"Then I went into an old solicitor's office. Ah! I was in clover there for some little time. He had a wife who was past her prime; she was very fond of walking and driving, and she chose me for her escort. The husband, who was thus relieved of that duty, was very well pleased to have me escort her everywhere; I think he would have made me his first clerk, if I would have agreed to take madame to walk all my life. But I got tired of having always on my arm a costume à la Pompadour and the face of a country magistrate. I ceased to be attentive to madame, monsieur took offence and discharged me. O tempora! O mores!
"Thereupon I renounced the legal profession; I felt in my heart the impulses of a noble independence, an intense love of liberty. So I began to do nothing—a superb profession, within everybody's reach; and a delightful one when it is supported by investments in the funds. Unluckily, my name is not inscribed on the books of the State, but only on those of my tailor, bootmaker, et cetera. I am an orphan; my parents left me very little, and that little could not last long, especially with me, who am neither miserly, nor economical, nor prudent, and who have no desire for money except to have the pleasure of spending it. My father, an estimable Breton, practised medicine; he ought to have made a fortune! Probably in his day there weren't enough colds, fevers, and bad air. He left me nothing but a most honorable name, which, for all my follies, I shall never suffer to be disgraced, because a man can be a reprobate and still be honest.
"When I had spent my modest inheritance, I began to philosophize; I was tempted to write, as Seneca did, on contempt for wealth. But Seneca had a fortune of forty millions when he wrote that; so that he was better acquainted with his subject than I am, without a sou. So, as one should try to talk of nothing except what one knows about, I concluded not to talk about wealth, of which I know nothing.
"Luckily, I still have an old aunt, in the wilds of Bretagne, who has never married. The dear woman has only a modest fortune, and yet she has never deserted her nephew. To be sure, I have written her some very affecting letters. Poor, dear soul! she thinks I am married! Faith! as I couldn't think of any other possible way of getting money from her, in my last letter I made myself out, at one stroke, a husband and father; yes, and the father of triplets! That was what brought the five-hundred-franc note that I have just lost at écarté. O cursed écarté! I swore that I wouldn't gamble any more, as I am in hard luck this month. But how could I resist? I went to little Delphine's, who, since she left the stage, receives the best people in Paris: artists, authors, journalists, English, Russian, and Tartar noblemen. Tartars, yes! indeed, I fancy that little man I played with was something of a Greek.[A] To pass eighteen times in succession is a little too much! And that other idiot, who made a point of offering me punch every time I lost! as if I could drink five hundred francs' worth of it! Ah! my poor old aunt! if you knew what had become of your money! The worst of it all is that she won't send me any more for a long time. I can't have the wife I have taken to my bosom, to touch my aunt's heart, lie in every month; I have said she was sick twice already; I have credited my triplets with all the diseases children have, and have given myself inflammation of the lungs and jaundice. But that sort of thing will be played out sooner or later. No, my poor aunt, no, I won't pester you any more. No, I don't propose that you shall deprive yourself any longer of all the little comforts of life, for your scamp of a nephew. I have abused your goodness of heart too much. I blush to think how often I have appealed to it; I feel in my heart a noble pride; and when I think of your last remittance of five hundred francs! gone in four games! Gad! it's horrible!"
[A] Greek, i.e., "sharper."
Dubourg began to walk a little more rapidly; he took his hands from his pockets, as if he were furious to find nothing in them; but in a moment he became calm again, resumed his former gait, and once more exclaimed:
"But what in the deuce am I going to do?"
At that moment, he passed one of those individuals who wander about the streets at night, with a bag on their back and a hooked stick in their hand, and halt in front of places which we avoid during the day.
"That's a last resort, to be sure," said Dubourg, glancing at the man with the lantern; "but I confess that I don't as yet feel courageous enough to employ it; and although a famous author has said: 'It is not the trade that honors the man, but the man should honor the trade,' I doubt whether I should be held in high esteem if I should take to that little hooked stick; even though I possessed with it the wisdom of Cato, the clemency of Titus, and the virtues of Marcus Aurelius.
"However, I have some talents of my own, and I am not reduced to that yet. I love the arts; ah! I adore them! I was born to be an artist. I don't know how to draw, I cannot play on any instrument, I do not write poetry with great facility; but, for all that, I love painting, music, and poetry. If I should go on the stage, I believe I should make a success of it. But to make one's début at thirty years—that's rather late in life. And then, the idea of the son of a doctor at Rennes going on the stage! But why not? Louis XIV did it; he acted before his court; and if I had been in Racine's place, I certainly would have written some splendid parts for him, instead of trying to turn aside his inclination. Our present-day authors wouldn't be so stupid; consequently they are rich, whereas in Racine's time they were not.