My words seemed to have taken away every particle of color there was in him. His eyes contracted until they resembled those of a wild animal, and for a moment I thought he was going to spring at my throat. His voice—when finally he regained it—sounded like that of another person.
"M. Granger," said he, "a man visiting the Jardin des Plantes once undertook to stroke a leopard. Strange as it may appear, the animal was more pleased with petting than the inquiring mind imagined. The instant our naturalist attempted to desist, the creature raised his paw to strike. There monsieur stood, for a whole night, gazing into his glaring eyes and smoothing his soft neck. Can you imagine his feelings?"
With a bow that would have graced the Duc de Beaumont, he left. I heard him hastily packing his modest wardrobe; and in fifteen minutes a tilbury had whirled him away—whither, Heaven only knows.
Leaf the Third.
I do not think his own mother would call him handsome; he is certainly not young, nor particularly brilliant; and yet there is a fascination about the proprietor of this rambling old house that gave me an unaccountable desire to become his tenant. He is a wine-merchant, and occupies, as his counting-room, the entire second floor. The place is desolate-looking and dusty, and the furniture old with service; but, I am told, no man in Paris controls more of the grand vintages than M. Pontalba. With a Frenchman, the legality of a transaction depends on its being negotiated in a café; and it was in one of these I first saw him. He was seated at a table near me, absorbed with the contents of a box of baby-clothes, while a rather pretty and exceedingly voluble modiste harangued him on their beauty. The tenderness of his expression struck me. He took out the articles one by one, examining each with the interest of a woman. He ran his fingers through the tiny sleeves, and smoothed out the ruffles and lace, with a care that was almost loving. Diminutive cambric shirts, snowy dresses, and silky flannels,—all in their turn were inspected and replaced with a sigh of satisfaction.
An ardent young friend and I had been discussing the merits of Comte's philosophy; but so attracted were we by the singular trait that both stopped involuntarily, and watched him, until the woman was paid and a messenger carried the fairy wardrobe away.
My friend was an enthusiastic metaphysician; and, resuming the subject with a zest, was soon plunged into the phenomena of thought, the action of the brain, and the vitality of the blood that sustained it. As all conversant with the subject can readily believe, not many minutes elapsed before his artful sophistries proved the non-existence of heaven, hell, and even God himself.
M. Pontalba turned suddenly, and, drawing his chair close beside us, with an apology for the seeming intrusion, addressed the incipient skeptic:
"Behind the iron bars of that dreariest of studies, a prison, a little weed once received the concentrated thought of a savant. The covering of its stem, the first tender leaves, the development of the bud, the expansion of the flower—each bewildering in its consummate propriety—unfolded, in their turn, a system of laws in simplicity transcendent. By the aid of a microscope, a 'gillyflower' was seen protecting a chrysalis. Warm leaves cherished it, dainty juices aided its digestion, wholesome offshoots nourished it to maturity. Eking out a scant existence between two granite flags, this insignificant waif reared a caterpillar. What man are you, who can say there is no God?"
There was a pathos in his voice, and a tone of simple fervor, which gave that quiet old man the air of a priest.