"Oh! in that case, I'll go. Never you fear! I'll do everything you've told me, and she shall have the money to-morrow. But suppose your concierge won't let me carry the things away?"

"There isn't any concierge."

"In that case, it will soon be fixed up."

"Good! I thank you, Bastringuette. And you won't mention this to Elina?"

"Oh! dear me, no! as long as you don't want her to know your good deeds."

"I am simply doing my duty. If only heaven will permit me to finish what I have undertaken! I was so happy to think that, in a few months more---- However, you'll go to-morrow, won't you, Bastringuette?--By the way, one word more: Madame Desroches will ask you, no doubt, why I haven't been to see her for so long a time, and why I have sent you with the money. You must tell her that I sent you because I had to leave Paris, to go on a short journey for the house in which I am employed.

Don't forget that."

"No, I won't forget anything."

Paul slept more quietly, thinking that the person whose self-const.i.tuted protector he was would not have to suffer by reason of the misfortune that had befallen him. That night his sleep refreshed him, and when he woke he saw Elina's pretty face leaning over him, and, in the background, Bastringuette, whose eyes seemed to express a wish to speak to him.

"Oh! what joy!" cried Elina; "you have slept till much later to-day.

It's almost eleven o'clock. Luckily, I had a dress to deliver, so I was able to come back."

"And I feel much better," said Paul.

Bastringuette seized the opportunity, when she was giving the invalid his draught, to whisper in his ear:

"Your errand is done. She has the hundred francs."

Paul could not reply, but his look expressed his satisfaction. From that day the fever abated, and the young man soon became convalescent.

XXVIII

THE INEVITABLE HAPPENS

It was only a few days since Albert had returned to Paris, and he had hardly had time to see his closest friends, when he disappeared again, and no one knew the reason of his abrupt departure.

When the jovial Mouillot chanced to meet Balivan or Dupetrain or Celestin, it rarely happened that they did not discuss the conduct of young Vermoncey.

"What sort of a life is he leading now?" said Mouillot; "he goes off, and is gone nearly three months; then he comes back, we see him two or three times, and off he goes again without a word, just at the beginning of winter, when all sorts of amus.e.m.e.nts have centred in the capital."

Monsieur Celestin, who had not given out that he had had a definitive rupture with Albert, contented himself with some such reply as this:

"As I have been entirely unable to understand Albert's moods of late, I have seen very much less of him. He's a queer fish: one of those people who fly into a pa.s.sion without any idea what it's all about; and I bother my head very little as to what he does or what becomes of him!"

"For my part," said Balivan, "I am very fond of the fellow. He's heedless and light-headed, but I am sure that he's as straight as a string, and he's most obliging. He's a mighty bright fellow, too; and if he'd like, I'd be glad to take a trip to Italy with him."

"If Monsieur Albert had chosen," said Monsieur Dupetrain, "he would have made a first-cla.s.s subject for magnetism; he had just the right look in his eyes to put himself in communication with a somnambulist."

"How about the fair lady that you were paying court to not long ago?"

said Monsieur Celestin, in a sarcastic tone; "have you magnetized her?"

"Madame Baldimer? No; I tried, but I couldn't make it work; she's a woman who is absolutely free from nervousness."

They asked one another about Tobie Pigeonnier also, who was still undiscoverable.

"Gad!" said Mouillot; "I wouldn't give five sous for that olive stone that poor Monsieur Varinet persists in carrying about in his purse."

Madame Plays was not disturbed about Albert, but she was fully determined to be revenged on little Tobie, who had hoodwinked her so completely with his alleged duel and was responsible for her having exhaled an odor of tobacco for two months. Every morning, she sent for a carriage, entered it with her husband, and took him to a shooting gallery, thence to a fencing school; and there the submissive husband was compelled to practise an hour with the pistol, and another hour with the sword; and his wife constantly scolded him because he could never succeed in hitting the target or in learning to parry a thrust.

Poor Monsieur Plays would return home tired to death.

"My dear love," he would say to his wife, "I a.s.sure you that I prefer to learn whist; I understand it much better than I do fencing."

"Whether you understand it or not," the fair Herminie would reply, "you've got to fight with that little Tobie, who isn't likely to be very formidable. Remember, monsieur, that you are to challenge him, wherever you meet him!"

And Monsieur Plays would bend his head with an air of resignation; and when he was on the street, or driving, if he saw a man who resembled Tobie, he would hasten away in the opposite direction.

Meanwhile, two months had pa.s.sed since Sans-Cravate had found his sister, only to lose her again at once. During that time the messenger had called frequently at Monsieur Vermoncey's, to ask if he had heard from his son, and if he knew where he had taken his sister. But Albert had written only two letters to his father; they were very short, and did not mention the girl he had abducted. One was dated in Alsace, and the other in Switzerland; he simply said that he was travelling, and gave no address.

As time pa.s.sed, Sans-Cravate's hopes grew fainter and fainter; often, after questioning Monsieur Vermoncey, he would shake his head sadly, and mutter:

"This looks bad! I tell you, monsieur, I'm very much afraid Monsieur Albert don't intend to do what's right. I don't like this keeping my sister away from me and preventing her from writing--for if he didn't forbid her to do it, I'm sure she'd have let me know where she is before this. And then, his not making any attempt to get you to forgive him for what he's done! I'm only a poor devil, without any education, but it don't seem to me that all that looks like a purpose to keep his promises."

Monsieur Vermoncey strove to rea.s.sure him, saying:

"You can always rely on my word!"

And the messenger would return to his stand, reflecting thus:

"The father's an honorable man, that's sure; he'll never go back on what he says; but what good does it do me to have the father's word, if the son don't keep his?"

Since he had seen his sister, since he had conceived the hope that she would be received into the Vermoncey family, Sans-Cravate had entirely changed his ways: he no longer drank too much; he had ceased to frequent wine shops; he was neither quarrelsome nor noisy as before; lastly, he had ceased to consort with Jean Ficelle, and all that worthy's insistence was powerless to induce him to leave his place or neglect his work.

Once only he had met Paul, who was then convalescent, and was crawling painfully along, on Bastringuette's arm; for it was the middle of the day, when Elina could not be with her lover.

Sans-Cravate felt that he quivered all over, and that his hand trembled, when he saw his former comrade's pale, emaciated face. If Paul had been alone, it is probable that Sans-Cravate would have thrown his arms about him and begged him to forgive the injury he had done him; but the presence of Bastringuette reawakened all the pangs of jealousy in his heart, and he walked quickly away, cursing anew his former friend and his former mistress.

But, whether because he was still too weak to work, or because he preferred not to encounter the man who had nearly killed him, Paul did not return to his former stand.

The cold was sharp, the snow fell in large flakes, and the people on the streets and the boulevard walked quickly and did not often stop.

Sans-Cravate was in his place, seated on his _crochets_; on his head was a broad-brimmed woollen hat, which protected him from the snow; but, despite the severity of the weather, his neck was bare, as on the warmest day in summer.

"I say, well-named!" cried Jean Ficelle, as he drew near, blowing on his fingers; "do you propose to stay here just to let the snow fall on your nose? This is no weather for customers to take the trouble to come after us. Let's go and get under cover in a wine shop."

"No, I'm done with wine shops," replied Sans-Cravate, shortly.

"Oho! so it's all up with you, is it? You're not a man at all; you've forgotten how to laugh or drink or play cards. Good-day! you're lost to society."