"That girl thinks of everything!" thought Monsieur de Mardeille. "She is prudence personified: she has put out her light. Very good! Darkness makes one more daring. I must make haste; the propitious moment is here!"

And the gentleman stole from his room on tiptoe, enveloped in an ample robe de chambre, and with his jaunty cap on his head. He went downstairs, taking every precaution not to make any noise; he pa.s.sed the concierge's lodge, where there was no light; darkness reigned on all sides, and as our seducer was feeling his way across the courtyard he ran against the pump; but that told him where he was; the door leading to the narrow stairway was close at hand; he found it and went upstairs, muttering:

"Here I am, at last!"

He soon stood in front of Georgette's door. He felt about on all sides; the key was not in the lock, and the door was securely fastened.

"She didn't think of leaving the key outside!" thought Monsieur de Mardeille; "that was an oversight. Perhaps it was from modesty, so that she might not seem to be expecting me. However, I must let her know that I am here. I'll knock softly; she can't be asleep."

And he gave two very soft taps, then a louder one, muttering:

"She doesn't hear! Can she have gone to sleep already? It's very strange; there's not a sound anywhere in the house, and she ought to hear! d.a.m.n the odds! I must wake her up! If other people hear, it will be her own fault."

And he knocked louder, then louder still, and shouted through the keyhole:

"Little neighbor! it's I! open the door a minute; I left something in your room. Come, charming Georgette, you've teased me enough; you must let me in; I have some very interesting things to tell you. For heaven's sake! just long enough to say two words to you, and then I'll leave you."

His trouble and entreaties were wasted; she made no reply, and the door did not open. After spending nearly three-quarters of an hour on Georgette's landing, the discomfited gallant angrily pulled his cap over his eyes and left the entresol, b.u.mping against the walls.

To augment his rage, when he was in the courtyard he heard roars of laughter from several windows; and he recognized Mademoiselle Arthemise's voice, saying in a very loud tone:

"Ah! that's well done! The scented dandy's sold again! The little one makes fools of her lovers; that reconciles me to her! Ha! ha! now's the time to sing:

"'Ma chandelle est morte, Je n'ai plus de feu; Ouvre-moi ta porte, Pour l'amour de Dieu!'"[F]

XIII

A BROOCH

Monsieur de Mardeille did not close his eyes that night. He was terribly vexed, and he awaited the morrow with extreme impatience, in order to have an explanation with the little shirtmaker, whom he proposed to reproach in no measured terms. He firmly believed himself to be in the right, because he maintained that in love one gives nothing without some equivalent.

At last the morning came; people began to stir in the house. Our dandy rose and looked at himself in the mirror. He found that he was horribly pale, that his eyes were red, and that he had a worn, jaded look. As he desired, before all else, to be handsome and fascinating, he pa.s.sed more than an hour at his toilet, changing his cravat and waistcoat again and again; but he did not succeed in restoring his usual freshness of aspect. At last, weary of the struggle, he said to himself:

"A little pallor makes one more interesting; women like a melancholy air. That cruel girl will be touched by my evident suffering. Decidedly, it is much better for me to be pale; it gives me the advantage at the outset."

He betook himself to his little neighbor's apartment, crossing the courtyard as rapidly as possible to avoid the glances of the other tenants. This time the door was unlocked. Monsieur de Mardeille unceremoniously entered Georgette's room and found her already at work.

She looked up at him with a sly smile, and said:

"Good-morning, monsieur! it's very good of you to come to see me. Pray sit down, and we will talk about the play."

But Monsieur de Mardeille did not sit down; he paced the floor excitedly, and rejoined in an angry tone:

"I didn't come here to talk about the play, mademoiselle!"

"Indeed? Very well, then we'll talk about something else."

"Mademoiselle--you sleep very soundly!"

"I? Oh! you are mistaken, monsieur; on the contrary, my sleep is very light; the slightest noise wakes me."

"The slightest noise? How did it happen, then, that you didn't hear the noise I made last night, when I knocked on your door for half an hour, and you did not deign to reply?"

"Last night? Why, I heard you distinctly, monsieur; much too distinctly, in fact!"

"Then, mademoiselle, why didn't you let me in?"

"Why? Because I didn't choose to; because I don't receive visits at midnight; because I considered the uproar you made at my door most unseemly!"

"Uproar? But if you had opened your door at once, I wouldn't have made any uproar!"

"True; but as I didn't choose to open it, you shouldn't have kept on knocking."

"Why, mademoiselle, it seems to me that I had the right to come to your room, that I might fairly expect to be admitted! When a woman accepts gifts from a man, it means that she consents--at all events, she shouldn't leave him at the door when he comes to see her."

"The right! the right!" cried Georgette, rising, and casting such an angry glance at Monsieur de Mardeille that he was thoroughly abashed.

"Let me tell you, monsieur, that you are most impertinent, and that I ought to turn you out of my room at once and forbid you ever to put your foot inside my door again. The right! What do you mean, monsieur? Is it because you have sent me a few paltry rags that you presume to speak to me in this tone? Understand, monsieur, that I did you much honor by receiving your superb gifts! If you had not wanted to go out with me, you wouldn't have given them to me, I presume. So that you did it much more to gratify your own vanity than to please me. And monsieur imagines that, because of those gifts, I will open my door to him at midnight!

and perhaps give myself to him and esteem myself too happy to be his mistress!--Why, you are mad, monsieur! Here are your presents. I don't want them; you may take them back! Look, this will show you how much I care for them!"

As she spoke, Georgette ran to her closet, took down the gown, shawl, and bonnet, threw them on the floor, and kicked them toward Monsieur de Mardeille, who was horrified and dared not move.

Having done this, the girl returned to her chair by the window, which was open as usual, and resumed her work, paying no further heed to her neighbor, who stood in the same spot as motionless as a statue.

Several minutes pa.s.sed thus. The ex-beau had had time to reflect. He began by picking up the gown, the shawl, and the bonnet, and laid them all carefully on a table; then he went to Georgette and stammered confusedly:

"Mademoiselle--I was wrong--I was very wrong--I admit it!"

"It's very fortunate that you realize it, monsieur!"

"I should not have believed--or rather, I should not have hoped---- Certainly I do not attach any value to these gewgaws that I sent you; it wasn't on account of them that I knocked at your door last night; but I thought that you were touched by my pa.s.sion for you, that you no longer doubted it--that was what led me to come here and knock last night, after the theatre. Forgive me, I beseech you, my dear neighbor; don't be angry with me; it would make me too unhappy."

"As you admit your wrongdoing," Georgette answered, with a smile, "I forgive you. Oh! I am not one who bears malice! I say at once what I have on my heart; then it's all over and I think no more about it."

The old beau took the girl's hand and respectfully put it to his lips.

She withdrew it and pointed to a chair, saying:

"Now sit down, and let us talk about something else."

"Something else!" murmured Monsieur de Mardeille as he sat down. "When I am with you, it is hard for me to refrain from telling you of my love.

Does it make you angry?"

"No; but have you forgotten what I said to you?"

"Faith! it's quite possible, my dear neighbor; what did you say to me on that subject?"