When I spent an afternoon at Norwood with M. Zola we generally returned to the hotel about half-past four for a cup of tea. And on the way back (particularly during the last months) I frequently purchased postage stamps for him at the chief post-office. He might, of course, have bought them himself, and as a matter of fact he did at times do so. But he was aware, I think, that he was regarded with some suspicion by the young lady clerks under the control of the Duke of Norfolk.
At certain periods, Christmas time and the New Year, for instance, M. Zola's correspondence became extensive, and on the first occasion when he entered the Upper Norwood post-office and asked for fifty 2 1_2 d. stamps he was looked at with surprise. When, a couple of days later, he applied for another fifty, the young ladies eyed him as if he were a genuine curiosity. A hundred 2 1_2 d. stamps in four days! What could he do with them? Nobody could tell. When, shortly afterwards, he returned for another supply of the same kind, the Norwood post-office was convulsed. And I doubt if even now some of the young ladies have quite got over that brief but extraordinary run on the so-called 'foreign stamp.'
I hope they do not imagine that M. Zola was hungry, and bought those stamps to eat.
XIII
WINTER DAYS
The winter was hardly a cold one, but it proved very tempestuous, and Upper Norwood, standing high as it does, felt the full force of the gales. Christmas found M. Zola alone; still, this did not particularly affect him, as Christmas, save as a religious observance, is but little kept up in France, where festivity and holiday-making are reserved for the New Year. In M. Zola's rooms the only token of the season was a huge branch of mistletoe hanging over the chimney-piece. This he had bought himself, after I had told him of the privileges attached to mistletoe in England. There were, however, no young ladies to kiss, and, if I remember rightly, Mme. Zola, who had been absent in Paris, did not return to Norwood until a day or two before the New Year.
While her husband formed a fairly favourable opinion of England, its customs and its climate, Mme. Zola, I fear, was scarcely pleased with this country. At all events, she finally left it vowing that she would never return. But then for three or four weeks bronchitis and kindred ailments had kept her absolutely imprisoned in her room—her illness lasting the longer, perhaps, because she was unwilling to place herself in the hands of any medical man.
The New Year was but a day or two old, when one of the London morning newspapers announced with a great show of authority that an application for the extradition of M. Zola was imminent. Somebody, moreover, informed the same journal that he had recognised and interviewed M. Zola an evening or two previously, to which statement was appended a brief account of some of M. Zola's views. All this amazed me the more as on the very day mentioned in the newspaper I had been with the master till nine P.M. and I could hardly believe than anybody had interviewed him after that hour. Moreover, my wife had since seen him, and he had said nothing to her of any visit or interview. Nevertheless, as other papers proceeded to copy the statements to which I have referred, I thought it well to communicate with our exile on the subject.
Through the carelessness of one of M. Zola's friends, Wareham's name and address had lately been given to an English journalist usually resident in Paris, and this journalist had then come to London to try to discover the master's whereabouts. It was therefore possible that there might be some truth in the story. But M. Zola promptly wired to me that such was not the case, and followed up his telegram with a note in which he said:
'My dear confrere and friend,—I have just telegraphed to you that the whole story of a journalist having interviewed me is purely and simply a falsehood. I have seen nobody. Again, there can be no question of extradition in my case; all that could be done would be to serve me with the judgment of the Assize Court. Those people don't even know what they write about.