I.
A heavy load was lifted, the air seemed lighter, one could breathe freely. The uprising in Paris was but short-lived, the bloody skirmish had lasted two days and Louis Phillipe was once more safe on his throne, reinforced by a new cabinet. The citizen-king—le roi citoyen—once more made the people believe that he was the same Louis Phillipe who had been in the habit of carrying an umbrella like any plain citizen, with a modest round felt hat on his uncrowned head no different from one worn by the masses. Peace was again restored. The red flag was again replaced by the one of three colors; the shouts of “Long live the Republic” and “Down with Louis Phillipe” had once more been hushed; the vicinity of the Cloister St. Merry, where the zealous One Hundred Republicans had fought and fallen, was quiet and deserted. The French capital always lived from day to day and forgot the past. Barricades and booming cannon one day, gay laughter and resplendent parades the next.
The genial sun of early summer was in the sky and all Paris seemed to have turned out into the streets, into the public gardens, into the parks; God, feeling bored in his celestial abode, “opened the window of heaven and looked down on the Boulevards.” And the Boulevards were amusing enough. The deathly clash of a few days ago was forgotten. There was merriment in every face; smiling eyes beamed above the marble-topped tables along the sidewalks in front of the busy cafés; from side streets came the tremulous gurgling of hurdy-gurdies, the emotional tones of chanting beggars, singing the latest, La Parisienne. Suddenly a frantic, joyous shout rent the air; handkerchiefs waved, canes were brandished—the variegated colors of a crowd in motion. An old man in a phaeton passed. His white hair was covered with a brown wig; his kindly eyes sparkled with youth in spite of his seventy-four years; he raised his hat and bowed with military dignity and yet with the humility of the very great.
“Vive le général LaFayette!”
The appearance of the hero of two hemispheres on the Boulevards always had a soothing effect upon the masses. They felt that with this champion of liberty still among them the rights of the people were preserved.
Amidst the jovial pedestrians that thronged the Grand Boulevards Albert Zorn strolled pensively, his hands in his pockets, his dreamy, though keen, eyes, narrowed inquisitively, his head thrown back, a smile of triumph and joy on his smooth-shaven oval face. He was well dressed, in light colored coat and trousers and a waistcoat of many bright hues, yet his clothes hung on him as if he gave no care to his outward appearance. Though well-built, with a body of medium height and a head proudly set upon a solidly formed neck, he gave one the impression of shortness. It was his legs rather than his body that were short. He walked with the aimlessness of a student, of a dreamer who always seeks life in the street rather than in the drawingroom. There was a touch of melancholy in his eyes even when he smiled and a peculiar light shone from between his narrowed eyelids—a shaft of sunlight emerging from a crevice. At times he whistled as he walked and mumbled rhythmic words to himself. There was the gait of conscious freedom in his step, the freedom regained by a convict after long imprisonment. The gayety of the people about him filled him with secret joy, the saluting ejaculations were music in his ears. He was seeing history in the making and was alive to the events of the day.
He rambled wistfully, as if carried along by the human tide, and not infrequently was jostled by the people about him. He was tempted to get into people’s way and hear the exclamations of apology and see the sunny smiles on their faces. He loved the gleam of those velvety French eyes and the melody of their light-hearted laughter. Though of a bluntly frank nature himself he found the polite urbanity of the Parisians as refreshing as the wafting fragrance from a greenhouse. He was keenly conscious of the foreign atmosphere and fascinated by the people’s manners. Some one had just touched his arm and apologized courteously, and he lapsed into a revery of comparison between the people in his native land and the people here. In his native land people dug each other in the ribs without a suggestion of craving one’s pardon. Many cycles of thought began to revolve in his brain. One led to another. Then came straggling, disjointed fragments of thought—like loose threads—that became snarled and were formed into a knotted coil. . . .