“But is the Marquis ill, sir?” the professor continued.
“My dear sir,” Jonathan replied, “Heaven only knows what is the matter with my master. You see, there are not a couple of houses like ours anywhere in Paris. Do you understand? Not two houses. Faith, that there are not. My Lord the Marquis had this hotel purchased for him; it formerly belonged to a duke and a peer of France; then he spent three hundred thousand francs over furnishing it. That’s a good deal, you know, three hundred thousand francs! But every room in the house is a perfect wonder. ‘Good,’ said I to myself when I saw this magnificence; ‘it is just like it used to be in the time of my lord, his late grandfather; and the young marquis is going to entertain all Paris and the Court!’ Nothing of the kind! My lord refused to see any one whatever. ‘Tis a funny life that he leads, M. Porriquet, you understand. An inconciliable life. He rises every day at the same time. I am the only person, you see, that may enter his room. I open all the shutters at seven o’clock, summer or winter. It is all arranged very oddly. As I come in I say to him:
“‘You must get up and dress, my Lord Marquis.’
“Then he rises and dresses himself. I have to give him his dressing-gown, and it is always after the same pattern, and of the same material. I am obliged to replace it when it can be used no longer, simply to save him the trouble of asking for a new one. A queer fancy! As a matter of fact, he has a thousand francs to spend every day, and he does as he pleases, the dear child. And besides, I am so fond of him that if he gave me a box on the ear on one side, I should hold out the other to him! The most difficult things he will tell me to do, and yet I do them, you know! He gives me a lot of trifles to attend to, that I am well set to work! He reads the newspapers, doesn’t he? Well, my instructions are to put them always in the same place, on the same table. I always go at the same hour and shave him myself; and don’t I tremble! The cook would forfeit the annuity of a thousand crowns that he is to come into after my lord’s death, if breakfast is not served inconciliably at ten o’clock precisely. The menus are drawn up for the whole year round, day after day. My Lord the Marquis has not a thing to wish for. He has strawberries whenever there are any, and he has the earliest mackerel to be had in Paris. The programme is printed every morning. He knows his dinner by rote. In the next place, he dresses himself at the same hour, in the same clothes, the same linen, that I always put on the same chair, you understand? I have to see that he always has the same cloth; and if it should happen that his coat came to grief (a mere supposition), I should have to replace it by another without saying a word about it to him. If it is fine, I go in and say to my master:
“‘You ought to go out, sir.’
“He says Yes, or No. If he has a notion that he will go out, he doesn’t wait for his horses; they are always ready harnessed; the coachman stops there inconciliably, whip in hand, just as you see him out there. In the evening, after dinner, my master goes one day to the Opera, the other to the Ital——no, he hasn’t yet gone to the Italiens, though, for I could not find a box for him until yesterday. Then he comes in at eleven o’clock precisely, to go to bed. At any time in the day when he has nothing to do, he reads—he is always reading, you see—it is a notion he has. My instructions are to read the Journal de la Librairie before he sees it, and to buy new books, so that he finds them on his chimney-piece on the very day that they are published. I have orders to go into his room every hour or so, to look after the fire and everything else, and to see that he wants nothing. He gave me a little book, sir, to learn off by heart, with all my duties written in it—a regular catechism! In summer I have to keep a cool and even temperature with blocks of ice and at all seasons to put fresh flowers all about. He is rich! He has a thousand francs to spend every day; he can indulge his fancies! And he hadn’t even necessaries for so long, poor child! He doesn’t annoy anybody; he is as good as gold; he never opens his mouth, for instance; the house and garden are absolutely silent. In short, my master has not a single wish left; everything comes in the twinkling of an eye, if he raises his hand, and instanter. Quite right, too. If servants are not looked after, everything falls into confusion. You would never believe the lengths he goes about things. His rooms are all—what do you call it?—er—er—en suite. Very well; just suppose, now, that he opens his room door or the door of his study; presto! all the other doors fly open of themselves by a patent contrivance; and then he can go from one end of the house to the other and not find a single door shut; which is all very nice and pleasant and convenient for us great folk! But, on my word, it cost us a lot of money! And, after all, M. Porriquet, he said to me at last:
“‘Jonathan, you will look after me as if I were a baby in long clothes,’ Yes, sir, ‘long clothes!’ those were his very words. ‘You will think of all my requirements for me.’ I am the master, so to speak, and he is the servant, you understand? The reason of it? Ah, my word, that is just what nobody on earth knows but himself and God Almighty. It is quite inconciliable!”
“He is writing a poem!” exclaimed the old professor.
“You think he is writing a poem, sir? It’s a very absorbing affair, then! But, you know, I don’t think he is. He often tells me that he wants to live like a vergetation; he wants to vergetate. Only yesterday he was looking at a tulip while he was dressing, and he said to me:
“‘There is my own life—I am vergetating, my poor Jonathan.’ Now, some of them insist that that is monomania. It is inconciliable!”