Bombiste leaned over and placed his face beside hers.
"Is it not enough?" he said in his softest voice. "Voyons bien! What is she to me, this Marcelle? Fichtre! I planted her last week, thou knowest. B'en, quoi? Thou knowest the blue gown? It is that which sweeps the Boul' Roch' at present! But that is not for long. Perhaps the Morgue—more likely St. Lazare. Art thou not content?" And he pressed his cheek to the woman's and moved his head up and down slowly, caressing her.
Papa Labesse rose slowly to his feet, and stretched his lean arms to their full length. The sun winked for the fraction of a second on the downward swirling scythe, and then all was still, save for the dull thud, thudding of two round objects rolling down the uneven slope of sod. In a moment even this sound ceased.
Papa Labesse revolved slowly upon his heels, pausing as his blue eyes, wide and vacant, fell upon the distant walls of Sacré-Cœur, swimming, cream-white and high in air, between him and the sun. Then he pitched softly forward upon the grass.
In the Absence of Monsieur
MONSIEUR ARMAND MICHEL—seated before his newly installed Titian—was in the act of saying to himself that if its acquisition could not, with entire accuracy, be viewed as an unqualified bargain, it had been, at least, an indisputable stroke of diplomacy, when his complacent meditation was interrupted by the entrance of Arsène. It was the first time that Monsieur Michel had seen his new servant in his official capacity, and he was not ill-pleased. Arsène was in flawless evening dress, in marked contrast to the objectionably flamboyant costume in which, on the preceding evening, he had made application for the position of valet-maître d'hôtel, left vacant by the fall from grace of Monsieur Michel's former factotum. That costume had come near to being his undoing. The fastidious Armand had regarded with an offended eye the brilliant green cravat, the unspeakable checked suit, and the painfully pointed chrome-yellow shoes in which the applicant for his approval was arrayed, and more than once, in the course of conversation, was on the point of putting a peremptory end to the negotiations by a crushing comment on would-be servants who dressed like café chantant comedians. But the reference had outweighed the costume. Monsieur Michel did not remember ever to have read more unqualified commendation. Arsène Sigard had been for two years in the service of the Comte de Chambour, whose square pink marble hôtel on the avenue de Malakoff is accounted, in this degenerate age, one of the sights of Paris; and this of itself, was more than a little. The Comte did not keep his eyes in his pockets, by any manner of means, when it came to the affairs of his household, and apparently there was nothing too good for him to say about Arsène. Here, on pale blue note-paper, and surmounted by the de Chambour crest, it was set forth that the bearer was sober, honest, clean, willing, capable, quiet, intelligent, and respectful. And discreet. When the Comte de Chambour gave his testimony on this last point it meant that you were getting the opinion of an expert. Monsieur Michel refolded the reference, tapped it three times upon the palm of his left hand, and engaged the bearer without further ado.
Now, as Arsène went quietly about the salon, drawing the curtains and clearing away the card table, which remained as mute witness to Monsieur Michel's ruling passion, he was the beau idéal of a gentleman's manservant,—unobtrusive in manner and movement, clean-shaven and clear-eyed, adapting himself without need of instruction to the details of his new surroundings. A less complacent person than Armand might have been aware that, while he was taking stock of Arsène, Arsène was taking stock, with equal particularity, of him. And there was an unpleasant slyness in his black eyes, a something akin to alertness in his thin nostrils, which moved like those of a rabbit, and seemed to accomplish more than their normal share of conveying to their owner's intelligence an impression of exterior things. Also, had Monsieur Michel but observed it, his new servant walked just a trifle too softly, and his hands were just a trifle too white and slender. Moreover, he had a habit of smiling to himself when his back was turned, which is an undesirable thing in anybody, and approaches the ominous in a valet-maître d'hôtel. But Monsieur Michel was far too much of an aristocrat to have any doubt of his power to overawe and impress his inferiors, or to see in the newcomer's excessive inconspicuity anything more than a commendable recognition of monsieur's commanding presence. So, when Arsène completed his work and had shut the door noiselessly behind him, his master rubbed his hands and said "Ter-rès bien!" in a low voice, this being his superlative expression of satisfaction. Had his glance been able to penetrate his salon door, it would have met, in the antichambre, with the astounding spectacle of his new servant in the act of tossing monsieur's silk hat into the air, and catching it, with extreme dexterity, on the bridge of his nose. Unfortunately, the other side of the door is something which, like the future and the bank-accounts of our debtors, it is not given us to see. So Monsieur Michel repeated his "Ter-rès bien!" and fell again to contemplating his Titian.
Yes, undoubtedly, it had been a great stroke of diplomacy. The young Marchese degli Abbraccioli was not conspicuous for his command of ready money, but his father had left him the finest private collection of paintings in Rome, and this, in consequence of chronic financial stress, was gradually passing from the walls of his palazzo in the via Cavour into the possession of an appreciative but none too extravagant government. It had been an inspiration, this proposal of Monsieur Michel's to settle his claim upon the Marchese for his overwhelming losses at baccarat by taking over one of the two Titians which flanked the chimney-piece in his study. The young Italian had assented eagerly, and had supplemented his acquiescence with a proposal to dispose of the pendant for somewhat more material remuneration than canceled reconnaissances. But Armand Michel had undertaken it before, this delicate task of getting objets d'art over the Italian frontier—yes, and been caught in the act, too, and forced to disgorge. For the moment, it was enough to charge himself with one picture, on the given conditions, without risking hard cash in the experiment. Later—well, later, one would see. And so, a rivederla, mio caro marchese.