The Nabob Volume Ii Part 12

"Don't stay here. Drive around some other way," she cried to the driver.

The vehicle turned painfully, tearing itself away with regret from that superb spectacle for which Paris had been waiting four days, rolled back up the avenue, into Rue Montaigne, and down Boulevard Malesherbes, at an unwilling, crawling trot, to the Madeleine. There the crowd was greater, more compact. In the heavy mist, the brightly lighted windows of the church, the m.u.f.fled strains of the funeral chants behind the black hangings, which were in such profusion that they concealed even the shape of the Greek temple, filled the whole square with reminders of the service then in progress, while the greater part of the huge procession still crowded Rue Royale as far as the bridges,--a long black line connecting the defunct statesman with the iron fence of the Corps Legislatif through which he had so often pa.s.sed. Beyond the Madeleine the roadway of the boulevard was entirely empty, kept clear by two lines of soldiers, who forced the spectators back to the sidewalks, black with people; all the stores closed, and the balconies, despite the rain, overflowing with bodies leaning far forward in the direction of the church, as if to watch the pa.s.sage of a herd of fat cattle, or the return of victorious troops. Paris, greedy of spectacles, makes a spectacle of everything indifferently, of civil war or of the burial of a statesman.

Once more the cab must retrace its steps, make another detour, and we can fancy the ill-humor of the driver and his beasts, Parisians all three at heart, and furious at being deprived of such a fine show.

Thereupon, through the silent deserted streets, all the life of Paris having betaken itself to the great artery of the boulevard, began a capricious, aimless journey, the senseless loitering of a cab hired by the hour, reaching the extreme limits of Faubourg Saint-Martin, Faubourg Saint-Denis, returning toward the centre, and always finding at the end of every circuit, every stratagem, the same obstacle lying in wait, the same crowd, some off-shoot of the black procession seen vaguely at the end of a street, defiling slowly in the rain to the sound of m.u.f.fled drums, a dull heavy sound like that made by earth falling bit by bit into a hole.

What torture for Felicia! It was her sin, her remorse pa.s.sing through the streets of Paris in all that solemn pomp, that funereal magnificence, that public mourning reflected even in the clouds; and the proud girl rebelled against the affront that circ.u.mstances put upon her, fled from it to the depths of the carriage, where she remained with closed eyes, overwhelmed, while old Crenmitz, believing that it was her grief which so affected her nerves, strove to comfort her, wept herself over their separation, and withdrawing into the other corner, left the cab-window in full possession of the great Algerian _slougui_, his delicate nostrils sniffing the air and his forepaws resting despotically on the sill with heraldic rigidity.

At last, after a thousand interminable detours, the cab suddenly stopped, moved slowly forward again amid shouts and insults, was then pushed this way and that, lifted from the ground, its equilibrium threatened by the trunks on its roof, and finally halted for good and all, as if anch.o.r.ed.

"_Bon Dieu!_ What a crowd!" murmured La Crenmitz in terror.

Felicia emerged from her torpor.

"Where in heaven's name are we?"

Beneath a colorless, smoky sky, with a fine network of rain drawn like gauze over the reality of things, lay a great square, filled with a human ocean flowing in from all the adjoining streets, immobilized around a lofty column which towered above that sea of heads like the gigantic mast of a sinking s.h.i.+p. Cavalry in troops, with drawn sabres, artillery in batteries lined the sides of an open pathway, a complete warlike host awaiting him who was soon to pa.s.s,--perhaps to try to rescue him, to carry him off by force from the redoubtable foe in whose power he was. Alas! cavalry charges, cannonades were of no avail. The prisoner was firmly bound, protected by a threefold wall of solid wood, of metal and of velvet, inaccessible to shot and sh.e.l.l, and not at the hands of those soldiers could he hope for deliverance.

"Drive on. I do not wish to remain here," said Felicia frantically, pulling the driver's dripping cape, seized with a mad fear at the thought of the nightmare that pursued her, of what she could hear approaching with a ghastly rolling of drums, still distant but drawing nearer momentarily. But, at the first movement of the wheels, the shouts and hooting began anew. Thinking that they would allow him to cross the square, the driver had with great difficulty forced his way to the front rank of the crowd, which had closed in behind him and refused to allow him to turn back. It was impossible to advance or retreat She must remain there, endure those alcoholic breaths, those inquisitive glances, kindled in antic.i.p.ation of an exceptionally fine spectacle, and eyeing with interest the fair traveller who was decamping "with such a pile o'

trunks as that!" and a cur of that size to protect her. La Crenmitz was horribly frightened; Felicia, for her part, had but one thought, that he was about to pa.s.s, that she would be in the front rank to see him.

Suddenly there was a loud shout: "Here he comes!" then a great silence fell upon the square, which had shaken off the burden of three weary hours of waiting.

He was coming!

Felicia's first impulse was to lower the curtain on her side, the side on which the procession was to pa.s.s. But, when she heard the drums close at hand, seized with a nervous frenzy at her inability to escape that obsession, or, it may be, infected by the unhealthy curiosity that encompa.s.sed her, she raised the curtain with a jerk, and her pale, ardent little face appeared, resting on both hands, at the window.

"Very good! you will have it so; I am looking at you."

It was the most magnificent funeral one can imagine, the last honors paid in all their vain pomp, as sonorous and as hollow as the rhythmic accompaniment upon a.s.ses' skins draped in c.r.a.pe. First, the white surplices of the clergy indistinctly seen amid the black trappings of the first five carriages; then, drawn by six black horses, veritable horses of Erebus, as black, as slow, as sluggish as its flood, came the funeral car, all bedecked with plumes and fringe, embroidered with silver, with heavy tears, with heraldic coronets surmounting gigantic M's, a prophetic initial which seemed to be that of Death (_Mort_) itself, of the d.u.c.h.ess Death decorated with eight _fleurons_. Such a ma.s.s of canopies and heavy draperies concealed the ign.o.ble framework of the hea.r.s.e that it s.h.i.+vered and swayed from top to bottom at every step, as if oppressed by the majesty of its dead. On the casket lay the sword, the coat, the embroidered hat, garments of state which had never been used, resplendent with gold and pearl in the dark chapel formed by the hangings, amid the beautiful display of fresh flowers which told that the season was spring despite the sulkiness of the sky. Ten paces behind came the people of the duke's household; and then, in solitary majesty, an official in a cloak carrying the decorations, a veritable show-case of all the orders in the known world, crosses, ribbons of all hues, which more than covered the black velvet cus.h.i.+on fringed with silver.

The master of ceremonies came next, at the head of the committee of the Corps Legislatif, a dozen or more deputies chosen by lot, in their midst the tall figure of the Nabob, dressed for the first time in his official costume, as if satirical fortune had chosen to give the representative on trial a foretaste of all the joys of parliamentary life. The friends of the deceased, who came next in line, formed a very limited contingent, exceedingly well chosen to lay bare the superficiality and emptiness of the existence of that great personage, reduced to the companions.h.i.+p of a theatrical manager thrice insolvent, a picture-dealer enriched by usury, a n.o.bleman of unsavory reputation and a few high-livers and boulevard idlers unknown to fame. Thus far everybody was on foot and bareheaded; in the parliamentary committee a few black silk skull caps had been timidly donned as they approached the populous quarters. After the friends came the carriages.

At the obsequies of a great warrior, it is customary to include in the funeral procession the hero's favorite horse, his battle-horse, compelled to adapt to the snail-like pace of the cortege the prancing gait which survives the smell of gunpowder and the waving of standards.

On this occasion Mora's great coupe, the "eight-spring" affair which carried him to social or political gatherings, occupied the place of that companion in victory, its panels draped in black, its lanterns enveloped in long, light streamers of crepe, which floated to the ground with an indescribable undulatory feminine grace. That was a new idea for funerals, those veiled lanterns, the supreme manifestation of _chic_ in mourning; and it was most fitting for that dandy to give one last lesson in style to the Parisians who flocked to his funeral as to a Longchamps of death.

Three more masters of ceremonies, then came the impa.s.sive official display, always the same for marriages, deaths, baptisms, openings of Parliament, receptions by the sovereign,--the interminable procession of state carriages, with gleaming panels, great mirrors, gaudy, gold-bespangled liveries, which pa.s.sed amid the dazzled throngs, reminding them of fairy tales, the equipages of Cinderella, and arousing the same _Ohs_! of admiration that ascend and burst with the bombs at displays of fireworks. And in the crowd there was always an obliging police officer, of an erudite petty bourgeois with nothing to do, on the watch for public ceremonials, to name aloud all the people in the carriages as they pa.s.sed with their proper escorts of dragoons, cuira.s.siers or _gardes de Paris_.

First the representatives of the Emperor, the Empress, all the imperial family; then, in hierarchical order, scientifically worked out, the slightest departure from which might have caused a serious conflict between the various bodies of the government, the members of the Privy Council, the marshals, the admirals, the grand chancellor of the Legion of Honor, the Senate, the Corps Legislatif, the Council of State, the whole of the judicial and educational departments, whose costumes, furred robes and wigs carried you back to the days of old Paris; they seemed pompous, superannuated, out of place in the sceptical era of the blouse and the black coat.

Felicia, to avoid thought, fixed her eyes persistently on that monotonous procession, of exasperating length, and gradually a sort of torpor stole over her, as if on a rainy day she were turning the leaves of an alb.u.m with colored plates lying on the table of a dreary salon, a history of state costumes from the earliest times to our own day. All those people, seen in profile, sitting erect and motionless behind the wide gla.s.s panels, bore a close resemblance to the faces of people in the colored fas.h.i.+on-plates displayed as near as possible to the sidewalk, so that we may lose nothing of their gold embroidery, their palm-leaves, their gold lace and braid; manikins intended to gratify the curiosity of the vulgar and exposing themselves with an air of heedless indifference.

Indifference! That was the most marked characteristic of that funeral.

You felt it everywhere, on the faces and in the hearts of the mourners, not only among all those functionaries, most of whom had known the duke by sight only, but in the ranks of those on foot between his hea.r.s.e and his coupe, his closest friends and those who were in daily attendance upon him. Indifferent, yes, cheerful, was the corpulent minister, vice-president of the Council, who grasped the cords of the pall firmly in his powerful hand, accustomed to pound the desk of the tribune, and seemed to be drawing it forward, in greater haste than the horses and the hea.r.s.e to consign to his six feet of earth his enemy of twenty years' standing, his constant rival, the obstacle to all his ambitions.

The other three dignitaries did not press forward with so much of the vigor of a led horse, but the long streamers were held listlessly in their wearied or distraught hands, significantly nerveless. Indifferent the priests by profession. Indifferent the servants, whom he never called anything else than "What's-your-name,"[4] and whom he treated like things. Indifferent, too, was M. Louis, whose last day of servitude it was--an enfranchised slave rich enough to pay his ransom. Even among his intimates that freezing coldness had made its way. And yet some of them were much attached to him. But Cardailhac was too much occupied in superintending the order and progress of the ceremonial to give way to the slightest emotion, which was quite foreign to his nature moreover.

Old Monpavon, although he was struck to the heart, would have considered the slightest crease in his linen breastplate, the slightest bending of his tall figure, as lamentably bad form, altogether unworthy his ill.u.s.trious friend. His eyes remained dry, as sparkling as ever, for the Funeral Pageant furnishes the tears for state mourning, embroidered in silver on black cloth. Some one was weeping, however, among the members of the committee, but that some one was shedding ingenuous tears on his own account. Poor Nabob, melted by the music and the display, it seemed to him that he was burying all his fortune, all his ambition for dignity and renown. And even that was one variety of indifference.

FOOTNOTES:

[4] _Chose_--literally _thing._

In the public the gratification of a gorgeous spectacle, the joy of making a Sunday of a weekday, dominated every other feeling. As the procession pa.s.sed along the boulevards, the spectators on the balconies almost applauded; here, in the populous quarters, irreverence manifested itself even more frankly. Coa.r.s.e chaff, vulgar comments on the dead man and his doings, with which all Paris was familiar, laughter called forth by the broad-brimmed hats of the rabbis and the solemn "mugs" of the council of wise men, filled the air between two drum-beats. With feet in the water, dressed in blouses and cotton caps, the head uncovered from habit, poverty, forced labor, idleness and strikes watched with a sneer the pa.s.sing of that dweller in another sphere, that brilliant duke now shorn of all his honors, who never in his life perhaps had visited that extremity of the city. But here he is! To reach the spot to which everybody goes, one must follow the road that everybody follows: Faubourg Saint-Antoine, Rue de la Roquette, to that mammoth toll-gate open so wide into the infinite. And _dame_! it is pleasant to see that n.o.blemen like Mora, dukes and ministers, all take the same road to the same destination. That equality in death consoles one for many unjust things in life. To-morrow the bread will seem not so dear, the wine better, the tools less heavy, when one can say to oneself on rising: "Well, that old Mora had to come to it like everybody else."

The procession dragged along, even more tiresome than lugubrious. Now it was the choral societies, deputations from the Army and Navy, officers of all arms of the service, herded together in front of a long line of empty carriages, mourning carriages, gentlemen's carriages, parading in compliance with etiquette; then came the troops in their turn, and Rue de la Roquette, that long street running through the filthy faubourg, already swarming with people as far as the eye could see, swallowed up a whole army, infantry, dragoons, lancers, carabineers, heavy guns with muzzles in the air, all ready to bark, shaking pavements and window-panes, but unable to drown the rolling of the drums, a sinister, barbarous sound, which transported Felicia's imagination to the obsequies of African monarchs, where thousands of immolated victims attend the soul of a prince so that it may not enter the kingdom of spirits alone, and made her think that perhaps that ostentatious, interminable procession was about to descend and disappear in a supernatural grave vast enough to hold it all.

"Now, and in the hour of our death. Amen!" murmured La Crenmitz, while the cab rattled across the empty square, where Liberty, in solid gold, seemed to be taking a magic flight in s.p.a.ce; and the old dancer's prayer was perhaps the only sincere note of true emotion uttered throughout the vast s.p.a.ce covered by the funeral.

All the discourses are at an end, three long discourses as cold as the cavern into which the dead man has descended, three official harangues which have afforded the orators an opportunity to proclaim in very loud tones their devotion to the interests of the dynasty. Fifteen times the cannon have awakened the numerous echoes of the cemetery, shaken the wreaths of jet and immortelles, the light _ex-votos_ hanging at the corners of burial lots, and while a reddish cloud floats upward and revolves amid the odor of powder across the city of the dead, mingling gradually with the smoke from the factories of the plebeian quarter, the countless mult.i.tude also disperses, scattering through the sloping streets, the long stairways gleaming white among the verdure, with a confused murmur as of waves beating against the rocks. Purple robes, black robes, blue and green coats, gold ornaments, slender swords which their wearers adjust while marching, return hastily to the carriages.

Dignified salutations, meaning smiles are exchanged, while the mourning equipages rumble along the paths at a gallop, displaying lines of black-coated drivers, with rounded backs, hats _en bataille_, capes floating in the wind caused by their swift pace.

The general feeling is one of relief at the close of a long and fatiguing exhibition, a legitimate eagerness to lay aside the administrative harness, the ceremonious costumes, to loosen the belts, the high collars and the stocks, to relax the features which, no less than the bodies, have been wearing fetters.

Short and stout, dragging his bloated legs with difficulty, Hemerlingue hurried toward the exit, declining the offers that were made him of a seat in various carriages, knowing well that only his own was adapted to the weight of his dropsical body.

"Baron, baron, this way. There's a seat for you."

"No, thanks. I am walking the numbness out of my legs."

And, in order to avoid these proposals, which at length annoyed him, he took a cross-path that was almost deserted, too deserted in fact, for he had hardly entered it when he regretted having done so. Ever since he had entered the cemetery, he had had but one absorbing thought, the fear of coming face to face with Jansoulet, whose violent temper he knew well, and who might forget the majesty of the spot and repeat the scandalous scene of Rue Royale in Pere-Lachaise. Two or three times during the ceremony he had seen his former partner's great head emerge from the ma.s.s of colorless types of which the attendant throng was largely composed, and move toward him, evidently seeking him, actuated by a desire for a meeting. In the main avenue yonder there would be people at hand in case of accident, while here--_Brr!_ It was that anxiety which caused him to force his short steps, his panting breath; but in vain. As he turned in his fear of being followed, the Nabob's tall form and broad shoulders appeared at the entrance of the path. It was impossible for the bulky creature to walk in the narrow s.p.a.ce between the tombs, which were packed so closely that there was hardly room to kneel. The rich, rain-soaked earth slipped and gave way under his feet. He adopted the plan of walking on with an indifferent air, hoping that the other would not recognize him. But a hoa.r.s.e, powerful voice behind him called:

"Lazare!"

The capitalist's name was Lazare. He made no reply but tried to overtake a group of officers who were walking a long way in front of him.

"Lazare! O Lazare!"

Just as in the old days on the quay at Ma.r.s.eille. He was tempted to halt, under the influence of an old habit, but the thought of his infamous conduct, of all the injury he had inflicted on the Nabob and was still attempting to inflict on him, suddenly came to his mind with a horrible fear, amounting to frenzy, when a hand of iron brought him abruptly to a standstill. The sweat of cowardice drenched his limp and nerveless limbs, his face turned still yellower, his eyes winked in antic.i.p.ation of the terrible blow he expected to receive, while his great arms were raised instinctively to ward it off.

"Oh! don't be afraid. I have no evil designs on you," said Jansoulet sadly. "I come simply to ask you to cease your designs on me."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "'_Don't be afraid. I have no evil designs on you._'"]

He paused to take breath. The banker, stupefied and dismayed, opened his round owl's eyes to their fullest extent in face of that suffocating emotion.

"Listen, Lazare, you are the stronger in this war we have been carrying on so long. I am on the ground at your feet. My shoulders have touched.

Now be generous, spare your old chum. Have mercy on me, I say, have mercy on me."

That Southerner, subdued and softened by the pomp of the funeral ceremony, trembled in every limb. Hemerlingue, facing him, was hardly more courageous. The dismal music, the open tomb, the orations, the cannonading, and the lofty philosophy of inevitable death, all had combined to move the stout baron to the depths of his being. His former comrade's voice completed the awakening of such human qualities as still remained in that bundle of gelatine.

His old chum! It was the first time in ten years, since their falling out, that he had seen him at such close quarters. How many things those swarthy features, those powerful shoulders ill-suited to an embroidered coat, recalled to his mind! The thin woollen blanket, full of holes, in which they both rolled themselves up to sleep on the deck of the _Sinai_, the rations fraternally shared, the long walks through the scorched country about Ma.r.s.eille, where they stole great onions and ate them on the bank of a ditch, the dreams, the projects, the sous put into the common purse, and, when fortune began to smile on them, the antics they played together, the dainty little suppers at which they told each other everything, with their elbows on the table.

How can two people ever fall out when they know each other so well, when they have lived like twins clinging to a thin, strong nurse, poverty, sharing her soured milk and her rough caresses! Such thoughts, long to a.n.a.lyze, pa.s.sed through Hemerlingue's mind like a flash of lightning.