Marie Claire.

by Marguerite Audoux.

INTRODUCTION

The origins of this extraordinary book are sufficiently curious and sufficiently interesting to be stated in detail. They go back to some ten years ago, when the author, after the rustic adventures which she describes in the following pages, had definitely settled in Paris as a working sempstress. The existence of a working sempstress in Paris, as elsewhere, is very hard; it usually means eleven hours' close application a day, six full days a week, at half a crown a day. But already Marguerite Audoux's defective eyesight was causing anxiety, and upsetting the regularity of her work, so that in the evenings she was often less fatigued than a sempstress generally is. She wanted distraction, and she found it in the realization of an old desire to write. She wrote, not because she could find nothing else to do, but because at last the chance of writing had come. That she had always loved reading is plain from certain incidents in this present book; her opportunities for reading, however, had been limited. She now began, in a tentative and perhaps desultory fashion, to set down her youthful reminiscences. About this time she became acquainted, through one of its members, and by one of those hazards of destiny which too rarely diversify the dull industrial life of a city, with a circle of young literary men, of whom possibly the most important was the regretted Charles Louis Philippe, author of "Bubu de Montparna.s.se," and other novels which have a genuine reputation among the chosen people who know the difference between literature and its counterfeit. This circle of friends used to meet at Philippe's flat. It included a number of talented writers, among whom I should mention MM. Iehl (the author of "Cauet"), Francis Jourdain, Paul Fargue, Larbaud, Chanvin, Marcel Ray, and Regis Gignoux (the literary and dramatic critic). Marguerite Audoux was not introduced as a literary prodigy. n.o.body, indeed, was aware that she wrote. She came on her merits as an individuality, and she took her place beside several other women who, like herself, had no literary pretensions. I am told by one of the intimates of the fellowship that the impression she made was profound. And the fact is indubitable that her friends are at least as enthusiastic about her individuality as about this book which she has written. She was a little over thirty, and very pretty, with an agreeable voice. The sobriety of her charm, the clear depth of her emotional faculty, and the breadth of her gentle interest in human nature handsomely conquered the entire fellowship. The working sempstress was sincerely esteemed by some of the brightest masculine intellects in Paris.

This admiring appreciation naturally encouraged her to speak a little of herself. And one evening she confessed that she, too, had been trying to write. On another evening she brought some sheets of ma.n.u.script--the draft of the early chapters of "Marie Claire"--and read them aloud. She read, I am told, very well. The reception was enthusiastic. One can imagine the ecstatic fervour of these young men, startled by the apparition of such a shining talent. She must continue the writing of her book, but in the mean time she must produce some short stories and sketches for the daily papers! Her gift must be presented to the public instantly! She followed the advice thus urgently offered, and several members of the circle (in particular, Regis Gignoux and Marcel Ray) gave themselves up to the business of placing the stories and sketches; Marcel Ray devoted whole days to the effort, obtaining special leave from his own duties in order to do so.

In the result several stories and sketches appeared in the _Matin, Paris Journal_ (respectively the least and the most literary of Paris morning papers), and other organs. These stories and sketches, by the way, were republished in a small volume, some time before "Marie Claire," and attracted no general attention whatever.

Meanwhile the more important work proceeded, slowly; and was at length finished. Its composition stretched over a period of six years.

Marguerite Audoux never hurried nor fatigued herself, and though she re-wrote many pa.s.sages several times, she did not carry this revision to the meticulous excess which is the ruin of so many ardent literary beginners in France. The trite phrase, "written with blood and tears,"

does not in the least apply here. A native wisdom has invariably saved Marguerite Audoux from the dangerous extreme. In his preface to the original French edition, M. Octave Mirbeau appositely points out that Philippe and her other friends abstained from giving purely literary advice to the auth.o.r.ess as her book grew and was read aloud. With the insight of artists they perceived that hers was a talent which must be strictly let alone. But Parisian rumour has alleged, not merely that she was advised, but that she was actually helped in the writing by her admirers. The rumour is worse than false--it is silly. Every paragraph of the work bears the unmistakable and inimitable work of one individuality. And among the friends of Marguerite Audoux, even the most gifted, there is none who could possibly have composed any of the pa.s.sages which have been singled out as being beyond the accomplishment of a working sempstress. The whole work and every part of the work is the una.s.sisted and untutored production of its author. This statement cannot be too clearly and positively made. Doubtless the spelling was drastically corrected by the proof-readers; but to have one's spelling drastically corrected is an experience which occurs to nearly all women writers, and to a few male writers.

The book completed, the question of its proper flotation arose. I use the word "flotation" with intent. Although Marguerite Audoux had originally no thought of publishing, her friends were firmly bent not simply on publishing, but on publishing with the maximum of eclat. A great name was necessary to the success of the enterprise, a name which, while keeping the sympathy of the artists, would impose itself on the crowd. Francis Jourdain knew Octave Mirbeau. And Octave Mirbeau, by virtue of his feverish artistic and moral enthusiasms, of his notorious generosity, and of his enormous vogue, was obviously the heaven-appointed man. Francis Jourdain went to Octave Mirbeau and offered him the privilege of floating "Marie Claire" on the literary market of Paris. Octave Mirbeau accepted, and he went to work on the business as he goes to work on all his business; that is to say, with flames and lightnings. For some time Octave Mirbeau lived for nothing, but "Marie Claire." The result has been vastly creditable to him.

"Marie Claire" was finally launched in splendour. Its path had been prepared with really remarkable skill in the Press and in the world, and it was an exceedingly brilliant success from the start. It ran a triumphant course as a serial in one of the "great reviews," and within a few weeks of its publication as a book thirty thousand copies had been sold. The sale continues more actively than ever. Marguerite Audoux lives precisely as she lived before. She is writing a further instalment of her pseudonymous autobiography, and there is no apparent reason why this new instalment should not be even better than the first.

Such is the story of the book.

My task is not to criticise the work. I will only say this. In my opinion it is highly distinguished of its kind (the second part in particular is full of marvellous beauty); but it must be accepted for what it is. It makes no sort of pretence to display those constructive and inventive artifices which are indispensable to a great masterpiece of impersonal fiction. It is not fiction. It is the exquisite expression of a temperament. It is a divine accident.

ARNOLD BENNETT.

MARIE CLAIRE

PART I

One day a number of people came to the house. The men came in as though they were going into church, and the women made the sign of the cross as they went out.

I slipped into my parents' bedroom and was surprised to see that my mother had a big lighted candle by her bedside. My father was leaning over the foot of the bed looking at my mother. She was asleep with her hands crossed on her breast.

Our neighbour, la mere Colas, kept us with her all day. As the women went out again she said to them, "No, she would not kiss her children good-bye." The women blew their noses, looked at us, and la mere Colas added, "That sort of illness makes one unkind, I suppose." A few days afterwards we were given new dresses with big black and white checks.

La mere Colas used to give us our meals and send us out to play in the fields. My sister, who was a big girl, scrambled into the hedges, climbed the trees, messed about in the ponds, and used to come home at night with her pockets full of creatures of all kinds, which frightened me and made la mere Colas furiously angry.

What I hated most were the earthworms. The red elastic things made me shiver with horror, and if I happened to step on one it made me quite ill. When I had a pain in my side la mere Colas used to forbid my sister to go out. But my sister got tired of remaining indoors and wanted to go out and take me with her. So she used to go and collect earthworms, and hold them up close to my face. Then I said that I wasn't in pain any more, and la mere Colas used to send us both out of doors. One day my sister threw a handful of earthworms on to my dress.

I jumped back so quickly that I fell into a tub of hot water. La mere Colas was very angry while she undressed me. I was not very much hurt.

She promised my sister a good slapping, and called to the sweeps, who were pa.s.sing, to come in and take her away. All three of them came in, with their black bags and their ropes. My sister howled and cried for mercy. I was very much ashamed at being all undressed.

My father often took us to a place where there were men who drank wine.

He used to put me on a table among the gla.s.ses, and make me sing. The men would laugh and kiss me, and try and make me drink wine. It was always dark when we went home. My father took long steps, and rocked himself as he walked. He nearly tumbled down lots of times. Sometimes he would begin to cry and say that his house had been stolen. Then my sister used to scream. It was always she who used to find the house.

One morning la mere Colas got angry with us and told us that we were children of misfortune, and that she would not feed us any longer. She said we could go and look for our father, who had gone away n.o.body knew where. When her anger had pa.s.sed she gave us our breakfasts as usual, but a few days afterwards we were put into pere Chicon's cart. The cart was full of straw and bags of corn. I was tucked away behind in a little hollow between the sacks. The cart tipped down at the back, and every jolt made me slip on the straw.

I was very frightened all the way along. Every time I slipped I thought I was going to fall out of the cart, or that the sacks were going to fall on me. We stopped at an inn. A woman lifted us down, shook the straw on our dresses, and gave us some milk to drink. I heard her say to pere Chicon, "You really think their father will take care of them, then?" Pere Chicon shook his head, and knocked his pipe against the table. Then he made a funny face and said, "He may be anywhere. Young Girard told me he had met him on the Paris road."

After a while pere Chicon took us to a big house with a lot of steps leading up to the door. He had a long talk with a gentleman who waved his arms about and talked about the dignity of labour. I wondered what that was. The gentleman put his hand on my head and patted it, and I heard him say several times, "He did not tell me that he had any children." I understood that he was talking of my father, and I asked if I could not see him. The gentleman looked at me without answering, and then asked pere Chicon, "How old is she?" "About five," said pere Chicon. All this time my sister was playing up and down the steps with a kitten. We went back into the cart and to mere Colas again. She was cross with us and pushed us about. A few days afterwards she took us to the railway station, and that evening we went to a big house, where there were a lot of little girls.

Sister Gabrielle separated us at once. She said that my sister was big enough to be with the middle-sized girls, while I was to stay with the little ones. Sister Gabrielle was quite small, quite old, quite thin, and all bent up. She managed the dormitory and the refectory. She used to make the salad in a huge yellow jar. She tucked her sleeves up to her shoulders, and dipped her arms in and out of the salad. Her arms were dark and knotted, and when they came out of the jar, all shining and dripping, they made me think of dead branches on rainy days.

I made a chum at once. She came dancing up to me and looked impudent, I thought. She did not stand any higher than the bench on which I was sitting. She put her elbows on my knees and said: "Why aren't you playing about?" I told her that I had a pain in my side. "Oh, of course," she said, "your mother had consumption, and Sister Gabrielle said you would soon die." She climbed up on to the bench, and sat down, hiding her little legs underneath her. Then she asked me my name and my age, and told me that her name was Ismerie, that she was older than I was, and that the doctor said she would never get any bigger.

She told me also that the cla.s.s mistress was called Sister Marie-Aimee, that she was very unkind, and punished you severely if you talked too much. Then all of a sudden she jumped down and shouted "Augustine."

Her voice was like a boy's voice, and her legs were a little twisted.

At the end of recreation I saw her on Augustine's back. Augustine was rolling her from one shoulder to the other, as if she meant to throw her down. When she pa.s.sed me Ismerie said in that big voice of hers, "You will carry me too sometimes, won't you?" I soon became friends with Augustine.

My eyes were not well. At night my eyelids used to close up tight, and I was quite blind until I had them washed. Augustine was told off to take me to the infirmary. She used to come and fetch me from the dormitory every morning. I could hear her coming before she got to the door. She caught hold of my hand and pulled me along, and she didn't mind a bit when I b.u.mped against the beds. We flew down the pa.s.sages like the wind and rushed down two flights of stairs like an avalanche.

My feet only touched a step now and again. I used to go down those stairs as if I was falling down a well. Augustine had strong hands and held me tight. To go to the infirmary we had to pa.s.s behind the chapel and then in front of a little white house. There we hurried more than ever. One day when I fell on to my knees she pulled me up again and smacked my head saying, "Do be quick, we are in front of the dead house." After that she was always afraid of my falling again, and used to tell me when we got in front of the dead house. I was frightened chiefly because Augustine was frightened. If she rushed along like that there must be danger. I was always out of breath when I got to the infirmary. Somebody pushed me on to a little chair, and the pain in my side had been gone a long time when they came and washed my eyes.

It was Augustine who took me into Sister Marie-Aimee's cla.s.sroom. She put on a timid kind of voice, and said, "Sister, here is a new girl."

I expected to be scolded; but Sister Marie-Aimee smiled, kissed me several times, and said, "You are too small to sit on a bench, I shall put you in here." And she sat me down on a stool in the hollow of her desk. It was ever so comfortable in the hollow of her desk, and the warmth of her woollen petticoat soothed my body, which was bruised all over by tumbling about on the wooden staircases, and on the stone ones.

Often two feet hemmed me in on each side of my stool, and two warm legs made a back for me. A soft hand pressed my head on to the woollen skirt between the knees, and the softness of the hand and the warmth of the pillow used to send me to sleep. When I woke up again the pillow became a table. The same hand put bits of cake on it, and bits of sugar and sweets sometimes. And all round me I heard the world living.

A voice with tears in it would say, "No, Sister, I didn't do it." Then shrill voices would say, "Yes, she did, Sister." Above my head a full warm voice called for silence. And then there would be the rap of a ruler on the desk. It would make an enormous noise down in my hollow.

Sometimes the feet would be drawn away from my little stool, the knees would be drawn together, the chair would move, and down to my nest came a white veil, a narrow chin, and smiling lips with little white pointed teeth behind them. And last of all I saw two soft eyes which seemed to cuddle me and make me feel comfortable.

When my eyes got better I used to get an alphabet as well as sweets and cakes. It was a little book with pictures next to the words. I often used to look at a great big strawberry which I fancied as big as a bun.

When it was not cold in the cla.s.sroom, Sister Marie-Aimee put me on a bench between Ismerie and Marie Renaud, who slept in the two beds next to mine in the dormitory. Now and then she used to let me go back to my hollow again, and I loved that. I used to find books there with pictures, which made me forget all about the time.

One morning Ismerie took me into a corner, and told me with great secrecy that Sister Marie-Aimee was not going to take the cla.s.s any more. She was going to take Sister Gabrielle's place in the dormitory and the refectory. She did not tell me who had told her this, but she said it was an awful shame. She was very fond of Sister Gabrielle, who used to treat her like a little child. She did not like "that Sister Marie-Aimee," as she used to call her when she knew that n.o.body heard her but ourselves. She said that Sister Marie-Aimee would not let her climb on to our backs, and that we should not be able to make fun of her as we used to of Sister Gabrielle, who always went upstairs sideways. In the evening after prayers Sister Gabrielle told us that she was going. She kissed us all, beginning with the smallest of us.

We went up to the dormitory making a dreadful noise. The big girls whispered together and said they would not put up with Sister Marie-Aimee. The little ones snivelled as though they were going into danger. Ismerie, whom I was carrying upstairs on my back, was crying noisily. Her little fingers hurt my throat, and her tears fell down my neck. n.o.body thought of laughing at Sister Gabrielle, who went upstairs slowly, saying "Hush, hush," all the time, without making the noise any less. The servant in the little dormitory was crying too.

She shook me a little while she was undressing me and said, "I'm sure you are pleased at having that Sister Marie-Aimee of yours." We used to call the servant Bonne Esther. I liked her best of the three servants. She was rather rough sometimes, but she was fond of us.

When I coughed she used to get up and put a piece of sugar in my mouth.

And often she took me out of my bed when I was cold and warmed me in her own.

Next morning we went down to the refectory in dead silence. The servants told us to remain standing. Several of the big girls stood very straight and looked proud. Bonne Justine stood at one end of the table. She looked sad and bent her head. Bonne Neron, who looked like a gendarme, walked up and down in the middle of the refectory. Now and then she looked at the clock, and shrugged her shoulders. Sister Marie-Aimee came in, leaving the door open behind her. She seemed to me to be taller than usual, in her white ap.r.o.n and white cuffs. She walked slowly, looking at us all. The rosary, which hung at her side, made a little clickety sound, and her skirt swung a little as she walked. She went up the three steps to her desk, and made a sign to us to sit down. In the afternoon she took us out for a walk in the country. It was very hot. I went and sat down near her on a little hillock. She was reading a book, and every now and then looked at the little girls who were playing in a field below us. She looked at the sun which was setting, and kept on saying "How lovely it is, how lovely it is."

That evening the birch which Sister Gabrielle kept in the dormitory was put away in a cupboard, and in the refectory the salad was turned with two long wooden spoons. These were the only changes. We went into cla.s.s from nine o'clock till twelve, and in the afternoon we cracked nuts, which were sold to an oil merchant. The bigger girls used to crack them with a hammer, and the little ones took them out of the sh.e.l.ls. We were forbidden to eat them, and it was not easy, anyhow.

One of the girls would always sneak if we did, because she was greedy too, and jealous. Bonne Esther used to peep into our mouths.

Sometimes she caught a very greedy girl. Then she used to roll her eyes at her, give her a little smack, and say, "I've got my eye on you." Some of us she trusted. She would make us turn round and open our mouths and pretend to look at them, and then she said, "Shut your beaks, birdies," and laughed.

I often wanted to eat the nuts. But I would look at Bonne Esther and blush at the idea of cheating her, because she trusted me. But after a time I wanted to eat nuts so badly that I could not think of anything else. Every day I tried to think of some way of eating them without being caught. I tried to slip some into my sleeves, but I was so awkward that I always dropped them. Besides, I wanted to eat a lot of them, a great big lot. I thought I should like to eat a sackful. One day I managed to steal some. Bonne Esther, who was taking us up to bed, slipped on a nutsh.e.l.l and dropped her lantern, which went out. I was close to a big bowl of nuts, and I took a handful and put them in my pocket. As soon as everybody was in bed I took the nuts out of my pocket, put my head under the sheets and crammed them into my mouth.

But it seemed to me at once as though everybody in the dormitory must hear the noise that my jaws were making. I did all I could to munch slowly and quietly, but the noise thumped in my ears like the blows of a mallet.