“Selfish little boy, to please you then—no.”
Jean gave a long sigh of relief. Where was his hatred now? His bitter antagonism? that feeling in his heart of remorseless hardness? It seemed impossible that they had ever existed and incredible that they should ever exist again; but even now they were only hidden, like the sharp teeth of rocks covered for the moment by the rush of the incoming tide.
Liane carried out a suitable arrangement, and Jean believed that she had obeyed him; it made him extraordinarily humble and tender with her; he could not do enough to show his gratitude; and Liane was not always easy to serve, she required so much and she had a most terrible temper. Jean set himself to please her with an almost feminine gentleness and tact. He did not ask from her refined sensibilities or quick perceptions. He called her to himself a great artist, and he made himself believe that this excused everything.
He was very young and he loved her, and the young cannot love without the divine fire. They must look for their vine to bring forth grapes, and when it brings forth wild grapes they shut their eyes.
They will believe in beauty though they must go blind to keep their vision; they would rather enter into the kingdom of heaven maimed than know it is not the kingdom of heaven.
Jean persisted in believing in Liane in spite of Liane, but sometimes she made it very hard for him.
“There is still an arrangement we must make,” she said to him one day. “I cannot have anyone going about with me who is dressed like a piano-tuner. You carry yourself well, it is true. You have the good little air which says: ‘I own myself,’ but that is not enough when you are with me. It is necessary that you show a great deal more importance, you must, in short, look as if you owned me! and for that, mon cher, you will require clothes. I cannot put a placard on your back—‘I beseech you, here is a man who is about to become a great musician; refrain from regarding his cravat!’ And I will not be seen with a nobody! In Paris it is necessary to have a note, a tone, to express one’s self in such a way that the world cannot readily overlook you.”
Jean looked dogged, he did not wish to say he was too poor. He had already been forced into this confession rather frequently by Liane, who never understood anything about money, except that you spent it—yours or any one else’s—like water, and that when it was finished you made yourself excessively agreeable or disagreeable (according to the requirements of the case) till you were given more. There is more than one way of paying for your fun, and since Jean’s pockets were empty, he had had to pay for it lately with his pride, and he had several times made a stand about the price. He did not like supping here and there and everywhere at enormous expense, for which Liane paid; he did not like the invariable use of the expensive motor, and Liane never walked a step and never used anything else. He did not like his position as the man who carried things, shared things, bought things, and for none of which his whole salary (he had just been started on a hundred francs a month) would have covered the tips for one busy night. Cravats and tie-pins he had hardly seen his way to escape, but he drew the line at a silk hat for the Opera, and a new suit, and took the first opportunity during a short afternoon’s shopping to say so.
Liane stared at him.
“Pourquoi, mon ami?” she said, in a voice of toneless gentleness, which Jean had learned to dread as the preliminary of a rising fury.