II. OLD HOUSE, OLD PEOPLE, OLD CUSTOMS
Weary of himself, Godefroid attempted one day to give a meaning to his life, after meeting a former comrade who had been the tortoise in the fable, while he in earlier days had been the hare. In one of those conversations which arise when schoolmates meet again in after years,—a conversation held as they were walking together in the sunshine on the boulevard des Italiens,—he was startled to learn the success of a man endowed apparently with less gifts, less means, less fortune than himself; but who had bent his will each morning to the purpose resolved upon the night before. The sick soul then determined to imitate that simple action.
“Social existence is like the soil,” his comrade had said to him; “it makes us a return in proportion to our efforts.”
Godefroid was in debt. As a first test, a first task, he resolved to live in some retired place, and pay his debts from his income. To a man accustomed to spend six thousand francs when he had but five, it was no small undertaking to bring himself to live on two thousand. Every morning he studied advertisements, hoping to find the offer of some asylum where his expenses could be fixed, where he might have the solitude a man wants when he makes a return upon himself, examines himself, and endeavors to give himself a vocation. The manners and customs of bourgeois boarding-houses shocked his delicacy, sanitariums seemed to him unhealthy, and he was about to fall back into the fatal irresolution of persons without will, when the following advertisement met his eye:—
“To Let. A small lodging for seventy francs a month; suitable for
an ecclesiastic. A quiet tenant desired. Board supplied; the rooms
can be furnished at a moderate cost if mutually acceptable.
“Inquire of M. Millet, grocer, rue Chanoinesse, near Notre-Dame,
where all further information can be obtained.”
Attracted by a certain kindliness concealed beneath these words, and the middle-class air which exhaled from them, Godefroid had, on the afternoon when we found him on the quay, called at four o’clock on the grocer, who told him that Madame de la Chanterie was then dining, and did not receive any one when at her meals. The lady, he said, was visible in the evening after seven o’clock, or in the morning between ten and twelve. While speaking, Monsieur Millet examined Godefroid, and made him submit to what magistrates call the “first degree of interrogation.”
“Was monsieur unmarried? Madame wished a person of regular habits; the gate was closed at eleven at the latest. Monsieur certainly seemed of an age to suit Madame de la Chanterie.”
“How old do you think me?” asked Godefroid.
“About forty!” replied the grocer.