Paris in the Twentieth Century (20 page)

And
he was right! What would he have done? Sink to the Division of Operas and
Operettas? Yet he would never have consented to write the mindless verses which
the musicians of his day required. And if he sank even further to review, to
pantomimes, to official occasions!

But
it would be better to be a scene shifter or a painter, and not a dramatic
author, producing new stage sets, and nothing else! A great deal in this kind
had already been accomplished, what with the advances in machinery—real trees
rooted in their invisible crates had been brought onstage, whole flowerbeds,
natural forests, and entire structures of stone were built in a few seconds.
The ocean was represented with real sea- water, emptied each evening before the
audience's eyes and renewed the next day!

Did
Michel feel capable of conceiving of such things? Did he have it in him to
influence audiences, compelling them to leave the contents of their
pocket-books in the theaters' coffers? No, a thousand times no! There was only
one thing he could do, clear out of the place. And this he did.

During
his time at the Grand Entrepôt Dramatique, from April to September, five long
months of disappointments and disgust, Michel had not neglected his Uncle
Huguenin nor his Professor Richelot.

How
many evenings were spent with one or the other, which he counted among the best
of his life; with the professor he spoke of the bibliophile; with the
bibliophile he spoke not of the professor but of his granddaughter Lucy, and in
what terms, with what sentiments!

"I
have rather poor eyesight, " his uncle remarked to him one evening,
"but I do discern, I believe, that you are in love with her!"

"Yes,
Uncle, madly in love!"

"Love
her like a madman, if you like, but marry her like a wise man, when..."

"When...
?" Michel asked, trembling.

"When
your position in life enables you to do so; succeed for her sake, if not for
yours!" To these words Michel made no reply but managed to conceal his
rage.

"But
does Lucy love you?" his uncle asked him on another evening.

"I
don't know, " Michel answered. "How could I have any value in her
eyes? There's really no reason on earth for her to love me!" And the
evening this question was put to him, Michel appeared to be the most wretched
man on earth.

Yet
the girl never once wondered whether or not this poor boy had a position in
life! It never even occurred to her to wonder; gradually she grew accustomed
to seeing Michel, to hearing him talk, to expecting him when he didn't come;
the two young people spoke of everything under the sun, and the two old men put
no obstacle in their way: why keep them from loving each other? They never
talked of their love. They spoke of the future. Michel dared not broach the
burning question of the present.

"How
I'll love you someday, " he would say, with a nuance which Lucy
understood, a question of time which was not to be answered.

Then
the young man flung himself into all his poetical conceptions; he knew he was
heard, was understood, and forthwith poured his every aspiration into this young
girl's heart. He was truly himself when he was beside her; yet he wrote no
verses to Lucy; he was incapable of that, for he loved her too authentically;
he understood neither the affiliation of love and rhyme nor the possibility of
subjugating his feelings to the requirements of a caesura.

Yet,
unbeknownst to him, his poetry was impregnated with his dearest thoughts, and
when he recited verses to Lucy, she listened as if she had written them
herself; they seemed to respond to some secret question which she dared ask no
one.

One
evening Michel, looking at her carefully, said: "The day is coming. "

"What
day?"

"The
day when I'll love you. "

"Oh!"

And
on other occasions, from time to time, he would repeat: "The day is
coming. " Finally, one fine August evening: "It's come, " he
said, taking her hand. "The day when you'll love me, " she murmured.
"The day when I love you, " Michel answered. When Uncle Huguenin and
Monsieur Richelot realized that the young people had reached this page of the
book, they intervened.

"You
have read far enough, children; close the book. And you, Michel, now you must
work for two. "

There
was no other engagement party.

In
this situation, as will be readily understood, Michel did not speak of his
disappointments. When asked how things were going at the Grand Entrepôt
Dramatique, he would answer evasively. This was not a satisfactory state of
affairs; reality would have to be faced, and he had not yet acquired the habit.

The
old men saw no more than this; Lucy divined Michel's sufferings and encouraged
him as best she could; but she showed a certain reserve herself, being one of
the interested parties in the matter.

Imagine
then the young man's profound discouragement, his veritable despair when he
found himself once more at the mercy of chance! There came a terrible moment
when existence appeared to him in its true aspect, with all its fatigue, its
disappointment, its irony. He felt poorer, unworthier, more useless than ever.
"What is there for me to do in this world, " he agonized, "where
I've not even been invited! I must leave!" The thought of Lucy held him.
He went to see Quinsonnas, finding him packing a pathetically tiny trunk.
Michel described his situation.

"I'm
not surprised, " Quinsonnas replied. "You aren't made for grand-scale
collaborations. What are you going to do?"

"Work
on my own. "

"Aha!"
the pianist responded. "Then you'll stick it out?"

"We'll
see. But where are you going, Quinsonnas?"

"I'm
leaving. "

"Leaving
Paris?"

"Yes,
and more than that. It's not in France that French reputations are made today;
it's foreign products we import, so I'm going to get myself imported. "

"But
where are you going?"

"To
Germany, to stir up those beer drinkers and pipe smokers. You'll hear about
me!"

"And
you still have your Secret Means?"

"Oh
yes. But what about you? You're going to fling yourself into the struggle for
existence, which is a good thing. Have you any money?"

"A
few hundred francs. "

"Not
much at all. Now here's a thought—you can have my place: the rent is paid for
the next three months. "

"But..."

"I'd
lose it if you didn't take it. I have a thousand francs saved up. Let's divide
it. "

"Never!"

"Don't
be stupid, my boy—I ought to give it all to you, and I'm dividing it. That's
another five hundred francs I owe you."

"Quinsonnas...,"
Michel stammered, tears in his eyes.

"Tears!
Well, why not? It's the obligatory stage business for a departure. Calm
yourself—I'll be back. All right, give us a hug!"

Michel
flung himself into the arms of his friend, who had promised himself he would
not be moved, and who fled in order not to break his promise. Michel remained
alone. At first he was determined to inform no one of the change in his
situation, neither his uncle nor Lucy's grandfather. There was no use burdening
them with this additional worry. "I'll work, I'll write, " he
repeated, in order to harden his resolve. "Others have struggled, when an
intransigent age refused to believe in them. We'll see!"

The
next day he carried his few possessions to his friend's room and settled down
to work. It was his hope to publish a book of useless but splendid poems, and
he worked unremittingly, virtually fasting, thinking and dreaming, and
sleeping only to dream some more. He heard nothing further about the
Boutardins; he avoided streets where he would be likely to meet any of them,
imagining that they might attempt to take him back! His guardian never gave him
a thought, glad to be rid of a burdensome fool. Michel's only happiness,
whenever he left his room, was to visit Monsieur

Richelot.
He emerged for no other purpose but came to his old professor's in order to
steep himself in the contemplation of the girl, to drink from this inexhaustible
spring of poetry. How he loved her! and, it must be confessed, how he was
loved! This sentiment filled his existence, nor did he realize that anything
else would be necessary in order to live. And yet his resources gradually
melted away, though he paid no heed. A visit to the old professor in the middle
of October greatly distressed him; he found Lucy sad and sought the reason for
her melancholy.

Classes
had begun again at the Academic Credit Union; the subject of rhetoric had not
been eliminated, it was true, but the end was approaching; Monsieur Richelot
had only one student, and if he were to withdraw, what would become of the
impoverished old professor? Yet just such an eventuality might occur from one
day to the next, and the professor of rhetoric be dismissed. "I'm not
concerned for myself, " Lucy said, "but I am worried about poor
Grandfather!"

"I'll
be here, won't I?" Michel declared, but he spoke with so little conviction
that Lucy dared not look at him. Michel felt a blush of helplessness rising to
his face. And when he was alone: "I promised to be there— if only I can
keep my promise! Onward—to work!" And he returned to his room.

Many
days passed; many fine notions blossomed in the young man's brain and assumed
delightful forms under his pen. Finally his book was done, if such a book can
ever be said to be done. He entitled the poems
Hopes,
and
indeed his pride required all his poetry in order still to hope.

Then
Michel began his great siege of the publishers; it is unnecessary to report
the predictable scene which followed each of these harebrained attempts; not
one publisher consented even to read his book; such was all his payment for his
paper, his ink, and his
Hopes.

He
returned in despair; his savings were dwindling to nothing; he thought of his
professor; he sought manual labor, but everywhere machines were advantageously
replacing human hands; there were no further resources; in another day and age,
he might have sold his skin to some rich boy who wished to avoid conscription;
such transactions were no longer possible.

December
arrived, the month when everything fell due, cold, mournful, dark, the month
which ends the year but not one's sufferings, the month which is generally
unwanted in most existences. The most terrifying word in the French language,
misère
,
was inscribed on
Michel's forehead. His shirts yellowed and gradually fell to pieces, like
leaves from the trees at the beginning of winter, and there was no spring to
make them grow again. He grew ashamed of himself; his visits to the professor
became less frequent, and to his uncle as well; he reeked of poverty; he offered
as excuses important work, even absences from the city; he would have inspired
pity, if pity had not been banished from the earth in this selfish age.

The
winter of 1961-62 was particularly harsh; worse than those of 1789, of 1813,
and 1829 for its rigor and length. In Paris, the cold set in on November 15,
and the freeze continued uninterrupted until February 28; the snow reached a
depth of seventy-five centimeters, and the ice in ponds and on several rivers
a thickness of seventy centimeters; for fifteen days the thermometer fell to
twenty-three degrees below freezing. The Seine froze over for forty-two days,
and shipping was entirely interrupted.

This
terrible cold spell was widespread in France and in much of Europe; the Rhone,
the Garonne, the Loire, and the Rhine were covered with ice, the Thames frozen
as far as Gravesend, six leagues below London; the port of Ostend presented a
solid surface which wagons could cross, and carriages traversed the Great Belt
on the ice.

The
winter's rigors reached as far as Italy, where the snow lay thick on the
ground, and Lisbon, where the freeze lasted four weeks, and Constantinople,
which was completely snowbound. The extension of these low temperatures had
disastrous consequences; a great number of persons died of the cold; it became
necessary to suspend all police service; people were attacked nightly in the
streets. Carriages could no longer circulate, train service was irregular, and
not only did the snow impede movement but it was impossible for the engineers
to remain on their locomotives without being mortally stricken by the cold.