have swift feet like Achilles the son of Peleus. On your way! Run like lithe cats and find us reinforcements quickly. Blazius and I will stand sentry, meanwhile, beside the luggage.’
The trio, so designated, prepared to leave, though the darkness augured ill for their expedition, for the night was as black as the mouth of an oven, and only the reflected glow from the snow allowed them to find their way; but darkness, though it eclipses objects, reveals any signs of light, and a small reddish star was seen to twinkle at the foot of a hill some considerable distance from the road.
— ‘Here,’ said the Pedant, ‘is the star of our salvation, a terrestrial star as pleasant to lost travellers as the polar star to sailors in periculo maris (‘in danger on the sea’). This star, with its benign rays, is some candle or lamp set beside a window; which supposes a well-sealed and warm room forming part of a house inhabited by human and civilised beings rather than by savage Laestrygonians (man-eating giants in Greek mythology, see Homer’s ‘Odyssey’). Doubtless, there is a bright fire blazing in the chimney, and over this fire a pot in which a rich soup is cooking; oh, pleasant imagining, at which fancy licks its lips, whose thirst I shall quench, in ideal manner, with two or three bottles seized from behind the wood-pile, and draped in ancient style with cobwebs!’
— ‘You ramble, my dear old Blazius,’ said the Tyrant, ‘and the cold, freezing your brain beneath that bald pate, has set mirages flickering before your eyes. However, there is this truth in your delirium, that a light supposes an inhabited house. This alters our plan of campaign. We shall all make for this beacon of salvation. It is hardly likely that thieves will pass tonight on this deserted road to steal our canvas forest, public square, or living room. Let us each take our clothes. The packages are not very heavy. We shall return tomorrow to reclaim the cart. Besides, I am beginning to suffer from cold, and can no longer feel the tip of my nose.’
The actors set off, Isabella leaning on Sigognac’s arm, Leander supporting Serafina, Scapin leading the Duenna and Blazius, with the Tyrant as the vanguard. They cut across the fields, straight towards the light, sometimes obstructed by a bush or a ditch, and sinking into the snow up to their knees.
‘They cut across the fields…’
Finally, after more than one fall, the troupe reached a large walled building, with a carriage door, which seemed to belong to a farm, as far as could be judged through the shadows. Amidst the dark wall, a lamp within illuminated a square frame, containing the panes of a little window whose shutter was not yet closed.
Sensing the approach of strangers, the watchdogs began to stir and raise their cries. They could be heard, in the silence of the night, running, leaping, and fretting behind the wall. Footsteps and human voices mingled with their row. Soon the whole farm was awake.
— ‘Stay there, the rest of you, and keep your distance,’ said the Pedant, ‘our numbers might frighten these good people who could take us for a band of rogues seeking to invade their rustic home. As I am old and have a fatherly and good-natured air, I alone will knock at the door, and begin negotiations. They will not be afraid of me.’
This wise advice was followed. Blazius rapped, with his knuckles, on the door. It opened slightly, then flew wide. From where they were standing, feet in the snow, the actors witnessed an inexplicable, and surprising spectacle. After a few words had been exchanged inaudible to the actors, the Pedant and the farmer, who had raised his lamp to illuminate the face of the man who had disturbed him, began, to gesticulate in a strange manner, and embrace one another, as is customary on recognising a fellow thespian.
Encouraged by this reception, which they scarcely comprehended, but which, based on the warmth of the pantomime, they judged to be cordial and favourable, the actors approached timidly, assuming a pitiful and modest demeanour, as befits travellers in distress seeking hospitality.
— ‘You, others,’ cried the Pedant in a joyful voice, ‘approach without fear; we are at the house of a child of the theatre, a darling of Thespis, a favourite of Thalia the Muse of Comedy, in a word at the house of the famous Bellombre, formerly so applauded by the court and the city, not to mention the provinces. You all know his remarkable reputation. Bless the good fortune that has led us to this philosophical retreat where a hero of the theatre now rests on his laurels.’
— ‘Enter, ladies and gentlemen,’ said Bellombre, advancing toward the actors with courteous grace, and presenting himself as one who has not forgotten his fine manners beneath his rustic clothes. ‘The cold night wind could harm your precious throats, and however modest my dwelling may be, you will always be better off within than in the open air.’
As one might imagine, Blazius’ companions did not need asking twice, and entered the farmhouse, delighted by this stroke of luck, which, however, was only extraordinary in the timeliness of the encounter. Blazius had been part of a troupe that included Bellombre, and as their roles did not put them in competition, they appreciated each other and had become good friends, thanks to a shared taste for the divine bottle. Bellombre, whom a troubled life had born into the theatre, had retired from it, having inherited the farm and its outbuildings on his father’s death. The roles he played demanded a youthful appearance, and he had not been sorry to quit the stage before the wrinkles on his brow caused his dismissal. He was thought to have died long ago, and old afficionados chided young actors by recalling their memories of his performances.
The room which the actors entered was quite large and, as in most farmhouses, served both as a bedroom and a kitchen. A fireplace with a broad hood, whose mantel was adorned with a sloping piece of green serge, now yellowed, occupied one of the walls. A rounded brick arch in the brown varnished wall indicated the mouth of the oven, which was currently covered by a sheet of metal. On enormous iron firedogs, the hollow half-globes of which could contain a good-sized bowl, four or five enormous logs, or rather tree-trunks, burned with a cheerful crackle. The glow of this fine fire lit the room with such a vivid glow that the light of the lamp was rendered needless; the reflections of the flames from the walls picked out, amidst the shadows, a bed, of Gothic form, veiled by curtains, while their gleams, flickering over the darkened beams of the ceiling, cast long shadows in strange designs at the feet of the table placed in the middle of the room, and raised sudden glimmers from the protruding dishes and utensils arranged on the sideboard or hanging on the walls.
In the corner near the window, two or three volumes thrown on a carved wooden pedestal table showed that the master of the house had not quite reverted to the peasantry, and that he occupied his leisure hours in the long winter evenings with reading, recalling thus his former profession.
Heated by the warm atmosphere, and his hospitable welcome, the whole troupe felt a profound sense of well-being. The pink colours of life reappeared on their pale faces and lips chapped by cold. Gaiety lit their previously dull eyes, and hope raised its head once more. The shifty, lame, teasing deity, named Misfortune, was finally tired of persecuting the wandering company, and, appeased no doubt by the death of Matamore, rested content with her meagre prey.
Bellombre had called to his servants, who set the table with plates and large-bellied drinking pots, to the great jubilation of Blazius, parched from birth, whose thirst was always aroused, even in the nocturnal hours.
— ‘You see,’ he said to the Tyrant, ‘how logical my prediction deduced from the presence of the little red light has proved. My suppositions were neither mirages nor phantoms. Dense steam rises, and swirls from this soup abundantly adorned with cabbages, turnips, and other vegetables. Clear red wine, newly-drawn, sparkles in these jugs crowned with pink foam. The fire blazes all the brighter because it is cold outside. And, what is more, we have as our guest the great, the illustrious, the never-sufficiently-praised Bellombre, the cream of actors past, present, and future, without wishing to belittle the talents of any present.’
— ‘Our happiness would be complete if poor Matamore were here,’ sighed Isabella.
— ‘What evil has happened to him?’ asked Bellombre, who knew Matamore by reputation.
The Tyrant told him the tragic adventure of the captain who remained in the snow.
— ‘Without this happy encounter with an old and brave comrade, our lives would have been hanging by a thread by dawn,’ said Blazius. We would have been found quite frozen, like sailors in the Cimmerian darkness and frost.’
— ‘That would indeed have been a pity,’ Bellombre continued, glancing at Isabella and Serafina, gallantly; ‘but surely these young goddesses would undoubtedly have melted the snow, and thawed Nature, with the fire in their eyes.’
— ‘You attribute too much power to them,’ replied Serafina; ‘they would have been incapable of warming even a single heart in that gloomy and icy darkness. Tears due to the cold would have extinguished the flames of amorousness there.’
While eating supper, Blazius informed Bellombre of the state of the troupe. The latter seemed not at all surprised.
— ‘Theatrical Fortune is even more feminine and capricious than worldly Fortune,’ he replied; ‘her wheel turns so quickly it barely stands still for a moment. But if the players often descend, they are led to ascend again with a light and deft movement, and soon regain their balance. Tomorrow, I will send men with plough-horses to recover your wagon, and we will set up a theatre in the barn. Not far from the farm, there’s a largish village that will provide us with an audience. And if the takings are insufficient, in the depths of my old leather purse lie a few pistoles of better quality than the tokens for the play, for, by Apollo, I will not leave my old Blazius and his friends in the lurch.’
— ‘I see,’ said the Pedant, ‘that you are still the same generous Bellombre, and that you have not grown rusty in your rural and bucolic occupation.’
— ‘No,’ replied Bellombre, ‘for while cultivating my land I refuse to allow my brain to lie fallow; I reread the old authors, in the corner of this fireplace, my feet on the andirons, and leaf through the plays of the great minds of the day that I can procure in the depths of exile. I study, as a pastime, the roles that would have suited me, and realise that I only triumphed as a fop, at the time when my role won applause, because of a sonorous voice, a gallant bearing, and a fine pair of legs. Then I had no real understanding of the art, and performed everything without reflection, like a crow knocking a line of walnuts over. The public’s ignorance ensured my success.’
— ‘Only the great Bellombre could speak thus of himself,’ said the Tyrant courteously.
— ‘Art is long, life is short,’ continued the former actor, ‘especially for the comedian obliged to express his ideas by means of his own person. I was gaining in skill, but acquiring a belly, a ridiculous thing in my role as a dark handsome fellow, a tragic lover. I declined to wait until two extras were obliged to raise me by my arms again whenever the situation demanded I throw myself on my knees before the princess to declare my love, a declaration punctuated with asthmatic hiccups, and the rolling of tearful eyes. I seized the opportunity presented by inheritance, and retired at the peak of my glory, not wishing to imitate those stubborn folk who are chased from the stage in a shower of apple-cores, orange-peel, and hard-boiled eggs.’
— ‘You were wise to do so, Bellombre,’ said Blazius, ‘even though your retirement was premature and you could have trodden the boards for another ten years.’
Indeed, Bellombre, although tanned by the country air, had maintained his good looks; his eyes, accustomed to expressing passion, became animated and filled with light amidst the heat of conversation. His nostrils wide and well-formed, flared. His lips, when they parted, revealed a set of teeth that would have been the pride of any coquette. His dimpled chin lifted proudly; abundant hair, in which a very few streaks of silver shone, played in thick curls down to his shoulders. He was still a most handsome man.
Blazius and the Tyrant continued to drink in company with Bellombre. The actresses retired to a separate room, where the servants had lit a large fire in the hearth. Sigognac, Leander, and Scapin lay down in a corner of the stable on a few forkfuls of fresh straw, well-defended against the cold by the breathing of the animals, and a coverlet of horse blankets.
While some drink and others sleep, let us return to the abandoned cart, and see what has become of it.
The horse still lay between the shafts. Its legs had stiffened like stakes, and its head lay flat on the ground among the strands of its mane, on which the sweat had frozen to ice crystals in the cold nocturnal wind. The visible socket in which a glassy eye was embedded had deepened further, and the thin cheek seemed as if it had been the subject of a dissection.
Dawn was breaking; the winter sun showed one leaden-white half of its disk between two long bands of cloud and shed its pale light on the livid landscape, in which the trees’ skeletons were outlined in lines of funereal black. Amidst the whiteness of the snow a few crows hopped, guided by their sense of smell, and cautiously approached the dead creature, fearing danger, an ambush, or a trap, since the motionless, dark mass of the wagon alarmed them, and they cawed to each other, in the croaks that constituted their language, that this object could well hide a hunter on watch, a crow not proving so ill an addition to a stew. They advanced, hop by hop, feverish with longing; then retreated, in fear, performing a sort of bizarre pavane. A bolder one broke from the swarm, shook its heavy wings two or three times, left the ground, and alighted on the horse’s head. It was already bending its beak to prick at and consume the corpse’s eyes when it suddenly desisted and ruffled its feathers, seeming to listen.
A heavy step crunched the snow far off on the road, and this noise, which the human ear might not have caught, resonated distinctly, so as to be detected by the crow’s keen sense of hearing. The danger not being pressing, the black-hued bird chose not to leave the spot, but kept a lookout. The step drew nearer, and soon the vague form of a man, bearing something in his arms, appeared through the morning mist. The crow thought it prudent to withdraw, and took flight, uttering a lengthy croak to warn its companions of the danger.
The whole mob flew towards the neighbouring trees, uttering hoarse, shrill cries. The man reached the wagon, and, surprised at encountering in the middle of the road, a driverless cart harnessed to an animal which, like Roland’s mare (see the epic poem ‘La Chanson de Roland’), had the chief fault of being dead, he stopped, casting a furtive and circumspect glance around him.
To examine the scene more closely, he set his burden on the ground. The burden stood by itself, and began to walk, for it was a little girl of about nine years old, whose long cloak, when she was folded over her companion’s shoulder, could have been taken for a leather bag or a satchel. Black, feverish eyes shone with a dark flame beneath the folds of the fabric which she wore as a headdress, eyes remarkably like Chiquita’s. A string of pearls showed as scattered points of light in the tawny shadow of her neck, and rags, twisted into cords, forming a contrast with that luxurious item, were wrapped around her bare legs.
It was, indeed, Chiquita herself, and her companion was none other than Agostin, the bandit of the mannequins’ ambush: weary of exercising his noble profession on empty roads, he was on his way to Paris where all manner of talents find employment, walking by night and hiding by day, as do all creatures that are about murder or plunder. The little girl, exhausted with fatigue and seized by the cold, had been unable to advance further, despite her vast courage, and Agostin, seeking shelter, carried her as Homer and Belisarius are said to have carried their guides, with this difference that Agostin was not blind, but on the contrary possessed the eyes of a lynx, which, according to Pliny the Elder (Naturalis Historia, Book XXVIII, xxxii, 122) has the clearest eyesight of all four-legged animals, and according to later writers can see through walls.
— ‘What means this?’ said Agostin to Chiquita. ‘It is usually we who confront wagons, and now a wagon confronts us. Let us take care lest it’s full of travellers who demand our purse or our lives.’
— ‘There’s no one here,’ replied Chiquita, who had poked her head beneath the cart’s awning.
— ‘Maybe they’ve left something behind,’ the bandit replied; ‘we’ll search it.’ And, rummaging in the folds of his belt, he brought out a flint, tinder, and a spill; having procured a flame, he lit a dark-lantern that he always carried with him for his nocturnal explorations, since daylight had not yet flooded the shadowy interior of the carriage. Chiquita, whose hope of spoils had made her forget her fatigue, slipped into the carriage, directing the beam of light onto the packages with which it was cluttered; but she saw only old painted canvases, props made of cardboard, and a few rags of no value.
— ‘Search thoroughly, my dear Chiquita,’ said the bandit, keeping watch, ‘examine the pouches and bags hanging at the sides.’
— ‘There’s nothing, nothing at all worth taking. ‘Oh, Wait! Here’s a bag that clinks with a sound of metal.’
— ‘Hand it to me, quickly,’ said Agostin, ‘and bring the lantern closer so I can examine the find. By Lucifer’s horns and tail! We’re dogged by misfortune! I’d hoped for gold coins, and these are only gilded tokens, made of copper or lead. We’ll take advantage of this encounter to rest a little, at least, sheltered from the north wind by the cart’s canopy. Your poor, dear, blood-stained feet can no longer bear you, so rough is the road, and so long the journey. Beneath the canvas, you can sleep for an hour or two. I’ll keep watch, and if there’s any alarm, we can leave quickly.’
Chiquita huddled as best she could in the back of the cart, pulling the old canvas stage-sets over herself to provide a little warmth, and soon fell asleep. Agostin remained at the front, his folding knife, the blade open, beside him and within reach of his hand, observing his surroundings with that piercing gaze of the bandit from whose observation nothing suspicious escapes. The deepest of silences reigned in the solitary countryside. On the slopes of the distant hills, touches of snow could be seen, gleaming in the pale rays of dawn, like spectral mirages, or marble tombs in a cemetery. But all maintained the most reassuring immobility. Agostin, despite his will and his iron constitution, felt sleep descending. Several times already his eyes had closed, and he had opened them abruptly with a determined air; objects began to blur beneath his drooping eyelids, and he was losing consciousness when, in his vague and incoherent dreamlike state, it seemed that a damp, warm breath traversed his face. He woke; and his eyes, as they opened, met two phosphorescent pupils.
— ‘Wolves don’t eat each other, my friend,’ the bandit murmured, ‘your jaws aren’t strong enough to bite me.’ And with a movement quicker than thought, he clasped the creature’s throat with his left hand, and with his right, grasping the knife, he plunged it into the visitor’s heart as far as the handle.
‘Wolves don’t eat each other, my friend.’
However, Agostin, despite his victory, judged the place unsafe, and woke Chiquita who showed no fear at the sight of the dead wolf, lying on the road.
— ‘We’re better on our feet,’ said the brigand, ‘this carcass attracts the wolves, rabid with hunger in snowy weather when there’s little to eat. I can kill a few as I did this one; but they may come by the dozen, and if I fell asleep, it would be unpleasant to wake in the belly of some carnivorous beast. If I were eaten, they’d make short work of you, little wimp, with your tender flesh. Come, let’s depart as fast as we can. The carcass will keep them busy. You can walk now, can you?’
— ‘Yes,’ said Chiquita, who was no spoiled child wrapped in cotton-wool, ‘that little sleep has restored my strength. My dear Agostin, you’ll no longer be obliged to carry an awkward bundle. And if my feet refuse to bear me,’ she added wildly, ‘you can cut my throat with that great knife, drop me in the ditch, and I’ll thank you.’
The Lord of the Mannequins and the little girl walked on swiftly, and after a few minutes were lost in the shadows. Reassured by their departure, the crows flew down from the nearby trees, swooped on the dead nag, and began to feast on the carrion. Two or three wolves soon arrived to take their share of the free meal, untroubled by the wingbeats, croaks, and beaks of their coal-black companions. In a few hours, such was their hunger, both quadrupeds and fowls, that the horse, cleaned to the bone, a skeleton in the morning light, appeared as if prepared by a veterinary surgeon. Only the tail and the hooves remained.
The Tyrant arrived with a farmhand, once it was broad daylight, to retrieve the cart. He kicked at the half-gnawed carcass of the wolf, and viewed between the shafts, still harnessed, the skeleton of the poor beast, which neither fang nor beak had seriously damaged. The bag of tokens, their counterfeit money for stage use, was scattered over the road, and the snow showed clearly-moulded prints, some large, some small, which led to the cart and then away again.
— ‘It would seem,’ said the Tyrant, ‘that Thespis’ chariot received visits of more than one sort last night. O happy accident, which obliged us to interrupt our odyssey, I cannot bless you too much! Thanks to you, we have avoided both the four-legged wolves and the two-legged, no less dangerous, if not more so. What a treat the tender flesh of our girls, Isabella and Serafina, would have been to them, not to mention our tough old skins!’
While the Tyrant mused in this way, Bellombre’s servant freed the cart, and harnessed the horse he had led behind him, though the animal balked at the skeleton’s terrifying appearance, and the smell of the savage wolf whose blood stained the snow.
The cart was housed beneath a shed roof, in the farmyard. Nothing was missing, and in fact there was something added: a small knife, one of those made in Albacete, which had fallen from Chiquita’s pocket during her short sleep, and which bore on its sharp blade this menacing motto in Spanish:
‘Cuando esta vivora pica,
No hay remedio en la botica’
‘When the toothed viper bites home,
For its wound, there’s no remedy known’
This mysterious discovery greatly intrigued the Tyrant, and Isabella, who was quite superstitious and readily saw omens, good or bad, in such little incidents, that went unnoticed by others or were of no value in their eyes, fell into a reverie. The young woman knew Castilian like all those with some education at that time, and the threatening nature of the inscription did not escape her.
Scapin had left for the village, dressed in his beautiful pink-and-white striped costume, his large ruff duly starched and pressed in folds, his toque over his eyes, his cape on the corner of his shoulder, while displaying a superb and triumphant air. He walked, raising his knees, in an automatic and rhythmic movement that strongly smacked of the soldier; indeed, Scapin had been just such before he had become an actor. When he reached the church square, already escorted by a few rascals amazed by his odd attire, he adjusted his toque, planted his feet, and, attacking the donkey’s hide with his drumsticks, produced a drum-roll so brief, so masterful, so imperative, that a like performance would serve to awaken the dead every bit as effectively as the trumpet of the Last Judgment. Imagine the effect it had on the living. All the windows and doors opened as if on a spring, simultaneously. Faces appeared at them, aiming interrogative, bewildered glances at the square. A second drum-roll, like the crack of musket fire, yielding a bass note like thunder, soon emptied the houses, in which only the sick, the bedridden, and women in labour remained. After a few minutes, the entire village had gathered together, forming a large circle around Scapin. To better engage his audience, the wily fellow executed several drum-rolls and counter-rolls in such a lively, accurate, and dextrous manner that the sticks seemed to vanish due to the rapidity of their employment, though his wrists seemed barely to move. As soon as he saw the wide-open mouths of the good villagers affect the O shape which, according to the old masters, in their sketchbooks, is the supreme expression of astonishment, he suddenly ceased his uproar; then, after a short silence, he began in a yelping voice, whose intonations he varied fancifully, this emphatic and comedic harangue:
— ‘This very evening, a unique opportunity! A grand spectacle! An extraordinary performance! The illustrious actors of the ambulatory troupe directed by Master Herod, who have had the honour of playing before crowned heads and princes of the blood, and are now passing through this region, will give, on this single occasion, since they are expected in Paris at the Court’s insistence, a wonderfully amusing and comic piece, entitled The Rodomontades of Captain Fracasse! With new costumes, original scenes, and regular beatings with a stick, it is the most entertaining in the world. At the end of the show, Mademoiselle Serafina will dance the Moresca, augmented by passepieds, twists and turns, and cabrioles in the latest style, accompanying herself on the tambourine, which she plays better than any gitana in Spain. It will be most pleasant to watch. This performance will take place in Monsieur Bellombre’s barn, arranged for the purpose, and abundantly furnished with benches and lighting. Working for glory rather than profit, we will accept not only money, but also food and provisions on the part of those who lack the former. Spread the word!’
Having finished his speech, Scapin drummed so furiously, by way of peroration, that the windows of the church shook in their networks of lead, and several dogs scattered howling, more frightened than if they had had tin pans tied to their tails.
At the farm, the actors, aided by Bellombre and his servants, had already finished work. At the back of the barn, planks laid over barrels formed the stage. Three or four benches borrowed from the cabaret served as seats; and, at that price, were not required to be padded or covered with velvet. The spiders were responsible for the ceiling decorations, and their webs like large rosettes linked one beam to another. What upholsterer, even one to the Court, could have produced a finer, more delicate, and airily elaborate hanging, even though it were in Chinese brocade? Those hanging nets of silk resembled armorial banners seen in the chapter rooms of royal and chivalric orders. A noble spectacle for anyone who chose to exercise their imagination more fully.
The oxen and cows, whose beds of straw had been removed, surprised by the unusual commotion, often turned their heads from their mangers to cast their gaze towards the theatre where the actors were bustling about, rehearsing the play, so as to show Sigognac his entrances and exits.
— ‘My debut on stage,’ said the Baron, laughing, ‘has cattle and calves as audience; it would be enough to diminish my self-esteem, if I possessed any.’
— ‘Nor will this be the last time you will have such an audience,’ replied Bellombre, ‘there are always imbeciles and husbands in the auditorium.’
For a novice, Sigognac’s acting was not at all bad, and he was felt to be a quick learner. He had a good voice, a sound memory, and an adequately informed imagination, literary-wise, to add to his role those lines which arise spontaneously in a scene, and give liveliness to the performance. The pantomime bothered him more, frequently involving blows from a stick, which sparked his indignation, even though they were only applied with a roll of painted canvas filled with tow; his comrades, aware of his sensibility, spared him as much as possible, and yet he became angered in spite of himself, displaying dreadful grimaces, terrific frowns, and severe looks. Then, suddenly remembering the nature of his role, he would suddenly take on a humble, fearful, and cowardly expression.
Bellombre, who was looking at him with the close and perceptive attention of an expert with long experience, a master of the acting profession, called to him from his seat: ‘Beware of restraining those natural movements of yours; they are very effective, and will produce a new interpretation of the Braggart. If you cease to experience angry outbursts and furious indignation, feign them through artifice: Fracasse, who is the character you have to create, for he who adopts another’s interpretation is never anything but second-rate, longs to be brave; he admires courage, valiant deeds please him, and he is indignant towards himself for being such a coward. Far from danger, he dreams only of heroic exploits, vast superhuman enterprises; but, when peril comes, his overly-vivid imagination presents a plethora of painful wounds, the bony face of Death, and his heart fails him; he rebels at first at the idea of letting himself be beaten, and rage fills his stomach, but the first blow shatters his resolve. This approach to the role is superior than that of staggering about, with staring eyes and grimaces more ape-like than human, by which inferior actors solicit laughter from the audience but forego artistry.’
Sigognac followed Bellombre’s advice, and shaped his performance according to this idea so effectively that the actors applauded him, and predicted his success.
The performance was to take place at four in the afternoon. An hour before, Sigognac donned Matamore’s costume which Leonarda had enlarged by removing the padding previously necessitated by the deceased’s successive losses of weight.
As he slipped into this disguise, the Baron said to himself that it would have been doubtless more glorious to dress himself in leather and iron like his ancestors than disguise himself as an actor to represent a coward, he who was a truly valiant man capable of heroic deeds and exploits; but adverse fortune had reduced him to this unfortunate extremity, and he had no other means of subsistence.
The people were already gathering, and crowding into the barn. A few lanterns hanging from the beams supporting the roof cast a reddish light on all those brown, blond, and greying heads, among which appeared a few white women’s head-dresses.
Other lanterns had been placed as footlights at the front of stage, since care had to be taken not to set fire to the straw and hay.
The play began, and was listened to attentively. Behind the actors, for the back of the stage was not lit, their large, bizarre-looking shadows were projected, which seemed to be parodying the actors, imitating all their movements in disjointed, fantastical ways; but these grotesque details went unnoticed by the naive spectators, entirely occupied with the workings of the comedy, and the performances of the characters, whom they considered to be real.
A few cows, the tumult prevented from sleeping, watched the scene with those large eyes which Homer celebrated in a laudatory epithet marking Hera’s beauty (βοῶπις, cow-eyed, ‘Iliad’ 1.551etc.) and even a calf, at a moment full of interest, uttered a lamentable moan which did not destroy the robust illusion as regards those fine countrymen, but which made the actors on stage well-nigh burst out laughing.
Captain Fracasse was applauded several times, since he fulfilled his role well, without his feeling, before this unsophisticated audience, the emotion he would have felt if playing to more critical and literate spectators. Besides, he was certain that, among these peasants, no one knew him. The other actors, were clapped vigorously, and repeatedly, by those calloused hands, which refused to spare themselves, and in a most intelligent manner, according to Bellombre.
Serafina performed her Maresca with voluptuous pride, and arched and provocative poses, interspersed with supple leaps, rapid foot movements, and all sorts of flourishes that would have made even persons of quality and courtiers swoon with delight. She was especially charming when, waving her tambourine above her head, she made the copper discs rattle, or when, rubbing her thumb against its yellowish-brown skin, she drew a dull hum from it with as much dexterity as a professional tocador de pandereta.
Meanwhile, the old ancestral portraits, lining the walls in the dilapidated manor of Sigognac, took on a more forbidding and sullen air than usual. The warriors heaved sighs that lifted their iron breastplates, and nodded their heads melancholically; the dowagers pouted disdainfully over their fluted ruffs, and stiffened themselves in their whalebone bodies and farthingales. Low, slow, toneless voices, shadowy voices, escaped their painted lips, murmuring: ‘The last of the Sigognacs has, alas, gone astray!’
In the kitchen there, seated, sadly, between Beelzebub and Miraut, who fixed long, questioning glances on him, Pierre was musing, saying to himself: ‘Where is my poor master now…?’ and a tear, licked at by the aged dog, rolled down the old servant’s tanned cheek.
Chapter VIII: Matters Become Complicated
The day after the performance, Bellombre took Blazius aside and, loosening the cords of a large leather purse, poured out, as if from a horn of plenty, a hundred gleaming pistoles which he arranged in a pile to the great admiration of the Pedant, who remained with a contemplative expression before the treasure on show, rolling his eyes full of pecuniary covetousness.
With a superb gesture, Bellombre gathered the pistoles, in one fell swoop, and placed them in the palm of his old friend’s hand: ‘You will doubtless be aware’ he said, ‘that I would not do this to mock your need, as the gods tormented Tantalus. Take the money without hesitation. I will gift it to you, or lend it, if your pride is troubled by the idea of accepting it from an old comrade. Money is the nourisher of war, love, and the theatre. Besides, these coins, being shaped so as to roll about, find it tedious to do no more than lie flat in the depths of this purse where, in time, they would become coated in rust, dust, and mould. I spend little here, living in a rustic manner and suckling at the breast of Nature, nurse to Humanity. So, I shall not miss these.’
Finding nothing to reply to his rhetoric, Blazius pocketed the pistoles, and gave Bellombre a cordial embrace. The Pedant’s wall eye shone more moistly than usual amidst the blinking of his eyelids. The light bathed a tear, and the efforts the old actor made to hide this sympathetic pearl caused the most comical movements of his bushy eyebrows. Sometimes they rose to the middle of his forehead among a reflux of pleated wrinkles, sometimes they lowered to well-nigh veil his gaze. These manoeuvres did not, however, prevent the tear from detaching itself and rolling down a nose heated to a cherry red by the previous day’s libations, on the surface of which it evaporated.
The wind of ill fortune that had enveloped the troupe had most definitely fallen. The takings from the performance, together with Bellombre’s pistoles, made quite a tidy sum, for the provisions offered in payment were intermixed with a certain quantity of coins, and Thespis’ chariot, so lacking in the past, was now generously provisioned. To ensure that nothing was done by halves, the generous Bellombre lent the actors two sturdy plough-horses, soundly harnessed, with painted collars, and bells that jingled most pleasantly in accompanying the firm, regular step of those brave beasts.
Our actors, thus heartened, made a vigorous entry into Poitiers, not perhaps as magnificent as that of Alexander the Great into Babylon, but still quite majestic. The boy who was to return the horses stood at their head and moderated their progress, since they quickened their pace on smelling, from afar, the warm odours of the stable. The wheels rumbled through the winding streets of the city, over the rough paving, while the horseshoes clanged with a cheerful noise that drew folk to the windows and the inn doors; to call for those doors to be opened, the driver executed a joyful musket-round of whiplashes, to which the animals responded with shuddering movements that set the chimes of their bells ringing.
Their approach lacked the piteous, miserable, and furtive manner in which such actors had formerly arrived at the gloomiest of dens. Thus, the hotelier of the Armes de France understood, from this triumph of an uproar, that the newcomers were in funds, and ran himself to attend on the wagon.
The Hôtel des Armes de France was the finest inn in Poitiers and the one in which well-born and wealthy travellers often stayed. The courtyard into which the wagon entered had a most pleasant air. It was surrounded by clean buildings, adorned on all four sides with a covered balcony or corridor supported on iron brackets, a convenient arrangement allowing access to the rooms whose windows overlooked the courtyard, and facilitating the service of the footmen.
At the end of the courtyard an archway opened, giving passage to the outbuildings, kitchens, stables, and sheds. An air of prosperity reigned over all this. Recently plastered, the walls were bright to the eye; the wood of the banisters, and balusters of the gallery showed not a speck of dust. New roof tiles, of a bright red hue, whose grooves still retained a few thin streaks of snow, shone gaily in the winter sun. From the chimneys spiralled auspicious smoke. At the foot of the steps, his cap in his hand, stood the innkeeper, Master Bilot, a strapping fellow of ample corpulence, the triple folds of his chin a witness to the excellence of his kitchen, and the beautiful purple hue of his face to that of his cellar, a face which seemed to have been scoured with blackberry-juice like that of Silenus, that old drunkard who was tutor to Bacchus (the wine-god Dionysus of Greek myth). A smile that stretched from ear to ear puffed out his plump cheeks, and enveloped his mocking eyes, the outer corners of which vanished into crow’s feet, and a host of mischievous wrinkles. He was so fresh, so fat, so ruddy, so tasty, so perfectly cooked, that he made you want to set him on a spit, and eat him drenched in his own juices!
‘The Innkeeper, Master Bilot.’
When he saw the Tyrant, whom he had known for a long time, and who always paid well, his good humour redoubled, since actors attract a crowd, and the youth of the city go to great lengths as regards snacks, feasts, suppers and other meals, to treat the actresses and win the good graces of those coquettes with sweets, fine wines, sugared almonds, jams, and other such little delicacies.
— ‘What good fortune brings you here, Master Herod?’ said the innkeeper: ‘It’s a long time since you were seen at the Armes de France.’
— ‘That’s true,’ replied the Tyrant, ‘but one shouldn’t always perform one’s antics in the same place. The spectators end up knowing all one’s tricks, and repeat them themselves. A brief absence is necessary. The largely-forgotten is as good as what’s new. Are any of the nobility in Poitiers at this time?’
— ‘Many, Master Herod, the hunting season is over, and they have little to do. One can’t always be eating and drinking. You’ll gather an audience.’
— ‘Then,’ said the Tyrant, ‘bring us the keys to eight of your rooms, lift three or four capons from the spit, remove from behind the woodpile a dozen bottles of that little wine that you know of, and spread the rumour throughout the city: that Master Herod’s illustrious troupe has arrived at the Armes de France with a new repertoire, and proposes to give several performances.’
While the Tyrant and the innkeeper were conversing in this way, the actors had descended from the carriage. The servants at the inn took their luggage, and carried it to the designated rooms. Isabella’s was a little apart from the others, the nearer ones being occupied. This distance did not displease the modest young woman, who was sometimes embarrassed by the bohemian promiscuity which the wandering life of an actress forced her to adopt.
Soon the whole town, thanks to the eloquence of Master Bilot, knew that the actors had arrived, and would perform plays penned by the finest minds of the time, and as well as they were done in Paris, if not better. The gallants and aficianados inquired about the beauty of the actresses, turning up the tips of their moustaches in a glorious manner, with a quite ridiculous air of conceit. Bilot, accompanying his words with significant grimaces, uttered discreet and mysterious answers calculated to turn the brains, and excite the curiosity of these young calves.
Isabella, having arranged her clothes on the shelves of the wardrobe, which, with an uneven bed, a table with twisted legs, two armchairs, and a wooden chest, formed the furniture of her room, attended to those matters of her toilette requiring the attention of a delicate young woman, after a long journey undertaken in the company of men. She spread out her long hair, finer than silk, untangled it, combed it, poured a few drops of essence of bergamot onto it, and tied it back, with thin blue ribbons of a colour most becoming to her pale rose complexion. Then she changed her linen. Anyone who had viewed her so would have thought they saw a nymph of Diana’s entourage, having laid her clothes on the bank, preparing to set her foot in the water, in some wooded valley of Greece. But only for an instant. A jealous cloud of white suddenly cloaked her pale nudity, for Isabella was chaste and prudish even in solitude. Then she put on a grey dress, adorned with blue embellishments, and looking at herself in the mirror, smiled with that smile that the least coquettish of women grants herself when she finds herself dressed to her advantage.
Under the influence of the milder temperature, the snow had melted and only a trace remained in the places exposed to the north wind. A ray of sunshine shone. Isabella could not resist the temptation of opening the window and poking her pretty nose outside for a moment, to examine the view revealed from her room; a whim all the more innocent because the window opened onto a deserted alley, formed on one side by the inn and on the other by a length of garden wall over which the bare tops of trees protruded. Her gaze plunged to the garden and followed the outline of a flowerbed marked by a box hedge; at the far end stood a mansion whose blackened walls attested to its antiquity.
Two cavaliers were walking beside the hedge, both young and well-looking, but not equal in rank, judging by the deference one showed the other, holding back a little, and yielding precedence at the end of the path whenever it was necessary to retrace their steps. Of this amicable couple, the first I will call Orestes, and the other Pylades. since we do not yet know their real names. Orestes might have been between twenty and twenty-two years of age. He had a pale complexion, and jet-black eyes and hair. His doublet of brown velvet emphasized his supple, slender figure: a short cloak of the same colour and material as the doublet, edged with a triple line of gold braid, hung from his shoulder, held by a cord whose tassels rested on his chest; soft boots of pale Russian leather shod his feet, which more than one woman might have envied for their smallness and their raised arches, further emphasised by the high heel of the boot. From the bold ease of his movements, and his proud assuredness of bearing, one might surmise that he was a great lord, sure of being well received everywhere, and before whom life opened free of obstacles. Pylades, red of hair and beard, and dressed in black from head to toe, lacked by a long way the same triumphant certainty of mien, though he was quite a handsome person in his own right.
— ‘I tell you, my dear fellow, that Corisande bores me,’ said Orestes, retracing his steps to the end of the path and continuing the conversation that had been under way before Isabella opened her window, ‘I have had my door barred to her, and I shall return that portrait of her which is as gloomy as her person, along with her letters which are even more tedious than her conversation.’
— ‘Yet Corisande loves you,’ objected Pylades, quietly.
— ‘What matter, if I don’t love her?’ Orestes replied with a touch of passion. ‘That’s exactly the point! Do I owe a charitable show of love to every fellow, every maid who has the fancy to fall in love with me? I am too good to them. I give in to those swooning carp’s eyes, those whining tones, those sighs and lamentations, and I end up being hoodwinked, muttering all the while about my own good-naturedness and cowardice. From now on I will adopt a Hyrcanian ferocity, be cold as Hippolytus, and hide from women, like Joseph in the Bible. Clever the Potiphar who shall sink her claws into the border of my cloak! I declare myself, from now on, a misogynist, that is to say, an enemy of the petticoat, whether it be of silk or taffeta. To the Devil with duchesses and courtesans, bourgeois women, and shepherdesses! Whoever says the word ‘woman’ speaks of irritation, disappointment, gloomy adventures. I hate them from head to toe, and I will confine myself to chastity like a young monk in a hood. That cursed Corisande has disgusted me with her sex forever. I renounce them all...’
Orestes had reached this point in his speech when, raising his head as if to call heaven to witness his resolution, he happened to see Isabella at the window. He nudged his companion with his elbow and said: ‘Note over there, at that window, fresh as the Dawn on its eastern balcony, that adorable and delightful creature who seems more like a deity than a woman, with her ash-brown hair, her clear face, and sweet eyes. How graceful she is, leaning like that a little forward, which shows off to advantage, under the gauze of her chemise, the curves of her ivory throat! I imagine here to be of the finest character, unlike other females. Her mind must be modest, amiable and polite, her manner pleasant and charming!’
— ‘A plague on you!’ replied Pylades, laughing, ‘what good eyesight you must have to see all that from here! I see nothing, except a woman at her window, quite a nice one to tell the truth, but who doubtless lacks the incomparable perfections with which you so liberally endow her.’
— ‘Oh! I love her already, and deeply. I am smitten with her; I must possess her, and shall, even if I have to use the most subtle inventions, empty my coffers, and kill a hundred rivals to do so.’
— ‘Come, come, sir knight, don’t get so heated in your armour," said Pylades, ‘you’ll end up with pleurisy. And what has become of that fine hatred of the sex that you displayed so boastfully just now? The first pretty face was enough to put it to flight.’
— ‘When I spoke and cursed in that way, I knew not that this angel of beauty existed, and all that I said was naught but a damnable blasphemy, a pure and monstrous heresy, that I beg Venus, goddess of love, to forgive.’
— ‘She will do so, no doubt, for she is indulgent to all mad lovers whose banner you are worthy to bear.’
— ‘I will open the campaign,’ said Orestes, ‘and declare war courteously on my beautiful enemy.’
With that, he stopped, fixed his gaze directly on Isabella, removed, in a manner as gallant as it was respectful, his felt hat, the long feather of which swept the ground, and sent a kiss with his fingertips in the direction of the window.
The young actress, on seeing his action, assumed a cold and composed air as if to make the insolent man understand that he was quite mistaken, closed the window, and drew the curtain.
— ‘Now Aurora is hidden by a cloud,’ said Pylades, ‘which bodes ill for the rest of the day.’
— ‘On the contrary, I regard it as a favourable sign that this beauty has withdrawn. When the soldier hides behind the battlements of the tower, it means the besieger’s arrow has struck home. She is winged, I tell you, and the kiss I signalled will force her to think of me all night, if only to insult me, and accuse me of effrontery, a fault that never displeases women. There is something between me and the stranger now. A very thin thread, true, but I will strengthen it so as to make a rope to climb to the infanta’s balcony.’
— ‘You are very well versed in the theory and stratagems of love,’ said Pylades respectfully.
— ‘I am sometimes touched by it,’ replied Orestes, ‘and now let us return, for the beauty once frightened will not reappear soon. This evening, I’ll send my spies out into the field.’ And the two friends slowly climbed the steps of the old mansion, and disappeared.
Now let me return to our actors. Not far from the inn was a racquet-court wonderfully suited to being employed as a theatre. The actors rented it, and a master-carpenter from the town, under the direction of the Tyrant, soon adapted it to its new purpose. A glazier-painter, who dabbled in daubing signs, and emblazoning coats of arms on the sides of carriages, refreshed the tired and faded decorations, and even painted new ones with some success. The room where the racquet-players changed, was arranged as a foyer for the actors, with screens surrounding the actresses’ area, forming a kind of dressing-room for the whole troupe. All the best seats were reserved in advance, and the takings promised to be excellent.
— ‘What a pity,’ said the Tyrant to Blazius, while listing the plays it would be suitable to perform, ‘what a pity that we lack Zerbina! A Soubrette is, in truth, the grain of salt, the mica salis, the spice of comedy. Her sparkling gaiety lights up the stage: she vivifies slow passages, and encourages laughter in those who are uncertain, by flashing her thirty-two pearls surrounded by bright carmine. By means of her chatter, impertinence, and lasciviousness, she emphasises the more modest mannerisms, gentle speech, and cooing tones of the Lover. The trenchant colours of her bold skirts amuse the eye, and she may reveal, as far as her garter, or almost, a slender leg in a red stocking with gold trim, a perspective pleasing to young and old alike, especially to the old whose dormant salaciousness she awakens.’
— ‘Indeed,’ replied Blazius, ‘the Soubrette is a precious condiment, a whole boxful even, that adds spice to the insipid comedies of the day. But we must do without her. Neither Isabella nor Serafina can fill the role. Besides, we need a Lover and a Grande Coquette. The Devil take that Marquis de Bruyères who has snatched our pearl from us, that phoenix wholly unique, that paragon of maids, in the person of the incomparable Zerbina!’
The conversation between the two had reached this point when a silvery chiming of bells was heard in front of the inn door; soon lively, rhythmic hoofbeats clattered on the pavement of the courtyard, and the pair, leaning on the balustrade of the gallery where they had been talking, saw three mules harnessed in the Spanish style, with plumes on their heads, embroidered decorations, tufts of wool, clusters of bells, and saddled with striped blankets. All very neat and magnificent, and in no way suggestive of hired beasts.
On the first was mounted a rogue of a footman, in grey livery, with a hunting knife at his belt and an arquebus across his saddle-bow, maintaining the insolent air of a great lord, who, if dressed otherwise than as a servant, might well have passed for his master. He was leading, by a rope twisted around his arm, the second mule burdened with two enormous bundles, balanced on each side of the pack-saddle, and covered with a Valencian patterned cape.
The third mule, finer and more stylish even than the other two, bore a young woman warmly wrapped in a fur-trimmed coat, and wearing a grey felt hat with a red feather pulled down over her eyes.
— ‘Does this procession not remind you of something?’ said Blazius to the Tyrant, ‘I think this is not the first time I have heard those same bells chime.’
—By Saint Alipantin! (a coinage of Rabelais’, see ‘Gargantua and Pantagruel’, Book 2:VI) replied the Tyrant, these same mules were employed in the kidnap of Zerbina at the crossroads of La Croix. Speak of the wolf...’
— ‘…and one sees its tail, or in this case feather,’ Blazius interrupted; ‘oh, thrice-fortunate day, worthy of being marked in red! It is indeed Senora Zerbina herself; see how she leaps from her mount with that mischievous turn of the hips which belongs only to her, and throws her mantle over the footman’s arm. There, she is doffing her felt hat, and shaking her hair as a bird does its feathers. Let’s go and welcome her, taking the steps four at a time.’
Blazius and the Tyrant rushed down to the courtyard, and met Zerbina at the foot of the stair. The joyful girl leapt at the Pedant’s neck and, clasping his head, cried out, her words suiting the action: ‘I must clasp you and kiss your old face, with all my heart, just as if you were a pretty youth, my joy is so great at seeing you again. Don’t be jealous, Herod, you Tyrant, and don’t frown with those great dark eyebrows, as if you were going to order the Massacre of the Innocents. I shall kiss you too. I began with Blazius because he’s the uglier.’
Zerbina executed her promise, faithfully, for she was a girl of her word, and was full of integrity in her own way. Giving a hand to each of the two actors, she ascended to the gallery where Master Bilot had prepared a room for her. As soon as she entered, she threw herself into an armchair, and began to breathe heavily like someone relieved of a great weight.
— ‘You’ve no idea,’ she said to the two actors, after a moment’s silence, ‘the pleasure I feel at being with you again; but don’t think it’s because I’m in love with your ugly old mugs marred by white lead and rouge. I love no one, thank God! My joy is due to returning to my element, for one’s always unhappy out of it. Birds are no more suited to water than fish to air; the former drown, while the latter suffocate. I’m an actress by nature, and the atmosphere of the theatre suits me. There, alone, I can breathe at ease; smoke-laden candles smell better to me than civet, benzoin, ambergris, musk or Spanish leather. That aroma backstage is like balm to my nose. Sunlight bores me; real life seems dull. I need invented lovers to serve me, and the world of romantic adventures present in comedies to absorb my energies. Once the poets no longer lend me their voices, I fall silent. So, I’m returning to my role. I hope you’ve not hired anyone to replace me. Nor shall I accept it, by the way. If it is the case, my claws will soon be at the little slut’s face; I’ll break her front teeth on the edge of the platform. When someone encroaches on my area of privilege, I can be as mean as the Devil.’
— ‘There’s no need for carnage,’ said the Tyrant, ‘we have no Soubrette. It was Leonarda who played your role, in an aged and duenna-like manner, a rather sad and gloomy metamorphosis, to which necessity condemned us. If by means of one of those magic ointments of which Apuleius speaks (see ‘The Golden Ass’, Book 3) you had just now transformed yourself into a bird, and, perched on the edge of the roof, had listened to the conversation I was holding with Blazius, you would have had a rare thing happen to you, that of hearing our praise of you delivered in a lyrical, Pindaric, and dithyrambic manner.’
— ‘Good,’ replied Zerbina, ‘I see that you are still the good companions of yesteryear, and that you missed your little Zerbinetta.’
Some lads from the inn, now entered the room and left packages, boxes, and cases there, which the actress inspected and opened, in the presence of her two comrades, employing several little keys on a silver ring.
They contained beautiful clothes, fine linen, guipure lace, jewels, pieces of velvet and Chinese satin: a whole trousseau as bold as it was rich. There was, in addition, a deep, wide and heavy leather bag, stuffed to the mouth with cash, the cord of which Zerbina untied, and whose contents she poured onto the table. It resembled the River Pactolus (the Sart Çayı, Turkey, whose waters yielded gold in ancient times), only in coinage. The Soubrette plunged her small brown hands into the pile of gold, like a winnower into a heap of wheat, raised all that her cupped palms could contain, then opened them and let the gold louis fall back in a shining shower, greater than that by which Danaë, daughter of Acrisius, was seduced in her brazen tower (by Zeus, so disguised). Zerbina’s eyes sparkled as brightly as the coins, her nostrils flared, and a nervous laugh revealed her white teeth.
— ‘Serafina would burst with rage if she saw me with such riches,’ said the Soubrette to Herod and Blazius, ‘I’m showing them to you to prove that it’s not poverty that draws me back to the fold, but pure love of the art. As for you, my old friends, if you’re low-spirited, you can plunge your hands in there, and take as much as your fingers can hold, and even use your thumbs, German style.’
The actors thanked her for her generosity, saying they needed nothing.
— ‘Well!’ said Zerbina: ‘Save it for another time; I’ll keep the coins in my coffer like a faithful treasurer.’
— ‘So, you’ve abandoned the poor marquis,’ said Blazius with exaggerated solemnity, ‘not being one to be abandoned by a lover yourself. You’re unsuited to the role of Ariadne (who was abandoned by Dionysus, in Greek myth), but that of Circe (a sorceress in Homer’s ‘Odyssey’) fits. Still, he was a fine nobleman, well-made, with a manner learned at Court, witty and worthy in every way of being loved longer.’
— ‘My intention,’ replied Zerbina, ‘is to keep him like a ring on my finger, and the most precious gem in my jewellery case. I’ve not abandoned him, and if I have left him, it was merely so that he would follow.’
— ‘Fugax sequax, sequax fugax,’ resumed the Pedant, ‘those four Latin words with their cabalistic consonance, seeming like the croaking of those amphibians in Aristophanes’ The Frogs, contain the marrow of all theories of love, and may serve as a rule of conduct for both the male and the female sex.’
— ‘And what does your Latin mean, old Pedant?’ said Zerbina. ‘You neglect to translate it, forgetting that not everyone has been like you, a schoolteacher and a distributor of canings.’
— ‘It could be translated,’ replied Blazius, ‘by a versicle, or a couplet if you will, in this manner:
Flee him, he’ll pursue you;
Follow, and he’ll flee you.’
— ‘That,’ said Zerbina, laughing, ‘is real poetry, fit for a mirliton or those sugared pastry-cones they stick into biscuits. It should be sung to the tune of Robin et Robine.’
And the mad creature began to sing the Pedant’s verse at full throat, in a voice so clear, so silvery, so pearly, it was a pleasure to hear her. She accompanied her song with such expressive looks, sometimes laughing, sometimes angry, that the pursuit and retreat of two lovers was perfectly portrayed, the one inflamed, the other disdainful. When she had given full rein to her frolics, she calmed down, and became more serious.
— ‘Hear my tale. On the Marquis’ orders, this valet and his mule boy, who gathered me up at the crossroads of La Croix, led me to a little fort, or hunting lodge, that he owns, deep in one of his woods, a place most secluded and difficult to discover, unless you know it exists, since it’s hidden behind a dark row of fir trees. It is there that this good lord goes to indulge in debauchery with some friends of his, free companions. You can shout ‘A Toast!’ and ‘Santé!’ without anyone hearing, other than an old servant who renews the wine-jars. It is also there that he hides his mistresses and his amorous fantasies. There’s a bright, clean apartment, wallpapered with Flemish woodland scenes, and furnished with a curtained bed, ancient but large, soft, and well-adorned with pillows and cushions; a set of clothes in which nothing is lacking essential to any woman, though she be a duchess: combs, sponges, bottles of essence, opiates, boxes for mouches (beauty-spots), lip-rouge, almond-paste; with armchairs, dining-chairs, and folding-chairs padded to perfection, and Turkish carpets everywhere, so thick that one can fall without hurting oneself. This secret retreat occupies the second floor of the pavilion. I say secret, because from the outside it is impossible to suspect its magnificence. Time has blackened the walls, which would fall to ruin without the ivy that embraces and supports them. Passing before the castle one would think it uninhabited; in the evening, the shutters and window-curtains prevent the candle-light and fire-light from being seen.’
— ‘That would prove a fine setting for the fifth act of a tragi-comedy,’ interrupted the Tyrant. ‘The actors could slit one another’s throats at leisure in such a place.’
— ‘Your custom of playing tragic roles,’ said Zerbina, ‘has clouded your judgement. On the contrary, it’s a very joyful dwelling, for the Marquis is anything but fierce.’
— ‘Continue your tale, Zerbina,’ said Blazius with an impatient gesture.
— ‘When I arrived at this château in the wilds,’ continued Zerbina, ‘I could not help but feel a certain apprehension. I had no reason to fear for my virtue, yet, for an instant, I had the idea that the Marquis wished to imprison me in a dungeon of some kind, from which he might drag me, capriciously, now and then, to serve his whims. I’ve no taste for dungeons with barred air-vents, nor could I endure captivity, even were I to be the favourite Sultana of His Highness the Mighty Sultan; but I said to myself, I’m a Soubrette by trade, and have, in my life, aided so many Isabellas, Leonoras, and Doralices to escape that I know how to find a ruse by which to do so myself, if, they do seek to detain me. A miracle it would be if some jealous fellow could keep Zerbina a prisoner! So, I entered, bravely, and was surprised, in the most pleasant way in the world, to see that this sullen dwelling, which grimaced at passers-by, smiled at its guests. Dilapidation reigned outside, luxury within. A good fire blazed in the fireplace. The light of the pink candles was mirrored in their polished holders, and on the table, with its wealth of crystal glass, silverware, and plate, a supper as abundant as it was delicious was served. On the edge of the bed, carelessly scattered lengths of fabric reflected light from their crumpled folds. Jewels set out on the dressing-table, bracelets, necklaces, earrings, shed wild gleams, and gave off sudden flashes of gold. I felt completely reassured. A young country maid, opened the door, offered me her services, and relieved me of my travelling dress so as to don a more suitable one which already hung in the wardrobe. Soon the Marquis arrived. He found me charming in my white taffeta silk negligee aflame with cerise, and swore indeed he loved me madly. We had supper, and at whatever cost to my modesty I must admit I was dazzling. I felt a devilish spirit within me; witty sallies flew, our encounters occurred, amidst bursts of sparkling laughter; it was a display of enthusiasm, verve, joyous fury, that none could imagine. It was enough to make the dead dance, and set ablaze the ashes of old King Priam of Troy. The dazzled, fascinated, and intoxicated Marquis called me now an angel and now a demon; he proposed to murder his wife and marry me. The dear man! He would have done as he said, but I refused to allow it, saying that such killings were insipid, bourgeois, common things. I cannot believe that Lais of Corinth, or the beautiful Imperia Cognati of Rome, or Madame Vannozza who was mistress to a Pope (Giovanna ‘Vannozza’ dei Cattanei was mistress to Cardinal Rodrigo de Borgia, later Pope Alexander VI), ever enlivened the midnight hour as charmingly. Things continued like this for several days. Little by little, however, the Marquis became dreamier, he seemed to be seeking something of which he was not aware, but which he lacked. He went out riding a few times, and even invited two or three friends to visit, as if to amuse himself. Knowing he was vain, I dressed to advantage and redoubled my kindness, grace, and coquettishness before these squires who had never before been at such a gathering: at dessert, employing pieces of a broken china plate as castanets, I executed a saraband so wild, so lascivious, so frenzied, it would have guaranteed the damnation of a saint. Arms swaying above my head, legs gleaming like lightning amidst a whirl of skirts, hips shaking more than quicksilver does, back arched to touch the parquet floor with my shoulders, breasts quivering, ablaze with glances and smiles to set fire to an audience if ever I chose to dance so on stage. The Marquis beamed, and gloried in it all, proud as a king to have such a mistress; but next day he was gloomy, languid, idle. I tried my strongest potions. Alas, they no longer had power over him. His state of mind seemed to astonish even himself. Sometimes he looked at me attentively as if contemplating, beneath my features, a resemblance to some other person. Had he acquired me, I thought to myself, merely to embody a memory, and remind him of a lost love? No, I answered, such melancholic fantasies are not in his nature. Such reveries are suited to bilious hypochondriacs, not joyful folk with rosy cheeks and reddened ears.’
— ‘Was it satiety, perhaps,’ said Blazius, ‘for one wearies even of ambrosia in the end, and the gods descend to earth, to taste the coarse bread mortals eat.’
— ‘Remember, Master Fool,’ replied Zerbina, giving the Pedant a little slap on the fingers, ‘that no one ever tires of me, you told me so a moment ago.’
— ‘Forgive me, Zerbina, and tell us what the Marquis’ dreamy mood was all about; I am dying to hear.’
— ‘Finally,’ resumed the Soubrette, ‘by dint of much reflection I comprehended what was distressing the Marquis, and marring his happiness. I discovered the worm in the rose that this sybarite sighed over on his couch of voluptuousness. He possessed the woman, but regretted the actress. The brilliant scene that the footlights reveal, the make-up, the costumes, the variety and activity the play demands had vanished, as the artificial splendour of the stage fades when the lights are quenched. By retreating to the wings, I had lost part of my charm for him. All that remained to him was Zerbina; while what he loved in me was Lisette, Marton, Marinette, the lightning-flash of a smile, the glance of an eye, the quick retort, the provocative look, the whimsical poise, the longing and admiration shown by the public. He was searching, in my everyday face, for my theatrical face, because we actresses, when we are not ugly, possess two forms of beauty, one created and the other natural; a mask, and a set of features. Often it is the mask that is preferred, even if the features are attractive. What the Marquis wanted was the Soubrette he had seen in the Rodomontades of Captain Matamore, of whom I myself represented only a part. The whim that attracts certain men to actresses is much less sensual than one thinks. It is a passion of the mind rather than the body. They believe they are reaching the ideal by embracing the reality, yet the image they are pursuing eludes them; an actress is like a painting that needs be contemplated from a distance, and in the right light. If you approach too near, the glamour dissipates. Then, I myself was beginning to feel bored. I had often wished to be loved by a nobleman, to wear expensive clothes, to live without cares in the lap of luxury, and I’d often cursed the harsh fate that forced me to wander from town to town, travelling by cart, sweating in the summer, freezing in the winter, to fulfil my role as a travelling player. I awaited an opportunity to put an end to that wretched life, not suspecting that it was my true life, my raison d’être, my talent, my claim to poetry, my charm, and my particular lustre. Without the rays of art that gild me a little, I would be nothing more than a vulgar scamp like so many others. Thalia, the virgin goddess, protects me by dressing me in her livery, and the verses the poets write, coals of fire touching my lips, cleanse them of more than one lascivious little kiss. My stay in the Marquis’ pavilion enlightened me. I understood that this brave gentleman was not only in love with my eyes, teeth, and skin, but also with that little spark that glows in me and wins me applause. One fine morning I told him quite clearly that I wished to resume my travels, since it did not suit me to remain the mistress of a noble lord forever: that the first woman who came along could perform the role as well, and that he must graciously grant me leave, while adding however that I loved him very much, and was most grateful for his kindness. The Marquis seemed surprised at first, but not angry, and after reflecting for a while, he said: “What will you do, my darling?” I replied: “Overtake Herod’s troupe on the way, or join them in Paris if they are already there. I wish to resume my role of Soubrette; it has been a long time since I made a fool of Gerontes (equivalent to Pantalone in the commedia dell’arte).” This made the Marquis laugh. “Well,” he said, “employ the team of mules that I am placing at your disposal, and I will follow shortly. I have some business which requires my presence at court, and which I have neglected, and besides I have been rusting away in the provinces for too long. You will allow me to applaud your performances, and if I tap on your dressing-room, you will open to me, I hope.” I adopted a coy, little air, but not one to make him despair. “Ah! Monsieur le Marquis, what do you seek from me.” In short, after the most tender of farewells, I mounted my mule, and here I am at the Armes de France.’
— ‘But,’ said Herod, in a doubtful tone, ‘if the Marquis failed to appear, you’d be utterly floored.’
This idea seemed so ludicrous to Zerbina that she leant back in her armchair and burst into laughter, clutching her sides. ‘The Marquis fail to appear!’ she cried, when she had regained her composure. ‘You may book his apartment in advance. My only fear was that in his ardour he might have arrived before me. Come, now! You doubt my charms, Tyrant, as foolish as your namesake is cruel. Tragedy is definitely rendering you stupid. You used to have more wit than that.’
Leander and Scapin, who had learned of Zerbina’s arrival from the servants, entered the room and welcomed her. Soon Dame Leonarda appeared, her owlish eyes blazing at the sight of the gold and jewels scattered on the table. She displayed the vilest obsequiousness towards Zerbina. Isabella also appeared, and the Soubrette graciously presented her with a length of taffeta. Serafina alone remained in her own room. After the blow to her self-esteem, she had been unable to forgive her rival with regard to the Marquis’ inexplicable preference.
Zerbina was told that Matamore had frozen to death on the way, but that he had been replaced in the company by the Baron de Sigognac, who had taken as his stage-name the title, most appropriate to the role, of Captain Fracasse.
— ‘It will be a great honour for me to act alongside a gentleman whose ancestors fought in the Crusades,’ said Zerbina, ‘and I shall try not to let respect dampen my enthusiasm. Happily, I am now accustomed to people of quality.’
At that moment, Sigognac entered the room. Zerbina curtsied so as to make her skirts puff out amply, and gave him a beautiful, well-executed, and ceremoniously courtly bow.
— ‘This,’ she said, ‘is for Monsieur Baron de Sigognac, and this for Captain Fracasse, my comrade,’ she added, kissing him warmly on both cheeks, which well-nigh disconcerted Sigognac, unaccustomed as yet to such theatrical liberties, and also disturbed by Isabella’s presence.
Zerbina’s return allowed for a pleasantly varied repertoire, and the whole troupe, with the exception of Serafina, could not have been more pleased to see her again.
Now we have seen her comfortably settled in her room, surrounded by her cheerful companions, let us enquire after Orestes and Pylades, whom we left as they were returning home following their walk in the garden.
Orestes, that is to say the young Duke of Vallombreuse, for such was his title, ate only the slightest amounts and more than once neglected the glass that the footman had re-filled, so preoccupied was his imagination with the beautiful woman seen at the window. The Chevalier de Vidalinc, his confidant, tried in vain to distract him; Vallombreuse only replied in monosyllables to the friendly jokes of his Pylades.
As soon as the dessert was removed, the knight addressed the duke:
— ‘The briefest follies are the best; so that you may cease thinking about this beauty, it is simply a matter of ensuring your possession of her. She will soon be in Corisande’s situation. You are like those hunters who love only the pursuit of game and, once the quarry is slain, scarcely care to retrieve it. I will go organise a hunt so as to drive the bird to your nets.’
— ‘No,’ Vallombreuse replied, ‘I’ll do so myself; as you said, it is the chase alone that amuses me, and I would follow the least creature of fur or feathers to the ends of the earth, from hide to hide, until I fell dead of exhaustion. Don’t deny me that pleasure. Oh! If I had the good fortune to find a woman who resisted my advances, I think I should adore her, but there are none on this earthly globe.’
— ‘If one did not know of your triumphs,’ said Vidalinc, ‘one might accuse you of conceit on this subject, but your caskets full of love-letters, portraits, ribbon-bows, dried-flowers, locks of black, blonde and red hair, and such other tokens of love, clearly show that you are modest in speaking thus. Perhaps you will find what you seek, for the lady at the window seems to me wise, modest, and wonderfully cold.’
— ‘We shall see. Master Bilot talks freely; he listens also, and knows much of the people who stay at his inn. Let us go and drink a bottle of wine from the Canary Islands with him. I shall encourage him to talk, and he will tell us of this princess and her wanderings.’
A few minutes later, the two young men entered the Armes de France and asked for Master Bilot. The worthy innkeeper, knowing the status of his guests, led them himself to a well-kept ground-floor room where a bright, sparkling fire blazed in the fireplace, beneath a broad mantelpiece. He took from the sommelier’s hands a bottle, grey with dust, and covered with cobwebs, removed its wax cover with infinite caution, extracted the stubborn cork from the neck, smoothly, and with a hand as firm as if it had been cast in bronze, and poured a thread of liquid as blond as topaz into the spiral-stemmed Venetian glassware held out to him by the duke and the knight. In performing this cupbearer’s task, Bilot affected a religious gravity; one would have said he was a priest of Bacchus officiating at, and celebrating, the mysteries of the divine bottle; all he lacked was a crown of ivy, or vine leaves. This ceremonial served to increase the value of the wine he served, which was truly very good, and more worthy of a royal table than of a tavern.
He was about to leave them, when Vallombreuse stopped him on the threshold with an intimate wink. ‘Master Bilot,’ he said to him, ‘take a glass from the dresser, and drink a glass of this wine to my health.’
The tone admitted no reply, and besides Bilot was not one to be asked twice as regards helping a guest to consume the treasures of his cellar. He raised his glass, with a bow, and drained the contents down to the last drop.
— ‘A fine wine,’ he said with a contented click of his tongue against the roof of his mouth, then stood with his hand resting on the edge of the table, his eyes fixed on the duke, waiting to know what was required of him.
— ‘Do you have many guests at your inn,’ asked Vallombreuse, ‘and of what nature?’ Bilot was about to reply, but the young duke forestalled the innkeeper’s words and continued. ‘What is the point of trifling with an old miscreant like you? Who is the woman who occupies that room the window of which overlooks the alley opposite the Vallombreuse mansion, the third window from the corner of the wall? Answer quickly, and you shall have a gold piece for every syllable.’
— ‘At that price,’ said Bilot with a hearty laugh, ‘I would be virtuous indeed were I to employ the laconic style so esteemed by the ancients. However, as I am entirely devoted to Your Lordship, I will utter a single name: Isabella!’
— ‘Isabella! A charming and romantic name,’ said Vallombreuse, but do not employ such Spartan restraint. Be verbose, and tell us in detail all you know of this infanta.’
— ‘I will comply with Your Lordship’s orders,’ replied Master Bilot, bowing. ‘My cellar, my kitchen, my very tongue, are at his disposal. Isabella is an actress who belongs to the troupe of Master Herod, currently lodged at my Hôtel des Armes de France.’
— ‘An actress,’ said the young duke, with an air of disappointment, ‘I would have taken her, from her discreet and reserved air, for a lady of quality, or a wealthy member of the bourgeoisie rather than a wandering player.’
— ‘One might well be deceived,’ continued Bilot, ‘for the young lady has very elevated manners. She plays the role of an ingénue on the stage, and continues to do so in reality. Her virtue, although at risk for she is pretty, has suffered no breach, and she would have the right to wear a virginal crown. None knows better how to turn away a lover with precise and cold politeness, in a manner that leaves him no hope.’
— ‘I admire such,’ said Vallombreuse. ‘I hate nothing more than undefended bastions, strongholds that beat the drums for parley, and seek to capitulate even before the assault has been ordered.’
— ‘It will take more than a single captain to take that citadel,’ said Bilot, ‘though you be a bold and brilliant soldier and one little accustomed to encountering resistance, since this fortress is guarded by a sentinel vigilant in defence of true love.’
— ‘So, she has a lover, this wise Isabella!’ cried the young duke in a tone both triumphant and dejected, for on the one hand he had had little belief in female virtue, yet on the other it annoyed him to learn that he had a rival.
— ‘I said love, not lover,’ the innkeeper continued with respectful insistence. ‘They are not the same thing. Your Lordship is too experienced in matters of gallantry not to appreciate the difference, though it may appear subtle. A woman who has taken a lover may well take more, as the song says, but a woman who has but one love is impossible, or at least very difficult, to conquer. She already possesses what you offer her.’
— ‘You discourse on the matter,’ said Vallombreuse, ‘as if you had studied the courts of love, and Petrarch’s sonnets. I thought you were only learned as regards sauces and wine. And who is the object of this platonic tenderness?’
— ‘An actor, a member of the troupe,’ replied Bilot, ‘whom I could readily imagine acts merely out of love, because he lacks, it seems to me, the appearance of a common player.’
— ‘Well,’ said the Chevalier de Vidalinc to his friend, ‘you should be pleased. Unforeseen obstacles present themselves here. A virtuous actress is not someone you encounter every day, and such an affair is what you seek. It will grant you relief from grand ladies and courtesans.’
— ‘Are you certain,’ continued the young duke, pursuing his own thoughts, ‘that this chaste Isabella grants no audiences to this fellow, whom I already detest with all my soul?’
— ‘It’s clear that you know her not,’ Master Bilot continued. ‘She is like the ermine that would rather die than accept a spot on its white coat. When the play demands a kiss, you will see her blush beneath her rouge and even wipe her cheek with the back of her hand.’
— ‘Long live the proud, fierce, mare who rebels against the mounting block!’ cried the duke. ‘I whip her so well she’s obliged to walk, amble, trot, gallop, and bow to my will.’
— ‘You will achieve nothing in that manner, Monsieur le Duc, allow me to say,’ said Master Bilot, performing a bow marked by the deepest humility, as befits an inferior who contradicts a superior separated from him by so many rungs on the social ladder.
— ‘Not if I sent her, in a beautiful shagreen case, a few pendants adorned with large pearls, a gold necklace with several strands and clasps, set with precious stones, or a bracelet in the shape of a snake with two large balas rubies for eyes!’
— ‘She would simply return your gifts, and reply that you probably take her for someone else. She is not that way inclined like most of her companions, and her eyes, a rare thing for a woman, fail to light at the sight of gems. She looks at the most finely-set diamonds as if they were but medlars in straw.’
— ‘What a strange and whimsical specimen of the female sex!’ cried the Duke of Vallombreuse, quite astonished. ‘No doubt she seeks to marry this rascal of hers, who must be abundantly endowed with wealth, given this pretence at wisdom. These creatures sometimes have a whim to achieve high rank, and sit amidst gatherings of prudish women, their eyes lowered in modesty, and with a “touch me not” air.’
— ‘Marry her,’ Vidalinc laughed, ‘if there’s no other way. The title of duchess renders human even the surliest of women.’
— ‘Enough! Enough!’ cried Vallombreuse. ‘Let’s not advance too swiftly; let us first negotiate. Let us find some stratagem for approaching this beauty that won’t frighten her away.’
— ‘That is easier than making her love you,’ said Master Bilot. ‘This evening at the racquet-court there is a rehearsal of the play that is to be performed tomorrow. A few aficionados from the town will be admitted, and you have only to declare your presence for the door to open to you. Besides, I will have a word with Master Herod about it, who is a great friend of mine and will refuse me nothing; but, according to my scant knowledge, you would do better to address your wishes to Mademoiselle Serafina, who is no less pretty than Isabella and whose vanity would have prompted her to swoon with pleasure at your mission.’
— ‘It is the thought of Isabella that intoxicates me,’ said the duke, in a dry little tone that he knew how to deploy admirably, and which cut short the conversation, ‘Isabella and no one else, Master Bilot,’ and, plunging his hand into his pocket, he carelessly scattered a trail of gold pieces across the table, ‘take your payment for the wine, and keep the change.’
The innkeeper gathered the louis punctiliously, and dropped them one after another into the depths of his purse. The two gentlemen rose, pushed their felt hats over their eyebrows, threw their coats over a shoulder, and left the room. Vallombreuse took several turns in the alley, raising his eyes each time he passed in front of the sacred window, but it was in vain. Isabella, now on her guard, did not show herself. The curtain was drawn, and one might have thought the room empty. Tired of lingering in this deserted alley, in a chilly north wind, a situation to which he was unaccustomed, the Duke of Vallombreuse bored by his idle sojourn, returned home, grumbling at the impertinent prudishness of a woman self-assured enough to make a young and handsome duke languish so. He even thought, with some complacency, of the good Corisande, formerly so disdained, but his pride soon whispered in his ear that he need only make an appearance to triumph like Caesar. As for his rival, if he bothered him too much, he would hire a few soldiers, or cut-throats, to eliminate him; his dignity would not allow him to challenge such a rascal.
Though Vallombreuse had not seen Isabella withdraw to the rear of her apartment, yet, during his period of loitering in the alley, a jealous eye had spied on her through the panes of another window, that of Sigognac, whom the manner and behaviour of the personage below greatly displeased. Ten times the Baron was tempted to descend and attack the gallant with drawn sword, but restrained himself. There was nothing sufficiently offensive in the act of walking beside a wall to justify such aggression, which would have been considered mad and ridiculous. Such an outburst might harm Isabella’s reputation, she being completely innocent of those glances raised always towards the same place. He promised himself, however, to keep a close eye on the gallant, and engraved his features in his memory so as to recognise him if needed.
Herod had chosen for the next day’s performance, drummed up, and announced to the whole town, Ligdamon and Lydias, or the Resemblance (1631), a tragicomedy by Georges de Scudéry, a gentleman who, after having served in the Guards, had quit the sword for the pen, and wielded the one no less skilfully than the other, and The Rodomontades of Captain Fracasse, in which Sigognac was to make his debut before the public, having only acted previously for calves, horned-cattle, and country folk, in Bellombre’s barn. All the actors were well-occupied learning their roles; the play by Monsieur de Scudéry had just debuted, and was unknown to them. Pre-occupied, though chattering like monkeys while reciting their parts, they walked about the gallery, sometimes muttering, sometimes emitting loud vocal bursts. Anyone who had seen them would have taken them for folk who had taken leave of their senses. They stopped short, and set out again, with great strides, waving their arms like disjointed windmills. Leander especially, who was to play Ligdamon, tried various poses, and effects and struggled like a demon in a font of holy water. He was counting on this role to realise his dream of inspiring love in some great lady and take his revenge for the blows he had received at the Château de Bruyères, blows that had remained in his memory even longer than on his back. His role, that of a languid and lovesick lover, expressing fine feelings at the feet of an inhuman woman, in rather well-turned verse, lent itself to winks of the eye, sighs, pallor and all sorts of touching affectations, in which Monsieur Leander, one of the best Lovers in the provinces despite his pretensions and his ridiculousness, mainly excelled.
Sigognac, to whom Blazius had appointed himself teacher, studied in his room with the ageing actor, and was shaping himself to master the difficult art of the theatre. The character-type he represented, in his extravagantly exaggerated role, was far from natural, and yet it was necessary that behind the exaggeration one felt a degree of truth, and so discovered the man behind the mask. Blazius gave him advice in that regard, and taught him to begin in a simple and true tone, to arrive at more fanciful intonations, or else to return to ordinary diction after uttering the lively cries of a plucked peacock, for there is no character thus affected who is always so. Moreover, this unevenness is characteristic of lunatics, and troubled minds; it is also evident in their deranged gestures which do not quite correspond to the words they utter, a mismatch from which the skilful artist can derive comic effects. Blazius was of the opinion that Sigognac should adopt the half-mask, that is to say, one concealing the forehead to the nose, to retain the traditional appearance of his character, and combine the fantastic and the real in his visage, a great advantage in such kinds of roles, half-false, half-true, being generalised caricatures of humanity which do not repel the observer as would an accurate portrait. In the hands of the talentless actor, such a role may be only an insipid buffoonery suitable for entertaining the crowd, and making decent people shrug their shoulders, but a skilful player can introduce natural traits, and represent life better than if they were uniformly present.
The idea of the half-mask pleased Sigognac greatly. The mask would preserve his incognito, and give him the courage to face the crowd. Its thin cardboard would act like a helmet with a lowered visor, through which he would speak with a ghostly voice. For the face is the person himself, the body is nameless, and the face that is concealed cannot be known or recognised: this arrangement reconciled his respect for his ancestors with the necessities of his role. He would no longer expose himself to the footlights in a material and direct manner. He would be only the unknown mind bringing to life a man-sized marionette, nervis alienis mobile lignum (‘a wooden figure moved by another’s hand’: see Horace ‘Satires’ Book II.7, line 81); only he inhabited the interior of the puppet instead of pulling its strings externally. His dignity would suffer nothing from such an activity.
Blazius, who was very fond of Sigognac, shaped the mask himself in such a way as to give Sigognac a theatrical appearance completely different from his everyday physiognomy. A raised nose, studded with warts and as red at the tip as a cherry, circumflex eyebrows the hairs curling back into a comma, a moustache with pointed tips curved like the horns of the moon, made the regular features of the young baron unrecognisable; the mask, arranged like a chamfron (a horse’s defensive headpiece), only covered the forehead and the nasal protuberance, but the whole appearance of his face was altered.
They attended the rehearsal, which was in costume so that the general effect could be clearly considered. In order not to cross the city during Lent, the actors had stored their costumes in the racquet-court and the actresses were accommodating themselves in the room we described previously. The people of rank, gallants, and beaus of the place had striven to enter this temple or rather sacristy of Thalia, where the priestesses of the Muse donned their ornaments to celebrate the mysteries. Now they were all crowding around the actresses. Some held out mirrors to them, others brought the candles closer so that they could see better. One gave his opinion on the position of a knotted ribbon, a second held out a box of powder; another, less bold, remained seated on a chest, swinging his legs, without saying a word, while twirling his moustache to keep countenance.
Each actress had, thus, her circle of courtiers whose greedy eyes sought each chance betrayal amid the hazards of the toilette. Sometimes it was a dressing gown slipping down, to reveal, opportunely, a back gleaming like marble; sometimes a half-globe of snow or ivory growing impatient with the rigours of the corset, preferring to rest in a nest of lace; or else a beautiful arm rising to adjust a curl of hair, displaying itself naked to the shoulder. I will leave the reader to imagine the verses, madrigals, compliments, and mythological insipidities drawn from these provincials at the sight of such treasures; Zerbina laughed like a madwoman at their nonsense; Serafina, owning to vanity more than literary appreciation, delighted in them; Isabella alone declined to listen, and beneath the gaze of all those men adorned herself in a modest manner, refusing in polite but cold tones those gentlemen’s offers of service.
Vallombreuse, followed by his friend Vidalinc, had taken care not to miss this opportunity of seeing Isabella. He found her even prettier close to than from afar, and his passion increased accordingly. The young duke had indulged himself for the occasion, and indeed was admirably handsome. He wore a magnificent costume of white satin, ruffled and embellished with ornaments and cherry-red bows attached by diamond studs. Showers of fine linen and lace overflowed from the sleeves of his doublet; a richly-worked scarf of silvery cloth supported his sword; a white felt hat with an incarnadine feather swung from his hand, imprisoned in a Frangipani-perfumed glove (the perfume was first produced by the Renaissance family named Frangipani, in Rome, and created by mixing ‘orris’ or iris root, spices, civet and musk. The scented ‘plumeria’ plant was named after the perfume.)
His long, black hair, in thin ringlets, curled along his perfectly oval cheeks, highlighting their warm pallor. Beneath his fine moustache, his lips shone red like pomegranates, and his eyes sparkled between the dense fringes of his eyelashes. His white neck, rounded like a marble column, supported his head proudly, emerging freely from a turned-down collar of the most expensive Venetian needle-lace.
Yet there was something unpleasant in all this perfection. His features, so fine, pure, and noble, were marred by an inhuman expression, if one may use that term. Evidently the pains and pleasures of others had little effect on the bearer of that pitilessly beautiful face. He ought and did believe himself to be of a unique species.
Vallombreuse had silently placed himself close to Isabella’s dressing table, his arm resting on the frame of the mirror so that the eyes of the actress, obliged to consult the glass at every moment, would often encounter him. It was a clever manoeuvre, excellent tactics which would doubtless have succeeded with anyone other than our ingénue. He wished, before speaking, to strike a blow by means of his beauty, his haughty air, and his magnificence.
Isabella, who recognised the daring young man from the alley-way, and who was embarrassed by this imperious gaze, maintained the utmost reserve, and refused to allow her gaze to deviate from the mirror. She seemed not to have noticed that one of the most handsome noblemen in France was standing before her, but Isabella was a singular girl. Bored by this pose, Vallombreuse abruptly made up his mind, and spoke to the actress:
— ‘Mademoiselle, are you not she who will play Silvie in Monsieur de Scudéry’s Ligdamon and Lydias?’
— ‘Indeed, sir,’ replied Isabella, who could not avoid his cunningly banal question.
— ‘Never has a role been better filled,’ Vallombreuse continued. ‘If it is a poor one, you will render it fine; if it is fine, you will make it excellent. Happy are the poets who entrust their verses to those beautiful lips!’
Such vague compliments were not beyond the gallantries that polite people usually address to actresses, and Isabella was obliged to accept them, thanking the duke with a slight inclination of the head.
Sigognac, having finished dressing in the racquet-court dressing-room reserved for actors, returned to the actresses’ room, with Blazius in attendance, to wait for the rehearsal to start. He was masked and had already fastened the belt of the large rapier with its weighty basket-hilt, and tipped with a cobweb, inherited from poor Matamore. His scarlet cape, shredded below in crayfish-tail shapes, fluttered oddly over his shoulders, and the tip of his sword was elevated behind. To conform to the spirit of his role, he walked with his hip set forward and strode with legs separated like a compass, and an outrageous and provocative air, as befits a Captain Fracasse.
— ‘You look very well,’ Isabella told him, as she came to greet him, ‘never did a Spanish captain look more superbly arrogant.’
The Duke of Vallombreuse looked down his nose, with a most disdainful haughtiness, at this newcomer to whom the young actress spoke in so sweet a tone: this apparently was the scoundrel she was said to be in love with, he told himself, all riled with spite, unable to conceive that a woman could hesitate for a moment between the young and splendid Duke of Vallombreuse, and this ridiculous player.
However, he feigned not to notice that Sigognac was there. He treated the man like a piece of furniture. For him, Sigognac was not a human being but a thing, and he behaved, in that baron’s presence, with the same freedom as if he had been alone, brooding over Isabella, with inflamed glances that rested on the nape of her throat left uncovered by the opening of her blouse.
Isabella, confused, felt herself blushing, in spite of herself, under this insolently fixed gaze, which seemed hot as a jet of molten lead, and hurried to finish her toilette so as to escape it, all the more so as she saw Sigognac’s hand furiously and convulsively tightening on the pommel of his rapier.
She placed a beauty spot at the corner of her lip, and pretended to rise so as to go on stage, as the Tyrant, in his bull-like bellow, had already shouted, several times: ‘Ladies, are you ready?’
— ‘Pardon me, mademoiselle,’ said the duke; ‘you forgot to employ the assassin.’ And Vallombreuse, dipping a finger into the box of mouches on the dressing-table, pulled out a small black taffeta star.
— ‘Allow me,’ he continued, ‘to place it here, close to your breast; it will enhance its whiteness and appear like a natural mole.’
The action accompanied the speech so closely that Isabella, startled by his presumption, barely had time to lean back in her chair to avoid the insolent contact; but the duke was not one of those who were easily intimidated, and his finger to which the mouche had attached itself was about to brush the young actress’s throat when an iron hand fell upon his arm, and held it as if in a vice.
The Duke of Vallombreuse, transported with rage, turned his head and saw Captain Fracasse standing in a pose that had nothing to do with his comedic role of a coward.
— ‘Monsieur le Duc,’ said Fracasse, still gripping Vallombreuse’s wrist, ‘mademoiselle places her beauty spots herself. She needs no one’s services.’
Having said this, he released the young lord’s arm, whose first impulse was to seek the hilt of his sword. At that moment Vallombreuse, despite his beauty, exhibited an expression more dreadful and formidable than that of Medusa. His face was of a frightful pallor and his black eyebrows drooped over bloodshot eyes. The purple of his lips took on a violet colour and whitened with foam; his nostrils palpitated as if breathing slaughter. He rushed toward Sigognac, who did not flinch an inch and awaited the assault, but, suddenly, he stopped. A sudden reflection extinguished, like a shower of icy water, his boiling frenzy. His features returned to their place; his natural colour returned to him, he had completely regained possession of himself, and his face expressed the most glacial disdain, the most supreme contempt that one human creature can show another. He had just reflected on the fact that his adversary was not nobly-born and that he had almost committed himself to fight an actor. All his ancestral pride revolted at the idea. The insult from one so low could not touch him; does one fight with the mud that splashes one? However, it was not in his nature to leave an offence unpunished from whatever source it came, and, approaching Sigognac, he said to him: ‘Fool, I shall have your bones broken by my lackeys!’
— ‘Be careful, my lord,’ replied Sigognac in the calmest of tones, and with the most detached air in the world, ‘be careful, I have hard bones on which their sticks will shatter like glass. I only allow myself to be struck in comedies.’
— ‘However insolent you may be, scoundrel, I will not grant you the honour of fighting you myself. That is an ambition that surpasses your merits,’ said Vallombreuse.
— ‘That we shall see, duke,’ replied Sigognac. ‘Perhaps, having less pride, I shall beat you with my own hands.’
— ‘I don’t answer to a mere mask,’ said the duke, taking Vidalinc’s arm as he approached.
— ‘I will reveal my face at the appropriate time and place,’ Sigognac continued, ‘and I believe it will prove even more inimical to you than my false nose. But let us stop there. I can hear the bell ringing, and I would run the risk of missing my entrance if I delayed any longer.’
The actors admired his courage, but, knowing the Baron’s lineage, were not as astonished by it as the other spectators of this scene, who were stunned at such audacity. Isabella’s emotion had been so strong that her rouge had flaked from her, and Zerbina, seeing the deathly pallor that conquered her cheeks, felt obliged to apply an inch of rouge to them. She could hardly stand on her legs, and if the Soubrette had not supported her elbow, she would have fallen to the boards as she emerged on-stage. To be the object of a quarrel was deeply disagreeable to the sweet, good, and modest Isabella, who feared nothing so much as the noise and clamour that surrounds a beautiful woman, her reputation forever losing by it; moreover, though resolved not to yield to him, she loved Sigognac tenderly, and the thought of an ambush, or at least a duel, to which he was exposed, troubled her more than one could say.
Despite this incident, the rehearsal proceeded at full speed, the real emotions of life being unable to distract the actors from their fictitious passions. Isabella herself acted very well, though her heart was full of care. As for Fracasse, excited by the quarrel, he sparkled with verve. Zerbina surpassed herself. Each of her lines aroused laughter and brought a prolonged clapping of hands. From one corner of the orchestra seats came pre-eminent bursts of applause which did not cease till the last, and whose enthusiastic persistence finally attracted Zerbina’s attention.
The Soubrette, feigning a genuine move, advanced near the footlights, stretched out her neck with the motion of a curious bird poking its head from between the leaves, looked out into the room and discovered the Marquis de Bruyères, crimson with delight, whose eyes, sparkling with desire, blazed like garnets. He had found the Lisette, the Marton, the Colombina of his dreams! He was in heaven.
— ‘The Marquis has arrived,’ Zerbina said quietly to Blazius, who was playing Pandolfo, in a pause before her cue, in the tight-lipped voice actors adopt when they are conversing between themselves on stage and do not wish to be heard by the audience; ‘see how jubilant he is, how radiant, how passionate! He is restless, and were it not for his sense of shame, he would leap the rail and kiss me in front of everyone! Ah! Monsieur de Bruyères, you like soubrettes. Well then! We’ll fricassee some for you with salt, pepper and nutmeg.’
From this point in the play, Zerbina acted for all she was worth, and with furious verve. She seemed luminous with gaiety, wit, and ardour. The Marquis understood that he could no longer do without this spiciness. All the other women with whom he had been in good graces, and whom he compared in memory to Zerbina, now seemed to him dull, boring, and insipid.
The play by Monsieur de Scudéry, which followed, was pleasing, though less amusing, and Leander, entrusted with the role of Ligdamon, was charming; but since we are familiar with the talent of our actors, let us leave them to their own affairs, and follow the Duke of Vallombreuse and his friend Vidalinc.
Outraged by that scene in which he had lacked advantage, the young duke had returned to the Hôtel Vallombreuse with his confidant, meditating a thousand plans for revenge; the mildest would involve nothing less than having the insolent captain beaten to the point of being left for dead in the public square.
Vidalinc attempted in vain to calm him; the duke wrung his hands in rage, and ran about the room like a madman, punching the armchairs which fell, comically, on their backs, overturning the tables, and causing other damage, while venting his fury; finally, he seized a Japanese vase, and hurled it to the floor, where it shattered into a thousand pieces.
— ‘Ah!’ he cried, ‘I long to break this fellow like the vase, trample him underfoot, and sweep the remains into the gutter! A wretch who dares to come between me and the object of my desire! If he were a gentleman, I would fight him with sword, dagger, pistol, on foot, or on horseback, until I had set my foot on his breast and spat in the face of his corpse!’
— ‘Perhaps he is one,’ said Vidalinc. ‘I would certainly believe it given his self-assurance. Master Bilot spoke of a nobleman who had engaged himself for love, and whom Isabella looked upon favourably. This must be he, if one is to judge by his jealousy and the infanta’s air of confusion.’
— ‘Do you think so?’ Vallombreuse continued, ‘A person of rank to mingle with these minstrels, to climb the trestles, smear himself with rouge, receive blows to the nose, and kicks to the behind! No, that is quite impossible.’
— ‘Jupiter transformed himself into a beast, even a husband, so as to enjoy mortal women,’ replied Vidalinc, ‘a greater debasement with regard to an Olympian god’s majesty than acting is with regard to the dignity of a nobleman.’
— ‘No matter,’ said the duke, ringing a bell to summon a servant, ‘I will first punish the buffoon, and punish the man later, should there be one behind that ridiculous mask.’
— ‘Should there be one! Never doubt it,’ resumed Vallombreuse’s friend; ‘his eyes glittered, under those false eyebrows, and despite his cardboard nose smeared with cinnabar, he had a majestic and threatening air, a difficult thing to accomplish in such attire.’
— ‘So much the better,’ said Vallombreuse, ‘my avenging blade will not strike the air, but a manly breast will encounter its blows.’
The servant entered, bowed low, and in perfect stillness awaited his master’s orders.
— ‘Rouse Basque, Azolan, Mérindol and Labriche, if they are resting, and tell them to arm themselves with stout clubs and wait for a certain Captain Fracasse at the exit of the racquet-court, in which Herod’s actors are performing. Have them assault him, beat him, and leave him on the ground, but without causing his death; otherwise, people might think me afraid of him! I'll take care of the aftermath. While they are beating him, let them shout: “With the compliments of the Duke of Vallombreuse,” so he cannot brush off the insult.’
This commission, though of a fierce and truculent nature, seemed no great surprise to the lackey, who withdrew, assuring the duke that his orders would be executed immediately.
— ‘I find it annoying,’ said Vidalinc, when the servant had retired, ‘that you should treat the buffoon in this way, who, after all, has shown courage above his station. Do you wish me, under some pretext or other, to pick a quarrel with him, and kill him? All blood is red when it is shed, even though it is often said that the blood of noblemen is blue. I am of good and ancient stock, though not of such high rank as yours, while my delicacy is not such as to refuse to commit to fight. Say the word, and I’ll go. This captain seems to me more worthy of the sword than the stave.’
— ‘I must thank you,’ replied the duke, ‘for an offer which demonstrates the perfect fidelity with which you support my interests, but I cannot accept. The scoundrel dared to touch me. It is fitting that he should atone ignominiously for his crime. If he is a gentleman, he will find a means to convey his challenge to me. I always answer when a sword is in question.’
— ‘As you please,’ said Vidalinc, resting his lower limbs on a footstool, like a man who sees no other course than to let things go their own way. ‘Incidentally, this Serafina is quite charming! I paid her a few compliments, and I’ve already arranged a rendezvous. Master Bilot was right.’
The duke and his friend, falling silent again, awaited the return of the guards.
Chapter IX: Swords, Sticks, and Other Goings-On.
The rehearsal was over. Having retired to their dressing-rooms, the actors changed into their street clothes. Sigognac did the same, but, expecting an attack, retained Matamore’s sword. It was a fine old Spanish blade, quite as long as a day without food, with a wrought iron basket-guard that closely protected the wrist, and which, wielded by a man of courage, could parry blows and deliver stout if not fatal ones, as it’s tip and edge were blunted according to the custom of the theatre, but it was quite sufficient for the servants whom the duke had charged with executing his vengeance.
Herod, a robust companion with broad shoulders, had with him the stick he used to prod the lads charged with raising the curtains, and with this club of sorts, which he wielded as if it were made of straw, he promised himself to deal with any marauder who might attack Sigognac, it not being in his character to leave his friends to face danger alone.
— ‘Captain,’ he said to the Baron, once they were in the street, ‘leave the females to go on before us, under the guardianship of Leander and Blazius, since their screams would deafen us: the former is a mere coward, as shy in appearing as the moon; the other is old, and his lack of strength would betray his courage. Scapin will stay with us, he can trip folk up better than anyone, and in less than a minute will have a couple of rascals stretched on their backs, flat as pancakes, should they attack us; in any case, my stick is at the service of your rapier.’
— ‘Thank you, brave Herod,’ replied Sigognac, ‘the offer is not to be refused, but let us prepare for being attacked unexpectedly. Let us march one behind the other, at a certain distance, down the centre of the street; any rogues posted there, in the shadow of the wall, will have to advance to reach us, and we will have time to see them coming. Here, let me draw my sword; you, brandish your stick, and let Scapin stretch his sinews to render them supple.’
Sigognac led the little column, and they advanced cautiously down the alley that led from the racquet-court to the Armes de France. It was dark, winding, unevenly paved, and wonderfully suited to an ambush. Porch roofs projected above it, doubling the depth of the shadows, and giving shelter to attackers. No light filtered from the slumbering houses, and there was no moon that night.
Basque, Azolan, Labriche, and Mérindol, the young duke’s retainers, had been waiting for more than half an hour for Captain Fracasse to pass by, since he could not return to his inn by any other route. Azolan and Basque had crouched in a doorway on one side of the street; Mérindol and Labriche, hidden against the wall, had taken up positions just opposite, so as to bring their sticks to bear on Sigognac, like the hammers of the Cyclopes on their anvil. The passage of the group of women led by Blazius and Leander had alerted them to the fact that Fracasse could not be far behind, and they stood piously, their fingers curled around their clubs, ready to carry out their task, without suspecting that they were going to have to deal with tough combatants, since the poets, actors, and bourgeoisie for whom the great deigned to order a beating, customarily received such without opposing it, and were content to bend their backs beneath the blows.
Though the night was dark, Sigognac, whose eyesight was sharp, had noted some moments ago the four lanky men lying in wait. He stopped, and made as if to turn back. This feint caused the cut-throats, who thought their prey might escape, to quit their hiding-places and race after the captain. Azolan rushed forward first, while all four shouted: ‘Death to Captain Fracasse! And the compliments of monseigneur, the duke!’ Sigognac had wrapped his coat about his left arm several times, forming, in that manner, a sort of impenetrable sleeve; with this sleeve, he parried the blow from the club that Azolan dealt him, and with his rapier struck the latter so violent a blow in the chest that the wretch collapsed in the gutter his breastbone shattered, his feet in the air, and his hat in the mud. If the point had not been dulled, the blade would have passed through his body, and emerged between his shoulder-blades. Basque, despite his companion’s misfortune, advanced bravely, but a furious blow from the flat of Sigognac’s sword landing on his head, shattered the dome of his iron cap, such that he saw three dozen candles flare in that night blacker than pitch. Herod’s club, meanwhile shattered Merindol’s stave, who, finding himself disarmed, ran for his life, but not without having his back beaten and bruised by that formidable piece of wood, quick though he was to take flight. Scapin’s effort went as follows: he seized Labriche by the body, with such a swift and agile movement that the latter, half-suffocated, could make little use of his club; then, holding Labriche back with his left arm while thrusting him forward with his right, so as to crack the vertebrae, he knocked him off-balance, with a sharp, sinewy, tripping movement, as sudden as the release of a crossbow spring, which sent the man rolling over the pavement, ten paces further on. Labriche’s neck struck a stone, and the shock was so severe that the executor of Vallombreuse’s vengeance lay unconscious on the battlefield, and as good as dead.
The street was now clear, and the actors victorious. Azolan and Basque, crawling on their hands and knees, tried to reach shelter to recover their senses. Labriche lay like a drunkard in the gutter. Mérindol, less grievously wounded, had taken to his heels, doubtless so that he at least would survive the disaster and be able to tell the tale.
‘The street was now clear, and the actors victorious.’
However, as Mérindol approached the Hôtel Vallombreuse, he slowed his pace, for he was about to face the wrath of the young duke, no less formidable than Herod’s club. At this thought, sweat trickled down his brow, and he no longer felt the pain in his dislocated shoulder, from which hung an arm as inert and limp as an empty sleeve.
He had scarcely reached the mansion when the duke, impatient to know the success of the altercation, sent for him. Mérindol appeared with a troubled and embarrassed countenance, for he was suffering greatly from the pain of his shoulder. Beneath his tanned complexion lay a greenish pallor, and drops of fine sweat beaded his forehead. Motionless and unspeaking, he stood at the threshold of the room, waiting for a word of encouragement or a question from the duke, who remained silent.
— ‘Well,’ said the Chevalier de Vidalinc, seeing that Vallombreuse was simply gazing fiercely at Mérindol, ‘what news do you bring? Ill news, no doubt, for you scarcely show a look of triumph.’
— ‘Monsieur le Duc,’ replied Mérindol, ‘should not doubt our zeal in carrying out his orders; but this time fortune has served our valour badly.’
— ‘How so?’ said the duke with an angry movement, ‘Could not four of you manage to defeat that clown’
‘That clown,’ replied Mérindol, ‘exceeds in vigour and courage the mythical Hercules. He rushed upon us so furiously that, turning from assailed to assailant, and in no time at all, he laid Azolan and Basque on the floor. Under his blows they fell like those little lines of Capuchin monks cut and folded from playing cards, and yet they are tough fellows. Labriche was brought down by another actor, by means of a clever wrestling trick, and his neck now knows how hard the pavement of Poitiers is. I myself had my stick broken under Monsieur Herod’s club, and my shoulder is so damaged I’ll not be able to use my arm for a fortnight.’
— ‘You’re nothing but cattle, scoundrels, idle ruffians, without loyalty, or courage!’ cried the outraged Duke of Vallombreuse, in a fury. ‘An old woman would put you to flight with her distaff. I did wrong in saving you from the galleys, or the gallows! I would do better to have honest people in my service: they would be neither more useless nor more cowardly! Since sticks proved insufficient, swords will be necessary!’
— ‘My lord,’ Mérindol continued, ‘ordered a beating, not an assassination. We would not have dared to take it upon ourselves to exceed his orders.’
— ‘There you are,’ said Vidalinc, laughing, ‘a formal, precise, and conscientious rascal. I like such candour in regard to their ambush; what say you? This little affair is coming together in quite a romantic manner, which must please you, Vallombreuse, since ease of encounter repels you while obstacles charm you. For an actress, Isabella seems to me to be most difficult of approach; she lives in a tower without a drawbridge, and guarded, as in tales of chivalry, by dragons breathing fire and flame. But here is our routed army returning.’
Indeed, Azolan, Basque, and Labriche, the latter having recovered from his fainting spell, appeared at the door of the salon, holding out supplicating hands to the duke. They were livid, haggard, stained with blood and dirt, though without other injuries than their bruises, except that the violence of the blows they had received had caused their noses to bleed, and reddish patches of gore hideously spotted the yellow leather of their buff
armour.
— ‘Back to your kennels, you scoundrels!’ cried the duke, who proved less than tender at the sight of his crippled troop. ‘Why I don’t have you lashed with stirrup-leathers for your imbecility and cowardice, I’ve no idea; my surgeon will examine you, and tell me if the blows you claim to apologise for are of consequence, otherwise I will have you flayed alive like the eels of Melun (see Rabelais’ ‘Gargantua and Pantagruel’ Book 1: XLVII). Away with you!’
The defeated squad took this for granted, and departed with a show of agility, so much terror did the young duke inspire in these swordsmen, men of rope and the sack, who were, moreover, less than timid by nature.
When these poor devils had withdrawn, Vallombreuse threw himself on a pile of cushions, and maintained a silence that Vidalinc respected. Stormy thoughts followed one another, in the former’s brain, like black clouds driven by a wild wind over a stormy sky. He longed to set fire to the inn, kidnap Isabella, slay this Captain Fracasse, and hurl the entire troupe of actors into the river. For the first time in his life, he encountered real resistance! He had commanded a thing to be done which had failed! A player had defied him! His own people had fled after being beaten by a theatrical ‘captain’! His pride revolted at the idea, and he fell into a sort of stupor. Was it possible, then, that he was facing opposition from this fellow? Then he reflected on the fact that, despite being clad in a magnificent costume studded with diamonds, adorned with all his grace, and in all the splendour of his rank and beauty, he had been unable to obtain a favourable glance from a mere girl, a travelling actress, a puppet exposed every evening to the whistles of the first idler, he whom princesses welcomed with a smile on their lips, for whom duchesses swooned with love, and who had never encountered cruelty from a woman. He ground his teeth with rage, and his clenched fist tore at the splendid white satin doublet he had not yet doffed, as if he wanted to punish it for having supported him so poorly in his plan of seduction.
Finally, he rose abruptly, made a sign of farewell to his friend Vidalinc, and withdrew, without touching the supper which had been served to him, to his bedroom where sleep came not to draw the damask curtains of his bed.
Vidalinc, who was happy in the company of his thoughts of Serafina, ignored the fact that he was eating supper alone, and dined with a hearty appetite. Lulled by voluptuous fantasies in which the young actress was ever-present, he slept soundly until the morning.
When Sigognac, Herod, and Scapin returned to the inn, they found the other actors in a state of great alarm. The cries of ‘Death to Captain Fracasse!’ and the sound of the brawl, had reached the ears of Isabella and her comrades, piercing the silence of the night. The young girl had almost fainted, and if it had not been for Blazius supporting her elbow, she would have sunk to her knees. Pale as wax, and trembling, she waited at the threshold of her room for news. At the sight of Sigognac unharmed, she gave a weak cry, raised her arms to the sky, and let them fall around the young man’s neck, hiding her face against his shoulder with an adorably modest motion; but, swiftly controlling her emotion, she soon freed herself from this embrace, stepped back a few steps, and resumed her usual reserve.
— ‘You are unhurt, at least!’ she said in her sweetest voice. ‘How I would have grieved if, because of me, the slightest harm had come to you! But, how imprudent! To brave this duke, so handsome and so wicked, who has the look and pride of Lucifer, on behalf of a poor girl like me! It was not sensible, Sigognac; since you are now an actor like us, you must know how to endure certain shows of insolence.’
— ‘I would never tolerate an insult’, replied Sigognac, ‘uttered in my presence, to the adorable Isabella, even though I only bear the mask of a captain.’
— ‘Well said, Captain,’ said Herod, ‘well said and better done! Good heavens! What vicious thrusts! It was a good thing for those rascals that the late Matamore’s sword lacks an edge, or you would have split them from skull to heel, as knights errant once slew Saracens and enchanters.’
— ‘Your stave did as well as my rapier,’ replied Sigognac, returning Herod’s compliment, ‘and your conscience must be clear, for these were no innocents you set about in this affair.’
— ‘No indeed!’ replied the Tyrant, with a square foot of a smile, in his broad black beard. ‘They were the finest flower of the penal colonies, true gallows material!’
— ‘Such work as theirs, indeed, is scarcely carried out by the most honest of people,’ said Sigognac, ‘but let us not neglect to celebrate, as is fitting, the heroic valour of the glorious Scapin, who fought and won without weapons other than those provided by nature.’
Scapin, playing the buffoon, arched his back, as if swollen with praise, placed his hand on his heart, lowered his eyes, and executed a comical bow expressing profound modesty.
— ‘I longed to accompany you,’ said Blazius; ‘but our leader thinks me too aged, and I’m no use anymore except with a glass in my hand in a drinking contest.’
Having uttered these remarks, as it was getting late, the actors withdrew, each to their own room, with the exception of Sigognac, who took a few more turns in the gallery, as if meditating a plan: the actor was avenged, but the gentleman was not. Should he doff the mask that ensured his incognito, reveal his true name, create a scene, and perhaps draw the anger of the young duke upon his comrades? Common prudence said no, but honour said yes. The Baron could not resist that imperious voice, and headed towards Zerbina’s room.
He tapped softly at the door, which opened a little, and then swung wide when he spoke his name. A bright light illuminated the room; rich holders laden with pink candles had been set on a table covered with a damask tablecloth with symmetrical folds, where a delicate supper was steaming, served in expensive crockery. A brace of partridges armoured with a gilded rasher of bacon lay at the centre of a circle of orange-slices; a chicken dish (‘blanc-manger’, from which the pudding later developed) and a quenelle (an oval-shaped dumpling) of creamed fish, a masterpiece by Master Bilot, accompanied them. In a crystal-glass bottle speckled with gold florets a ruby-coloured wine sparkled, and, in a similar bottle, one of a topaz hue. Two places were set, and as Sigognac entered, Zerbina was offering a brimming glass of red to the Marquis de Bruyères, whose eyes were ablaze with a double intoxication, for never had the clever maid been more seductive, while on the other hand the Marquis adhered to the doctrine that without Ceres and Bacchus (the Roman deities of food and drink, respectively) Venus would languish.
Zerbina nodded graciously to Sigognac, a nod in which the actress’s familiarity with regards to a comrade, and the woman’s respect for the gentleman were skillfully blended.
— ‘It is most pleasant of you,’ said the Marquis de Bruyères, ‘to surprise us in our love nest. I hope that, without fearing to disturb our tête-à-tête, you will dine with us. Jacques, set a place for monsieur.’
— ‘I shall accept your gracious invitation,’ said Sigognac, ‘not that I am hungry, but I would not wish to disturb your meal, and nothing is more unpleasant to the appetite than a guest who does not eat.’
The Baron seated himself in the armchair that Jacques brought forward for him, opposite the Marquis and next to Zerbina. The Marquis detached a partridge-wing for him and filled his glass without question, like the man of quality that he was, for he suspected that a serious matter had driven the Baron, usually so private and reserved, to join them.
— ‘Do you like this wine, or prefer the white?’ asked the Marquis. ‘I take both, so as not to inspire jealousy.’
— ‘I am sober by nature and habit,’ said Sigognac, ‘and temper the drink of Bacchus, with that of the Naiads (water-nymphs), as the ancients said. Red wine is fine for me; but it’s not for the sake of a banquet that I have committed the indiscretion of entering your retreat at this incongruous hour, Marquis, I have come to request a service of you, that one gentleman cannot refuse another. Mademoiselle Zerbina will doubtless have told you that in the actresses’ dressing room, the Duke of Vallombreuse wished to place his hand on Isabella’s breast, on the pretext of planting a beauty-spot there, an unworthy, lascivious, and crude action, which was not justified by any coquetry or advance on the part of that young person, who is as wise as she is modest, and for whom I profess perfect esteem.’
— ‘She deserves it,’ said Zerbina, ‘and, though a woman, as her companion I could not speak ill of her even if I sought to.’
— ‘I arrested,’ continued Sigognac, ‘the arm of the duke, whose anger overflowed in the form of threats and invective to which I responded with mocking composure, protected by my Matamore mask. He threatened to have me beaten by his lackeys; and indeed, just now, as I was returning to the Hôtel des Armes de France, by way of a dark alley, four scoundrels set upon me. With a few blows of the flat of my sword, I did justice to two of these rascals; Herod and Scapin accommodated the other two, in lively fashion. Though the duke may imagine he is dealing with no more than a poor actor, yet there is a gentleman beneath the skin of this actor, and such an outrage cannot go unpunished. You know me, Marquis; though until now you have respected my incognito, you know who my ancestors were, and can certify that the line of the Sigognacs has been a noble one for a thousand years, free of all misalliance, and that none who have borne that name ever suffered a stain on their coat of arms.’
— ‘Baron de Sigognac,’ replied the Marquis de Bruyères, giving his guest his true name for the first time, ‘I will witness, on my honour before whomever you wish, to the antiquity and nobility of your race. Palamedes de Sigognac performed marvellous deeds on the First Crusade, to which he led a hundred lances, in a vessel equipped at his own expense. This was at a time when many of the nobles who are so proud of themselves today were not even squires. He was a great friend of Hugues de Bruyères, my ancestor, and the two shared the same tent as brothers in arms.’
At these glorious memories, Sigognac raised his head; he felt the soul of his ancestors palpitating within him, and Zerbina, who was contemplating him, was surprised by the singular, and so to speak internal, beauty which illuminated like a flame the Baron’s customarily sad countenance. ‘These nobles,’ said the Soubrette to herself, ‘seem as if they had sprung from Jupiter’s own thigh; at the slightest word, their pride rises in the stirrups, and they are unable to swallow an insult as the lower orders must. It’s all one, but if the Baron looked at me with those eyes, I would be happy to commit an infidelity to the Marquis in his favour. This little Sigognac blazes with heroism.’
— ‘So, since such is your opinion of my family,’ said the Baron to the Marquis, ‘will you challenge the Duke of Vallombreuse in my name, and bear my challenge to him?’
— ‘I shall,’ replied the Marquis, in a serious and measured tone that contrasted with his usual carefree attitude, ‘and what is more, I place my sword at your service as your second. Tomorrow, I will present myself at the Hôtel Vallombreuse. The young Duke, though he is at fault for displaying insolence, has no lack of courage, and will not hide behind his dignity, as soon as he learns your true rank. But enough of this. Let us not bore Zerbina any longer with our male quarrels. I see her purple lips twitching, despite her polite nature; and it is surely laughter, and not tiredness that leads her to display those pearls behind her lips. Come, Zerbina, recover your cheerfulness and pour the Baron a glass.’
The Soubrette obeyed with as much grace as dexterity. Hebe pouring out nectar could have done so no better. Everything this girl did, she did well.
Nothing more on the matter was said during the rest of the supper. The conversation turned to Zerbina’s performance, the Marquis showering her with compliments, to which Sigognac was able to add his own without complacency or gallantry, for the Soubrette had indeed shown incomparable wit, verve, and talent. They also spoke of the verses of Monsieur de Scudéry, one of the finest playwrights of the time, which the Marquis found perfect, though slightly soporific, preferring The Rodomontades of Captain Fracasse to Ligdamon and Lydias. He was a man of taste, the Marquis!
As soon as he could do so, Sigognac took his leave, and retired to his room, locking the door. Then he took an old sword, his father’s, which he carried with him like a faithful friend, from a serge case that he had wrapped round it for fear of rust. He drew it slowly from the scabbard, and respectfully kissed the hilt. It was a beautiful weapon, richly-worked, though without superfluous ornamentation, a weapon for combat and not for the parade-ground. On the bluish steel blade, etched with a few thin lines of gold, was imprinted the mark of one of the most famous swordsmiths of Toledo. Sigognac took a woollen cloth and passed it several times over the steel to restore its full brilliance. He felt the edge and the point with his finger and, pressing the sword against the door, bent the blade almost to his wrist to test its flexibility. The noble weapon valiantly withstood these tests, and showed that it would not betray its man, in the field. Animated by the gleam of polished steel, and gripping the hilt firmly in his hand, Sigognac began to lunge at the wall, and found that he had forgotten none of the lessons that Pierre, a former assistant to a fencing master, had taught him during his long periods of leisure at the Castle of Misery.
These exercises, which he had performed with his old servant, for want of being able to attend the fencing academy as would have been proper for a young gentleman, had developed his strength, improved his muscularity, and increased his natural suppleness. Having little else to do, he had acquired a sort of passion for fencing and had studied the noble art in depth; though he still believed himself to be only a learner, he had long since become a master, and it often happened that, during the practice sessions they performed together, he flecked with a bluish dot the yellow leather breastplate with which Pierre protected his chest. It is true that, in his modesty, he said to himself that the good Pierre deliberately allowed himself to be hit, so as not to discourage him with endlessly invincible parries. He was mistaken in this: the old servant had hidden none of the secrets of his art from his beloved pupil. For years he had drummed home the principles of combat, though Sigognac sometimes testified to the tedium of these exercises so long repeated, until the young Baron possessed a solidity in attack and defence equal to that of his master, while his youth gave him more flexibility and speed; also his eyesight was better, so that Pierre, though knowing a riposte for any move, failed to deflect the Baron’s blade as frequently as before. Such defeats, which would have embittered an ordinary fencing-master, since these professional gladiators do not willingly allow themselves to be overcome, even by their dearest companions, delighted the old servant and filled his heart with pride, though he hid his joy, for fear that the Baron, believing that he had reached the goal and won the palm, would neglect his studies.
Thus, in that century of sensitivity to points of honour, of nostril-splitting braggards (an allusion to the boastful young lords of Henri III’s court), of folk who planted their right-hips firmly, of duellists and swordsmen who frequented the fencing-halls of the Spanish and Neapolitan masters to learn Jarnac’s backhand stroke (first exhibited in France, in a famous duel in 1547, by Guy Chabot de Saint-Gelais, later the second Baron de Jarnac) our young Baron, who had never left his castle except to chase, behind Miraut’s tail, a scrawny hare in the heather, found himself to be, without being aware of it, one of the finest blades of the day, and capable of measuring himself with the most famous swordsmen. Perhaps he did lack the insolent elegance, deliberate pose, and provocative boasting of this or that gentleman renowned for his prowess in the field, but skilful indeed would have been the blade capable of penetrating the tight circle guarded by his blade.
Pleased with himself, and with the sword, which he placed near his bedside, Sigognac soon fell asleep in perfect security, just as if he had not instructed the Marquis de Bruyères to provoke the powerful Duke of Vallombreuse to a duel.
‘The Baron de Sigognac and the Marquis de Bruyères.’
Isabella was unable to sleep: she understood that Sigognac would not leave things as they were, and feared the consequences of the quarrel as regards her friend, yet there was no question of her intervening between the combatants. Matters of honour were sacred in those days, and no woman would have thought of interrupting or disturbing the resolution of their grievances.
At about nine in the morning, the Marquis, already fully dressed, went to find Sigognac in his room, and settle with him the terms of the duel, while the Baron wished him to take, in case of any show of incredulity or refusal on the part of the duke, the old charters, the ancient parchments from which hung large wax seals on silk ribbons, the diplomas, worn at every fold and initialled with royal signatures whose ink had yellowed, the genealogical tree its copious branches burdened with labels, all the documents in short which attested to the nobility of the Sigognacs. These illustrious papers, whose indecipherable Gothic script would have required spectacles and the scholarship of a Benedictine for their decipherment, were piously wrapped in a piece of crimson taffeta whose faded colour had taken on a yellowish tint. One might have thought it a fragment of the banner which once went before the hundred lances of Baron Palamedes de Sigognac, when encountering the Saracen army.
— ‘I do not believe it necessary,’ said the Marquis, ‘in this instance, to prove your lineage as if before a herald at arms; my word, which no one has ever doubted, will suffice. However, as it may be that the Duke of Vallombreuse, through exaggerated disdain and foolish presumption, pretends to see in you only Captain Fracasse, a hired actor for Monsieur Herod, I will take the documents, which my valet will carry, in case they need to be produced.’
— ‘You must do what you think is appropriate,’ replied Sigognac, ‘I trust your wisdom, and I place my honour in your hands.’
— ‘It shall not perish,’ replied Monsieur de Bruyères, ‘be sure of it, and we shall prevail over this outrageous duke whose haughty manners more than shock me. A baron’s tortil (a circle of gold wreathed with a string of small silver balls called ‘pearls’), and a marquis’ coronet (with four’ strawberry leaves’ alternating with four ‘pearls’), are well worth the points of a ducal crown (with its eight ‘strawberry leaves’) if the lineages are ancient and free of all admixture. But enough talk, we must act. Words for women, actions for men, and a stain on one’s honour is only cleansed with blood, as the Spaniards say.’
Thereupon the Marquis called his valet, handed him the bundle of papers, and left the inn to go to the Hôtel de Vallombreuse to carry out his mission.
It was not yet light, and at the ducal mansion, agitated and angered by the events of the previous day, the duke had fallen asleep only very late at night. Thus, when the Marquis de Bruyères told Vallombreuse’s valet to announce him to his master, the scoundrel’s eyes widened at the enormity of the request. Wake the Duke! Enter his room before he rang! It would have been as good as entering the cage of a Barbary lion, or an Indian tiger. The duke, even when he went to bed in a good mood, never woke in a gracious one.
— ‘Monsieur, you had better wait,’ said the footman, trembling at the thought of such audacity, ‘or return later. My lord has not yet called me, and I dare not take it upon myself...’
— ‘Announce the Marquis de Bruyères,’ cried Zerbina’s admirer, in a voice in which anger was beginning to resonate, or I’ll charge the door, and let myself in; I must speak to your master immediately with regard to an important matter of honour.’
— ‘Ah! Monsieur is here to issue a challenge?’ said the valet, suddenly softening. ‘Why did you not say so at once? I will go and carry your name to his lordship; he retired to bed yesterday in so fierce a mood that he will be charmed to be awakened by a quarrel, and be given a pretext for fighting.’
And the footman, with a resolute air, entered the apartment after asking the Marquis to be kind enough to wait a few minutes.
At the sound of the door opening and closing, Vallombreuse, who had been resting with one eye open, woke completely, and with so sudden a start that the wood of the bed creaked, sat upright, and looked about him for something to throw at the valet’s head.
— ‘May the Devil skewer with his horns the triple-fool who interrupts my sleep!’ he cried in an irritated voice. ‘Did I not order you to stay away until you were called? I will have my major-domo give you a hundred lashes with a stirrup leather for disobeying me. How am I to sleep now? I feared for a moment that it was the all too tender Corisande!’
— ‘My lord,’ replied the footman, grovelling, ‘may have me beaten to death if it suits him, but if I dare to transgress his orders, it is not without good reason. The Marquis de Bruyères is here, and wishes to speak to the duke on a matter of honour, or so I understand. The duke has never hidden himself away on such occasions, and has always received such visits.’
— ‘The Marquis de Bruyères!’ said the duke, ‘do I have any quarrel with him? I don’t recall one; and besides, it’s many a day since I last spoke to him. Perhaps he thinks I sought to whisper the name Zerbina to him, for lovers always imagine that one desires the object of their affection. Come, Picard, hand me my dressing-gown and draw the bed-curtains, so that no one can view the disorder. We must not keep this brave Marquis waiting.’
Picard presented the duke with a magnificent Venetian gown which he took from a wardrobe, and whose gold background was decorated with large velvet-black flowers; Vallombreuse tightening the cord about his hips, so as to display his slender waist, seated himself in an armchair, assumed an air of indifference, and said to the footman: ‘Now show him in.’
— ‘Monsieur le Marquis de Bruyères,’ said Picard, opening the double doors.
— ‘Good morning, Marquis,’ said the young Duke of Vallombreuse, half rising from his armchair, ‘and welcome, whatever the matter that brings you here. Picard, pull a chair forward for the gentleman. Excuse me if I receive you in this untidy room, and in early morning undress; do not take it as a lack of civility, but as a sign of eagerness.’
— ‘You pique my curiosity,’ replied Vallombreuse; ‘I cannot think what this urgent matter might be.’
— ‘Doubtless, Monsieur le Duc,’ said the Marquis de Bruyères, ‘you have forgotten certain events of yesterday evening. Such minor details are not designed to be engraved in your memory. So, I will aid your recollection, if you will allow me. In the actresses’ dressing-room, you deigned to honour with special attention a young person who plays the ingénue: Isabella, I believe. And in a jesting manner that, for my part, I do not find blameworthy, you wished to place a beauty-spot on her breast. This action, which I will not mention further, greatly shocked an actor, Captain Fracasse, who had the audacity to obstruct your hand.’
— ‘Marquis, you are the most faithful and conscientious of historiographers,’ Vallombreuse interrupted. ‘All this is true in every detail, and, to complete the anecdote, I promised this rascal, as insolent as a nobleman, a beating, a punishment appropriate to a scoundrel of his kind.’
— ‘There is no great harm in having a comedic actor or a literary scoundrel beaten, a fellow with whom one is displeased,’ said the Marquis with an air of perfect indifference, ‘such fellows are not worth the canes that are broken on their backs; but here the case is different. Behind the name Captain Fracasse, who, moreover, thrashed your men in a fine manner, stands Baron de Sigognac, a gentleman of old stock, indeed of the finest nobility in Gascony. No one has anything ill to say of him.’
— ‘What the Devil is he doing among this troupe of minstrels?’ replied the young Duke of Vallombreuse, toying with the cord of his dressing-gown. ‘How was I to suspect a Sigognac beneath his grotesque attire and behind his false nose smeared with carmine?’
— ‘As for your first question,’ said the Marquis, ‘I will answer it in a word. Between us, I believe the Baron is very much in love with Isabella; unable to persuade her to stay at his castle, he has joined the acting troupe to follow his love. You cannot find his gallant pursuit in bad taste, since the lady of his thoughts excites your fancy also.’
— ‘True, I admit. But you will agree that I could not have guessed the situation, and that Captain Fracasse’s action was impertinent.
— ‘Impertinent from an actor,’ continued M. de Bruyères, ‘but perfectly natural from a gentleman jealous of his mistress. Therefore, Captain Fracasse doffs his mask, and appears, as Baron de Sigognac, to propose through myself a duel, and asks you to explain the insult you offered him.’
— ‘But who knows,’ said Vallombreuse, ‘if this so-called Sigognac, who plays the Braggard in a company of jesters, is not some low-level intriguer usurping a respected name to gain the honour of having his blade touched by my sword?’
— ‘My dear Duke,’ replied the Marquis de Bruyères, in a dignified tone, ‘I would not serve as a witness and second to one who was lowly born. I know the Baron de Sigognac personally, whose château is only a few miles from my own estate. I vouch for him. Besides, if you still doubted his quality, I have here all the documents necessary to assuage your scruples. Will you allow me to call my footman who is waiting in the antechamber, and will hand you the parchments?’
— ‘There is no need,’ replied Vallombreuse. ‘Your word is enough for me; I accept the duel. Monsieur the Chevalier de Vidalinc, my friend, will be my second. Please arrange matters with him. Any weapons or conditions are acceptable to me. I shall not be displeased to discover whether the Baron de Sigognac knows how to parry sword blows as well as Captain Fracasse does those from staves. The charming Isabella shall crown the winner of the tournament, as in the heyday of chivalry. But allow me to withdraw. Monsieur de Vidalinc, who occupies an apartment in the hotel, will descend, and you can agree with him the place, weapons, and hour. On that, beso a vuestra merced la mano, caballero (‘I kiss your grace’s hand, sir’)’.
With this, the Duke of Vallombreuse bowed to the Marquis de Bruyères with studied courtesy, lifted a heavy tapestry over a doorway, and exited.
A few moments later, the Chevalier de Vidalinc arrived to join the Marquis; the terms and conditions were soon settled. The sword, the natural weapon of gentlemen, was chosen, and the meeting was set for the following day, Sigognac not wishing, if he were to be wounded or slain, to miss that afternoon’s performance already announced to the whole city. The meeting was arranged at a certain place outside the walls, in a meadow much appreciated by the duellists of Poitiers for its solitariness, firm ground, and natural convenience.
The Marquis de Bruyères returned to the Armes de France and reported his mission to Sigognac, who thanked him warmly for having arranged things so well, for he had taken to heart the insolent and libertine looks of the young duke towards Isabella.
The play was to begin at three, and since morning the town crier had been walking the streets beating the drum, and announcing the performance, as soon as a circle of onlookers had gathered around him. The rascal had the lungs of a Stentor (a Greek herald during the Trojan War, renowned for his loud voice, see Homer’s ‘Iliad’ V 783), and his voice, accustomed to promulgating edicts, gave the titles of the plays, and the names of the actors, an emphatic resonance the most majestic in all the world. The window-panes of the houses trembled, and the glasses rattled in unison on the tables within. He also exhibited a mechanical way of moving his chin while pronouncing his sentences that made him look like a Nuremberg nutcracker, delighting all the urchins. The attention of eyes was no less solicited than that of ears, and those who had not heard the announcement could see displayed at the busiest crossroads, on the walls of the racquet-court, and against the gate of the Armes de France, large posters on which, in skilfully-alternating red and black capital letters, appeared Ligdamon and Lydias, and The Rodomontades of Captain Fracasse, drawn with a brush by Scapin, the calligrapher of the troupe. These posters were arranged in lapidary style, in the Roman manner, and the most fastidious would have found nothing to criticise in them.
A servant from the inn, dressed as the theatre-doorman, with a half-green half-yellow coat, a wide shoulder-belt supporting a sword in a clasp, a broad-brimmed felt hat pulled down over his eyes and topped with a long feather fit to sweep the cobwebs from the ceiling, held back the crowd at the door, which he barred with a length of rope, not allowing anyone to enter unless they had acknowledged the silver tray on a table beside him, that is to say, paid the price of their seat, or at least shown an entry ticket in the agreed form. In vain, various young clerks, schoolboys, pages, and lackeys tried to enter illegally, and slip beneath the formidable rope obstructing them, for the vigilant watchdog pushed them back into the street, where some fell in the gutter with their legs flailing, a subject of great hilarity to the others, who burst out laughing, and held their sides to see them rise stinking of filth and stained with mud.
The ladies arrived in sedan-chairs the shafts of which were gripped by sturdy countrymen racing along bearing their light loads. Various men who came on horseback or by mule threw the bridles of their mounts to footmen posted there for the purpose. Two or three coaches with reddened gilding and faded paint, freed from the coach-house on this important occasion, approached the door, at the fastest pace the heavy horses could manage, and out of them emerged, as from Noah’s Ark, all sorts of provincial creatures of heterogeneous appearance, dressed in clothes fashionable under the late king. However, these coaches, dilapidated though they were, did not fail to make an impression on the crowd that had gathered in haste to see the gentry arrive, and lined up one next to the other in the square, these carriages produced a quite decent effect.
Soon the hall was so full that it was impossible to move. On each side of the stage, armchairs had been placed for the distinguished personages; something, certainly, detrimental to the theatrical illusion and to the actors’ performance, but which custom prevented from seeming merely ridiculous. The young Duke of Vallombreuse, in black velvet trimmed with jet, and awash with lace, appeared beside his friend the Chevalier de Vidalinc, who was dressed in a charming costume of lavender-coloured satin enhanced with gold. As for the Marquis de Bruyères, so as to be free to applaud Zerbina without compromising himself too greatly, he had taken a seat in the orchestra stalls close to the violins.
Boxes, fashioned out of fir-planks, and covered with serge and old Flemish tapestry, had been erected at the sides of the room, the middle of which formed the parterre, where the petty-bourgeoisie, shopkeepers, attorney’s clerks, apprentices, and schoolchildren, and the lackeys and other scoundrels stood.
In the boxes, puffing out their skirts and toying with the openings of their bodices to better show off the fullness of their white breasts, the women were as superbly adorned as their provincial wardrobe, a little behind the fashions of the court, allowed. But wealth advantageously replaced elegance, at least to the untrained eyes of the Poitevin public. There were large, fine family diamonds to be seen which, despite being set in old, tarnished settings, were nonetheless valuable; antique lace, a little yellow, it is true, but of considerable value still; long chains of twenty-four-carat gold, heavy and precious, though of ancient workmanship; brocades and silks bequeathed by grandmothers, such as are no longer woven in Venice or Lyon. There were even charming, fresh, alert and rosy, faces, which would have been highly prized in Saint-Germain and Paris, despite their somewhat too innocent and naive physiognomy.
Some of these ladies, doubtless not wishing to be recognised, had retained their domino-masks, which did not prevent the jesters in the stalls from naming them, and recounting their more or less scandalous adventures. However, alone in a box with a woman who appeared to be her attendant, one lady, masked more heavily than the others, and standing a little further back so that the light would not fall on her, thwarted the sagacity of the curious. A veil of black lace, tied under the chin, covered her head preventing anyone from discerning the colour of her hair. The rest of her clothing, of rich material, but dark in colour, blended into the shadows into which she shrank, unlike the other women, who sought the candlelight so as to impress. Sometimes she even raised to the level of her eyes, as if to protect them from the over-bright lights, a fan of black feathers, in the centre of which was set a small mirror which she refrained from consulting.
The violins, playing a refrain, drew the stage to the general attention once more, and no one paid further attention to this mysterious beauty, who might have been taken for Calderón’s dama tapada (‘veiled lady’, see his play ‘La Dama Duende’ 1629).
They began with Ligdamon and Lydias. The scenery, representing a green and leafy landscape, carpeted with moss, watered by clear fountains, and ending in the distance in a range of azure mountains, favourably disposed the public towards the play by means of its pleasing appearance. Leander, who played Ligdamon, was dressed in a reddish-purple costume enhanced with green embroidery in pastoral fashion. His hair twisted in curls over the nape of his neck, where a ribbon tied it in the most gallant fashion. A lightly-folded ruff revealed a neck as white as a woman’s. His beard, shaved as closely as possible, coloured his cheeks and chin with an imperceptible bluish tint and made them appear velvety like peach blossom, a comparison made even more exact by the fresh vermilion of the patches of rouge spread discreetly over the cheekbones. His teeth, brightened by the contrasting carmine of his lips, and polished to excess, sparkled like pearls on a bed of bran. A stroke of Indian ink had regularised the tip of each of his eyebrows, and another line of extreme thinness, bordering his eyelids, lent the whites of his eyes an extraordinary brilliance.
A murmur of satisfaction ran through the assembly: the women leaned towards each other, whispering, and a young woman, recently out of the convent, could not help saying with a naivety that earned her a reprimand from her mother: ‘He is charming!’
The little girl’s candour, expressed the secret thoughts of more experienced women, even perhaps of her own mother. She turned bright red at the remonstrance, said no more, and kept her eyes fixed on the tip of her corsage, not however without raising them furtively when she was not being watched.
But the most moved of all was, without doubt, the masked lady. The rapid palpitation of her breast, which raised her lace, the slight trembling of the fan in her hand, the pose she had adopted, leaning on the edge of her box so as not to miss any of the spectacle, would have betrayed the interest she had in Leander, if anyone had taken the leisure to observe her. Fortunately, all eyes were turned towards the stage, which gave her time to recover.
Ligdamon, as everyone knows, for there is no one who is unaware of the work of the illustrious Georges de Scudéry, opens the scene with a very touching and pathetic monologue, in which Sylvie’s rejected lover raises the important question of how he will end an existence that the rigour of his beloved renders unbearable. Will he choose, with which to end his sad days, the rope or the sword? Will he throw himself from the summit of a rock? Will he plunge into the river, and drown his ardour beneath the waves? He hesitates on the verge of suicide not knowing what to do. A vague element of hope, which abandons lovers only at the last resort, restrains him from dying. Perhaps the inhuman woman will soften, or allow herself to be softened by his steadfast adoration? It must be admitted that Leander delivered this tirade like the consummate actor he was, with the most touching alternations of languor and despair in the world. He made his voice tremble like someone stifled by grief, and who, while speaking, can barely contain his sobs and tears. When he heaved a sigh, he seemed to breathe it from the depths of his soul, and he complained of the cruelties of his lover in a tone so sweet, so tender, so submissive, so penetrating, that all the women in the room were furious with the wicked and barbaric Sylvie, claiming that in her place they would not have been so savagely fierce as to drive to despair, perhaps to death, a shepherd of such merit.
At the end of this tirade, while being applauded until the benches broke, Leander looked around at the women in the room, lingering on those who seemed to him to be titled; for, despite many disappointments, he did not abandon his dream of being loved, for his beauty and his talent as an actor, by some great lady. He saw more than one lovely eye shining with a tear, more than one white breast that palpitated with emotion. His vanity was satisfied, though he was scarcely surprised. Success never astonishes an actor; but his curiosity was keenly excited by the dama tapada who stood half-concealed in her box. Her air of mystery hinted at the possibility of an affair. Leander immediately divined that beneath her mask lay a passion that decorum was obliged to restrain, and he cast a burning glance towards the stranger, to show her that she had been understood.
The dart landed, and the lady gave Leander an imperceptible nod, as if to thank him for his insight. A rapport was established, and from then on, when the action of the play permitted it, glances were exchanged between the box and the stage. Leander excelled at these sorts of manoeuvres, and knew how to direct his voice and launch an amorous tirade in such a way that a member of the audience might believe he was speaking to her alone.
On Sylvie’s entrance, she being played by Serafina, the Chevalier de Vidalinc did not fail to applaud, and the Duke of Vallombreuse, wishing to favour his friend’s choice, deigned to bring together three or four times the palms of his white hands, the fingers of which were laden with rings with sparkling gems. Serafina bowed a half-curtsey to the knight and the duke, and prepared to commence that pretty dialogue with Ligdamon, which connoisseurs judge one of the most touching passages of the play.
As required by the role of Sylvie, Serafina took a few steps across the stage, with a preoccupied and thoughtful air, prompting Ligdamon’s advances towards her, after the line:
‘À ce coup je vous prend dedans la rêverie.’
‘Tis now I shall woo you, lost in your reverie.’
Her nonchalant attitude was most graceful, her head slightly bent, one arm hanging loose, and the other resting on her belt. Her dress was a watery-green glazed with silver, and trimmed with black velvet bows. She had a few wildflowers pinned in her hair, as if her hand had picked them in her distraction, and set them there without thinking. This head-dress, moreover, became her marvellously, far better than diamonds would have done, though that was scarcely her opinion, but her role had forced her to maintain good taste, and not adorn a shepherdess like a princess. She spoke, in a most charming manner, all those poetic and flowery phrases about roses, zephyrs, the height of the woods, and the song of the birds, by means of which Sylvie deliberately prevents Ligdamon from speaking to her of his love, although the lover finds in every image the beauty employs a symbol of love and a means of returning to the idea that obsesses him.
Throughout this scene, Leander, while Sylvie was speaking, found the means to elicit a few sighs from the mysterious woman, and did the like till the end of the play, which terminated to the sound of applause. It is pointless to say more of a work that is now accessible to all in print. Leander’s success was complete, and all expressed surprise that an actor of such merit had not yet appeared before the Court. Serafina also had her partisans, and her wounded vanity was consoled by her conquest of the Chevalier de Vidalinc, who, if his fortune was not the equal of that of the Marquis de Bruyères, was young, fashionable, and on the verge of success.
After Ligdamon and Lydias, The Rodomontades of Captain Fracasse was performed, which had its usual effect, and raised immense peals of laughter. Sigognac, well-mentored by Blazius, and served by a natural talent, was most delightfully extravagant in the role of the captain. Zerbina seemed bathed in light, she sparkled so much, and the marquis, beside himself, applauded her like a madman. The uproar he was making even attracted the attention of the masked lady. She shrugged her shoulders slightly and, beneath her velvet mask, the corners of her lips lifted in an ironic smile. As for Isabella, the presence of the Duke of Vallombreuse, seated to the right of the stage, caused her a certain unease which would have been visible to the audience if she had been a less experienced actress. She feared some insolent action on his part, some outrageous mark of disapproval. But her fear was not realised. The duke made no effort to disconcert her with a gaze too fixed or too free; he even applauded her decently and with reserve when her performance deserved it. Yet, when some situation in the play resulted in Captain Fracasse having his nose tweaked, his ears flicked, and receiving blows from a stick, a singular expression of quiet disdain was painted on the young duke’s features. His lip curled proudly, as though he had murmured in a low voice: ‘Fie, then!’ But he displayed none of the feelings that might be agitating him internally, and maintained an indolent and superb pose throughout the spectacle. Though violent by nature, the Duke of Vallombreuse, his fury having passed, was too much of a gentleman to allow himself to neglect the laws of courtesy as regards an adversary with whom he was to fight the next day: till then hostilities were suspended, and it was as if a truce had been ordained from above.
The masked lady had withdrawn a little before the end of the second play, to avoid being caught up in the crowd, and to return unseen to the sedan chair that awaited her a few yards from the racquet-court. Her disappearance greatly intrigued Leander, who, from a corner of the wings, observed the audience, and followed the movements of the mysterious woman.
Hastily throwing a cloak over his costume of a shepherd of Lignon (see the character ‘Lysis’ in Charles Sorel’s ‘Le Berger Extravagant’, 1627), Leander rushed to the stage door to follow the unknown woman. The frail thread that bound them would break if he failed to act swiftly. The lady, having emerged from the shadows for a moment, would return to them forever, and the affair, barely instigated, would be aborted. Although he hurried until he found himself out of breath, Leander, when he arrived outside the racquet-court, saw about him only dark houses and deep alleyways, in which a few lanterns flickered, carried by servants escorting their masters, and the reflections of which shimmered in the puddles left by the rain. The chaise, borne away by vigorous porters, had already turned the corner of a street that hid it from the gaze of the impassioned Leander.
— ‘How stupid I am,’ he said to himself, with that frankness one sometimes employs towards oneself in moments of despair. ‘I should have left after the first play, dressed normally, and waited for my unknown at the front of the theatre, whether she stayed to see The Rodomontades of Captain Fracasse or no. Oh! Idiot, scoundrel! A great lady, for she certainly is one, is making eyes at you, and swooning beneath her mask on seeing you act, and yet you lack the sense to run after her? You deserve to have no finer mistresses in this life than frivolous fools, drabs, servant girls, or country maids with hands calloused from wielding a broom.’
Leander had reached this point in his internal harangue, when a sort of little page, dressed in brown un-braided livery wearing a hat pulled down over his eyes, suddenly rose up before him like an apparition, and said to him in a childish voice that he tried to deepen to disguise it:
— ‘Are you Monsieur Leander, the one who played the shepherd Ligdamon in Monsieur de Scudéry's play?’
— ‘That is indeed myself,’ replied Leander. ‘What do you want with me, and what can I do to serve you?’
— ‘Oh! My thanks,’ said the page, ‘but I desire nothing from you; I am only charged to repeat a word or two to you, if you are disposed to hear them, a few words from a masked lady.’
— ‘From a masked lady?’ cried Leander, ‘Oh! Speak them at once! I am dying of impatience!’
— ‘Here they are word for word,’ said the page: ‘If Ligdamon is as brave as he is gallant, he has only to be at the church at midnight: a carriage will await him; let him ascend and take a drive.’
‘Here they are word for word, said the page.’
Before the astonished Leander had time to reply, the page had disappeared, leaving Leander quite perplexed as to what he should do. Though his heart leapt with joy at the thought of his good fortune, his shoulders shuddered at the memory of the beating he had received in a certain park, at the foot of the statue of Cupid the Discreet. Was this yet another trap set for his vanity by some rude fellow jealous of his charms? Would he find, at the place of rendezvous, some frenzied husband, sword in hand, ready to beat him, and cut his throat? These reflections eroded his enthusiasm prodigiously, for, as we have said, Leander feared nothing, except like Panurge (in Rabelais’ ‘Gargantua and Pantagruel’) blows, and death. However, if he failed to take advantage of the favourable and romantic opportunity that presented itself, she would perhaps never appear again, and with her the dream of his life would vanish, a dream that had cost him so much in ointments, cosmetics, linen, and courage. Moreover, the beautiful stranger, if he did not go, would suspect him of cowardice, something too horrible to think of, which should instil a brave heart in the most lily-livered of cowards. This thought, unbearable as it was, determined Leander’s course of action. ‘And yet,’ he said to himself, ‘what if this beauty, on whose behalf I am about to expose myself to the danger of having my bones broken, and being thrown into some dungeon, were to prove but a dowager plastered with rouge and white lead, and owning to false hair and teeth? There is no shortage of these hot old women, these ghouls of love who, unlike the ghouls of the cemetery, like to feed on living flesh. No, no; she is young and full of charm, I am sure of it. What I saw of her neck and throat was white, round, appetising, and promised wonders as regards the rest! Yes, I shall certainly go! I shall ascend the carriage. A carriage, indeed! Nothing is nobler or more stylish!
Having made this decision, Leander returned to the Armes de France, barely touched the actors’ supper, and retired to his room where he indulged himself as best he could, sparing neither the fine linen with openwork embroidery, nor the orris-root powder, nor the musk. He also took a dagger and a sword, though they scarcely suited the occasion, but an armed lover always commands more respect from jealous troublemakers. Then he pulled his hat down over his eyes, wrapped himself in a dark-coloured coat in the Spanish style, and slipped out of the hotel on tiptoe, having had the good fortune not to be seen by the malicious Scapin, who was snoring away in his little box of a room at the other end of the gallery.
The streets had been deserted for a long time, as Poitiers went to bed early. Leander met not a living soul, except for a few scrawny cats prowling in a melancholy manner, that vanished like shadows beneath some badly-fitting door, or through a cellar window, at the sound of his footsteps. Our gallant emerged onto the church square as the last stroke of midnight struck sending the owls fleeing from the old tower at the mournful sound. The sinister vibration of the bell in the midst of the nocturnal silence roused a deep, religious horror in Leander’s anxious soul. It seemed to him that he heard his own death-knell. For a moment he was on the point of turning back and retiring to lie, prudent and alone, between the sheets, instead of chasing adventure in the night; but he found the carriage waiting at the designated place, and the little page, the messenger of the masked lady, standing on the step, holding the door open. There was no opportunity to retreat, for few people have the courage to be cowards in front of witnesses. Leander had been seen by the child, and the coachman; he therefore advanced with a deliberate air that was inwardly belied by the nervous beating of his heart, and climbed into the carriage with the apparent intrepidity of a Galaor (the brother of ‘Amadis of Gaul’, and a model knight, in the Portuguese chivalric romance of that name).
No sooner had Leander seated himself than the coachman whipped up his horses, who broke into a brisk trot. A deep darkness reigned in the carriage; besides the fact that it was night, leather screens covered the windows, and prevented anything outside being seen. The page remained standing on the step, and Leander could not engage in conversation with him, or gain the slightest insight from him. He seemed, moreover, quite laconic, and little disposed to say what he knew, if anything. Our actor felt the cushions, which were of velvet adorned with ornamental tufts; he felt a thick carpet beneath his feet, and he inhaled a faint scent of amber given off by the fabric of the interior trim, a testimony to elegance and refinement. It was indeed to the home of a person of quality that this carriage was conveying him so mysteriously! He tried to orient himself, but knew little of Poitiers; however, it seemed to him, after a while, that the noise of the wheels no longer echoed from the walls, and that the carriage was no longer running over paving-stones. They were driving out of the city, and into the countryside, toward some retreat suitable for love or murder, Leander thought, with a slight shudder, placing his hand on his dagger’s hilt, as if some bloodthirsty husband or ferocious brother were seated opposite him in the shadows.
At last, the carriage halted. The little page opened the carriage-door; Leander descended, and found himself facing a high blackish wall which seemed to him to form the perimeter of some park or garden. Soon he distinguished a portal whose cracked, browned, and moss-covered wood made him at first mistake it for part of the stone wall. The page pressed hard on one of the rusty nails which held the planks together, and the door half-opened.
—'Give me your hand,’ said the page, ‘so I may guide you; it is too dark for you to find your way through this labyrinth of trees.’
Leander obeyed, and the pair walked for a few minutes through a wood that was still quite dense, though bared of leaves, the remnants of which crunched beneath their feet, by winter. The wood was succeeded by flowerbeds marked out by box hedges, and adorned with yew trees trimmed into pyramids which, in the darkness, took on the vague appearance of ghosts, or men on sentry duty, which was even more frightening to the fearful actor. Having navigated the flowerbeds, Leander and his guide climbed a ramp to a terrace on which stood a pavilion of rustic order topped with a dome and adorned with fiery vases in stone at its corners. These details were observed by our gallant thanks to the vague light which the night sky always provides in open places. The pavilion would have appeared uninhabited, if a faint redness filtered by a thick damask curtain had not empurpled one of the windows highlighting its embrasure against the dark mass of the wall.
It was doubtless behind this curtain that the masked lady was waiting, and feeling moved, for, in these amorous escapades, women risk their reputation, and sometimes their lives, just as much as gallants, should their husbands learn of the matter and happen to be in a brutal mood. But at that moment Leander was no longer afraid; pride assuaged hid all danger from him. The carriage, the page, the garden, the pavilion, all suggested an affair involving some great lady, and an intrigue woven in a manner that possessed nothing bourgeois about it. He was in heaven, and his feet scarcely touched the ground. He longed for that mocking rogue Scapin to see him in all his glory and triumph.
The page pushed open a large glass door and withdrew, leaving Leander alone in the pavilion, which had been furnished with great taste and magnificence. The vault formed by the dome represented a bright turquoise-blue sky, across which floated small pink clouds, and fluttering Cupids in various graceful attitudes. A tapestry decorated with scenes borrowed from that novel by Honoré d'Urfé, L’Astrée, softly covered the walls. Cabinets inlaid with Florentine pietra dura, red-velvet armchairs with tassels, a table covered with a Turkish carpet, and Chinese vases, full of flowers despite the season, showed clearly enough that the mistress of the house was rich and of noble lineage. Black marble arms, springing from gilded sleeves, formed candelabras, and shed the light of their candles over all this magnificence. Dazzled by these splendours, Leander did not, at first, notice that there was no one in the room; he took off his coat, which he placed with his felt hat on a folding chair, gave a new twist to one of his curls, whose arrangement was compromised, in front of a Venetian mirror, adopted the most graceful pose in his repertoire, and said to himself, as he looked about him:
— ‘But where is the deity of the place? I see the temple, but not the idol. When will she appear from her cloud and reveal herself as a true goddess by her deportment, according to Virgil’s expression?’ (See ‘Aeneid’ I, 405 ‘et vera incessu patuit dea’)
Leander had reached this point in his gallant soliloquy when the leaf of a door, in crimson Indian damask, moved, opening a passage for the masked lady, the admirer of Ligdamon. She still wore her black velvet mask, which troubled our actor.
— ‘Is she ugly?’ he thought, ‘this liking for masks alarms me.’ His fear was short-lived, for the lady, advancing to the centre of the room where Leander was standing respectfully, undid her domino mask and threw it on the table, revealing by the candlelight a regular and pleasant face in which shone two beautiful eyes the colour of Spanish tobacco, inflamed with passion, and in which a well-furnished mouth smiled, cherry-red with a small cleft in the lower lip. Around this face, curled opulent clusters of brown hair which hung down over rounded white shoulders and even ventured to kiss the outline of a certain pair of half-globes, whose palpitations were betrayed by the quivering of the lace which veiled them.
— ‘Madame la Marquise de Bruyères!’ cried Leander, surprised to the utmost degree, and somewhat perturbed as he recalled the memory of that beating, ‘Is this possible? Am I the victim of some dream? Dare I believe in this unexpected happiness?’
— ‘You are not mistaken, my friend,’ came her reply, ‘I am indeed Madame de Bruyères, and I hope that your heart recognises me as your eyes do.’
— ‘Oh! Your image is there engraved in lines of fire,’ replied Leander with a penetrating tone, ‘I have only to look within myself to view it, adorned with every grace and perfection.’
— ‘I thank you,’ said the Marquise, ‘for having retained so fair a memory of me. It proves a refined and generous soul. You must have thought me cruel, ungrateful, and false. Alas! My vulnerable heart is only too tender, and I was far from being insensitive to the passion you showed. Your letter, given to a disloyal servant, fell into the Marquis’ hands. He penned the reply you received, which deceived you. Later, Monsieur de Bruyères, laughing at what he called a fine jest, made me read this missive, in which the most pure and lively love shone forth, but in a perfectly ridiculous manner. But it did not achieve the effect he hoped for. The feelings I had for you only increased, and I resolved to reward you for the trouble you have endured for me. Knowing my husband was busy with his new conquest, I came to Poitiers; hidden beneath this mask, I heard you express a fictitious love so beautifully that I longed to see if you would be as eloquent when speaking on your own behalf.’
— ‘Madame,’ said Leander, kneeling on a cushion at the feet of the Marquise, who had let herself fall into an armchair, as if exhausted by the effort that the confession she had just made had cost her, in terms of her modesty, ‘Madame, or rather my queen and deity, how can mere words, counterfeit flames, conceits coldly imagined by nail-biting poets, idle sighs uttered at the feet of an actress smeared with rouge, whose distracted gaze wanders over the audience, be compared to words springing from the soul, fire that burns the marrow, hyperboles of passion for which the whole universe could not provide images brilliant enough to honour its goddess, or the impulses of a heart that longs to leap from the breast which contains it, to serve as a cushion at the feet of the adored object? If you deign to find, heavenly marquise, that I express love with warmth on the stage, it is because I have never loved an actress, for my thoughts always rise beyond, towards a perfect ideal, some beautiful, noble, and wise lady like yourself, and it is she alone that I love, beneath the names of Silvie, Doralice and Isabella, who are merely her phantoms.’
As he said this, Leander, too good an actor to forget that action must accompany delivery, leant over the hand that the Marquise proffered, and covered it with ardent kisses. The Marquise let her long, white, ring-laden fingers wander through the actor’s silky, perfumed hair, and gazed, half-leaning back in her armchair, at the little winged Cupids on the turquoise-blue ceiling.
Suddenly the marquise pushed Leander away and stood up, staggering.
— ‘Oh! Finish what you have begun,’ she whispered in a panting, breathless voice, ‘do so, Leander, for your kisses are burning me, and driving me mad!’
And, leaning her hand on the wall, she reached the doorway, through which she had entered and raised the curtain, the folds of which closed behind her, and Leander, who had approached to support her.
A winter dawn was freezing his reddened fingers when Leander, well wrapped in his cloak and half-asleep in the corner of the carriage, was returned to the Porte de Poitiers. Having lifted the corner of his cloak to reconnoitre the scene, he saw from afar the Marquis de Bruyères walking beside Sigognac, and heading towards the place set for the duel. Leander drew back the leather curtain so as not to be seen by the Marquis, whom the carriage almost brushed against. The smile of vengeance sated wandered over his lips. The blows with the stick had been repaid!
The spot chosen for the duel was sheltered from the wind by a length of wall, which had the benefit of hiding the combatants from travellers passing on the road. The ground was firm, well-trodden, without stones, clods, or tufts of grass that could encumber the feet, and offered every proper facility for cutting throats, as performed between people of honour.
The Duke of Vallombreuse and the Chevalier Vidalinc, followed by a barber-surgeon, were not late in arriving. The four gentlemen greeted each other with haughty courtesy, and cold politeness, as befits well-bred people about to fight to the death. A complete insouciance was evident on the face of the young Duke, who was perfectly brave and, moreover, certain of his skill. Sigognac was no less cheerful, though it was his first duel. The Marquis de Bruyères was satisfied with his degree of composure and augured well from it.
Vallombreuse doffed his coat and felt hat, and undid his doublet, manoeuvres which were imitated point by point by Sigognac. The Marquis and the Chevalier, in turn, measured the combatants’ swords. They were of equal length. Each man occupied his ground, received his sword, and took up position en guarde.
— ‘Begin, gentlemen, and act like men of courage,’ said the Marquis.
— ‘Your exhortation is redundant,’ said the Chevalier de Vidalinc; ‘they will fight like lions. It will be superb.’
‘The Duel.’
Vallombreuse, who, deep down, could not help but despise Sigognac a little, imagining that he was encountering but a weak adversary, was surprised when he casually countered the Baron’s steel, to find a supple though firm blade that thwarted his own with admirable ease. He paid closer attention, and tried a few feints that were immediately divined. Through the slightest gap he left, Sigognac’s point advanced, requiring a prompt parry. Vallombreuse risked an attack; his sword, driven aside by a clever riposte, left him uncovered and, if he had not suddenly leaned back, he would have been struck full in the chest. For the duke, the nature of the contest was changing. He had thought he could direct it at will, and after a few passes, wound Sigognac as he wanted by means of the famous stroke that until then had always succeeded. Not only was he no longer able to attack at will, but he needed all his skill to defend himself. Though he endeavoured to remain cool, anger gained on him; he felt himself becoming nervous and feverish, while Sigognac, impassive, seemed, by his impeccable guard, to take pleasure in irritating him.
— ‘Shall we do nothing while our friends are fighting?’ said the Chevalier de Vidalinc to the Marquis de Bruyères. ‘It is very cold this morning; let us exercise a little, if only to warm ourselves.’
— ‘Most gladly,’ said the Marquis, ‘it will stretch our legs.’
Vidalinc was superior to the Marquis de Bruyères in fencing, and after a few thrusts, knocked the sword from his hand with a quick, sharp flick of the wrist. As no hard feelings existed between them, they ceased by mutual consent, and their attention turned back to Sigognac and Vallombreuse.
The duke, pressed hard by the Baron’s controlled efforts, had already broken away several times. He was tiring, and his breathing was becoming ragged. From time to time, a bluish spark would spring from the swiftly meshed irons, but the riposte would weaken on attack, and give way. Sigognac, who, after tiring his adversary, stood firm and lunged, forever forced the duke to retreat.
The Chevalier de Vidalinc was very pale, and was beginning to fear for his friend. It was obvious, in the eyes of those familiar with fencing, that the entire advantage belonged to Sigognac.
— ‘Why on earth,’ murmured Vidalinc, ‘does Vallombreuse not try the move that Girolamo of Naples taught him, and that this Gascon probably has no knowledge of?’
As if reading his friend’s thoughts, the young duke tried to execute the famous stroke, but just as he was about to strike as if with a whip, Sigognac anticipated him, and delivered a lunge so precise that it passed straight through the duke’s forearm. The pain of the wound caused the duke’s fingers to open, and his sword fell to the ground.
Sigognac, with perfect courtesy, halted immediately, though he could have repeated the blow without transgressing the duelling convention, which did not require him to stop when first blood was drawn. He pressed the point of his blade to the ground, placed his left hand on his hip, and appeared to await his opponent’s wishes. But Vallombreuse, to whom, at a gesture of acquiescence from Sigognac, Vidalinc handed his sword, could not hold it and signalled that he had had enough.
Whereupon Sigognac and the Marquis de Bruyères bowed to the Duke of Vallombreuse and the Chevalier de Vidalinc in the politest manner possible, and returned to the town.
Chapter X: A Face at the Window
His wound, though it would prevent him from wielding a sword for a few weeks, was not dangerous; the blade had only pierced the flesh, without damaging any nerve, vein or artery. His wound certainly caused him pain, but his pride bled much more. Also, the slight contractions that, due to the pain, the young duke’s dark eyebrows occasionally underwent were accompanied by an expression of cold rage, and the hand on his good arm scratched at the velvet of the sedan chair with clenched fingers. Often, during the journey, he bent his pale head to reprimand the porters, who nevertheless walked at their most even pace, even seeking out ways to avoid the slightest jolt, which did not prevent the wounded man from calling them boors, and promising them a dose of stirrup-leather, for tossing him about, he said, like a basket of salad.
On arriving home, he refused to retire to bed, and lay down, resting against the cushions, on a chaise longue, his feet covered with a quilted silk coverlet brought to him by Picard, the valet, who was very surprised and perplexed to see his master return in a state of distress, a situation which was not common, given the young duke’s skill in fencing.
Seated on a folding chair next to his friend, the Chevalier de Vidalinc offered him, every quarter of an hour, a spoonful of cordial prescribed by the surgeon. Vallombreuse remained silent, but it was clear that a dull anger was boiling within him, despite the calmness he affected. Finally, his anger boiled over in these violent words:
— ‘Can you comprehend, Vidalinc, how this lean, plucked stork, having flown from the tower of its ruined castle so as to avoid dying of hunger, can have pierced me with its long beak? I, who have measured myself with the finest blades of the day, and who have always returned from the field without a scratch, leaving behind, on the contrary, my swooning and eye-rolling opponent in the arms of his witnesses?’
— ‘The most fortunate and skilful have just such strokes of bad luck,’ Vidalinc replied, sententiously. ‘Dame Fortune’s face is not always the same; sometimes she smiles, sometimes she pouts. Until now, you have had no reason to complain of her treatment of you, she who has cherished you in her lap like her dearest child.’
— ‘Yet, is it not shameful,’ Vallombreuse continued, growing increasingly animated, ‘that this ridiculous puppet, this grotesque squire, who receives insults and beatings, on stage, in ignoble farces, should have overcome the hitherto undefeated Duke of Vallombreuse? He must be a professional gladiator dressed in the skin of a mountebank.’
— ‘You know his true rank, for which the Marquis de Bruyères vouches,’ said Vidalinc. ‘However, his unparalleled skill with the sword astonishes me; it surpasses that of those experts known to me. Neither Girolamo nor Paraguante, the famed fencing masters, possess a tighter defence. I observed it well in this encounter, and our most famous duellists would blanch. It took all your skill, and the Neapolitan’s advice, not to be more seriously hurt. Your defeat is still a victory. Marcilly and Duportal, who pride themselves on their abilities, and are amongst the best blades in the city, would undoubtedly have been left on the field given such an opponent.’
— ‘I cannot wait for my wound to heal,’ the duke continued after a moment’s silence, ‘so I can provoke him again, and take my revenge.’
— ‘That would be a risky undertaking, and one I would not advise you to contemplate,’ said the Chevalier. You may be left with some residual weakness in your arm that would diminish your chances of victory. This Sigognac is a formidable antagonist, with whom you should not fight needlessly. He now knows your strength, and the assurance that this initial advantage grants him will double his own. Honour is satisfied; the encounter was serious enough. Leave it at that.’
Vallombreuse felt, inwardly, the justice of this reasoning. He had studied the art of fencing, in which he believed he excelled, sufficiently enough to understand that his blade, however skillfully wielded by himself, would not reach Sigognac’s chest, defended by that impenetrable guard against which all his efforts had proved in vain. He admitted, to himself, the fact of the Baron’s astonishing superiority, though it aroused his indignation. He was even forced to concede in a whisper that the Baron, not seeking to kill him, had merely inflicted a wound that had put him out of action. This magnanimity, which would have annoyed a far less haughty character, irritated his pride and roused a poisonous resentment. To be defeated! The very idea oppressed him. He apparently accepted his friend’s advice, but from the fierce, dark look on his face one could have guessed that some secret plan of revenge was already taking shape in his brain, a plan that needed only to be nurtured by his resentment in order to be executed.
— ‘I shall cut a fine figure before Isabella now,’ he said, forcing a smile, but a bitter smile it was, given his wounded arm had been pierced by her lover. Cupid the invalid cuts a poor figure beside the Graces.
— ‘Forget that ungrateful girl,’ said Vidalinc. ‘After all, she could not have foreseen that a duke would fall for her on whim. Take back that pretty Corisande who loves you with all her soul, and cries for hours at your door like a spurned lap-dog.’
— ‘Don't mention her name, Vidalinc,’ cried the duke, ‘if you wish us to remain friends. Such fawning affection, that no amount of insult can repel, disgusts and exasperates me. I need haughty coldness, rebellious pride, impregnable virtue! How adorable and charming she seems to me, this disdainful Isabella! How grateful I am to her for scorning my love, which would doubtless have already vanished if it had been received! Certainly, she must possess no base and common soul, to refuse, in her situation, the advances of a lord whose attentions flatter her and who is not unhandsome as regards his person, if the ladies of the town are to be believed. There enters into my passion for her a feeling of esteem that I am not accustomed to experiencing towards women; but how to rid the scene of this damnable gentleman, this Sigognac, who’s enough to confound the Devil himself?’
— ‘That won’t be easy,’ said Vidalinc, ‘now that he’s on his guard. But even if one could dispose of him, Isabella is nonetheless in love with him, and you know, better than any, having suffered it many times, how stubborn women’s feelings are.’
— ‘Oh! If I could kill the Baron,’ Vallombreuse continued, not being convinced by the Chevalier’s arguments, ‘I would soon conquer the maid, despite her prudish and virtuous air. No one is forgotten more quickly than a dead lover.’
Such was not the Chevalier de Vidalinc’s opinion, but he thought it inappropriate to enter into an argument on the subject which might well have further soured Vallombreuse’s irritable mood.
— ‘Heal first, and later we will see; this conversation is tiring you. Try to rest, and not worry so; the surgeon would scold me and accuse me of being a bad nurse if I failed to recommend peace of mind as well as of body.’ The wounded man, yielding to this observation, fell silent, closed his eyes and soon fell asleep.
Sigognac and the Marquis de Bruyères had quietly returned to the Hôtel des Armes de France, where, like discreet gentlemen, they said nothing about the duel; but the walls, which are said to have ears, also have eyes: they observe at least as well as they hear. In this seemingly solitary place, more than one inquisitive eye was spying on the progress of the combat. Provincial idleness gives rise to many of those invisible or little-noticed flies that hover about in places where something is likely to occur, and which quickly buzz away, to spread the news everywhere. By lunchtime, all of Poitiers already knew that the Duke of Vallombreuse had been wounded in an encounter with an unknown adversary. Sigognac, living in retirement at the hotel, had shown the public only his mask and not his face. This mystery aroused local curiosity greatly, and imaginations worked busily to discover the name of the victor. It is pointless to report the bizarre suppositions that were made. Each individual laboriously constructed their own, supporting their idea with the most frivolous and ridiculous inferences, but no one harboured the incongruous notion that the triumph belonged to Captain Fracasse, who had acted on stage so amusingly the previous day. A duel between a lord of this quality and an actor would have seemed too enormous and monstrous a thing to surmise. Several members of the upper ranks of society sent word to the Vallombreuse hotel hoping to receive news of the duke, or obtain some clue given the servants’ usual indiscretion; but the servants remained as silent as the mutes in the Seraglio for the good reason that they knew nothing, and so had nothing to say.
Vallombrosa, due to his wealth, stature, good looks, and success with women, excited many a jealous hatred which dared not be manifested openly, while his defeat satisfied a malign longing to hear of his failure. It was the first defeat he had suffered, and all those whom his arrogance had offended rejoiced at this blow to the tenderest region of his self-esteem. They did not cease to talk, though they had not witnessed it, of the bravery, skill and noble appearance of his adversary. The ladies, who all possessed more or less cause to complain about the young duke’s actions towards them, for he was one of those people who sacrifice others, their thoughtless whims defiling the altar on which they have burned incense, felt full of enthusiasm for the one who avenged their secret affronts. They would have gladly crowned him with laurel and myrtle: we except from the number the tender Corisande, who thought she would go mad at the news, wept publicly, and, at the risk of the harshest rebuffs, attempted to force her way in to see the duke nonetheless. He was too well-guarded for that, though the Chevalier de Vidalinc, gentler and more merciful, with great difficulty was able to reassure the lady, who was far too sensitive to the misfortunes of that ingrate.
However, as nothing in this terrestrial, sublunary globe can remain hidden, it was learned from Master Bilot, who had it from Jacques, the Marquis’ valet, who had been present at the conversation between Sigognac and his master at Zerbina’s supper, that the unknown hero, conqueror of the young Duke of Vallombreuse, was without a doubt Captain Fracasse, or rather a baron engaged for amorous reasons to Herod’s traveling troupe. As for his name, Jacques had forgotten it. It was a name that ended in ‘gnac’, a common final syllable in Gascony, but he was sure of the rank.
This story, true despite its romantic flavour, was most successful in Poitiers. People were interested in this brave and skilful gentleman, and when Captain Fracasse appeared on stage, prolonged applause testified, even before he had opened his mouth, to the favour in which he was held. Ladies, among the highest and most fashionable, did not hesitate to wave their handkerchiefs. There was also louder than usual applause for Isabella, which almost embarrassed the young lady and brought to her cheeks, beneath the rouge, the natural blush of modesty. Without interrupting her role, she responded to these marks of favour with a modest curtsy and a graceful inclination of the head.
Herod rubbed his hands with joy, and his broad, pale face beamed like a full moon, for the takings were superb and the purse was in danger of bursting due to a plethora of coins, everyone wishing to see the famous Captain Fracasse, actor and gentleman, who was not afraid of sticks or swords, and who, a valiant champion of beauty, was not afraid to measure himself against a duke, the terror of the bravest. Blazius, for his part, did not augur well from this triumph; he feared, not without reason, the vindictiveness of Vallombreuse, who would find a way to take his revenge, and play some nasty trick on the troupe. Earthenware pots, he said, should avoid, even if they had not been broken at the first shock, further collision with iron pots, metal being harder than clay. Whereupon Herod, confident in the support of Sigognac and the Marquis, called him a poltroon, and a snivelling coward.
If the Baron had not been sincere in his love for Isabella, he could easily have been disloyal to her more than once, for more than one beauty smiled at him with a most tender air, despite his extravagant costume, his cardboard nose illumined with cinnabar, and his ridiculous role which scarcely lent itself to romantic illusion. Even Leander’s success was compromised. In vain he flaunted his looks, puffed himself up like a pigeon, twirled the curls of his wig with his fingers, showed his solitaire ring, and displayed his teeth with mouth wide open; it no longer produced the desired effect, and he would have been furious with vexation, if the dama tapada had not been at her post, gazing at him, and responding to the winks he gave her with little flutters of her fan on the edge of the box and other signs of amorous intelligence. His recent good fortune poured balm on this minor wound to his self-esteem, and the pleasures that night promised consoled him for not being the star of the performance.
The actors returned to the inn, and Sigognac escorted Isabella to her room, where the young actress, contrary to her usual custom, permitted him to enter. The chambermaid lit a candle, put more wood on the fire, and discreetly withdrew. When the door had closed, Isabella took Sigognac’s hand, which she squeezed with more force than one would have expected from those frail and delicate fingers, and in a tone of voice altered by emotion, she said to him:
‘Swear you won’t fight over me again. Swear it, if you love me as you say you do.’
— ‘That’s an oath I could not fulfil,’ said the Baron; ‘if some audacious person dared to disrespect you. I would certainly punish him as I must, were he a duke, or even a prince.’
— ‘Remember,’ Isabella continued, ‘that I am only a poor actress, exposed to the affronts of the first comer. The opinion of the world, too justified, alas, by the mores of the theatre, is that every actress is also a courtesan. When a woman sets foot on stage, she belongs to the public; eager glances examine her charms, scrutinise her beauty, and the male imagination seizes upon her as a mistress. Men, because they know her, believe they are known to her, and, if they are admitted backstage, astonish her modesty with abrupt confessions of love she has not provoked. Is she prudent? Her virtue is taken for pure pretence, or self-interested calculation. These are things that must be endured since they cannot be changed. From now on, trust me to repel, with a reserved demeanour, a brief word, a cold air, the impertinence of the noblemen, the gallants, and fops of all species who bend over my dressing table, or tap with their combs, between acts, at the door of my dressing room. A sharp tap with a busk on fingers that are wandering too freely is better than a blow from your rapier.’
— ‘Permit me to believe, my charming Isabella,’ said Sigognac, ‘that the sword of a gallant man may defend the busk of an honest woman, and do not deprive me of the role of being your knight and champion.’
Isabella still held Sigognac’s hand, and fixed on him her blue eyes, in a caressing manner, with a silent supplication desired to extract the desired oath; but the Baron paid no attention, being as intractable as a hidalgo as regards a point of honour, and he would have braved a thousand deaths rather than suffer anyone to disrespect his mistress; he wished Isabella, on the stage, to be as esteemed as a duchess in the salon.
— ‘Come now,’ said the young actress, ‘promise me that you will not expose yourself like that again for a frivolous reason. Oh, with what anxiety and anguish I awaited your return! I knew that you were going to fight this duke, of whom everyone speaks with terror. Zerbina told me everything. Wicked man that you are, to torment my heart like this! You men! You hardly think of a poor woman when your pride is at stake; you go about deaf, blind, and ferocious, without hearing her sobs, without seeing her tears. Do you not know that if you had been killed, I would have died?’
Tears gleamed in Isabella’s eyes at the mere thought of the danger Sigognac had run, and the nervous trembling in her voice showed that the gentle creature spoke the truth.
Touched more than one could say by this sincere passion, Baron de Sigognac, wrapping his free hand around Isabella’s waist, drew her to his heart without resistance from her, and his lips brushed the young woman’s bowed forehead, while feeling the effects of her panting breath against his chest.
They remained silent for a few minutes, in an ecstasy that a less respectful lover than Sigognac would undoubtedly have taken advantage of, but he was loath to abuse the chaste abandonment her emotion had produced.
— ‘Console yourself, dear Isabella,’ he said in a tender and cheerful voice, ‘I am not dead, and I have even wounded my opponent, even though he is considered a competent duellist.’
— ‘I know that you have a brave heart and a firm hand,’ Isabella continued, ‘and I love you, and am not afraid to tell you so, certain that you will respect my openness, and not take advantage of it. When I saw you so sad and so abandoned in that gloomy castle where your youth was fading, I felt a sad and tender pity for you. Happiness does not seduce me; its brightness renders me fearful. If happy and fortunate, you would have frightened me. During that walk in the garden, when you pushed aside the brambles, you picked for me a small wild rose, the only gift you could give me; I let a tear fall on it before putting it in my bosom, and, silently, I gave you my soul in exchange.’
Hearing these sweet words, Sigognac desired to kiss the beautiful lips that had spoken them; but Isabella freed herself from his embrace, without a show of prudishness but with the modest firmness that a gallant man should not thwart.
— ‘Yes, I love you,’ she continued, ‘but not like other women; my goal is your glory, not my pleasure. I am quite willing to be thought your mistress; it is the only reason that might excuse your presence among this troupe of strolling players. What do malicious remarks matter, provided that I retain my self-esteem and know myself to be virtuous? A stain on my honour would kill me. It is doubtless the noble blood in my veins that inspires such pride. Quite ridiculous, is it not, in an actress, but I am made that way.’
Though shy, Sigognac was young. These charming confessions, which would have meant nothing to a fop, filled him with a delightful intoxication, and troubled him to the highest degree. A deep blush rose to his cheeks, usually so pale; it seemed to him that flames were passing before his eyes; his ears were ringing and he felt the palpitations of his heart even in his throat. Certainly, he did not doubt Isabella’s virtue, but he believed that a little audacity would triumph over her scruples; he had heard it said that a lover’s moment once past never returns. The young girl was there before him in all the glory of her beauty, radiant, luminous so to speak, a visible soul, an angel standing on the threshold of the paradise of love; he took a step towards her, and clasped her in his arms with convulsive ardour.
Isabella did not attempt to struggle; but, leaning back to avoid the young man’s kisses, she fixed on him a look full of reproach and pain. From her beautiful blue eyes sprang pure tears, true pearls of chastity, which rolled suddenly down her marred cheeks to Sigognac’s lips; a suppressed sob swelled in her chest, and her whole body sank as if she were about to faint.
The distraught Baron placed her on an armchair and, kneeling before her, took her hands which she had abandoned to him, imploring her forgiveness, apologising for his youthful ardour, for a moment of vertigo which he repented of and which he would expiate by the most perfect submission.
— ‘You have pained me greatly,’ Isabella said, at last, with a sigh. ‘I had so much confidence in your delicacy! My confession of love should have been enough for you, and you should have understand by my very frankness that I was resolved not to yield. I had thought you would let me love you as I wished, without disturbing my tenderness with vulgar transports. You have robbed me of confidence; it is not that I doubt your word, but I no longer dare listen to my heart. Yet it was so sweet to see you, to hear you, to follow your thoughts in your eyes! It was your sorrow that I wished to share, leaving pleasure to others. Among all these coarse libertines, these dissolute men, here is one, I said to myself, who believes in modesty, and knows how to respect what he loves. I had dreamt, I, a girl from the world of the theatre, constantly pursued by odious gallantry, of witnessing pure affection. I only asked to lead you to the threshold of happiness and then return to the depths of obscurity. Surely that was not too demanding.’
— ‘Adorable Isabella, every word you say,’ cried Sigognac, ‘makes me feel my unworthiness more; I have misunderstood your angelic heart; I should have kissed the traces of your footsteps. But fear nothing more from me; the husband would know how to restrain the passions of the lover. I have only my name, it is as pure and spotless as you yourself are. I offer it to you if you deign to accept it.’
Sigognac was still kneeling before Isabella: at these words the young girl bent down towards him, and, taking his head with a movement of delirious passion, she printed a quick kiss on the Baron’s lips; then, rising, she took a few steps into the room.
— ‘You will be my wife?’ asked Sigognac, intoxicated by the touch of that mouth as fresh as a flower, as ardent as a flame.
— ‘Never, never,’ replied Isabella with extraordinary exaltation; ‘I will show myself worthy of such an honour by refusing it. Oh, my friend, in what an ocean of heavenly rapture my soul swims! You esteem me then? You would dare to lead me, your head held high, into those rooms where the portraits of your ancestors hang, into that chapel where your mother’s tomb stands! I might suffer without fear the gaze of the dead who know everything, and my brow not seem unworthy of the virginal crown!’
— ‘What!’ cried the Baron, ‘you say you love me, yet you will accept me neither as a lover nor a husband?’
— ‘You have offered me your name, that is enough for me. I return it to you, after holding it to my heart for a minute. For a moment I was your wife, and shall never be another’s. While I embraced you, I said ‘yes’ inwardly. But I have no right to such happiness on earth. For you, dear friend, it would be a great mistake to embarrass your fate with a poor actress like me, who would always be reproached for her life on the stage, however honourable and pure she might be. The cold and composed expressions with which the great ladies would welcome me would cause you to suffer, and yet you could not challenge malicious women to a duel. You are the last of a noble race, and it is your duty to rebuild your House, brought down by adverse fate. When, with a tender glance, I persuaded you to leave your château, you were thinking of love and gallantry: that was quite natural; I, anticipating the future, was thinking of something quite different. I saw you returning from court, in magnificent attire, with some fine mission to execute. Sigognac would regain its former lustre; in thought I tore the ivy from the walls, re-roofed the old towers, repaired the broken walls, replaced the glass in the windows, re-gilded the symbolic storks faded from your coat of arms, and, having led you to the border of your domain, vanished, stifling a sigh.’
— ‘Your dream will come true, noble Isabella, but not as you say, for the outcome would be too sad. It is you who will be the first, your hand in mine, to cross that threshold from which ill fortune and abandonment will have disappeared.’
— ‘No, no, it will be some beautiful, rich and noble heiress, worthy of you in every way, whom you can show proudly to your friends, and of whom none will say with a spiteful smile: ‘I whistled at, or applauded, her in such and such a place.’
— ‘It is cruel of you to be so adorable and so perfect while driving me to despair,’ said Sigognac; ‘to open the gates of heaven and close them again; nothing could be more barbaric. But I will alter your resolution.’
— ‘Do not even try,’ Isabella continued, with gentle firmness, ‘it is immutable. I would despise myself if I renounced it. Be content, then, with the purest, truest, most devoted love that ever filled a woman’s heart, but don't pretend things can be otherwise. Is it so painful,’ she added, smiling, ‘to be adored by an ingénue whom many have had the bad taste to find charming? Vallombreuse himself would be proud of such worship!’
— ‘To give oneself, and yet refuse oneself so completely, to mingle in the same cup this sweetness and bitterness, this honey and gall, only you are capable of such perversity.’
— ‘Yes, I am a strange girl,’ Isabella continued, ‘I take after my mother in that; but you must see me as I am. If you insist on pursuing me, I know how to hide in some retreat where you will never find me. So, let it be agreed; and since it is getting late, return to your room, and adapt this text, so I may play a role that suits neither my figure nor my character, in the play we are soon to perform. I am your little friend, be my grand poet.’
As she said this, Isabella took from the bottom of a drawer a scroll tied with a pink ribbon, which she handed to Baron de Sigognac.
— ‘Now kiss me and go,’ she said, offering him her cheek. ‘You will labour on my behalf, and all work deserves its reward.’
Back in his room, it took Sigognac a good while to recover from the emotion this scene had caused him. He was at once desolate and delighted, radiant and gloomy, in heaven and in hell. He laughed and wept, prey to the most tumultuous and contradictory feelings; the joy of being loved by such a beautiful person, with such a noble heart, made him exult, yet the certainty of never obtaining anything from her threw him into a deep depression. Little by little the mad waves of feeling subsided, and calm was restored. His thoughts returned, one by one, to Isabella’s words, and that portrait of the château of Sigognac renewed, which she had evoked, presented itself to his heated imagination in the most vivid and striking of colours.
It awakened all his feelings for it, as if in a dream. The castle’s facade shone white in the sunlight, and the newly-gilded weathervanes gleamed against the blue sky. Peter, dressed in rich livery, stood between Miraut and Beelzebub beneath the armorial gate, awaiting his master. From chimneys long unused rose curls of smoke, showing that the castle was populated by numerous servants and abundance had returned there.
He saw himself dressed in a suit as gallant as it was magnificent, whose embroidery shimmered and fluttered, leading Isabella, who wore a princess’s costume emblazoned with a coat of arms whose emblems and colours seemed those of one of the greatest houses in France, to the manor of his ancestors. A coronet gleamed on her brow, but the young woman seemed no different. She retained her tender, modest air, and held in her hand the little rose, that gift from Sigognac, which had lost none of its freshness, and, as she walked, she breathed in its perfume.
As the young couple approached the castle, an old man of the most venerable and majestic appearance, on whose chest glittered the ribbons and medals of several orders, and whose physiognomy was completely unknown to Sigognac, advanced a few steps from the porch as if to welcome them. But what surprised the Baron greatly was that near the old man stood a young man of the proudest appearance whose features he could not at first clearly distinguish, but who soon revealed himself to be the Duke of Vallombreuse. The young man smiled at him in a friendly manner, and no longer possessed his haughty expression.
His tenants shouted: ‘Long live Isabella, long live Sigognac!’ with demonstrations of the liveliest joy. Above the tumultuous cheers of the crowd, a hunting-horn was heard; then from the middle of a thicket an Amazon emerged into the clearing, whipping her rebellious palfrey, an Amazon whose features closely resembled those of Yolande. She stroked her horse’s neck with her hand, reined it in, to achieve a more moderate pace, and passed slowly in front of the manor. In spite of himself, Sigognac’s eyes followed the superb huntress whose velvet skirt swelled like a bird’s wing, but the more he looked at her, the more his vision paled and faded. She seemed composed of diaphanous shadows, and through her almost erased contours various details of the landscape could be distinguished. Yolande faded like a confused memory before Isabella’s reality. True love dissipated the first dreams of adolescence.
Indeed, in that ruined manor, where his eyes had nothing to feast on but the spectacle of desolation and misery, the Baron had lived, gloomy, somnolent, well-nigh inanimate, more like a shadow than a man, until the day of his first encounter with Yolande de Foix while hunting on the deserted moor. He had previously seen only country women tanned by the sun, or mud-stained shepherdesses, female personages rather than women. He retained from that vision of her a dazzlement like those who stare too long at the sun. Always, dancing before his eyes, even when he closed them, he saw that radiant figure which seemed to him to belong to another sphere. Yolande, it is true, was incomparably beautiful and born to fascinate more worldly people than a poor squire riding a lean pony, and dressed in his father’s over-large clothes. And, given the smile provoked by his grotesque attire, Sigognac had felt how ridiculous it would be for him to entertain the slightest hope regarding that insolent beauty. He avoided Yolande, or managed to view her, himself unnoticed behind some hedge or tree trunk, riding along some track she was accustomed to take with her retinue of gallants, all of whom, in his self-contempt, he found cruelly handsome, marvellously dressed, and superbly amiable. On those days, his heart was filled with bitter sadness, and he returned to the château, pale, defeated, dejected, like a man wasted from some illness, and he remained silent for hours on end, sitting, chin in hand, in a corner of the hearth.
Isabella’s appearance at the castle had given a purpose to that vague desire for love that torments youth and leads it, in its idleness, to cling to phantoms. The grace, the sweetness, the modesty of the young actress had touched Sigognac in the tenderest part of his soul, and he truly loved her very much. She had healed the wound inflicted by Yolande’s contempt.
Sigognac, after giving himself over to these phantasmagorical reveries, scolded himself for his laziness and managed, not without difficulty, to focus his attention on the text that Isabella had entrusted to him, in order for him to revise various passages. He deleted certain verses which did not suit the physiognomy of the young actress, and added certain others; he rewrote the lover’s declaration of affection, deeming it cold, pretentious, stiff, and obscure and bombastic in style. The speech he substituted was, certainly, more natural, more passionate, warmer; he addressed it, in thought, to Isabella herself.
This effort consumed a considerable part of the night, but he completed it to his advantage and satisfaction, and was rewarded the next day with a gracious smile from Isabella, who at once set about learning the lines that her poet, as she called him, had composed. Neither Alexandre Hardy nor Tristan l’Hermite could have bettered them.
At the evening performance, the crowd was even larger than the previous day, and the doorman was almost stifled by the press of spectators who all wished to enter the theatre at the same time, fearing, though they had paid, that they would not find a place. The reputation of Captain Fracasse, victor over Vallombreuse, grew hourly and took on chimerical and fabulous proportions; as if he had been attributed with performing the Labours of Hercules and possessing the prowess of the Twelve Peers of the Round Table. Some young gentlemen, enemies of the duke, spoke of seeking the friendship of this valiant gladiator, and inviting him to carouse with them at the tavern, at six pistoles (the Louis d’Or, worth ten livres) apiece. More than one lady had intended to write a billet-doux, of a gallant turn of phrase, aimed at him, and had thrown five or six ill-written drafts into the fire. In short, he was in fashion. People swore by him. He cared little for this success, which dragged him from the obscurity in which he would have wished to remain, but it was impossible for him to escape what he was obliged to endure; though for a moment, he had the fancy to slip away, and not appear on stage. The idea of the despair that the Tyrant would feel, still amazed at the enormous takings from their performances, prevented him from doing so. Should not these honest actors, who had helped him in his misery, benefit from the unexpected vogue he now enjoyed? So, resigning himself to his role, he adopted his mask, buckled his belt, draped his cape over his shoulder, and waited to be called on-stage.
The profits being good, and the house full, Herod, being a generous director, had doubled the lighting, so that the room shone with a brilliance as vivid as a Court spectacle. In the hope of seducing Captain Fracasse, the ladies of the city had taken up arms, as they say in Rome, in fiocchi (in full glory, ‘ribbons’ and all). Not a single diamond remained in its case, and a weight of gems shone and sparkled on breasts more or less pale, on heads more or less shapely, but wholly animated by a lively desire to please.
Only one box was still empty, the best placed, the most prominent in the hall, and curious eyes turned in that direction. The lack of enthusiasm of those who had rented it astonished the gentlemen and bourgeois of Poitiers, who had been at their posts for more than an hour. Herod, half-opening the curtain, seemed to be waiting for these disdainful people to arrive before giving the three sacramental knocks to open the proceedings, for nothing is so wretched in the theatre as the late and endlessly-annoying entrance of spectators, who scrape their seats, settle noisily, and divert attention from the play.
It was as the curtain rose, that a young woman took her place in the box, while beside her a lord of venerable and patriarchal appearance seated himself with difficulty. Long white hair, the tips of which curled into silvery ringlets, fell from the old gentleman’s still well-furnished temples, while the top of his head revealed a skull of ivory tones. These locks accompanied cheeks pockmarked with violent colours which witnessed to a habit of living in the open air, and perhaps a Rabelaisian cultivation of the divine bottle. The eyebrows, still black and very bushy, shaded eyes whose vivacity had not been extinguished by age, and which still sparkled at times amidst their circles of brown wrinkles. Moustachios and a royal beard, to which one could have applied that epithet of grifaigne (imposing, redoubtable) that the old romans de gestes (epics of chivalry) invariably attribute to Charlemagne’s beard, bristled and bracketed his sensual mouth with its prominent lips, while a double-chin joined the face to a plump neck, though his general appearance might have seemed quite commonplace without his clothes which elevated all, and confirmed the gentleman’s rank. A collar, in Venetian needle lace, overlapped his jacket of gold brocade, while his overflowing shirt, of a dazzling whiteness, raised by a rather prominent abdomen, covered the belt of a pair of breeches in tan velvet; a cape of the same colour, braided with gold, and carelessly doffed, was draped over the back of his seat. It was easy to surmise in this elderly fellow an uncle and chaperon, reduced to the state of a duenna, by a niece much adored in spite of her whims; one might have seen in them, she, slender and light, he, heavy and sullen, a Diana leading on a leash an old, semi-retired lion who would have preferred to sleep in his den than be paraded around the world, but who nevertheless resigns himself to it.
‘A young woman took her place in the box…’
The young girl’s costume proved by its elegance the wealth and rank of she who wore it. A dress of glaucous green, of that shade which only the most self-assured of blondes can wear, highlighted the snowy whiteness of a chastely-revealed bosom, and a collar of alabastrine transparency sprang, like the pistil from a flower’s corolla, from a starched and openwork ruff. The skirt, of silver cloth, was glazed with light, and bright points marked the pearls that bordered the dress and bodice. The hair, full of rays, twisted into small curls on the forehead and temples, resembled living gold; It merited twenty sonnets in its praise full of Italian concetti (conceits) and Spanish agudezzas (flashes of wit). The entire room was already dazzled by this beauty, though she had not yet removed her mask, but what could be seen of her answered for the rest; the pure and delicate chin, the perfect lines of the mouth whose raspberry tones almost reached to dark velvet, the elongated, graceful, refined oval of the face, the ideal perfection of a charming ear one might have thought chiselled from agate by Benvenuto Cellini, sufficiently attested to enviable charms even the goddesses might have envied.
Soon, doubtless inconvenienced by the heat of the room or perhaps generously wishing to favour mortals with a sight of which they were hardly worthy, the young deity removed the odious mask which had eclipsed half her splendour. Then her charming eyes could be viewed, whose translucent pupils shone like lazulite between long lashes of burnished gold, as well as her nose, half-Greek, half-aquiline, and her cheeks tinged with an imperceptible carmine which would have made the complexion of the freshest rose appear earthy. It was Yolande de Foix. The female jealousy, felt by all those women threatened at their moment of success, and reduced to a state of comparative ugliness, or agedness, had recognised her before she had fully unmasked herself.
Calmly overlooking the room, in which she had caused a sensation, Yolande leaned on the edge of the box, her hand pressed to her cheek in a pose which would have made the reputation of a sculptor and carver of images, if such a workman, whether Greek or Roman, could have invented a pose of such distracted grace and natural elegance.
— ‘Above all, uncle, don’t fall asleep,’ she said in a quiet voice to the old lord, who immediately opened his eyes wide, and sat upright. It would not be kind to me, and would be contrary to the laws of ancient gallantry that you always praise.’
— ‘Be calm, niece. When the stuff and nonsense spouted by these clowns, whose affairs interest me very little, bores me too greatly, I will look at you, and suddenly my eyes will be as clear as those of a basilisk.’
While Yolande and her uncle were talking, Captain Fracasse, striding, one leg outstretched before the other like a pair of compasses, advanced to the footlights, rolling his eyes furiously and making the most outrageous and presumptuous faces in the world.
Frantic applause erupted from all sides at the entrance of this favourite actor, and attention was momentarily diverted from Yolande. Certainly, Sigognac was not vain, his pride as a gentleman revolting at the profession of acting to which necessity had driven him. However, I would not wish to deny that his self-esteem was somewhat enhanced by this warm and noisy approval. The fame of actors, gladiators, and buffoons, occasionally provoked jealousy in those high-ranking Romans, Caesars and emperors, masters of the world, who did not disdain to seek, in the circus or on the stage, to be crowned as singers, mimes, wrestlers, or charioteers, when they already had so many others to bear on their heads, witness Nero, to speak of the most notorious.
When the applause ceased, Captain Fracasse looked around the room with that gaze that an actor never fails to cast abroad, to check that that the benches are well-filled, and to divine the joyful or hostile mood of the audience on which he bases his performance, allowing or refusing liberties to be taken.
Suddenly the Baron was dazzled; the footlights became suns, then seemed to turn dark against a luminous background. The heads of the spectators, whom he viewed, confusedly, at his feet, melted into a kind of formless mist. A burning sweat, immediately icy, drenched him from the roots of his hair to his heels. His legs, as if made of cotton, bent beneath him, and the floor of the theatre seemed to rise to his waist. His dry, parched mouth lacked saliva; an iron yoke gripped his throat as the Spanish garotte does that of criminal, and the words he was about to pronounce flew, frightened, tumultuous, clashing, and tangled like birds fleeing from an opened cage, from his brain. Coolness, composure, the contents of his memory, all vanished at once. It was as if an invisible thunderbolt had struck him, and he almost fell dead, his nose in the lighted candles. He had recognised Yolande de Foix, tranquil and radiant in the box, fixing her beautiful Persian eyes upon him!
Oh, the shame, the irritation! What an evil turn of fate! A setback too great for so noble a soul! To be caught, in grotesque attire, performing this base and unworthy function of entertaining the rabble with clownish grimaces, by a lady so haughty, so arrogant, so disdainful, before whom, to humble and lower her pride, one would wish to execute only magnanimous, heroic, and superhuman deeds! And to be unable to slip away, vanish, engulf oneself in the bowels of the earth! Sigognac had for a moment the idea of fleeing, of launching himself through the canvas backcloth, forcing a hole in it by employing his head like a ballista; but his foot-soles felt like lead, as if clad in those weighted boots which it is said that certain runners use in their exercises to strengthen themselves, feeling lighter afterwards; he was unable to detach his feet from the floor, and remained there, bewildered, gaping, stupid, to the great astonishment of Scapin, who, thinking that Captain Fracasse had forgotten his lines, whispered to him, in a low voice, the first words of his tirade.
The audience thought that the actor, before commencing, sought a second round of applause, and began to clap their hands, stamp their feet, and make the most triumphant uproar that had ever been heard in a theatre. This gave Sigognac time to regain his senses. With a supreme effort of will, he regained possession of his faculties violently: ‘Let me at least find glory in my infamy,’ he thought to himself, steadying himself on his feet; ‘the only thing lacking to complete my humiliation would be to be hissed at, and receive a hail of raw apples and hard-boiled eggs, in her presence. Perhaps she will not recognise me in this ignoble mask. Who would suppose a Sigognac beneath this literate monkey’s costume, mottled in yellow and red! Come now, courage, to the rescue! Let me act the role to the full. If I play well, she’ll applaud me. It would certainly be a fine triumph, for she is beyond proud!’
Sigognac pursued these thoughts in less time than it has taken me to write them, the pen’s rapidity being unable to match that of the mind, while he delivered his grand tirade with such singular outbursts, such unexpected variations in intonation, such a frenzied comic fury, that the audience burst into applause, and Yolande herself, though she testified that she took no liking to such farces, could not help smiling. Her uncle, the plump Commander, was perfectly awake, and struck the palms of his gouty hands together in satisfaction. The unfortunate Sigognac in his despair, through his exaggerated manner of acting, excessive clowning, and the mad boastfulness of his role, seemed to wish to mock himself, and embrace his derisory fate in the extreme; he cast at his own feet his dignity, nobility, self-respect, and the memory of his ancestors; and stamped on them with delirious and ferocious joy! ‘You must be pleased, adverse Fortune, for I am quite humiliated, sunk deep in abject wretchedness,’ he thought while enduring the customary flicks, thumps, and kicks, ‘you rendered me miserable! Now you make me appear ridiculous! You force me, by a cowardly trick, to dishonour myself before this haughty woman! What more do you wish?’
Now and then, he felt so angered he straightened his back beneath Leander’s baton, with such a formidable and dangerous air, that the latter recoiled in fear; but, recovering, with a sudden start, the spirit of his role, he trembled all over, his teeth chattered, his legs faltered, and, to the great pleasure of the spectators, he gave every sign of the most cowardly cravenness.
These extravagances, which would have seemed ridiculous in a less charged role than that of Matamore, were attributed by the public to actor’s verve, he having entered fully into the part, and did not fail to produce a good effect. Isabella alone had guessed what was troubling the Baron: namely, the presence in the room of that insolent huntress whose features had remained only too vivid in her memory. While playing her role, she slyly turned her eyes towards the box where, with the disdainful and tranquil pride of self-assured perfection, the haughty beauty whom, in her humility, she did not dare call her rival, was enthroned. She found it bitter-sweet to observe, covertly, that inescapable air of superiority, and told herself that no woman could compete in charms against such a goddess. Such sovereign qualities allowed her to comprehend the insane love that is sometimes excited in scoundrels among the masses, by the peerless grace of some young queen, appearing at a triumph or public ceremony, a love that is accompanied by madness, prison, and torture.
As for Sigognac, he had promised himself not to look at Yolande, for fear of being seized by a sudden transport, and, losing his self-control, commit publicly some bizarre escapade which would dishonour him. He tried, on the contrary, to calm himself by keeping his gaze fixed, whenever his role permitted, on the sweet and virtuous Isabella. Her charming face, imbued with a slight sadness, attributable to the unhappy tyranny of the father who, in the comedy, wished to marry her against her will, gave his soul a little peace; Isabella’s love consoled him for the contempt previously displayed by Yolande. He regained his self-esteem, and found the strength to complete the performance.
His torment finally came to an end. The play concluded, and when, having returned to the wings, Sigognac, who was suffocating, undid his mask, his comrades were struck by the strange alteration of his features. He was livid, and let himself fall well-nigh lifeless, onto a bench that was close by. Seeing him near to fainting, Blazius brought him a flask of wine, saying that nothing was as effective in such circumstances as a swig or two of the best. Sigognac signed that he only wanted water.
— ‘A reprehensible regime,’ cried the Pedant, ‘a serious dietary error; water is only fit for frogs, fish, and teal, not human beings; in the best pharmacies, one should find carafes of wine inscribed: “Medicine, for external use.” I would die an instant living death were I to swallow a drop of this insipid liquid.’
Blazius’ reasoning did not prevent the Baron from swallowing a whole jug of water. The coolness of the beverage restored him completely, and he began to look around him with less alarm.
— ‘You acted the part in admirably fantastic style,’ said Herod, approaching the captain, ‘but you must not indulge too often in that degree of effort. Such ardour would soon consume you. The actor’s art is to control himself and present only the appearance of things. He must be cold when scorching the boards, and remain calm in the midst of the greatest fury. Never has an actor so vividly represented the exaggerations, impertinence, and madness of Matamore, and if you could repeat those improvised effects, you would win the prize for comedy, above all others.’
— ‘Is it then the case,’ replied the Baron bitterly, ‘that I acted the part well? I felt myself to be a clown, a complete buffoon, when my head poked through the guitar Leander shattered on my skull.’
— ‘Truly,’ the Tyrant continued, ‘you had the most farcical, wild, and comical expression imaginable. Even Mademoiselle Yolande de Foix, that lovely person, so proud, so noble, so serious, deigned to smile. I saw it clearly.’
— ‘It is a great honour for me,’ said Sigognac, whose cheeks suddenly flushed, ‘to have entertained that beauty.’
— ‘Pardon me,’ said the Tyrant, noticing this blush. ‘Such success, which intoxicates us, humble professional minstrels, must be a matter of indifference to a person of your quality, far above applause, illustrious even.’
— ‘You did not offend me, dear Herod,’ said Sigognac, holding out his hand to the Tyrant; ‘one must seek to do well in everything one does. But I could not help thinking that youth promised greater triumphs.’
Isabella, who was dressed for the second play, passed Sigognac and, before going on-stage, gave him a consoling and angelic look, so full of tenderness, sympathy, and affection, that he forgot Yolande, utterly, and no longer felt unhappy. Here was a divine balm that healed the wound to his pride, at least for the moment, since such wounds ever reopen and bleed.
The Marquis de Bruyères was at his post, and however busy he had been applauding Zerbina during the performance, he did not fail to go and greet Yolande, whom he knew and whose hunt he sometimes followed. He told her, without naming the Baron, of the duel between Captain Fracasse and the Duke of Vallombreuse, the details of which he knew better than any, having acted as witness for one of the two adversaries.
— ‘You are being discreet,’ replied Yolande, ‘I divined instantly that Captain Fracasse was none other than the Baron de Sigognac. Did I not see him leave his owl’s nest in the company of that little scamp, that gypsy girl who plays the ingénue in so sugary a manner,’ she added with a slightly forced laugh, ‘and was it not he, at your château, amongst the actors? From his foolish expression I would not have believed such a perfect buffoon could be so brave a companion.’
While talking with Yolande, the Marquis looked around the auditorium, the various aspects of which were more visible than from the seat he usually occupied, close to the violins, the better to follow Zerbina’s performance. His attention was drawn to the masked lady whom he had not seen till then, since, seated in the front row, he invariably turned his back on the audience, not wishing to be noticed unduly. Although she was as if buried beneath her black lace, he thought he recognised in the figure and attitude of this mysterious beauty something that vaguely reminded him of the Marquise, his wife. ‘Nonsense!’ he said, rebuking himself, ‘she will doubtless be at the Château de Bruyères, where I left her.’ However, he noticed a rather large diamond ring, which the marquise was in the habit of wearing, glittering on the lady’s finger, since she was resting her hand, coquettishly, on the edge of the box, as if in compensation for not showing her face. The sight of it troubled his imagination, and, intending to ascertain the facts, he took leave of Yolande and the aged lord, with a somewhat abrupt show of civility, yet not so promptly as to find, when he reached his destination, the nest lacking the bird. The lady, alarmed, had fled. This left him most perplexed and disappointed, though he was the philosophical kind of husband. ‘Could she be in love with this Leander?’ he murmured. ‘Happily, I had the fop flogged in advance, and so am even on that score.’ The thought restored his serenity, and he went backstage to find the Soubrette, who was already surprised not to see him there, and received him with the feigned bad humour which such women employ to irritate men.
After the performance, Leander, concerned that the Marquise had suddenly disappeared in the middle of the show, made for the church square and the place where the page was due to meet him with the carriage. He found the page all alone, who then handed him a letter accompanied by a small, very heavy box, and disappeared so swiftly into the shadows that the actor might well have doubted the reality of the apparition if he had not the letter and the package in his hands. Calling a footman, who was passing with a lantern in order to collect his master from some neighbouring house, Leander broke the seal with a hasty and trembling hand, and, bringing the paper close to the light that the valet held at nose height, he read the following lines:
— ‘Dear Leander, I fear my husband recognised me at the play, despite my mask; he was staring so intently at my box that I withdrew in haste to avoid being surprised. Prudence, so inimical to love, dictates that we should not see each other tonight in the pavilion. You might be spied on, followed, perhaps killed, not to mention the danger I myself might run. While waiting for a happier and more convenient opportunity, please wear the triple-linked gold chain my page will give you. May it remind you, each time you place it about your neck, of one who will never forget you, and will always love you.
She who, for you, is simply Marie.”
— ‘Alas! My fine romance is over,’ said Leander to himself, giving some coins to the footman whose lantern he had borrowed; ‘what a pity! Ah! My charming Marchioness, how I would have loved you, endlessly,’ he continued when the valet had left, ‘but the Fates, jealous of my happiness, will not permit it; rest assured, madame, I will not compromise you through ardent and indiscreet displays of affection. Your pitiless brute of a husband would cause me untold grief by plunging his sword into your white breast. No, no, let there be no savage slaughter, more suited to a tragedy than to a life together. Even though my heart bleeds, I shall not strive to see you again, but will rest content with kissing this chain, heavier and less fragile than the one that united us for but a moment. How much might it be worth? A thousand ducats at least, judging by its weight! How right I am to love only the greatest of ladies! Doing so possesses no drawback other than the blows from a stick, and those from a sword, that one risks in such a service. In short, the affair has ended beautifully, let me not complain.’ And desirous of seeing his gold chain gleam and shimmer in the light, he made his way to the Armes de France with quite a firm step for a lover who has just received his quittance.
Meanwhile, Isabella, on returning to her room, had found a casket placed in the centre of the table, so as to oblige even the most distracted eye to observe it. A folded piece of paper had been placed beneath one of the corners of the box which surely contained items of value, for it was already a jewel in itself. The paper was unsealed and contained these words, penned in shaky, ill-formed handwriting like that produced by a hand lacking strength: ‘For Isabella.’
A flush of indignation rose to the actress’ cheeks at the sight of the gift, which might have troubled one even more virtuous. Without opening the casket, contrary to customary feminine curiosity, she summoned Master Bilot, who was not yet in bed, since he was preparing supper for some noblemen, and instructed him to remove the box and return it to its rightful owner, for she would not suffer it in her possession a moment longer.
The innkeeper expressed astonishment, and swore by all that was holy, an oath as solemn to him as the Styx to the Olympians, that he knew not who had placed the box there, though he suspected its provenance. In truth, it was Dame Leonarda, to whom the duke had addressed himself, thinking that an old woman often succeeds where the Devil fails, who had secretly placed the casket of jewels on the table, in Isabella’s absence. But, in agreeing to this, the devious matron had promised what she could not deliver, presuming too much on the corrupting power of precious stones, and gold, which act only on baser souls.
‘Dame Leonarda.’
— ‘Dispose of it,’ Isabella told Master Bilot, forcefully. ‘Return that infamous box to whomever sent it, and above all, speak not a word to the captain; for though my conduct is in no way reprehensible, he might fly into a rage and cause a scandal that would damage my reputation.’
Master Bilot admired the disinterestedness of the young actress, who had not thought even to look at jewels that might turn a duchess’ head, and had dismissed them disdainfully, as if they were sugared-almonds made of plaster, or hollow walnut-shells, and, as he withdrew, he gave her a most respectful bow, as though addressing royalty, so much did her display of virtue surprise him.
Isabella, restless, feverish, opened the window, once Master Bilot had departed, to quench, in the cool of the night, her fiery cheeks and brow. Through the tree-branches, a light shone from the black facade of the Vallombreuse hotel, doubtless the lodgings of the young wounded duke. The alley seemed deserted. However, Isabella, with the acute hearing of an actress accustomed to catching the prompter’s whisper on the fly, thought she heard a low voice saying: ‘She is not yet abed.’
Intrigued by this, she leant forward a little, and thought she could distinguish amidst the shadows, at the foot of the wall, two human forms wrapped in cloaks, and standing, motionless, like stone statues on a church porch; at the other end of the alley, despite the darkness, her eyes, dilated with fear, discovered a third phantom who seemed to be keeping guard.
Feeling they were being watched, the enigmatic beings disappeared or hid themselves more carefully, for Isabella could no longer distinguish or hear anything. Tired of playing sentry, believing she had been the victim of a nocturnal illusion, she gently closed her window, slid home the bolt on her door, set the light down near her bed, and turned in, with a vague anxiety that could not be calmed by the exercise of reason. Yet, what had she to fear in an inn full of people, two steps from her friends, in a room well and duly locked and triple-locked? What connection could these shadows, glimpsed at the foot of the wall, have to her? Doubtless they were thieves, awaiting some victim or other, who had been troubled by the light from her window.
All this was logical, but failed to reassure her: an anxious presentiment gripped her breast. If she had not feared being mocked, she would have risen, and taken refuge with a companion, but Zerbina was not alone, Serafina had little love for her, and the duenna roused an instinctive repugnance in her. She therefore remained a prey to inexpressible terrors.
The slightest creak of the woodwork, the slightest flicker of the candle whose un-snuffed wick was topped with a black cap of burnt wax, made her shudder and bury herself beneath the covers, for fear of seeing a monstrous form in a dark corner; then she would regain courage, inspecting the apartment with her eyes, in which nothing suspicious or supernatural seemed present.
At the top of one of the walls was a bull’s-eye window, free of glass, which was doubtless originally intended to light the dark chamber. This circular opening, set in the greyish wall, was faintly visible, like the enormous black pupil of a cyclopean eye, and seemed to be spying on the young woman’s actions. Isabella could not help staring fixedly at this deep, dark hole, its pair of inset iron bars forming a cross moline. There was it seemed nothing to fear from that quarter; yet, for a moment, Isabella thought she saw two human eyes shining in the shadowy depths.
But, shortly, a dark-skinned head, with long, tousled black hair appeared at one of the narrow openings formed by the intersection of the bars; a thin arm followed, then the shoulders passed through, constrained by the rough edges of the iron, and a little girl, clinging with her hand to the rim of the opening, stretched her puny body as far as she could over the drop, and let herself fall to the floor, with less noise than a feather or a snowflake touching the ground.
‘A little girl, clinging with her hand to the rim of the opening.’
Seeing Isabella immobile, petrified, and stunned with terror, the child believed her to be asleep, and when she approached the bed to make sure that it was a deep slumber, extreme surprise appeared on her dark-hued face.
— ‘The lady with the necklace!’ she said to herself, touching the pearls that rustled on her own thin, brown neck, ‘The lady with the necklace!’
For her part, Isabella, half-scared to death, had recognised the little girl she had seen at the Auberge du Soleil Bleu, and on the road to Bruyères accompanied by Agostin. She tried to call for help, but the child put her hand over Isabella’s mouth.
— ‘Don’t cry out, you’re not in any danger; Chiquita said she would never slit the neck of the lady who gave her the pearls she had set out to steal.’
— ‘But what are you doing here, unhappy child?’ said Isabella, regaining some composure at the sight of this weak, feeble being who could surely not be very formidable, and who, besides, showed a certain strange wild gratitude towards her.
— ‘I’m here to draw the bolt you slide to every night,’ resumed Chiquita in the calmest of tones, as if in no doubt regarding the legitimacy of her actions: ‘I was chosen for this because I’m thin as a snake, and agile. There are hardly any holes through which I cannot pass.’
— ‘And why did they want you to do so? To rob me?’
— ‘Oh no,’ Chiquita replied disdainfully, ‘it was so the men could enter the room and carry you off.’
— ‘My God, I am lost,’ cried Isabella, groaning and clasping her hands.
— ‘No,’ said Chiquita, ‘since I’ll leave the bolt as it is. They would never dare force the door, it would make too much noise, someone would come and catch them; they are not so stupid!’
— ‘But I would have screamed, I would have clung to the walls, I would have been heard.’
— ‘A gag stifles all screams,’ said Chiquita with the pride of an artist explaining a secret of their trade to the ignorant. ‘A blanket rolled around the body prevents movement. It’s all very easy. The stable-hand was won over, and he opened the back door.’
— ‘Who has hatched this odious plot?’ said the poor actress, quite terrified by the danger she had been in.
— ‘It was some lord who gave the money, oh, so much money! Just like that, handfuls!’ replied Chiquita, her eyes shining with a fierce and greedy glint. ‘But it matters not, you gave me the pearls as a gift; I’ll tell the others that you were awake, that there was a man in your room, and that it was nothing but a missed opportunity. They’ll go away. Let me look at you; you are beautiful, and I love you, yes, very much, almost as much as Agostin. Ah!’ she cried, noticing the knife found in the cart lying on the table. ‘You found the knife I lost, my father’s knife. Keep it, it’s a good blade.
‘When the toothed viper bites home,
For its wound, there’s no remedy known.’
You see, you turn the ferrule like this, and then you strike like this; from beneath, then the iron sinks in better. Wear it in your bodice, and when rogues trouble you, thrust home, and slit their stomachs!’ And the little girl commented on her words with matching gestures.
This lesson with the knife, given at night, in so strange a situation, by the haggard, half-mad little thief, produced on Isabella the effect of one of those nightmares that one tries in vain to dispel.
— ‘Hold the knife in your hand like this, with your fingers closed. Nothing will harm you. Now I’m leaving. Goodbye, remember Chiquita!’
Agostin’s little accomplice dragged a chair close to the wall, climbed upon it, and, raising herself on tiptoes, grasped the bars; then she bent herself into an arc, pushing her feet against the wall, gave a wiry leap, and so reached the edge of the bull’s-eye window, through which she disappeared, murmuring in a sort of vague prose-song: ‘Chiquita climbs through the holes in the wall, dances on the edge of the bars, and the shards of glass without any harm. Clever the one that can catch her!’
Isabella waited impatiently for daybreak, unable to close her eyes, so agitating had this strange event proved; but the night hours that remained were peaceful.
Yet, when the young girl descended to the dining room, her companions were struck by her pallor and the mottled circles round her eyes. They pressed her with questions, and she recounted her nocturnal adventure. Sigognac, furious, spoke of nothing less than ransacking the house of the Duke of Vallombreuse, to whom he attributed, without hesitation, this wicked attempt.
— ‘It seems to me,’ said Blazius, ‘that it would be a good idea to roll up our scenery, and go and lose ourselves, or rather save ourselves, in the great ocean of Paris. Our good-fortune is waning.’
The actors concurred, and their departure was set for the following day.
The End of Part II of Gautier’s ‘Le Capitaine Fracasse’
