The Petite Duchesse was
being rehearsed at the Varietés. The first
act had just been carefully gone through, and the
second was about to begin. Seated in old armchairs
in front of the stage, Fauchery and Bordenave were
discussing various points while the prompter, Father
Cossard, a little humpbacked man perched on a straw-bottomed
chair, was turning over the pages of the manuscript,
a pencil between his lips.
“Well, what are they waiting
for?” cried Bordenave on a sudden, tapping the
floor savagely with his heavy cane. “Barillot,
why don’t they begin?”
“It’s Monsieur Bosc that
has disappeared,” replied Barillot, who was
acting as second stage manager.’
Then there arose a tempest, and everybody
shouted for Bosc while Bordenave swore.
“Always the same thing, by God!
It’s all very well ringing for ’em:
they’re always where they’ve no business
to be. And then they grumble when they’re
kept till after four o’clock.”
But Bosc just then came in with supreme tranquillity.
“Eh? What? What do
they want me for? Oh, it’s my turn!
You ought to have said so. All right! Simonne
gives the cue: ‘Here are the guests,’
and I come in. Which way must I come in?”
“Through the door, of course,”
cried Fauchery in great exasperation.
“Yes, but where is the door?”
At this Bordenave fell upon Barillot
and once more set to work swearing and hammering the
boards with his cane.
“By God! I said a chair
was to be put there to stand for the door, and every
day we have to get it done again. Barillot!
Where’s Barillot? Another of ’em!
Why, they’re all going!”
Nevertheless, Barillot came and planted
the chair down in person, mutely weathering the storm
as he did so. And the rehearsal began again.
Simonne, in her hat and furs, began moving about like
a maidservant busy arranging furniture. She paused
to say:
“I’m not warm, you know, so I keep my
hands in my muff.”
Then changing her voice, she greeted Bosc with a little
cry:
“La, it’s Monsieur
lé Comte. You’re the first to come,
Monsieur lé Comte, and Madame will be delighted.”
Bosc had muddy trousers and a huge
yellow overcoat, round the collar of which a tremendous
comforter was wound. On his head he wore an old
hat, and he kept his hands in his pockets. He
did not act but dragged himself along, remarking in
a hollow voice:
“Don’t disturb your mistress,
Isabelle; I want to take her by surprise.”
The rehearsal took its course.
Bordenave knitted his brows. He had slipped down
low in his armchair and was listening with an air of
fatigue. Fauchery was nervous and kept shifting
about in his seat. Every few minutes he itched
with the desire to interrupt, but he restrained himself.
He heard a whispering in the dark and empty house behind
him.
“Is she there?” he asked, leaning over
toward Bordenave.
The latter nodded affirmatively.
Before accepting the part of Geraldine, which he was
offering her, Nana had been anxious to see the piece,
for she hesitated to play a courtesan’s part
a second time. She, in fact, aspired to an honest
woman’s part. Accordingly she was hiding
in the shadows of a corner box in company with Labordette,
who was managing matters for her with Bordenave.
Fauchery glanced in her direction and then once more
set himself to follow the rehearsal.
Only the front of the stage was lit
up. A flaring gas burner on a support, which
was fed by a pipe from the footlights, burned in front
of a reflector and cast its full brightness over the
immediate foreground. It looked like a big yellow
eye glaring through the surrounding semiobscurity,
where it flamed in a doubtful, melancholy way.
Cossard was holding up his manuscript against the
slender stem of this arrangement. He wanted to
see more clearly, and in the flood of light his hump
was sharply outlined. As to Bordenave and Fauchery,
they were already drowned in shadow. It was only
in the heart of this enormous structure, on a few
square yards of stage, that a faint glow suggested
the light cast by some lantern nailed up in a railway
station. It made the actors look like eccentric
phantoms and set their shadows dancing after them.
The remainder of the stage was full of mist and suggested
a house in process of being pulled down, a church
nave in utter ruin. It was littered with ladders,
with set pieces and with scenery, of which the faded
painting suggested heaped-up rubbish. Hanging
high in air, the scenes had the appearance of great
ragged clouts suspended from the rafters of some vast
old-clothes shop, while above these again a ray of
bright sunlight fell from a window and clove the shadow
round the flies with a bar of gold.
Meanwhile actors were chatting at
the back of the stage while awaiting their cues.
Little by little they had raised their voices.
“Confound it, will you be silent?”
howled Bordenave, raging up and down in his chair.
“I can’t hear a word. Go outside if
you want to talk; we are at work. Barillot,
if there’s any more talking I clap on fines all
round!”
They were silent for a second or two.
They were sitting in a little group on a bench and
some rustic chairs in the corner of a scenic garden,
which was standing ready to be put in position as it
would be used in the opening act the same evening.
In the middle of this group Fontan and Prulliere were
listening to Rose Mignon, to whom the manager of the
Folies-Dramatique Theatre had been making
magnificent offers. But a voice was heard shouting:
“The duchess! Saint-Firmin!
The duchess and Saint-Firmin are wanted!”
Only when the call was repeated did
Prulliere remember that he was Saint-Firmin!
Rose, who was playing the Duchess Helene, was already
waiting to go on with him while old Bosc slowly returned
to his seat, dragging one foot after the other over
the sonorous and deserted boards. Clarisse offered
him a place on the bench beside her.
“What’s he bawling like
that for?” she said in allusion to Bordenave.
“Things will be getting rosy soon! A piece
can’t be put on nowadays without its getting
on his nerves.”
Bosc shrugged his shoulders; he was
above such storms. Fontan whispered:
“He’s afraid of a fiasco.
The piece strikes me as idiotic.”
Then he turned to Clarisse and again
referred to what Rose had been telling them:
“D’you believe in the
offers of the Folies people, eh? Three hundred
francs an evening for a hundred nights! Why not
a country house into the bargain? If his wife
were to be given three hundred francs Mignon would
chuck my friend Bordenave and do it jolly sharp too!”
Clarisse was a believer in the three
hundred francs. That man Fontan was always picking
holes in his friends’ successes! Just then
Simonne interrupted her. She was shivering with
cold. Indeed, they were all buttoned up to the
ears and had comforters on, and they looked up at the
ray of sunlight which shone brightly above them but
did not penetrate the cold gloom of the theater.
In the streets outside there was a frost under a November
sky.
“And there’s no fire in
the greenroom!” said Simonne. “It’s
disgusting; he is just becoming a skinflint!
I want to be off; I don’t want to get seedy.”
“Silence, I say!” Bordenave once more
thundered.
Then for a minute or so a confused
murmur alone was audible as the actors went on repeating
their parts. There was scarcely any appropriate
action, and they spoke in even tones so as not to tire
themselves. Nevertheless, when they did emphasize
a particular shade of meaning they cast a glance at
the house, which lay before them like a yawning gulf.
It was suffused with vague, ambient shadow, which resembled
the fine dust floating pent in some high, windowless
loft. The deserted house, whose sole illumination
was the twilight radiance of the stage, seemed to
slumber in melancholy and mysterious effacement.
Near the ceiling dense night smothered the frescoes,
while from the several tiers of stage boxes on either
hand huge widths of gray canvas stretched down to
protect the neighboring hangings. In fact, there
was no end to these coverings; bands of canvas had
been thrown over the velvet-covered ledges in front
of the various galleries which they shrouded thickly.
Their pale hue stained the surrounding shadows, and
of the general decorations of the house only the dark
recesses of the boxes were distinguishable. These
served to outline the framework of the several stories,
where the seats were so many stains of red velvet turned
black. The chandelier had been let down as far
as it would go, and it so filled the region of the
stalls with its pendants as to suggest a flitting and
to set one thinking that the public had started on
a journey from which they would never return.
Just about then Rose, as the little
duchess who has been misled into the society of a
courtesan, came to the footlights, lifted up her hands
and pouted adorably at the dark and empty theater,
which was as sad as a house of mourning.
“Good heavens, what queer people!”
she said, emphasizing the phrase and confident that
it would have its effect.
Far back in the corner box in which
she was hiding Nana sat enveloped in a great shawl.
She was listening to the play and devouring Rose with
her eyes. Turning toward Labordette, she asked
him in a low tone:
“You are sure he’ll come?”
“Quite sure. Without doubt
he’ll come with Mignon, so as to have an excuse
for coming. As soon as he makes his appearance
you’ll go up into Mathilde’s dressing
room, and I’ll bring him to you there.”
They were talking of Count Muffat.
Labordette had arranged this interview with him on
neutral ground. He had had a serious talk with
Bordenave, whose affairs had been gravely damaged by
two successive failures. Accordingly Bordenave
had hastened to lend him his theater and to offer
Nana a part, for he was anxious to win the count’s
favor and hoped to be able to borrow from him.
“And this part of Geraldine,
what d’you thing of it?” continued Labordette.
But Nana sat motionless and vouchsafed
no reply. After the first act, in which the author
showed how the Duc de Beaurivage played his
wife false with the blonde Geraldine, a comic-opera
celebrity, the second act witnessed the Duchess Helene’s
arrival at the house of the actress on the occasion
of a masked ball being given by the latter. The
duchess has come to find out by what magical process
ladies of that sort conquer and retain their husbands’
affections. A cousin, the handsome Oscar de Saint-Firmin,
introduces her and hopes to be able to debauch her.
And her first lesson causes her great surprise, for
she hears Geraldine swearing like a hodman at the
duke, who suffers with most ecstatic submissiveness.
The episode causes her to cry out, “Dear me,
if that’s the way one ought to talk to the men!”
Geraldine had scarce any other scene in the act save
this one. As to the duchess, she is very soon
punished for her curiosity, for an old buck, the Baron
de Tardiveau, takes her for a courtesan and becomes
very gallant, while on her other side Beaurivage sits
on a lounging chair and makes his peace with Geraldine
by dint of kisses and caresses. As this last lady’s
part had not yet been assigned to anyone, Father Cossard
had got up to read it, and he was now figuring away
in Bosc’s arms and emphasizing it despite himself.
At this point, while the rehearsal was dragging monotonously
on, Fauchery suddenly jumped from his chair. He
had restrained himself up to that moment, but now
his nerves got the better of him.
“That’s not it!” he cried.
The actors paused awkwardly enough
while Fontan sneered and asked in his most contemptuous
voice:
“Eh? What’s not it? Who’s
not doing it right?”
“Nobody is! You’re
quite wrong, quite wrong!” continued Fauchery,
and, gesticulating wildly, he came striding over the
stage and began himself to act the scene.
“Now look here, you Fontan,
do please comprehend the way Tardiveau gets packed
off. You must lean forward like this in order
to catch hold of the duchess. And then you, Rose,
must change your position like that but not too soon only
when you hear the kiss.”
He broke off and in the heat of explanation
shouted to Cossard:
“Geraldine, give the kiss!
Loudly, so that it may be heard!”
Father Cossard turned toward Bosc
and smacked his lips vigorously.
“Good! That’s the
kiss,” said Fauchery triumphantly. “Once
more; let’s have it once more. Now you
see, Rose, I’ve had time to move, and then I
give a little cry so: ‘Oh, she’s
given him a kiss.’ But before I do that,
Tardiveau must go up the stage. D’you hear,
Fontan? You go up. Come, let’s try
it again, all together.”
The actors continued the scene again,
but Fontan played his part with such an ill grace
that they made no sort of progress. Twice Fauchery
had to repeat his explanation, each time acting it
out with more warmth than before. The actors
listened to him with melancholy faces, gazed momentarily
at one another, as though he had asked them to walk
on their heads, and then awkwardly essayed the passage,
only to pull up short directly afterward, looking
as stiff as puppets whose strings have just been snapped.
“No, it beats me; I can’t
understand it,” said Fontan at length, speaking
in the insolent manner peculiar to him.
Bordenave had never once opened his
lips. He had slipped quite down in his armchair,
so that only the top of his hat was now visible in
the doubtful flicker of the gaslight on the stand.
His cane had fallen from his grasp and lay slantwise
across his waistcoat. Indeed, he seemed to be
asleep. But suddenly he sat bolt upright.
“It’s idiotic, my boy,” he announced
quietly to Fauchery.
“What d’you mean, idiotic?”
cried the author, growing very pale. “It’s
you that are the idiot, my dear boy!”
Bordenave began to get angry at once.
He repeated the word “idiotic” and, seeking
a more forcible expression, hit upon “imbecile”
and “damned foolish.” The public
would hiss, and the act would never be finished!
And when Fauchery, without, indeed, being very deeply
wounded by these big phrases, which always recurred
when a new piece was being put on, grew savage and
called the other a brute, Bordenave went beyond all
bounds, brandished his cane in the air, snorted like
a bull and shouted:
“Good God! Why the hell
can’t you shut up? We’ve lost a quarter
of an hour over this folly. Yes, folly!
There’s no sense in it. And it’s so
simple, after all’s said and done! You,
Fontan, mustn’t move. You, Rose, must make
your little movement, just that, no more; d’ye
see? And then you come down. Now then, let’s
get it done this journey. Give the kiss, Cossard.”
Then ensued confusion. The scene
went no better than before. Bordenave, in his
turn, showed them how to act it about as gracefully
as an elephant might have done, while Fauchery sneered
and shrugged pityingly. After that Fontan put
his word in, and even Bosc made so bold as to give
advice. Rose, thoroughly tired out, had ended
by sitting down on the chair which indicated the door.
No one knew where they had got to, and by way of finish
to it all Simonne made a premature entry, under the
impression that her cue had been given her, and arrived
amid the confusion. This so enraged Bordenave
that he whirled his stick round in a terrific manner
and caught her a sounding thwack to the rearward.
At rehearsal he used frequently to drub his former
mistress. Simonne ran away, and this furious
outcry followed her:
“Take that, and, by God, if
I’m annoyed again I shut the whole shop up at
once!”
Fauchery pushed his hat down over
his forehead and pretended to be going to leave the
theater. But he stopped at the top of the stage
and came down again when he saw Bordenave perspiringly
resuming his seat. Then he, too, took up his
old position in the other armchair. For some
seconds they sat motionless side by side while oppressive
silence reigned in the shadowy house. The actors
waited for nearly two minutes. They were all
heavy with exhaustion and felt as though they had
performed an overwhelming task.
“Well, let’s go on,”
said Bordenave at last. He spoke in his usual
voice and was perfectly calm.
“Yes, let’s go on,”
Fauchery repeated. “We’ll arrange
the scene tomorrow.”
And with that they dragged on again
and rehearsed their parts with as much listlessness
and as fine an indifference as ever. During the
dispute between manager and author Fontan and the rest
had been taking things very comfortably on the rustic
bench and seats at the back of the stage, where they
had been chuckling, grumbling and saying fiercely
cutting things. But when Simonne came back, still
smarting from her blow and choking with sobs, they
grew melodramatic and declared that had they been
in her place they would have strangled the swine.
She began wiping her eyes and nodding approval.
It was all over between them, she said. She was
leaving him, especially as Steiner had offered to give
her a grand start in life only the day before.
Clarisse was much astonished at this, for the banker
was quite ruined, but Prulliere began laughing and
reminded them of the neat manner in which that confounded
Israelite had puffed himself alongside of Rose in
order to get his Landes saltworks afloat on ’change.
Just at that time he was airing a new project, namely,
a tunnel under the Bosporus. Simonne listened
with the greatest interest to this fresh piece of
information.
As to Clarisse, she had been raging
for a week past. Just fancy, that beast La Faloise,
whom she had succeeded in chucking into Gaga’s
venerable embrace, was coming into the fortune of a
very rich uncle! It was just her luck; she had
always been destined to make things cozy for other
people. Then, too, that pig Bordenave had once
more given her a mere scrap of a part, a paltry fifty
lines, just as if she could not have played Geraldine!
She was yearning for that rôle and hoping that Nana
would refuse it.
“Well, and what about me?”
said Prulliere with much bitterness. “I
haven’t got more than two hundred lines.
I wanted to give the part up. It’s too
bad to make me play that fellow Saint-Firmin; why,
it’s a regular failure! And then what a
style it’s written in, my dears! It’ll
fall dead flat, you may be sure.”
But just then Simonne, who had been
chatting with Father Barillot, came back breathless
and announced:
“By the by, talking of Nana, she’s in
the house.”
“Where, where?” asked Clarisse briskly,
getting up to look for her.
The news spread at once, and everyone
craned forward. The rehearsal was, as it were,
momentarily interrupted. But Bordenave emerged
from his quiescent condition, shouting:
“What’s up, eh? Finish
the act, I say. And be quiet out there; it’s
unbearable!”
Nana was still following the piece
from the corner box. Twice Labordette showed
an inclination to chat, but she grew impatient and
nudged him to make him keep silent. The second
act was drawing to a close, when two shadows loomed
at the back of the theater. They were creeping
softly down, avoiding all noise, and Nana recognized
Mignon and Count Muffat. They came forward and
silently shook hands with Bordenave.
“Ah, there they are,” she murmured with
a sigh of relief.
Rose Mignon delivered the last sentences
of the act. Thereupon Bordenave said that it
was necessary to go through the second again before
beginning the third. With that he left off attending
to the rehearsal and greeted the count with looks
of exaggerated politeness, while Fauchery pretended
to be entirely engrossed with his actors, who now
grouped themselves round him. Mignon stood whistling
carelessly, with his hands behind his back and his
eyes fixed complacently on his wife, who seemed rather
nervous.
“Well, shall we go upstairs?”
Labordette asked Nana. “I’ll install
you in the dressing room and come down again and fetch
him.”
Nana forthwith left the corner box.
She had to grope her way along the passage outside
the stalls, but Bordenave guessed where she was as
she passed along in the dark and caught her up at
the end of the corridor passing behind the scenes,
a narrow tunnel where the gas burned day and night.
Here, in order to bluff her into a bargain, he plunged
into a discussion of the courtesan’s part.
“What a part it is, eh?
What a wicked little part! It’s made for
you. Come and rehearse tomorrow.”
Nana was frigid. She wanted to
know what the third act was like.
“Oh, it’s superb, the
third act is! The duchess plays the courtesan
in her own house and this disgusts Beaurivage and
makes him amend his way. Then there’s an
awfully funny quid Pro quo, when Tardiveau
arrives and is under the impression that he’s
at an opera dancer’s house.”
“And what does Geraldine do in it all?”
interrupted Nana.
“Geraldine?” repeated
Bordenave in some embarrassment. “She has
a scene not a very long one, but a great
success. It’s made for you, I assure you!
Will you sign?”
She looked steadily at him and at length made answer:
“We’ll see about that all in good time.”
And she rejoined Labordette, who was
waiting for her on the stairs. Everybody in the
theater had recognized her, and there was now much
whispering, especially between Prulliere, who was scandalized
at her return, and Clarisse who was very desirous
of the part. As to Fontan, he looked coldly on,
pretending unconcern, for he did not think it becoming
to round on a woman he had loved. Deep down in
his heart, though, his old love had turned to hate,
and he nursed the fiercest rancor against her in return
for the constant devotion, the personal beauty, the
life in common, of which his perverse and monstrous
tastes had made him tire.
In the meantime, when Labordette reappeared
and went up to the count, Rose Mignon, whose suspicions
Nana’s presence had excited, understood it all
forthwith. Muffat was bothering her to death,
but she was beside herself at the thought of being
left like this. She broke the silence which she
usually maintained on such subjects in her husband’s
society and said bluntly:
“You see what’s going
on? My word, if she tries the Steiner trick on
again I’ll tear her eyes out!”
Tranquilly and haughtily Mignon shrugged
his shoulders, as became a man from whom nothing could
be hidden.
“Do be quiet,” he muttered.
“Do me the favor of being quiet, won’t
you?”
He knew what to rely on now.
He had drained his Muffat dry, and he knew that at
a sign from Nana he was ready to lie down and be a
carpet under her feet. There is no fighting against
passions such as that. Accordingly, as he knew
what men were, he thought of nothing but how to turn
the situation to the best possible account.
It would be necessary to wait on the
course of events. And he waited on them.
“Rose, it’s your turn!”
shouted Bordenave. “The second act’s
being begun again.”
“Off with you then,” continued
Mignon, “and let me arrange matters.”
Then he began bantering, despite all
his troubles, and was pleased to congratulate Fauchery
on his piece. A very strong piece! Only why
was his great lady so chaste? It wasn’t
natural! With that he sneered and asked who had
sat for the portrait of the Duke of Beaurivage, Geraldine’s
wornout roue. Fauchery smiled; he was far
from annoyed. But Bordenave glanced in Muffat’s
direction and looked vexed, and Mignon was struck
at this and became serious again.
“Let’s begin, for God’s
sake!” yelled the manager. “Now then,
Barillot! Eh? What? Isn’t Bosc
there? Is he bloody well making game of me now?”
Bosc, however, made his appearance
quietly enough, and the rehearsal began again just
as Labordette was taking the count away with him.
The latter was tremulous at the thought of seeing
Nana once more. After the rupture had taken place
between them there had been a great void in his life.
He was idle and fancied himself about to suffer through
the sudden change his habits had undergone, and accordingly
he had let them take him to see Rose. Besides,
his brain had been in such a whirl that he had striven
to forget everything and had strenuously kept from
seeking out Nana while avoiding an explanation with
the countess. He thought, indeed, that he owed
his dignity such a measure of forgetfulness.
But mysterious forces were at work within, and Nana
began slowly to reconquer him. First came thoughts
of her, then fleshly cravings and finally a new set
of exclusive, tender, well-nigh paternal feelings.
The abominable events attendant on
their last interview were gradually effacing themselves.
He no longer saw Fontan; he no longer heard the stinging
taunt about his wife’s adultery with which Nana
cast him out of doors. These things were as words
whose memory vanished. Yet deep down in his heart
there was a poignant smart which wrung him with such
increasing pain that it nigh choked him. Childish
ideas would occur to him; he imagined that she would
never have betrayed him if he had really loved her,
and he blamed himself for this. His anguish was
becoming unbearable; he was really very wretched.
His was the pain of an old wound rather than the blind,
present desire which puts up with everything for the
sake of immediate possession. He felt a jealous
passion for the woman and was haunted by longings for
her and her alone, her hair, her mouth, her body.
When he remembered the sound of her voice a shiver
ran through him; he longed for her as a miser might
have done, with refinements of desire beggaring description.
He was, in fact, so dolorously possessed by his passion
that when Labordette had begun to broach the subject
of an assignation he had thrown himself into his arms
in obedience to irresistible impulse. Directly
afterward he had, of course, been ashamed of an act
of self-abandonment which could not but seem very
ridiculous in a man of his position; but Labordette
was one who knew when to see and when not to see things,
and he gave a further proof of his tact when he left
the count at the foot of the stairs and without effort
let slip only these simple words:
“The right-hand passage on the
second floor. The door’s not shut.”
Muffat was alone in that silent corner
of the house. As he passed before the players’
waiting room, he had peeped through the open doors
and noticed the utter dilapidation of the vast chamber,
which looked shamefully stained and worn in broad
daylight. But what surprised him most as he emerged
from the darkness and confusion of the stage was the
pure, clear light and deep quiet at present pervading
the lofty staircase, which one evening when he had
seen it before had been bathed in gas fumes and loud
with the footsteps of women scampering over the different
floors. He felt that the dressing rooms were empty,
the corridors deserted; not a soul was there; not a
sound broke the stillness, while through the square
windows on the level of the stairs the pale November
sunlight filtered and cast yellow patches of light,
full of dancing dust, amid the dead, peaceful air which
seemed to descend from the regions above.
He was glad of this calm and the silence,
and he went slowly up, trying to regain breath as
he went, for his heart was thumping, and he was afraid
lest he might behave childishly and give way to sighs
and tears. Accordingly on the first-floor landing
he leaned up against a wall for he was
sure of not being observed and pressed his
handkerchief to his mouth and gazed at the warped
steps, the iron balustrade bright with the friction
of many hands, the scraped paint on the walls all
the squalor, in fact, which that house of tolerance
so crudely displayed at the pale afternoon hour when
courtesans are asleep. When he reached the second
floor he had to step over a big yellow cat which was
lying curled up on a step. With half-closed eyes
this cat was keeping solitary watch over the house,
where the close and now frozen odors which the women
nightly left behind them had rendered him somnolent.
In the right-hand corridor the door
of the dressing room had, indeed, not been closed
entirely. Nana was waiting. That little Mathilde,
a drab of a young girl, kept her dressing room in
a filthy state. Chipped jugs stood about anyhow;
the dressing table was greasy, and there was a chair
covered with red stains, which looked as if someone
had bled over the straw. The paper pasted on
walls and ceiling was splashed from top to bottom
with spots of soapy water and this smelled so disagreeably
of lavender scent turned sour that Nana opened the
window and for some moments stayed leaning on the
sill, breathing the fresh air and craning forward
to catch sight of Mme Bron underneath. She could
hear her broom wildly at work on the mildewed pantiles
of the narrow court which was buried in shadow.
A canary, whose cage hung on a shutter, was trilling
away piercingly. The sound of carriages in the
boulevard and neighboring streets was no longer audible,
and the quiet and the wide expanse of sleeping sunlight
suggested the country. Looking farther afield,
her eye fell on the small buildings and glass roofs
of the galleries in the passage and, beyond these,
on the tall houses in the Rue Vivienne, the backs
of which rose silent and apparently deserted over against
her. There was a succession of terrace roofs
close by, and on one of these a photographer had perched
a big cagelike construction of blue glass. It
was all very gay, and Nana was becoming absorbed in
contemplation, when it struck her someone had knocked
at the door.
She turned round and shouted:
“Come in!”
At sight of the count she shut the
window, for it was not warm, and there was no need
for the eavesdropping Mme Bron to listen. The
pair gazed at one another gravely. Then as the
count still kept standing stiffly in front of her,
looking ready to choke with emotion, she burst out
laughing and said:
“Well! So you’re here again, you
silly big beast!”
The tumult going on within him was
so great that he seemed a man frozen to ice.
He addressed Nana as “madame” and
esteemed himself happy to see her again. Thereupon
she became more familiar than ever in order to bounce
matters through.
“Don’t do it in the dignified
way! You wanted to see me, didn’t you?
But you didn’t intend us to stand looking at
one another like a couple of chinaware dogs.
We’ve both been in the wrong Oh, I
certainly forgive you!”
And herewith they agreed not to talk
of that affair again, Muffat nodding his assent as
Nana spoke. He was calmer now but as yet could
find nothing to say, though a thousand things rose
tumultuously to his lips. Surprised at his apparent
coldness, she began acting a part with much vigor.
“Come,” she continued
with a faint smile, “you’re a sensible
man! Now that we’ve made our peace let’s
shake hands and be good friends in future.”
“What? Good friends?” he murmured
in sudden anxiety.
“Yes; it’s idiotic, perhaps,
but I should like you to think well of me. We’ve
had our little explanation out, and if we meet again
we shan’t, at any rate look like a pair of boobies.”
He tried to interrupt her with a movement of the hand.
“Let me finish! There’s
not a man, you understand, able to accuse me of doing
him a blackguardly turn; well, and it struck me as
horrid to begin in your case. We all have our
sense of honor, dear boy.”
“But that’s not my meaning!”
he shouted violently. “Sit down listen
to me!” And as though he were afraid of seeing
her take her departure, he pushed her down on the
solitary chair in the room. Then he paced about
in growing agitation. The little dressing room
was airless and full of sunlight, and no sound from
the outside world disturbed its pleasant, peaceful,
dampish atmosphere. In the pauses of conversation
the shrillings of the canary were alone audible and
suggested the distant piping of a flute.
“Listen,” he said, planting
himself in front of her, “I’ve come to
possess myself of you again. Yes, I want to begin
again. You know that well; then why do you talk
to me as you do? Answer me; tell me you consent.”
Her head was bent, and she was scratching
the blood-red straw of the seat underneath her.
Seeing him so anxious, she did not hurry to answer.
But at last she lifted up her face. It had assumed
a grave expression, and into the beautiful eyes she
had succeeded in infusing a look of sadness.
“Oh, it’s impossible,
little man. Never, never, will I live with you
again.”
“Why?” he stuttered, and
his face seemed contracted in unspeakable suffering.
“Why? Hang it all, because It’s
impossible; that’s about it. I don’t
want to.”
He looked ardently at her for some
seconds longer. Then his legs curved under him
and he fell on the floor. In a bored voice she
added this simple advice:
“Ah, don’t be a baby!”
But he was one already. Dropping
at her feet, he had put his arms round her waist and
was hugging her closely, pressing his face hard against
her knees. When he felt her thus when
he once more divined the presence of her velvety limbs
beneath the thin fabric of her dress he
was suddenly convulsed and trembled, as it were, with
fever, while madly, savagely, he pressed his face
against her knees as though he had been anxious to
force through her flesh. The old chair creaked,
and beneath the low ceiling, where the air was pungent
with stale perfumes, smothered sobs of desire were
audible.
“Well, and after?” Nana
began saying, letting him do as he would. “All
this doesn’t help you a bit, seeing that the
thing’s impossible. Good God, what a child
you are!”
His energy subsided, but he still
stayed on the floor, nor did he relax his hold of
her as he said in a broken voice:
“Do at least listen to what
I came to offer you. I’ve already seen
a town house close to the Parc Monceau I
would gladly realize your smallest wish. In order
to have you all to myself, I would give my whole fortune.
Yes, that would be my only condition, that I should
have you all to myself! Do you understand?
And if you were to consent to be mine only, oh, then
I should want you to be the loveliest, the richest,
woman on earth. I should give you carriages and
diamonds and dresses!”
At each successive offer Nana shook
her head proudly. Then seeing that he still continued
them, that he even spoke of settling money on her for
he was at loss what to lay at her feet she
apparently lost patience.
“Come, come, have you done bargaining
with me? I’m a good sort, and I don’t
mind giving in to you for a minute or two, as your
feelings are making you so ill, but I’ve had
enough of it now, haven’t I? So let me
get up. You’re tiring me.”
She extricated herself from his clasp,
and once on her feet:
“No, no, no!” she said. “I
don’t want to!”
With that he gathered himself up painfully
and feebly dropped into a chair, in which he leaned
back with his face in his hands. Nana began pacing
up and down in her turn. For a second or two she
looked at the stained wallpaper, the greasy toilet
table, the whole dirty little room as it basked in
the pale sunlight. Then she paused in front of
the count and spoke with quiet directness.
“It’s strange how rich
men fancy they can have everything for their money.
Well, and if I don’t want to consent what
then? I don’t care a pin for your presents!
You might give me Paris, and yet I should say no!
Always no! Look here, it’s scarcely clean
in this room, yet I should think it very nice if I
wanted to live in it with you. But one’s
fit to kick the bucket in your palaces if one isn’t
in love. Ah, as to money, my poor pet, I can
lay my hands on that if I want to, but I tell you,
I trample on it; I spit on it!”
And with that she assumed a disgusted
expression. Then she became sentimental and added
in a melancholy tone:
“I know of something worth more
than money. Oh, if only someone were to give
me what I long for!”
He slowly lifted his head, and there
was a gleam of hope in his eyes.
“Oh, you can’t give it
me,” she continued; “it doesn’t depend
on you, and that’s the reason I’m talking
to you about it. Yes, we’re having a chat,
so I may as well mention to you that I should like
to play the part of the respectable woman in that
show of theirs.”
“What respectable woman?” he muttered
in astonishment.
“Why, their Duchess Helene!
If they think I’m going to play Geraldine, a
part with nothing in it, a scene and nothing besides if
they think that! Besides, that isn’t the
reason. The fact is I’ve had enough of
courtesans. Why, there’s no end to ’em!
They’ll be fancying I’ve got ’em
on the brain; to be sure they will! Besides, when
all’s said and done, it’s annoying, for
I can quite see they seem to think me uneducated.
Well, my boy, they’re jolly well in the dark
about it, I can tell you! When I want to be a
perfect lady, why then I am a swell, and no mistake!
Just look at this.”
And she withdrew as far as the window
and then came swelling back with the mincing gait
and circumspect air of a portly hen that fears to dirty
her claws. As to Muffat, he followed her movements
with eyes still wet with tears. He was stupefied
by this sudden transition from anguish to comedy.
She walked about for a moment or two in order the more
thoroughly to show off her paces, and as she walked
she smiled subtlely, closed her eyes demurely and
managed her skirts with great dexterity. Then
she posted herself in front of him again.
“I guess I’ve hit it, eh?”
“Oh, thoroughly,” he stammered
with a broken voice and a troubled expression.
“I tell you I’ve got hold
of the honest woman! I’ve tried at my own
place. Nobody’s got my little knack of looking
like a duchess who don’t care a damn for the
men. Did you notice it when I passed in front
of you? Why, the thing’s in my blood!
Besides, I want to play the part of an honest woman.
I dream about it day and night I’m
miserable about it. I must have the part, d’you
hear?”
And with that she grew serious, speaking
in a hard voice and looking deeply moved, for she
was really tortured by her stupid, tiresome wish.
Muffat, still smarting from her late refusals, sat
on without appearing to grasp her meaning. There
was a silence during which the very flies abstained
from buzzing through the quiet, empty place.
“Now, look here,” she
resumed bluntly, “you’re to get them to
give me the part.”
He was dumfounded, and with a despairing gesture:
“Oh, it’s impossible!
You yourself were saying just now that it didn’t
depend on me.”
She interrupted him with a shrug of the shoulders.
“You’ll just go down,
and you’ll tell Bordenave you want the part.
Now don’t be such a silly! Bordenave wants
money well, you’ll lend him some,
since you can afford to make ducks and drakes of it.”
And as he still struggled to refuse her, she grew
angry.
“Very well, I understand; you’re
afraid of making Rose angry. I didn’t mention
the woman when you were crying down on the floor I
should have had too much to say about it all.
Yes, to be sure, when one has sworn to love a woman
forever one doesn’t usually take up with the
first creature that comes by directly after.
Oh, that’s where the shoe pinches, I remember!
Well, dear boy, there’s nothing very savory in
the Mignon’s leavings! Oughtn’t you
to have broken it off with that dirty lot before coming
and squirming on my knees?”
He protested vaguely and at last was
able to get out a phrase.
“Oh, I don’t care a jot
for Rose; I’ll give her up at once.”
Nana seemed satisfied on this point. She continued:
“Well then, what’s bothering
you? Bordenave’s master here. You’ll
tell me there’s Fauchery after Bordenave ”
She had sunk her voice, for she was
coming to the delicate part of the matter. Muffat
sat silent, his eyes fixed on the ground. He had
remained voluntarily ignorant of Fauchery’s
assiduous attentions to the countess, and time had
lulled his suspicions and set him hoping that he had
been deceiving himself during that fearful night passed
in a doorway of the Rue Taitbout. But he still
felt a dull, angry repugnance to the man.
“Well, what then? Fauchery
isn’t the devil!” Nana repeated, feeling
her way cautiously and trying to find out how matters
stood between husband and lover. “One can
get over his soft side. I promise you, he’s
a good sort at bottom! So it’s a bargain,
eh? You’ll tell him that it’s for
my sake?”
The idea of taking such a step disgusted the count.
“No, no! Never!” he cried.
She paused, and this sentence was on the verge of
utterance:
“Fauchery can refuse you nothing.”
But she felt that by way of argument
it was rather too much of a good thing. So she
only smiled a queer smile which spoke as plainly as
words. Muffat had raised his eyes to her and now
once more lowered them, looking pale and full of embarrassment.
“Ah, you’re not good natured,” she
muttered at last.
“I cannot,” he said with
a voice and a look of the utmost anguish. “I’ll
do whatever you like, but not that, dear love!
Oh, I beg you not to insist on that!”
Thereupon she wasted no more time
in discussion but took his head between her small
hands, pushed it back a little, bent down and glued
her mouth to his in a long, long kiss. He shivered
violently; he trembled beneath her touch; his eyes
were closed, and he was beside himself. She lifted
him to his feet.
“Go,” said she simply.
He walked off, making toward the door.
But as he passed out she took him in her arms again,
became meek and coaxing, lifted her face to his and
rubbed her cheek against his waistcoat, much as a cat
might have done.
“Where’s the fine house?”
she whispered in laughing embarrassment, like a little
girl who returns to the pleasant things she has previously
refused.
“In the Avenue de Villiers.”
“And there are carriages there?”
“Yes.”
“Lace? Diamonds?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, how good you are, my old
pet! You know it was all jealousy just now!
And this time I solemnly promise you it won’t
be like the first, for now you understand what’s
due to a woman. You give all, don’t you?
Well then, I don’t want anybody but you!
Why, look here, there’s some more for you!
There and there and there!”
When she had pushed him from the room
after firing his blood with a rain of kisses on hands
and on face, she panted awhile. Good heavens,
what an unpleasant smell there was in that slut Mathilde’s
dressing room! It was warm, if you will, with
the tranquil warmth peculiar to rooms in the south
when the winter sun shines into them, but really, it
smelled far too strong of stale lavender water, not
to mention other less cleanly things! She opened
the window and, again leaning on the window sill,
began watching the glass roof of the passage below
in order to kill time.
Muffat went staggering downstairs.
His head was swimming. What should he say?
How should he broach the matter which, moreover, did
not concern him? He heard sounds of quarreling
as he reached the stage. The second act was being
finished, and Prulliere was beside himself with wrath,
owing to an attempt on Fauchery’s part to cut
short one of his speeches.
“Cut it all out then,”
he was shouting. “I should prefer that!
Just fancy, I haven’t two hundred lines, and
they’re still cutting me down. No, by Jove,
I’ve had enough of it; I give the part up.”
He took a little crumpled manuscript
book out of his pocket and fingered its leaves feverishly,
as though he were just about to throw it on Cossard’s
lap. His pale face was convulsed by outraged vanity;
his lips were drawn and thin, his eyes flamed; he
was quite unable to conceal the struggle that was
going on inside him. To think that he, Prulliere,
the idol of the public, should play a part of only
two hundred lines!
“Why not make me bring in letters
on a tray?” he continued bitterly.
“Come, come, Prulliere, behave
decently,” said Bordenave, who was anxious to
treat him tenderly because of his influence over the
boxes. “Don’t begin making a fuss.
We’ll find some points. Eh, Fauchery, you’ll
add some points? In the third act it would even
be possible to lengthen a scene out.”
“Well then, I want the last
speech of all,” the comedian declared. “I
certainly deserve to have it.”
Fauchery’s silence seemed to
give consent, and Prulliere, still greatly agitated
and discontented despite everything, put his part back
into his pocket. Bosc and Fontan had appeared
profoundly indifferent during the course of this explanation.
Let each man fight for his own hand, they reflected;
the present dispute had nothing to do with them; they
had no interest therein! All the actors clustered
round Fauchery and began questioning him and fishing
for praise, while Mignon listened to the last of Prulliere’s
complaints without, however, losing sight of Count
Muffat, whose return he had been on the watch for.
Entering in the half-light, the count
had paused at the back of the stage, for he hesitated
to interrupt the quarrel. But Bordenave caught
sight of him and ran forward.
“Aren’t they a pretty
lot?” he muttered. “You can have no
idea what I’ve got to undergo with that lot,
Monsieur lé Comte. Each man’s
vainer than his neighbor, and they’re wretched
players all the same, a scabby lot, always mixed up
in some dirty business or other! Oh, they’d
be delighted if I were to come to smash. But
I beg pardon I’m getting beside myself.”
He ceased speaking, and silence reigned
while Muffat sought how to broach his announcement
gently. But he failed and, in order to get out
of his difficulty the more quickly, ended by an abrupt
announcement:
“Nana wants the duchess’s part.”
Bordenave gave a start and shouted:
“Come now, it’s sheer madness!”
Then looking at the count and finding
him so pale and so shaken, he was calm at once.
“Devil take it!” he said simply.
And with that there ensued a fresh
silence. At bottom he didn’t care a pin
about it. That great thing Nana playing the duchess
might possibly prove amusing! Besides, now that
this had happened he had Muffat well in his grasp.
Accordingly he was not long in coming to a decision,
and so he turned round and called out:
“Fauchery!”
The count had been on the point of
stopping him. But Fauchery did not hear him,
for he had been pinned against the curtain by Fontan
and was being compelled to listen patiently to the
comedian’s reading of the part of Tardiveau.
Fontan imagined Tardiveau to be a native of Marseilles
with a dialect, and he imitated the dialect. He
was repeating whole speeches. Was that right?
Was this the thing? Apparently he was only submitting
ideas to Fauchery of which he was himself uncertain,
but as the author seemed cold and raised various objections,
he grew angry at once.
Oh, very well, the moment the spirit
of the part escaped him it would be better for all
concerned that he shouldn’t act it at all!
“Fauchery!” shouted Bordenave once more.
Thereupon the young man ran off, delighted
to escape from the actor, who was wounded not a little
by his prompt retreat.
“Don’t let’s stay
here,” continued Bordenave. “Come
this way, gentlemen.”
In order to escape from curious listeners
he led them into the property room behind the scenes,
while Mignon watched their disappearance in some surprise.
They went down a few steps and entered a square room,
whose two windows opened upon the courtyard.
A faint light stole through the dirty panes and hung
wanly under the low ceiling. In pigeonholes and
shelves, which filled the whole place up, lay a collection
of the most varied kind of bric-a-brac.
Indeed, it suggested an old-clothes shop in the Rue
de Lappe in process of selling off, so indescribable
was the hotchpotch of plates, gilt pasteboard cups,
old red umbrellas, Italian jars, clocks in all styles,
platters and inkpots, firearms and squirts, which
lay chipped and broken and in unrecognizable heaps
under a layer of dust an inch deep. An unendurable
odor of old iron, rags and damp cardboard emanated
from the various piles, where the debris of forgotten
dramas had been collecting for half a century.
“Come in,” Bordenave repeated.
“We shall be alone, at any rate.”
The count was extremely embarrassed,
and he contrived to let the manager risk his proposal
for him. Fauchery was astonished.
“Eh? What?” he asked.
“Just this,” said Bordenave
finally. “An idea has occurred to us.
Now whatever you do, don’t jump! It’s
most serious. What do you think of Nana for the
duchess’s part?”
The author was bewildered; then he burst out with:
“Ah no, no! You’re joking, aren’t
you? People would laugh far too much.”
“Well, and it’s a point
gained already if they do laugh! Just reflect,
my dear boy. The idea pleases Monsieur lé
Comte very much.”
In order to keep himself in countenance
Muffat had just picked out of the dust on a neighboring
shelf an object which he did not seem to recognize.
It was an eggcup, and its stem had been mended with
plaster. He kept hold of it unconsciously and
came forward, muttering:
“Yes, yes, it would be capital.”
Fauchery turned toward him with a
brisk, impatient gesture. The count had nothing
to do with his piece, and he said decisively:
“Never! Let Nana play the
courtesan as much as she likes, but a lady No,
by Jove!”
“You are mistaken, I assure
you,” rejoined the count, growing bolder.
“This very minute she has been playing the part
of a pure woman for my benefit.”
“Where?” queried Fauchery with growing
surprise.
“Upstairs in a dressing room.
Yes, she has, indeed, and with such distinction!
She’s got a way of glancing at you as she goes
by you something like this, you know!”
And eggcup in hand, he endeavored
to imitate Nana, quite forgetting his dignity in his
frantic desire to convince the others. Fauchery
gazed at him in a state of stupefaction. He understood
it all now, and his anger had ceased. The count
felt that he was looking at him mockingly and pityingly,
and he paused with a slight blush on his face.
“Egad, it’s quite possible!”
muttered the author complaisantly. “Perhaps
she would do very well, only the part’s been
assigned. We can’t take it away from Rose.”
“Oh, if that’s all the
trouble,” said Bordenave, “I’ll undertake
to arrange matters.”
But presently, seeing them both against
him and guessing that Bordenave had some secret interest
at stake, the young man thought to avoid aquiescence
by redoubling the violence of his refusal. The
consultation was on the verge of being broken up.
“Oh, dear! No, no!
Even if the part were unassigned I should never give
it her! There, is that plain? Do let me alone;
I have no wish to ruin my play!”
He lapsed into silent embarrassment.
Bordenave, deeming himself de trop, went
away, but the count remained with bowed head.
He raised it with an effort and said in a breaking
voice:
“Supposing, my dear fellow,
I were to ask this of you as a favor?”
“I cannot, I cannot,”
Fauchery kept repeating as he writhed to get free.
Muffat’s voice became harder.
“I pray and beseech you for it! I want
it!”
And with that he fixed his eyes on
him. The young man read menaces in that darkling
gaze and suddenly gave way with a splutter of confused
phrases:
“Do what you like I
don’t care a pin about it. Yes, yes, you’re
abusing your power, but you’ll see, you’ll
see!”
At this the embarrassment of both
increased. Fauchery was leaning up against a
set of shelves and was tapping nervously on the ground
with his foot. Muffat seemed busy examining the
eggcup, which he was still turning round and about.
“It’s an eggcup,” Bordenave obligingly
came and remarked.
“Yes, to be sure! It’s an eggeup,”
the count repeated.
“Excuse me, you’re covered
with dust,” continued the manager, putting the
thing back on a shelf. “If one had to dust
every day there’d be no end to it, you understand.
But it’s hardly clean here a filthy
mess, eh? Yet you may believe me or not when
I tell you there’s money in it. Now look,
just look at all that!”
He walked Muffat round in front of
the pigeonholes and shelves and in the greenish light
which filtered through the courtyard, told him the
names of different properties, for he was anxious to
interest him in his marine-stores inventory, as he
jocosely termed it.
Presently, when they had returned
into Fauchery’s neighborhood, he said carelessly
enough:
“Listen, since we’re all
of one mind, we’ll finish the matter at once.
Here’s Mignon, just when he’s wanted.”
For some little time past Mignon had
been prowling in the adjoining passage, and the very
moment Bordenave began talking of a modification of
their agreement he burst into wrathful protest.
It was infamous they wanted to spoil his
wife’s career he’d go to law
about it! Bordenave, meanwhile, was extremely
calm and full of reasons. He did not think the
part worthy of Rose, and he preferred to reserve her
for an operetta, which was to be put on after the
Petite Duchesse. But when her husband
still continued shouting he suddenly offered to cancel
their arrangement in view of the offers which the
Folies-Dramatiques had been making the singer.
At this Mignon was momentarily put out, so without
denying the truth of these offers he loudly professed
a vast disdain for money. His wife, he said,
had been engaged to play the Duchess Helene, and she
would play the part even if he, Mignon, were to be
ruined over it. His dignity, his honor, were
at stake! Starting from this basis, the discussion
grew interminable. The manager, however, always
returned to the following argument: since the
Folies had offered Rose three hundred francs
a night during a hundred performances, and since she
only made a hundred and fifty with him, she would
be the gainer by fifteen thousand francs the moment
he let her depart. The husband, on his part, did
not desert the artist’s position. What
would people say if they saw his wife deprived of
her part? Why, that she was not equal to it; that
it had been deemed necessary to find a substitute
for her! And this would do great harm to Rose’s
reputation as an artist; nay, it would diminish it.
Oh no, no! Glory before gain! Then without
a word of warning he pointed out a possible arrangement:
Rose, according to the terms of her agreement, was
pledged to pay a forfeit of ten thousand francs in
case she gave up the part. Very well then, let
them give her ten thousand francs, and she would go
to the Folies-Dramatiques. Bordenave
was utterly dumfounded while Mignon, who had never
once taken his eyes off the count, tranquilly awaited
results.
“Then everything can be settled,”
murmured Muffat in tones of relief; “we can
come to an understanding.”
“The deuce, no! That would
be too stupid!” cried Bordenave, mastered by
his commercial instincts. “Ten thousand
francs to let Rose go! Why, people would make
game of me!”
But the count, with a multiplicity
of nods, bade him accept. He hesitated, and at
last with much grumbling and infinite regret over the
ten thousand francs which, by the by, were not destined
to come out of his own pocket he bluntly continued:
“After all, I consent.
At any rate, I shall have you off my hands.”
For a quarter of an hour past Fontan
had been listening in the courtyard. Such had
been his curiosity that he had come down and posted
himself there, but the moment he understood the state
of the case he went upstairs again and enjoyed the
treat of telling Rose. Dear me! They were
just haggling in her behalf! He dinned his words
into her ears; she ran off to the property room.
They were silent as she entered. She looked at
the four men. Muffat hung his head; Fauchery answered
her questioning glance with a despairing shrug of
the shoulders; as to Mignon, he was busy discussing
the terms of the agreement with Bordenave.
“What’s up?” she demanded curtly.
“Nothing,” said her husband.
“Bordenave here is giving ten thousand francs
in order to get you to give up your part.”
She grew tremulous with anger and
very pale, and she clenched her little fists.
For some moments she stared at him, her whole nature
in revolt. Ordinarily in matters of business
she was wont to trust everything obediently to her
husband, leaving him to sign agreements with managers
and lovers. Now she could but cry:
“Oh, come, you’re too base for anything!”
The words fell like a lash. Then
she sped away, and Mignon, in utter astonishment,
ran after her. What next? Was she going mad?
He began explaining to her in low tones that ten thousand
francs from one party and fifteen thousand from the
other came to twenty-five thousand. A splendid
deal! Muffat was getting rid of her in every sense
of the word; it was a pretty trick to have plucked
him of this last feather! But Rose in her anger
vouchsafed no answer. Whereupon Mignon in disdain
left her to her feminine spite and, turning to Bordenave,
who was once more on the stage with Fauchery and Muffat,
said:
“We’ll sign tomorrow morning.
Have the money in readiness.”
At this moment Nana, to whom Labordette
had brought the news, came down to the stage in triumph.
She was quite the honest woman now and wore a most
distinguished expression in order to overwhelm her
friends and prove to the idiots that when she chose
she could give them all points in the matter of smartness.
But she nearly got into trouble, for at the sight
of her Rose darted forward, choking with rage and stuttering:
“Yes, you, I’ll pay you
out! Things can’t go on like this; d’you
understand?” Nana forgot herself in face of this
brisk attack and was going to put her arms akimbo
and give her what for. But she controlled herself
and, looking like a marquise who is afraid of treading
on an orange peel, fluted in still more silvery tones.
“Eh, what?” said she. “You’re
mad, my dear!”
And with that she continued in her
graceful affectation while Rose took her departure,
followed by Mignon, who now refused to recognize her.
Clarisse was enraptured, having just obtained the part
of Geraldine from Bordenave. Fauchery, on the
other hand, was gloomy; he shifted from one foot to
the other; he could not decide whether to leave the
theater or no. His piece was bedeviled, and he
was seeking how best to save it. But Nana came
up, took him by both hands and, drawing him toward
her, asked whether he thought her so very atrocious
after all. She wasn’t going to eat his
play not she! Then she made him laugh
and gave him to understand that he would be foolish
to be angry with her, in view of his relationship
to the Muffats. If, she said, her memory failed
her she would take her lines from the prompter.
The house, too, would be packed in such a way as to
ensure applause. Besides, he was mistaken about
her, and he would soon see how she would rattle through
her part. By and by it was arranged that the
author should make a few changes in the rôle of the
duchess so as to extend that of Prulliere. The
last-named personage was enraptured. Indeed,
amid all the joy which Nana now quite naturally diffused,
Fontan alone remained unmoved. In the middle of
the yellow lamplight, against which the sharp outline
of his goatlike profile shone out with great distinctness,
he stood showing off his figure and affecting the
pose of one who has been cruelly abandoned. Nana
went quietly up and shook hands with him.
“How are you getting on?”
“Oh, pretty fairly. And how are you?”
“Very well, thank you.”
That was all. They seemed to
have only parted at the doors of the theater the day
before. Meanwhile the players were waiting about,
but Bordenave said that the third act would not be
rehearsed. And so it chanced that old Bosc went
grumbling away at the proper time, whereas usually
the company were needlessly detained and lost whole
afternoons in consequence. Everyone went off.
Down on the pavement they were blinded by the broad
daylight and stood blinking their eyes in a dazed
sort of way, as became people who had passed three
hours squabbling with tight-strung nerves in the depths
of a cellar. The count, with racked limbs and
vacant brain, got into a conveyance with Nana, while
Labordette took Fauchery off and comforted him.
A month later the first night of the
Petite Duchesse proved supremely disastrous
to Nana. She was atrociously bad and displayed
such prétentions toward high comedy that the
public grew mirthful. They did not hiss they
were too amused. From a stage box Rose Mignon
kept greeting her rival’s successive entrances
with a shrill laugh, which set the whole house off.
It was the beginning of her revenge. Accordingly,
when at night Nana, greatly chagrined, found herself
alone with Muffat, she said furiously:
“What a conspiracy, eh?
It’s all owing to jealousy. Oh, if they
only knew how I despise ’em! What do I
want them for nowadays? Look here! I’ll
bet a hundred louis that I’ll bring all
those who made fun today and make ’em lick the
ground at my feet! Yes, I’ll fine-lady your
Paris for you, I will!”