At the end of these three days I returned, but I did not dare to go straight to the house. I went to find my good friend Madame Darcourt, and I begged her to announce to my mother the return of her prodigal son, and to smooth the way for my re-entry under the maternal roof.
Alas! the more prodigal the children, the warmer their reception! When the original prodigal son returned home to his father after three years' absence, they killed a calf; if he had not returned until after an absence of six years, they would have killed an ox.
My mother hugged me to her and called me a bad boy. She promised me that there should be no more talk between us of my going to the Seminary, delighted to think that I should not leave her. She reserved all her wrath for Boudoux, and, the first time she saw him, poor as we were, she gave him five francs.
Just think what a trivial circumstance decided the course of my life. If the grocer had had the inkstand I wanted that morning, I should not have returned to his shop in the evening; I should not have met Cécile there; she would not have made that joke which exasperated me; I should not have placed myself under Boudoux's care; and the next day I should have gone to Soissons and entered the Seminary. When at the Seminary my latent inclinations for a religious life would have developed, and I might have become a great preacher instead of what I am—namely, a poor poet. I wonder whether that would have been better or worse?
What God does is well done. This was not the only danger I escaped; we shall see later how I nearly became something much worse than a Seminarist or a priest.
We shall see that I just missed being a tax-gatherer!
[CHAPTER VI]
The Abbé Grégoire's College—The reception I got there—The fountains play to celebrate my arrival—The conspiracy against me—Bligny challenges me to single combat—I win.