I appreciated the turn of events which was to enable me to witness one of these magnificent German ceremonies, even more when, about eleven o'clock, a note came up from Major von Kessel. The Prince's tutor informed me that his pupil was to accompany the Grand Duke at the preliminary review of the garrison in the afternoon. He therefore requested me to be good enough to postpone my lesson for a couple of days.
At lunch, Doctor Cyrus Beck, more hoffmannesque than ever, came down late in a state of great excitement. I wanted to get some further information out of him.
"Here's a disgraceful thing," he burst out, enraged. "Have you read this libelous stuff, sir?"
He held out La Peau de Chagrin.
"Libelous stuff?" I said in amazement.
"Yes, silly, libelous nonsense. It takes a frivolous Frenchman to treat certain subjects with such levity. It is science itself that is ridiculed here, sir. Just consider. You spend your life in the study of two or three questions, break retorts, bum your face over crucibles, run innumerable risks of being blown up and your laboratory with you—and all that for a tomfool novelist to come along, and, in a few contemptuous words, which he takes for eternal verities, tell you your business and make you a public laughing-stock."
"I don't know what particular passage of La Peau de Chagrin is responsible for your recriminations," I said, "and I'm afraid, in any case, I'm not competent to defend Balzac on this point. You should know, however, that, generally speaking, he was extremely accurate. The historical parts of his work are an important authority. I once heard a good commercial lawyer say that his descriptions of César Birotteau's bankruptcy and the sale of the Roguin property are masterpieces from the legal point of view. Besides ..."
"Sir," he broke in with rising anger, "neither Law nor History has ever claimed to be an exact science. A superficial intelligence like your Balzac's can easily excel in them. But science, sir ..."
"My dear Herr Beck," I said, a little nettled, "if La Peau de Chagrin can produce such an effect upon you, I wonder what you'll say when you've read La Recherche de l'Absolu? It refers to a certain Balthazar Claës, who, like you studies high matters and with the same wealth of experience as yourself. It is possible that you might discover many valuable suggestions there."
He was not quite certain whether to take me seriously or not; but prudently wrote the title of the book on his cuff. Then his lips went to his spoon, which, in the German fashion, never left the surface of his soup.