Zut, and Other Parisians

by Guy Wetmore Carryl

Papa Labesse rose suddenly to his full height.

"God damn you!" he said. And this was no oath, but rather a prayer.

Toward the end of July Papa Labesse resumed his pilgrimages to the summit of the Butte. He had aged visibly in six weeks, and he walked no longer with the brisk and cheerful step which had bespoken his youthfulness of spirit, but shuffled his feet, and often stumbled over trifling obstacles. He looked neither to the right nor to the left, and if he heard the greetings of those along his way, for whom formerly he had always had a hearty word, he made no reply. It is doubtful whether, had he been suddenly asked, he could have told his exact whereabouts: it was rather instinct than absolute intention which sent him shuffling up to his old coign of vantage. His eyes took no note of his immediate surroundings, but looked far beyond, with an expression that was half question, half entreaty. It was only when he had come to the edge of the bluff that he seemed to awaken into something resembling the man he had been. Then, his lean, gnarled hands gripped the wattles with a kind of convulsive eagerness, and, for a little, the old blue spark gleamed under his lids, and his eyes swept the great city feverishly, as if they would pluck out her secret from her by mere force of will. He no longer dwelt upon the churches and the public buildings, but traced with his glance the line of the great boulevards, des Batignolles, de Clichy, and de Rochechouart, and their tributary streets; and often he remained at his post until nearly midnight, motionless, silent, watching, watching, watching, with his eyes fixed upon the distant red glare from the giant revolving wings of the brilliantly lighted Moulin Rouge.

What he saw, what he heard, during those long hours of vigil no one ever knew: what he thought he barely knew himself. The entire intensity of his failing strength was concentrated upon one endeavor. Hour after hour he sent a voice without sound out, over, and down into the labyrinth of streets beneath him, into the dance-halls, the wine-shops, the café-concerts, wooing, pleading, beseeching. It was as if, minute by minute, he wove a great net of tenderest entreaty and persuasion, fitting it cunningly into each nook and cranny of the city below, and then, at the end, with one mighty effort of his will, drew the whole fabric up and into his heart, hoping against hope that, mysteriously, some one pleading thought of his might have caught her and swept her back to his arms. It was a struggle, silent but to the death, between Papa Labesse and the great siren city, for the possession of a soul.

And, as if, indeed, that eager voice without words of his entreaty had, somehow, been able to reach and win her, Marcelle came back. It was at the hour just following sunset, the hour they had loved to pass together, and superbly still and clear. To the west, over the wide, green sweep of the Bois de Boulogne, a great multitude of little puffs of cloud lay piled up against a turquoise sky, and these were constantly changing from tint to opalescent tint, as shafts of crimson and saffron sunlight moved among them from below the horizon. Above, where the turquoise dulled to steel, the stars were already nicking the sky, one by one; and, one by one, the lights of the boulevard, red, white, and yellow, flashed into being in reply.

As it was the dinner hour, the summit of the Butte was deserted save for the figure of Papa Labesse, silhouetted against the sky, as Marcelle emerged from the rue St. Rustique, came slowly across the open space before the church, and stood at his side. She was very pale, with the transparent, leaden pallor which comes only at the end, and her face seemed little more than two great, stunned eyes. Her clothes, in the last stage of what had been tawdry finery, were unspeakably more slovenly than mere rags. It was but eight weeks since they had stood on the same spot together, but this so brief period had wrought in each the havoc of a decade.

For a time neither spoke. Papa Labesse had looked up briefly as she reached his side, and then, as she swayed and seemed about to fall, had put an arm about her and drawn her close to him. So they stood watching, while Paris winked and sparkled into the starry splendor of her summer night. Finally,—

"I knew thou wouldst come, my pigeon," said Papa Labesse. "For a time I was desolate, is it not so?—and sat alone in the shop below there, and thought of nothing. But then I remembered how that thou didst love this place, and so I have come each night to wait for thee, because I knew thou wouldst return. And now thou art here. It is well, my little white pigeon, it is very well."

A keener ear than his would have caught the unmistakable warning that underlay her voice when she replied. It lacked not only hope, but life itself. It was the voice of one long dead.

"I did not think to find thee here, Papa Labesse—it has been so long since then. I came to see it all once again—to hear the voice of the great city that sings of love. And then, when at last comes the night, I would throw myself down from here, even into the very heart of her, for I am hers, and she has made me like herself."