Unconscious Comedians

“That’s it! – maximum and minimum,” said Gazonal.

“You’ve said it,” replied the corn-cutter, decisively.

“No more manufacturers?” asked Gazonal.

“The state will manufacture. We shall all be the usufructuaries of France; each will have his ration as on board ship; and all the world will work according to their capacity.”

“Ah!” said Gazonal, “and while awaiting the time when you can cut off the heads of aristocrats – ”

“I cut their nails,” said the radical republican, putting up his tools and finishing the jest himself.

Then he bowed very politely and went away.

“Can this be possible in 1845?” cried Gazonal.

“If there were time we could show you,” said his cousin, “all the personages of 1793, and you could talk with them. You have just seen Marat; well! we know Fouquier-Tinville, Collot d’Herbois, Robespierre, Chabot, Fouche, Barras; there is even a magnificent Madame Roland.”

“Well, the tragic is not lacking in your play,” said Gazonal.

“It is six o’clock. Before we take you to see Odry in ‘Les Saltimbauques’ to-night,” said Leon to Gazonal, “we must go and pay a visit to Madame Cadine, – an actress whom your committee-man Massol cultivates, and to whom you must therefore pay the most assiduous court.”

“And as it is all important that you conciliate that power, I am going to give you a few instructions,” said Bixiou. “Do you employ workwomen in your manufactory?”

“Of course I do,” replied Gazonal.

“That’s all I want to know,” resumed Bixiou. “You are not married, and you are a great – ”

“Yes!” cried Gazonal, “you’ve guessed my strong point, I’m a great lover of women.”

“Well, then! if you will execute the little manoeuvre which I am about to prescribe for you, you will taste, without spending a farthing, the sweets to be found in the good graces of an actress.”

When they reached the rue de la Victoire where the celebrated actress lived, Bixiou, who meditated a trick upon the distrustful provincial, had scarcely finished teaching him his role; but Gazonal was quick, as we shall see, to take a hint.

The three friends went up to the second floor of a rather handsome house, and found Madame Jenny Cadine just finishing dinner, for she played that night in an afterpiece at the Gymnase. Having presented Gazonal to this great power, Leon and Bixiou, in order to leave them alone together, made the excuse of looking at a piece of furniture in another room; but before leaving, Bixiou had whispered in the actress’s ear: “He is Leon’s cousin, a manufacturer, enormously rich; he wants to win a suit before the Council of State against his prefect, and he thinks it wise to fascinate you in order to get Massol on his side.”

All Paris knows the beauty of that young actress, and will therefore understand the stupefaction of the Southerner on seeing her. Though she had received him at first rather coldly, he became the object of her good graces before they had been many minutes alone together.

“How strange!” said Gazonal, looking round him disdainfully on the furniture of the salon, the door of which his accomplices had left half open, “that a woman like you should be allowed to live in such an ill-furnished apartment.”

“Ah, yes, indeed! but how can I help it? Massol is not rich; I am hoping he will be made a minister.”

“What a happy man!” cried Gazonal, heaving the sigh of a provincial.

“Good!” thought she. “I shall have new furniture, and get the better of Carabine.”

“Well, my dear!” said Leon, returning, “you’ll be sure to come to Carabine’s to-night, won’t you? – supper and lansquenet.”

“Will monsieur be there?” said Jenny Cadine, looking artlessly and graciously at Gazonal.

“Yes, madame,” replied the countryman, dazzled by such rapid success.

“But Massol will be there,” said Bixiou.

“Well, what of that?” returned Jenny. “Come, we must part, my treasures; I must go to the theatre.”

Gazonal gave his hand to the actress, and led her to the citadine which was waiting for her; as he did so he pressed hers with such ardor that Jenny Cadine exclaimed, shaking her fingers: “Take care! I haven’t any others.”

When the three friends got back into their own vehicle, Gazonal endeavoured to seize Bixiou round the waist, crying out: “She bites! You’re a fine rascal!”

“So women say,” replied Bixiou.

At half-past eleven o’clock, after the play, another citadine took the trio to the house of Mademoiselle Seraphine Sinet, better known under the name of Carabine, – one of those pseudonyms which famous lorettes take, or which are given to them; a name which, in this instance, may have referred to the pigeons she had killed.

Carabine, now become almost a necessity for the banker du Tillet, deputy of the Left, lived in a charming house in the rue Saint-Georges. In Paris there are many houses the destination of which never varies; and the one we now speak of had already seen seven careers of courtesans. A broker had brought there, about the year 1827, Suzanne du Val-Noble, afterwards Madame Gaillard. In that house the famous Esther caused the Baron de Nucingen to commit the only follies of his life. Florine, and subsequently, a person now called in jest “the late Madame Schontz,” had scintillated there in turn. Bored by his wife, du Tillet bought this modern little house, and there installed the celebrated Carabine, whose lively wit and cavalier manners and shameless brilliancy were a counterpoise to the dulness of domestic life, and the toils of finance and politics.

Whether du Tillet or Carabine were at home or not at home, supper was served, and splendidly served, for ten persons every day. Artists, men of letters, journalists, and the habitues of the house supped there when they pleased. After supper they gambled. More than one member of both Chambers came there to buy what Paris pays for by its weight in gold, – namely, the amusement of intercourse with anomalous untrammelled women, those meteors of the Parisian firmament who are so difficult to class. There wit reigns; for all can be said, and all is said. Carabine, a rival of the no less celebrated Malaga, had finally inherited the salon of Florine, now Madame Raoul Nathan, and of Madame Schontz, now wife of Chief-Justice du Ronceret.

As he entered, Gazonal made one remark only, but that remark was both legitimate and legitimist: “It is finer than the Tuileries!” The satins, velvets, brocades, the gold, the objects of art that swarmed there, so filled the eyes of the wary provincial that at first he did not see Madame Jenny Cadine, in a toilet intended to inspire respect, who, concealed behind Carabine, watched his entrance observingly, while conversing with others.

“My dear child,” said Leon to Carabine, “this is my cousin, a manufacturer, who descended upon me from the Pyrenees this morning. He knows nothing of Paris, and he wants Massol to help him in a suit he has before the Council of State. We have therefore taken the liberty to bring him – his name is Gazonal – to supper, entreating you to leave him his full senses.”

“That’s as monsieur pleases; wine is dear,” said Carabine, looking Gazonal over from head to foot, and thinking him in no way remarkable.

Gazonal, bewildered by the toilets, the lights, the gilding, the chatter of the various groups whom he thought to be discussing him, could only manage to stammer out the words: “Madame – madame – is – very good.”

“What do you manufacture?” said the mistress of the house, laughing.

“Say laces and offer her some guipure,” whispered Bixiou in Gazonal’s ear.

“La-ces,” said Gazonal, perceiving that he would have to pay for his supper. “It will give me the greatest pleasure to offer you a dress – a scarf – a mantilla of my make.”

“Ah, three things! Well, you are nicer than you look to be,” returned Carabine.

“Paris has caught me!” thought Gazonal, now perceiving Jenny Cadine, and going up to her.

“And I,” said the actress, “what am I to have?”

“All I possess,” replied Gazonal, thinking that to offer all was to give nothing.

Massol, Claude Vignon, du Tillet, Maxime de Trailles, Nucingen, du Bruel, Malaga, Monsieur and Madame Gaillard, Vauvinet, and a crowd of other personages now entered.

After a conversation with the manufacturer on the subject of his suit, Massol, without making any promises, told him that the report was not yet written, and that citizens could always rely on the knowledge and the independence of the Council of State. Receiving that cold and dignified response, Gazonal, in despair, thought it necessary to set about seducing the charming Jenny, with whom he was by this time in love. Leon de Lora and Bixiou left their victim in the hands of that most roguish and frolicsome member of the anomalous society, – for Jenny Cadine is the sole rival in that respect of the famous Dejazet.

At the supper-table, where Gazonal was fascinated by a silver service made by the modern Benvenuto Cellini, Froment-Meurice, the contents of which were worthy of the container, his mischievous friends were careful to sit at some distance from him; but they followed with cautious eye the manoeuvres of the clever actress, who, being attracted by the insidious hope of getting her furniture renewed, was playing her cards to take the provincial home with her. No sheep upon the day of the Fete-Dieu ever more meekly allowed his little Saint John to lead him along than Gazonal as he followed his siren.

Three days later, Leon and Bixiou, who had not seen Gazonal since that evening, went to his lodgings about two in the afternoon.

“Well, cousin,” said Leon, “the Council of State has decided in favour of your suit.”