Having sent off his despatch and feeling as satisfied as a hunter who at six o'clock in the morning on a fine autumn day, comes out into a plain that abounds with game, he went out to go and ask advice of M. Chélan. But before he had arrived at the good curé's, providence, wishing to shower favours upon him, threw in his path M. de Valenod, to whom he owned quite freely that his heart was torn in two; a poor lad such as he was owed an exclusive devotion to the vocation to which it had pleased Heaven to call him. But vocation was not everything in this base world. In order to work worthily at the vine of the Lord, and to be not totally unworthy of so many worthy colleagues, it was necessary to be educated; it was necessary to spend two expensive years at the seminary of Besançon; saving consequently became an imperative necessity, and was certainly much easier with a salary of eight hundred francs paid quarterly than with six hundred francs which one received monthly. On the other hand, did not Heaven, by placing him by the side of the young de Rênals, and especially by inspiring him with a special devotion to them, seem to indicate that it was not proper to abandon that education for another one.

Julien reached such a degree of perfection in that particular kind of eloquence which has succeeded the drastic quickness of the empire, that he finished by boring himself with the sound of his own words.

On reaching home he found a valet of M. Valenod in full livery who had been looking for him all over the town, with a card inviting him to dinner for that same day.

Julien had never been in that man's house. Only a few days before he had been thinking of nothing but the means of giving him a sound thrashing without getting into trouble with the police. Although the time of the dinner was one o'clock, Julien thought it was more deferential to present himself at half-past twelve at the office of M. the director of the workhouse. He found him parading his importance in the middle of a lot of despatch boxes. His large black whiskers, his enormous quantity of hair, his Greek bonnet placed across the top of his head, his immense pipe, his embroidered slippers, the big chains of gold crossed all over his breast, and the whole stock-in-trade of a provincial financier who considers himself prosperous, failed to impose on Julien in the least: They only made him think the more of the thrashing which he owed him.

He asked for the honour of being introduced to Madame Valenod. She was dressing and was unable to receive him. By way of compensation he had the privilege of witnessing the toilet of M. the director of the workhouse. They subsequently went into the apartment of Madame Valenod, who introduced her children to him with tears in her eyes. This lady was one of the most important in Verrières, had a big face like a man's, on which she had put rouge in honour of this great function. She displayed all the maternal pathos of which she was capable.

Julien thought all the time of Madame de Rênal. His distrust made him only susceptible to those associations which are called up by their opposites, but he was then affected to the verge of breaking down. This tendency was increased by the sight of the house of the director of the workhouse. He was shown over it. Everything in it was new and magnificent, and he was told the price of every article of furniture. But Julien detected a certain element of sordidness, which smacked of stolen money into the bargain. Everybody in it, down to the servants, had the air of setting his face in advance against contempt.

The collector of taxes, the superintendent of indirect taxes, the officer of gendarmerie, and two or three other public officials arrived with their wives. They were followed by some rich Liberals. Dinner was announced. It occurred to Julien, who was already feeling upset, that there were some poor prisoners on the other side of the dining-room wall, and that an illicit profit had perhaps been made over their rations of meat in order to purchase all that garish luxury with which they were trying to overwhelm him.

"Perhaps they are hungry at this very minute," he said to himself. He felt a choking in his throat. He found it impossible to eat and almost impossible to speak. Matters became much worse a quarter of an hour afterwards; they heard in the distance some refrains of a popular song that was, it must be confessed, a little vulgar, which was being sung by one of the inmates. M. Valenod gave a look to one of his liveried servants who disappeared and soon there was no more singing to be heard. At that moment a valet offered Julien some Rhine wine in a green glass and Madame Valenod made a point of asking him to note that this wine cost nine francs a bottle in the market. Julien held up his green glass and said to M. Valenod.

"They are not singing that wretched song any more."

"Zounds, I should think not," answered the triumphant governor. "I have made the rascals keep quiet."

These words were too much for Julien. He had the manners of his new position, but he had not yet assimilated its spirit. In spite of all his hypocrisy and its frequent practice, he felt a big tear drip down his cheek.

He tried to hide it in the green glass, but he found it absolutely impossible to do justice to the Rhine wine. "Preventing singing he said to himself: Oh, my God, and you suffer it."

Fortunately nobody noticed his ill-bred emotion. The collector of taxes had struck up a royalist song. "So this," reflected Julien's conscience during the hubbub of the refrain which was sung in chorus, "is the sordid prosperity which you will eventually reach, and you will only enjoy it under these conditions and in company like this. You will, perhaps, have a post worth twenty thousand francs; but while you gorge yourself on meat, you will have to prevent a poor prisoner from singing; you will give dinners with the money which you have stolen out of his miserable rations and during your dinners he will be still more wretched. Oh, Napoleon, how sweet it was to climb to fortune in your way through the dangers of a battle, but to think of aggravating the pain of the unfortunate in this cowardly way."

I own that the weakness which Julien had been manifesting in this soliloquy gives me a poor opinion of him. He is worthy of being the accomplice of those kid-gloved conspirators who purport to change the whole essence of a great country's existence, without wishing to have on their conscience the most trivial scratch.

Julien was sharply brought back to his rôle. He had not been invited to dine in such good company simply to moon dreamily and say nothing.

A retired manufacturer of cotton prints, a corresponding member of the Academy of Besançon and of that of Uzès, spoke to him from the other end of the table and asked him if what was said everywhere about his astonishing progress in the study of the New Testament was really true.

A profound silence was suddenly inaugurated. A New Testament in Latin was found as though by magic in the possession of the learned member of the two Academies. After Julien had answered, part of a sentence in Latin was read at random. Julien then recited. His memory proved faithful and the prodigy was admired with all the boisterous energy of the end of dinner. Julien looked at the flushed faces of the ladies. A good many were not so plain. He recognised the wife of the collector, who was a fine singer.

"I am ashamed, as a matter of fact, to talk Latin so long before these ladies," he said, turning his eyes on her. "If M. Rubigneau," that was the name of the member of the two Academies, "will be kind enough to read a Latin sentence at random instead of answering by following the Latin text, I will try to translate it impromptu." This second test completed his glory.

Several Liberals were there, who, though rich, were none the less the happy fathers of children capable of obtaining scholarships, and had consequently been suddenly converted at the last mission. In spite of this diplomatic step, M. de Rênal had never been willing to receive them in his house. These worthy people, who only knew Julien by name and from having seen him on horseback on the day of the king of —— 's entry, were his most noisy admirers. "When will those fools get tired of listening to this Biblical language, which they don't understand in the least," he thought. But, on the contrary, that language amused them by its strangeness and made them smile. But Julien got tired.

As six o'clock struck he got up gravely and talked about a chapter in Ligorio's New Theology which he had to learn by heart to recite on the following day to M. Chélan, "for," he added pleasantly, "my business is to get lessons said by heart to me, and to say them by heart myself."

There was much laughter and admiration; such is the kind of wit which is customary in Verrières. Julien had already got up and in spite of etiquette everybody got up as well, so great is the dominion exercised by genius. Madame Valenod kept him for another quarter of an hour. He really must hear her children recite their catechisms. They made the most absurd mistakes which he alone noticed. He was careful not to point them out. "What ignorance of the first principles of religion," he thought. Finally he bowed and thought he could get away; but they insisted on his trying a fable of La Fontaine.

"That author is quite immoral," said Julien to Madame Valenod. A certain fable on Messire Jean Chouart dares to pour ridicule on all that we hold most venerable. He is shrewdly blamed by the best commentators. Before Julien left he received four or five invitations to dinner. "This young man is an honour to the department," cried all the guests in chorus. They even went so far as to talk of a pension voted out of the municipal funds to put him in the position of continuing his studies at Paris.

While this rash idea was resounding through the dining-room Julien had swiftly reached the front door. "You scum, you scum," he cried, three or four times in succession in a low voice as he indulged in the pleasure of breathing in the fresh air.

He felt quite an aristocrat at this moment, though he was the very man who had been shocked for so long a period by the haughty smile of disdainful superiority which he detected behind all the courtesies addressed to him at M. de Rênal's. He could not help realising the extreme difference. Why let us even forget the fact of its being money stolen from the poor inmates, he said to himself as he went away, let us forget also their stopping the singing. M. de Rênal would never think of telling his guests the price of each bottle of wine with which he regales them, and as for this M. Valenod, and his chronic cataloguing of his various belongings, he cannot talk of his house, his estate, etc., in the presence of his wife without saying, "Your house, your estate."

This lady, who was apparently so keenly alive to the delights of decorum, had just had an awful scene during the dinner with a servant who had broken a wine-glass and spoilt one of her dozens; and the servant too had answered her back with the utmost insolence.

"What a collection," said Julien to himself; "I would not live like they do were they to give me half of all they steal. I shall give myself away one fine day. I should not be able to restrain myself from expressing the disgust with which they inspire one."

It was necessary, however, to obey Madame de Rênal's injunction and be present at several dinners of the same kind. Julien was the fashion; he was forgiven his Guard of Honour uniform, or rather that indiscretion was the real cause of his successes. Soon the only question in Verrières was whether M. de Rênal or M. the director of the workhouse would be the victor in the struggle for the clever young man. These gentlemen formed, together with M. Maslon, a triumirate which had tyrannised over the town for a number of years. People were jealous of the mayor, and the Liberals had good cause for complaint, but, after all, he was noble and born for a superior position, while M. Valenod's father had not left him six hundred francs a year. His career had necessitated a transition from pitying the shabby green suit which had been so notorious in his youth, to envying the Norman horses, his gold chains, his Paris clothes, his whole present prosperity.

Julien thought that he had discovered one honest man in the whirlpool of this novel world. He was a geometrist named Gros, and had the reputation of being a Jacobin. Julien, who had vowed to say nothing but that which he disbelieved himself, was obliged to watch himself carefully when speaking to M. Gros. He received big packets of exercises from Vergy. He was advised to visit his father frequently, and he fulfilled his unpleasant duty. In a word he was patching his reputation together pretty well, when he was thoroughly surprised to find himself woken up one morning by two hands held over his eyes.

It was Madame de Rênal who had made a trip to the town, and who, running up the stairs four at a time while she left her children playing with a pet rabbit, had reached Julien's room a moment before her sons. This moment was delicious but very short: Madame de Rênal had disappeared when the children arrived with the rabbit which they wanted to show to their friend. Julien gave them all a hearty welcome, including the rabbit. He seemed at home again. He felt that he loved these children and that he enjoyed gossiping with them. He was astonished at the sweetness of their voices, at the simplicity and dignity of their little ways; he felt he needed to purge his imagination of all the vulgar practices and all the unpleasantnesses among which he had been living in Verrières. For there everyone was always frightened of being scored off, and luxury and poverty were at daggers drawn.

The people with whom he would dine would enter into confidences over the joint which were as humiliating for themselves as they were nauseating to the hearer.

"You others, who are nobles, you are right to be proud," he said to Madame de Rênal, as he gave her an account of all the dinners which he had put up with.

"You're the fashion then," and she laughed heartily as she thought of the rouge which Madame Valenod thought herself obliged to put on each time she expected Julien. "I think she has designs on your heart," she added.

The breakfast was delicious. The presence of the children, though apparently embarrassing, increased as a matter of fact the happiness of the party. The poor children did not know how to give expression to the joy at seeing Julien again. The servants had not failed to tell them that he had been offered two hundred francs a year more to educate the little Valenods.

Stanislas-Xavier, who was still pale from his illness, suddenly asked his mother in the middle of the breakfast, the value of his silver cover and of the goblet in which he was drinking.

"Why do you want to know that?"

"I want to sell them to give the price to M. Julien so that he shan't be done if he stays with us."

Julien kissed him with tears in his eyes. His mother wept unrestrainedly, for Julien took Stanislas on his knees and explained to him that he should not use the word "done" which, when employed in that meaning was an expression only fit for the servants' hall. Seeing the pleasure which he was giving to Madame de Rênal, he tried to explain the meaning of being "done" by picturesque illustrations which amused the children.

"I understand," said Stanislas, "it's like the crow who is silly enough to let his cheese fall and be taken by the fox who has been playing the flatterer."

Madame de Rênal felt mad with joy and covered her children with kisses, a process which involved her leaning a little on Julien.

Suddenly the door opened. It was M. de Rênal. His severe and discontented expression contrasted strangely with the sweet joy which his presence dissipated. Madame de Rênal grew pale, she felt herself incapable of denying anything. Julien seized command of the conversation and commenced telling M. the mayor in a loud voice the incident of the silver goblet which Stanislas wanted to sell. He was quite certain this story would not be appreciated. M. de Rênal first of all frowned mechanically at the mere mention of money. Any allusion to that mineral, he was accustomed to say, is always a prelude to some demand made upon my purse. But this was something more than a mere money matter. His suspicions were increased. The air of happiness which animated his family during his absence was not calculated to smooth matters over with a man who was a prey to so touchy a vanity. "Yes, yes," he said, as his wife started to praise to him the combined grace and cleverness of the way in which Julien gave ideas to his pupils. "I know, he renders me hateful to my own children. It is easy enough for him to make himself a hundred times more loveable to them than I am myself, though after all, I am the master. In this century everything tends to make legitimate authority unpopular. Poor France!"

Madame de Rênal had not stopped to examine the fine shades of the welcome which her husband gave her. She had just caught a glimpse of the possibility of spending twelve hours with Julien. She had a lot of purchases to make in the town and declared that she positively insisted in going to dine at the tavern. She stuck to her idea in spite of all her husband's protests and remonstrances. The children were delighted with the mere word tavern, which our modern prudery denounces with so much gusto.

M. de Rênal left his wife in the first draper's shop which she entered and went to pay some visits. He came back more morose than he had been in the morning. He was convinced that the whole town was busy with himself and Julien. As a matter of fact no one had yet given him any inkling as to the more offensive part of the public gossip. Those items which had been repeated to M. the mayor dealt exclusively with the question of whether Julien would remain with him with six hundred francs, or would accept the eight hundred francs offered by M. the director of the workhouse.

The director, when he met M. de Rênal in society, gave him the cold shoulder. These tactics were not without cleverness. There is no impulsiveness in the provinces. Sensations are so rare there that they are never allowed to be wasted.

M. le Valenod was what is called a hundred miles from Paris a faraud; that means a coarse imprudent type of man. His triumphant existence since 1815 had consolidated his natural qualities. He reigned, so to say, in Verrieres subject to the orders of M. de Rênal; but as he was much more energetic, was ashamed of nothing, had a finger in everything, and was always going about writing and speaking, and was oblivious of all snubs, he had, although without any personal pretensions, eventually come to equal the mayor in reputation in the eyes of the ecclesiastical authorities. M. Valenod had, as it were, said to the local tradesmen "Give me the two biggest fools among your number;" to the men of law "Show me the two greatest dunces;" to the sanitary officials "Point out to me the two biggest charlatans." When he had thus collected the most impudent members of each separate calling, he had practically said to them, "Let us reign together."

The manners of those people were offensive to M. de Rênal. The coarseness of Valenod took offence at nothing, not even the frequency with which the little abbé Maslon would give the lie to him in public.

But in the middle of all this prosperity M. Valenod found it necessary to reassure himself by a number of petty acts of insolence on the score of the crude truths which he well realised that everybody was justified in addressing to him. His activity had redoubled since the fears which the visit of M. Appert had left him. He had made three journeys to Besançon. He wrote several letters by each courier; he sent others by unknown men who came to his house at nightfall. Perhaps he had been wrong in securing the dismissal of the old curé Chélan. For this piece of vindictiveness had resulted in his being considered an extremely malicious man by several pious women of good birth. Besides, the rendering of this service had placed him in absolute dependence on M. the Grand Vicar de Frilair from whom he received some strange commissions. He had reached this point in his intrigues when he had yielded to the pleasure of writing an anonymous letter, and thus increasing his embarrassment. His wife declared to him that she wanted to have Julien in her house; her vanity was intoxicated with the idea.

Such being his position M. Valenod imagined in advance a decisive scene with his old colleague M. de Rênal. The latter might address to him some harsh words, which he would not mind much; but he might write to Besançon and even to Paris. Some minister's cousin might suddenly fall down on Verrières and take over the workhouse. Valenod thought of coming to terms with the Liberals. It was for that purpose that several of them had been invited to the dinner when Julien was present. He would have obtained powerful support against the mayor but the elections might supervene, and it was only too evident that the directorship of the workhouse was inconsistent with voting on the wrong side. Madame de Rênal had made a shrewd guess at this intrigue, and while she explained it to Julien as he gave her his arm to pass from one shop to another, they found themselves gradually taken as far as the Cours de la Fidelite where they spent several hours nearly as tranquil as those at Vergy.

At the same time M. Valenod was trying to put off a definite crisis with his old patron by himself assuming the aggressive. These tactics succeeded on this particular day, but aggravated the mayor's bad temper. Never has vanity at close grips with all the harshness and meanness of a pettifogging love of money reduced a man to a more sorry condition than that of M. de Rênal when he entered the tavern. The children, on the other hand, had never been more joyful and more merry. This contrast put the finishing touch on his pique.

"So far as I can see I am not wanted in my family," he said as he entered in a tone which he meant to be impressive.

For answer, his wife took him on one side and declared that it was essential to send Julien away. The hours of happiness which she had just enjoyed had given her again the ease and firmness of demeanour necessary to follow out the plan of campaign which she had been hatching for a fortnight. The finishing touch to the trouble of the poor mayor of Verrières was the fact that he knew that they joked publicly in the town about his love for cash. Valenod was as generous as a thief, and on his side had acquitted himself brilliantly in the last five or six collections for the Brotherhood of St. Joseph, the congregation of the Virgin, the congregation of the Holy Sacrament, etc., etc.

M. de Rênal's name had been seen more than once at the bottom of the list of gentlefolk of Verrières, and the surrounding neighbourhood who were adroitly classified in the list of the collecting brethren according to the amount of their offerings. It was in vain that he said that he was not making money. The clergy stands no nonsense in such matters.

CHAPTER XXIII

SORROWS OF AN OFFICIAL

Il piacere di alzar la testa tutto l'anno, è ben pagato da certi quarti d'ora che bisogna passar.— Casti.

Let us leave this petty man to his petty fears; why did he take a man of spirit into his household when he needed someone with the soul of a valet? Why can't he select his staff? The ordinary trend of the nineteenth century is that when a noble and powerful individual encounters a man of spirit, he kills him, exiles him and imprisons him, or so humiliates him that the other is foolish enough to die of grief. In this country it so happens that it is not merely the man of spirit who suffers. The great misfortunes of the little towns of France and of representative governments, like that of New York, is that they find it impossible to forget the existence of individuals like M. de Rênal. It is these men who make public opinion in a town of twenty thousand inhabitants, and public opinion is terrible in a country which has a charter of liberty. A man, though of a naturally noble and generous disposition, who would have been your friend in the natural course of events, but who happens to live a hundred leagues off, judges you by the public opinion of your town which is made by those fools who have chanced to be born noble, rich and conservative. Unhappy is the man who distinguishes himself.

Immediately after dinner they left for Vergy, but the next day but one Julien saw the whole family return to Verrières. An hour had not passed before he discovered to his great surprise that Madame de Rênal had some mystery up her sleeve. Whenever he came into the room she would break off her conversation with her husband and would almost seem to desire that he should go away. Julien did not need to be given this hint twice. He became cold and reserved. Madame de Rênal noticed it and did not ask for an explanation. "Is she going to give me a successor," thought Julien. "And to think of her being so familiar with me the day before yesterday, but that is how these great ladies are said to act. It's just like kings. One never gets any more warning than the disgraced minister who enters his house to find his letter of dismissal." Julien noticed that these conversations which left off so abruptly at his approach, often dealt with a big house which belonged to the municipality of Verrières, a house which though old was large and commodious and situated opposite the church in the most busy commercial district of the town. "What connection can there be between this house and a new lover," said Julien to himself. In his chagrin he repeated to himself the pretty verses of Francis I. which seemed novel to him, for Madame de Rênal had only taught him them a month before:

Souvent femme varie Bien fol est qui s'y fie.

M. de Rênal took the mail to Besançon. This journey was a matter of two hours. He seemed extremely harassed. On his return he threw a big grey paper parcel on the table.

"Here's that silly business," he said to his wife. An hour afterwards Julien saw the bill-poster carrying the big parcel. He followed him eagerly. "I shall learn the secret at the first street corner." He waited impatiently behind the bill-poster who was smearing the back of the poster with his big brush. It had scarcely been put in its place before Julien's curiosity saw the detailed announcement of the putting up for public auction of that big old house whose name had figured so frequently in M. de Rênal's conversations with his wife. The auction of the lease was announced for to-morrow at two o'clock in the Town Hall after the extinction of the third fire. Julien was very disappointed. He found the time a little short. How could there be time to apprise all the other would-be purchasers. But, moreover, the bill, which was dated a fortnight back, and which he read again in its entirety in three distinct places, taught him nothing.

He went to visit the house which was to let. The porter, who had not seen him approach, was saying mysteriously to a neighbour:

"Pooh, pooh, waste of time. M. Maslon has promised him that he shall have it for three hundred francs; and, as the mayor kicked, he has been summoned to the bishop's palace by M. the Grand Vicar de Frilair."

Julien's arrival seemed very much to disconcert the two friends who did not say another word. Julien made a point of being present at the auction of the lease.

There was a crowd in the badly-lighted hall, but everybody kept quizzing each other in quite a singular way. All eyes were fixed on a table where Julien perceived three little lighted candle-ends on a tin plate. The usher was crying out "Three hundred francs, gentlemen."

"Three hundred francs, that's a bit too thick," said a man to his neighbour in a low voice. Julien was between the two of them. "It's worth more than eight hundred, I will raise the bidding," "It's cutting off your nose to spite your face. What will you gain by putting M. Maslon, M. Valenod, the Bishop, this terrible Grand Vicar de Frilair and the whole gang on your track."

"Three hundred and twenty francs," shouted out the other.

"Damned brute," answered his neighbour. "Why here we have a spy of the mayor," he added, designating Julien.

Julien turned sharply round to punish this remark, but the two, Franc-comtois, were no longer paying any attention to him. Their coolness gave him back his own. At that moment the last candle-end went out and the usher's drawling voice awarded the house to M. de St. Giraud of the office of the prefecture of —— for a term of nine years and for a rent of 320 francs.

As soon as the mayor had left the hall, the gossip began again.

"Here's thirty francs that Grogeot's recklessness is landing the municipality in for," said one—"But," answered another, "M. de Saint Giraud will revenge himself on Grogeot."

"How monstrous," said a big man on Julien's left. "A house which I myself would have given eight hundred francs for my factory, and I would have got a good bargain."

"Pooh!" answered a young manufacturer, "doesn't M. de St. Giraud belong to the congregation? Haven't his four children got scholarships? poor man! The community of Verrières must give him five hundred francs over and above his salary, that is all."

"And to say that the mayor was not able to stop it," remarked a third. "For he's an ultra he is, I'm glad to say, but he doesn't steal."

"Doesn't he?" answered another. "Suppose it's simply a mere game of 'snap' then. Everything goes into a big common purse, and everything is divided up at the end of the year. But here's that little Sorel, let's go away."

Julien got home in a very bad temper. He found Madame de Rênal very sad.

"You come from the auction?" she said to him.

"Yes, madam, where I had the honour of passing for a spy of M. the Mayor."

"If he had taken my advice, he would have gone on a journey."

At this moment Monsieur de Rênal appeared: he looked very dismal. The dinner passed without a single word. Monsieur de Rênal ordered Julien to follow the children to Vergy.

Madame de Rênal endeavoured to console her husband.

"You ought to be used to it, my dear."

That evening they were seated in silence around the domestic hearth. The crackle of the burnt pinewood was their only distraction. It was one of those moments of silence which happen in the most united families. One of the children cried out gaily,

"Somebody's ringing, somebody's ringing!"

"Zounds! supposing it's Monsieur de Saint Giraud who has come under the pretext of thanking me," exclaimed the mayor. "I will give him a dressing down. It is outrageous. It is Valenod to whom he'll feel under an obligation, and it is I who get compromised. What shall I say if those damned Jacobin journalists get hold of this anecdote, and turn me into a M. Nonante Cinque."

A very good-looking man, with big black whiskers, entered at this moment, preceded by the servant.

"Monsieur the mayor, I am Signor Geronimo. Here is a letter which M. the Chevalier de Beauvaisis, who is attached to the Embassy of Naples, gave me for you on my departure. That is only nine days ago, added Signor Geronimo, gaily looking at Madame de Rênal. Your cousin, and my good friend, Signor de Beauvaisis says that you know Italian, Madame."

The Neapolitan's good humour changed this gloomy evening into a very gay one. Madame de Rênal insisted upon giving him supper. She put the whole house on the go. She wanted to free Julien at any price from the imputation of espionage which she had heard already twice that day.

Signor Geronimo was an excellent singer, excellent company, and had very gay qualities which, at any rate in France, are hardly compatible with each other. After dinner he sang a little duet with Madame de Rênal, and told some charming tales. At one o'clock in the morning the children protested, when Julien suggested that they should go to bed.

"Another of those stories," said the eldest.

"It is my own, Signorino," answered Signor Geronimo.

"Eight years ago I was, like you, a young pupil of the Naples Conservatoire. I mean I was your age, but I did not have the honour to be the son of the distinguished mayor of the pretty town of Verrières." This phrase made M. de Rênal sigh, and look at his wife.

"Signor Zingarelli," continued the young singer, somewhat exaggerating his action, and thus making the children burst into laughter, "Signor Zingarelli was an excellent though severe master. He is not popular at the Conservatoire, but he insists on the pretence being kept up that he is. I went out as often as I could. I used to go to the little Theatre de San Carlino, where I used to hear divine music. But heavens! the question was to scrape together the eight sous which were the price of admission to the parterre? An enormous sum," he said, looking at the children and watching them laugh. "Signor Giovannone, director of the San Carlino, heard me sing. I was sixteen. 'That child is a treasure,' he said.

"'Would you like me to engage you, my dear boy?' he said.

"'And how much will you give me?'

"'Forty ducats a month.' That is one hundred and sixty francs, gentlemen. I thought the gates of heaven had opened.

"'But,' I said to Giovannone, 'how shall I get the strict Zingarelli to let me go out?'

" ' Lascia fare a me .'"

"Leave it to me," exclaimed the eldest of the children.

"Quite right, my young sir. Signor Giovannone he says to me, 'First sign this little piece of paper, my dear friend.' I sign.

"He gives me three ducats. I had never seen so much money. Then he told me what I had to do.

"Next day I asked the terrible Zingarelli for an audience. His old valet ushered me in.

"'What do you want of me, you naughty boy?' said Zingarelli.

"'Maestro,' I said, 'I repent of all my faults. I will never go out of the Conservatoire by passing through the iron grill. I will redouble my diligence.'

"'If I were not frightened of spoiling the finest bass voice I have ever heard, I would put you in prison for a fortnight on bread and water, you rascal.'

"'Maestro,' I answered, 'I will be the model boy of the whole school, credete a me , but I would ask one favour of you. If anyone comes and asks permission for me to sing outside, refuse. As a favour, please say that you cannot let me.'

"'And who the devil do you think is going to ask for a ne'er-do-well like you? Do you think I should ever allow you to leave the Conservatoire? Do you want to make fun of me? Clear out! Clear out!' he said, trying to give me a kick, 'or look out for prison and dry bread.'"

One thing astonished Julien. The solitary weeks passed at Verrières in de Rênal's house had been a period of happiness for him. He had only experienced revulsions and sad thoughts at the dinners to which he had been invited. And was he not able to read, write and reflect, without being distracted, in this solitary house? He was not distracted every moment from his brilliant reveries by the cruel necessity of studying the movement of a false soul in order to deceive it by intrigue and hypocrisy.

"To think of happiness being so near to me—the expense of a life like that is small enough. I could have my choice of either marrying Mademoiselle Elisa or of entering into partnership with Fouqué. But it is only the traveller who has just scaled a steep mountain and sits down on the summit who finds a perfect pleasure in resting. Would he be happy if he had to rest all the time?"

Madame de Rênal's mind had now reached a state of desperation. In spite of her resolutions, she had explained to Julien all the details of the auction. "He will make me forget all my oaths!" she thought.

She would have sacrificed her life without hesitation to save that of her husband if she had seen him in danger. She was one of those noble, romantic souls who find a source of perpetual remorse equal to that occasioned by the actual perpetration of a crime, in seeing the possibility of a generous action and not doing it. None the less, there were deadly days when she was not able to banish the imagination of the excessive happiness which she would enjoy if she suddenly became a widow, and were able to marry Julien.

He loved her sons much more than their father did; in spite of his strict justice they were devoted to him. She quite realised that if she married Julien, it would be necessary to leave that Vergy, whose shades were so dear to her. She pictured herself living at Paris, and continuing to give her sons an education which would make them admired by everyone. Her children, herself, and Julien! They would be all perfectly happy!

Strange result of marriage such as the nineteenth century has made it! The boredom of matrimonial life makes love fade away inevitably, when love has preceded the marriage. But none the less, said a philosopher, married life soon reduces those people who are sufficiently rich not to have to work, to a sense of being utterly bored by all quiet enjoyments. And among women, it is only arid souls whom it does not predispose to love.

The philosopher's reflection makes me excuse Madame de Rênal, but she was not excused in Verrières, and without her suspecting it, the whole town found its sole topic of interest in the scandal of her intrigue. As a result of this great affair, the autumn was less boring than usual.

The autumn and part of the winter passed very quickly. It was necessary to leave the woods of Vergy. Good Verrières society began to be indignant at the fact that its anathemas made so little impression on Monsieur de Rênal. Within eight days, several serious personages who made up for their habitual gravity of demeanour by their pleasure in fulfilling missions of this kind, gave him the most cruel suspicions, at the same time utilising the most measured terms.

M. Valenod, who was playing a deep game, had placed Elisa in an aristocratic family of great repute, where there were five women. Elisa, fearing, so she said, not to find a place during the winter, had only asked from this family about two-thirds of what she had received in the house of the mayor. The girl hit upon the excellent idea of going to confession at the same time to both the old curé Chélan, and also to the new one, so as to tell both of them in detail about Julien's amours.

The day after his arrival, the abbé Chélan summoned Julien to him at six o'clock in the morning.

"I ask you nothing," he said. "I beg you, and if needs be I insist, that you either leave for the Seminary of Besançon, or for your friend Fouqué, who is always ready to provide you with a splendid future. I have seen to everything and have arranged everything, but you must leave, and not come back to Verrières for a year."

Julien did not answer. He was considering whether his honour ought to regard itself offended at the trouble which Chélan, who, after all, was not his father, had taken on his behalf.

"I shall have the honour of seeing you again to-morrow at the same hour," he said finally to the curé.

Chélan, who reckoned on carrying so young a man by storm, talked a great deal. Julien, cloaked in the most complete humbleness, both of demeanour and expression, did not open his lips.

Eventually he left, and ran to warn Madame de Rênal whom he found in despair. Her husband had just spoken to her with a certain amount of frankness. The weakness of his character found support in the prospect of the legacy, and had decided him to treat her as perfectly innocent. He had just confessed to her the strange state in which he had found public opinion in Verrières. The public was wrong; it had been misled by jealous tongues. But, after all, what was one to do?

Madame de Rênal was, for the moment, under the illusion that Julien would accept the offer of Valenod and stay at Verrières. But she was no longer the simple, timid woman that she had been the preceding year. Her fatal passion and remorse had enlightened her. She soon realised the painful truth (while at the same time she listened to her husband), that at any rate a temporary separation had become essential.

When he is far from me, Julien will revert to those ambitious projects which are so natural when one has no money. And I, Great God! I am so rich, and my riches are so useless for my happiness. He will forget me. Loveable as he is, he will be loved, and he will love. You unhappy woman. What can I complain of? Heaven is just. I was not virtuous enough to leave off the crime. Fate robs me of my judgment. I could easily have bribed Elisa if I had wanted to; nothing was easier. I did not take the trouble to reflect for a moment. The mad imagination of love absorbed all my time. I am ruined.

When Julien apprised Madame de Rênal of the terrible news of his departure, he was struck with one thing. He did not find her put forward any selfish objections. She was evidently making efforts not to cry.

"We have need of firmness, my dear." She cut off a strand of her hair. "I do no know what I shall do," she said to him, "but promise me if I die, never to forget my children. Whether you are far or near, try to make them into honest men. If there is a new revolution, all the nobles will have their throats cut. Their father will probably emigrate, because of that peasant on the roof who got killed. Watch over my family. Give me your hand. Adieu, my dear. These are our last moments. Having made this great sacrifice, I hope I shall have the courage to consider my reputation in public."

Julien had been expecting despair. The simplicity of this farewell touched him.

"No, I am not going to receive your farewell like this. I will leave you now, as you yourself wish it. But three days after my departure I will come back to see you at night."

Madame de Rênal's life was changed. So Julien really loved her, since of his own accord he had thought of seeing her again. Her awful grief became changed into one of the keenest transports of joy which she had felt in her whole life. Everything became easy for her. The certainty of seeing her lover deprived these last moments of their poignancy. From that moment, both Madame de Rênal's demeanour and the expression of her face were noble, firm, and perfectly dignified.

M. de Rênal soon came back. He was beside himself. He eventually mentioned to his wife the anonymous letter which he had received two months before.

"I will take it to the Casino, and shew everybody that it has been sent by that brute Valenod, whom I took out of the gutter and made into one of the richest tradesmen in Verrières. I will disgrace him publicly, and then I will fight him. This is too much."

"Great Heavens! I may become a widow," thought Madame de Rênal, and almost at the same time she said to herself,

"If I do not, as I certainly can, prevent this duel, I shall be the murderess of my own husband."

She had never expended so much skill in honoring his vanity. Within two hours she made him see, and always by virtue of reasons which he discovered himself, that it was necessary to show more friendship than ever to M. Valenod, and even to take Elisa back into the household.

Madame de Rênal had need of courage to bring herself to see again the girl who was the cause of her unhappiness. But this idea was one of Julien's. Finally, having been put on the track three or four times, M. de Rênal arrived spontaneously at the conclusion, disagreeable though it was from the financial standpoint, that the most painful thing that could happen to him would be that Julien, in the middle of the effervescence of popular gossip throughout Verrières, should stay in the town as the tutor of Valenod's children. It was obviously to Julien's interest to accept the offer of the director of the workhouse. Conversely, it was essential for M. de Rênal's prestige that Julien should leave Verrières to enter the seminary of Besançon or that of Dijon. But how to make him decide on that course? And then how is he going to live?

M. de Rênal, seeing a monetary sacrifice looming in the distance, was in deeper despair than his wife. As for her, she felt after this interview in the position of a man of spirit who, tired of life, has taken a dose of stramonium. He only acts mechanically so to speak, and takes no longer any interest in anything. In this way, Louis XIV. came to say on his deathbed, "When I was king." An admirable epigram.

Next morning, M. de Rênal received quite early an anonymous letter. It was written in a most insulting style, and the coarsest words applicable to his position occurred on every line. It was the work of some jealous subordinate. This letter made him think again of fighting a duel with Valenod. Soon his courage went as far as the idea of immediate action. He left the house alone, went to the armourer's and got some pistols which he loaded.

"Yes, indeed," he said to himself, "even though the strict administration of the Emperor Napoleon were to become fashionable again, I should not have one sou's worth of jobbery to reproach myself with; at the outside, I have shut my eyes, and I have some good letters in my desk which authorise me to do so.

Madame de Rênal was terrified by her husband's cold anger. It recalled to her the fatal idea of widowhood which she had so much trouble in repelling. She closeted herself with him. For several hours she talked to him in vain. The new anonymous letter had decided him. Finally she succeeded in transforming the courage which had decided him to box Valenod's ears, into the courage of offering six hundred francs to Julien, which would keep him for one year in a seminary.

M. de Rênal cursed a thousand times the day that he had had the ill-starred idea of taking a tutor into his house, and forgot the anonymous letter.

He consoled himself a little by an idea which he did not tell his wife. With the exercise of some skill, and by exploiting the romantic ideas of the young man, he hoped to be able to induce him to refuse M. Valenod's offer at a cheaper price.

Madame de Rênal had much more trouble in proving to Julien that inasmuch as he was sacrificing the post of six hundred francs a year in order to enable her husband to keep up appearances, he need have no shame about accepting the compensation. But Julien would say each time, "I have never thought for a moment of accepting that offer. You have made me so used to a refined life that the coarseness of those people would kill me."

Cruel necessity bent Julien's will with its iron hand. His pride gave him the illusion that he only accepted the sum offered by M. de Rênal as a loan, and induced him to give him a promissory note, repayable in five years with interest.

Madame de Rênal had, of course, many thousands of francs which had been concealed in the little mountain cave.

She offered them to him all a tremble, feeling only too keenly that they would be angrily refused.

"Do you wish," said Julien to her, "to make the memory of our love loathsome?"

Finally Julien left Verrières. M. de Rênal was very happy, but when the fatal moment came to accept money from him the sacrifice proved beyond Julien's strength. He refused point blank. M. de Rênal embraced him around the neck with tears in his eyes. Julien had asked him for a testimonial of good conduct, and his enthusiasm could find no terms magnificent enough in which to extol his conduct.

Our hero had five louis of savings and he reckoned on asking Fouqué for an equal sum.

He was very moved. But one league from Verrières, where he left so much that was dear to him, he only thought of the happiness of seeing the capital of a great military town like Besançon.

During the short absence of three days, Madame de Rênal was the victim of one of the cruellest deceptions to which love is liable. Her life was tolerable, because between her and extreme unhappiness there was still that last interview which she was to have with Julien.

Finally during the night of the third day, she heard from a distance the preconcerted signal. Julien, having passed through a thousand dangers, appeared before her. In this moment she only had one thought—"I see him for the last time." Instead of answering the endearments of her lover, she seemed more dead than alive. If she forced herself to tell him that she loved him, she said it with an embarrassed air which almost proved the contrary. Nothing could rid her of the cruel idea of eternal separation. The suspicious Julien thought for the moment that he was already forgotten. His pointed remarks to this effect were only answered by great tears which flowed down in silence, and by some hysterical pressings of the hand.

"But," Julien would answer his mistress's cold protestations, "Great Heavens! How can you expect me to believe you? You would show one hundred times more sincere affection to Madame Derville to a mere acquaintance."

Madame de Rênal was petrified, and at a loss for an answer.

"It is impossible to be more unhappy. I hope I am going to die. I feel my heart turn to ice."

Those were the longest answers which he could obtain.

When the approach of day rendered it necessary for him to leave Madame de Rênal, her tears completely ceased. She saw him tie a knotted rope to the window without saying a word, and without returning her kisses. It was in vain that Julien said to her.

"So now we have reached the state of affairs which you wished for so much. Henceforward you will live without remorse. The slightest indisposition of your children will no longer make you see them in the tomb."

"I am sorry that you cannot kiss Stanislas," she said coldly.

Julien finished by being profoundly impressed by the cold embraces of this living corpse. He could think of nothing else for several leagues. His soul was overwhelmed, and before passing the mountain, and while he could still see the church tower of Verrierès he turned round frequently.

CHAPTER XXIV

A CAPITAL

What a noise, what busy people! What ideas for the future in a brain of twenty! What distraction offered by love.— Barnave.

Finally he saw some black walls near a distant mountain. It was the citadel of Besançon. "How different it would be for me," he said with a sigh, "if I were arriving at this noble military town to be sub-lieutenant in one of the regiments entrusted with its defence." Besançon is not only one of the prettiest towns in France, it abounds in people of spirit and brains. But Julien was only a little peasant, and had no means of approaching distinguished people.

He had taken a civilian suit at Fouqué's, and it was in this dress that he passed the drawbridge. Steeped as he was in the history of the siege of 1674, he wished to see the ramparts of the citadel before shutting himself up in the seminary. He was within an ace two or three times of getting himself arrested by the sentinel. He was penetrating into places which military genius forbids the public to enter, in order to sell twelve or fifteen francs worth of corn every year.

The height of the walls, the depth of the ditches, the terrible aspect of the cannons had been engrossing him for several hours when he passed before the great café on the boulevard. He was motionless with wonder; it was in vain that he read the word caf , written in big characters above the two immense doors. He could not believe his eyes. He made an effort to overcome his timidity. He dared to enter, and found himself in a hall twenty or thirty yards long, and with a ceiling at least twenty feet high. To-day, everything had a fascination for him.

Two games of billiards were in progress. The waiters were crying out the scores. The players ran round the tables encumbered by spectators. Clouds of tobacco smoke came from everybody's mouth, and enveloped them in a blue haze. The high stature of these men, their rounded shoulders, their heavy gait, their enormous whiskers, the long tailed coats which covered them, everything combined to attract Julien's attention. These noble childen of the antique Bisontium only spoke at the top of their voice. They gave themselves terrible martial airs. Julien stood still and admired them. He kept thinking of the immensity and magnificence of a great capital like Besançon. He felt absolutely devoid of the requisite courage to ask one of those haughty looking gentlemen, who were crying out the billiard scores, for a cup of coffee.

But the young lady at the bar had noticed the charming face of this young civilian from the country, who had stopped three feet from the stove with his little parcel under his arm, and was looking at the fine white plaster bust of the king. This young lady, a big Franc-comtoise , very well made, and dressed with the elegance suitable to the prestige of the cafe, had already said two or three times in a little voice not intended to be heard by any one except Julien, "Monsieur, Monsieur." Julien's eyes encountered big blue eyes full of tenderness, and saw that he was the person who was being spoken to.

He sharply approached the bar and the pretty girl, as though he had been marching towards the enemy. In this great manœuvre the parcel fell.

What pity will not our provincial inspire in the young lycée scholars of Paris, who, at the early age of fifteen, know already how to enter a café with so distinguished an air? But these children who have such style at fifteen turn commonplace at eighteen. The impassioned timidity which is met with in the provinces, sometimes manages to master its own nervousness, and thus trains the will. "I must tell her the truth," thought Julien, who was becoming courageous by dint of conquering his timidity as he approached this pretty girl, who deigned to address him.

"Madame, this is the first time in my life that I have come to Besançon. I should like to have some bread and a cup of coffee in return for payment."

The young lady smiled a little, and then blushed. She feared the ironic attention and the jests of the billiard players might be turned against this pretty young man. He would be frightened and would not appear there again.

"Sit here near me," she said to him, showing him a marble table almost completely hidden by the enormous mahogany counter which extended into the hall.

The young lady leant over the counter, and had thus an opportunity of displaying a superb figure. Julien noticed it. All his ideas changed. The pretty young lady had just placed before him a cup, some sugar, and a little roll. She hesitated to call a waiter for the coffee, as she realised that his arrival would put an end to her tete-a-tete with Julien.

Julien was pensively comparing this blonde and merry beauty with certain memories which would often thrill him. The thought of the passion of which he had been the object, nearly freed him from all his timidity. The pretty young woman had only one moment to save the situation. She read it in Julien's looks.

"This pipe smoke makes you cough; come and have breakfast to-morrow before eight o'clock in the morning. I am practically alone then."

"What is your name?" said Julien, with the caressing smile of happy timidity.

"Amanda Binet."

"Will you allow me to send you within an hour's time a little parcel about as big as this?"

The beautiful Amanda reflected a little.

"I am watched. What you ask may compromise me. All the same, I will write my address on a card, which you will put on your parcel. Send it boldly to me."

"My name is Julien Sorel," said the young man. "I have neither relatives nor acquaintances at Besançon."

"Ah, I understand," she said joyfully. "You come to study law."

"Alas, no," answered Julien, "I am being sent to the Seminary."

The most complete discouragement damped Amanda's features. She called a waiter. She had courage now. The waiter poured out some coffee for Julien without looking at him.

Amanda was receiving money at the counter. Julien was proud of having dared to speak: a dispute was going on at one of the billiard tables. The cries and the protests of the players resounded over the immense hall, and made a din which astonished Julien. Amanda was dreamy, and kept her eyes lowered.

"If you like, Mademoiselle," he said to her suddenly with assurance, "I will say that I am your cousin."

This little air of authority pleased Amanda. "He's not a mere nobody," she thought. She spoke to him very quickly, without looking at him, because her eye was occupied in seeing if anybody was coming near the counter.

"I come from Genlis, near Dijon. Say that you are also from Genlis and are my mother's cousin."

"I shall not fail to do so."

"All the gentlemen who go to the Seminary pass here before the café every Thursday in the summer at five o'clock."

"If you think of me when I am passing, have a bunch of violets in your hand."

Amanda looked at him with an astonished air. This look changed Julien's courage into audacity. Nevertheless, he reddened considerably, as he said to her. "I feel that I love you with the most violent love."

"Speak in lower tones," she said to him with a frightened air.

Julien was trying to recollect phrases out of a volume of the Nouvelle Heloise which he had found at Vergy. His memory served him in good stead. For ten minutes he recited the Nouville Héloise to the delighted Mademoiselle Amanda. He was happy on the strength of his own bravery, when suddenly the beautiful Franc-contoise assumed an icy air. One of her lovers had appeared at the cafe door. He approached the bar, whistling, and swaggering his shoulders. He looked at Julien. The latter's imagination, which always indulged in extremes, suddenly brimmed over with ideas of a duel. He paled greatly, put down his cup, assumed an assured demeanour, and considered his rival very attentively. As this rival lowered his head, while he familiarly poured out on the counter a glass of brandy for himself, Amanda ordered Julien with a look to lower his eyes. He obeyed, and for two minutes kept motionless in his place, pale, resolute, and only thinking of what was going to happen. He was truly happy at this moment. The rival had been astonished by Julien's eyes. Gulping down his glass of brandy, he said a few words to Amanda, placed his two hands in the pockets of his big tail coat, and approached the billiard table, whistling, and looking at Julien. The latter got up transported with rage, but he did not know what to do in order to be offensive. He put down his little parcel, and walked towards the billiard table with all the swagger he could muster.

It was in vain that prudence said to him, "but your ecclesiastical career will be ruined by a duel immediately on top of your arrival at Besançon."

"What does it matter. It shall never be said that I let an insolent fellow go scot free."

Amanda saw his courage. It contrasted prettily with the simplicity of his manners. She instantly preferred him to the big young man with the tail coat. She got up, and while appearing to be following with her eye somebody who was passing in the street, she went and quickly placed herself between him and the billiard table.

"Take care not to look askance at that gentleman. He is my brother-in-law."

"What does it matter? He looked at me."

"Do you want to make me unhappy? No doubt he looked at you, why it may be he is going to speak to you. I told him that you were a relative of my mother, and that you had arrived from Genlis. He is a Franc-contois, and has never gone beyond Dôleon the Burgundy Road, so say what you like and fear nothing."

Julien was still hesitating. Her barmaid's imagination furnished her with an abundance of lies, and she quickly added.

"No doubt he looked at you, but it was at a moment when he was asking me who you were. He is a man who is boorish with everyone. He did not mean to insult you."

Julien's eye followed the pretended brother-in-law. He saw him buy a ticket for the pool, which they were playing at the further of the two billiard tables. Julien heard his loud voice shouting out in a threatening tone, "My turn to play."

He passed sharply before Madame Amanda, and took a step towards the billiard table. Amanda seized him by the arm.