Taking the Bastile (57 page)

As Sebastian, on the contrary, ate little or nothing as he did not speak at all as he was a pale and sickly-looking youth, every one who felt interested in Sebastian, admired the vigilant and paternal care of Pitou towards him, who caressed, cosseted, attended on the boy, and, into the bargain, ate his part of the dinners, without seeming to have any other motive than that of being agreeable to him.

When they arrived at Vauciennes, Pitou appeared to hesitate; ho looked at Sebastian, Sebastian looked at Pitou. Pitou scratched his head. This was his mode of expressing his embarrassment. Sebastian knew enough of Pitou to be aware of this peculiarity.

‘Well, what is the matter, Pi ton?’ asked Sebastian.

‘The matter is, that if it were the same thing to you, and if you were not too tired, instead of continuing our way straight on, we would return to Villers-Cotterfits through Haramont.’

Sebastian at once understood him.

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‘Ah! yes,’ said he, ‘it was there our poor mother, Pitou, died.’

‘Come, my brother, come.’

Pitou pressed Sebastian to his heart with an energy that almost suffocated him, and taking the boy’s hand, he began running down the cross-road, which leads along the valley of Wuala, and so rapidly that, after going a hundred paces, poor Sebastian was completely out of breath, and was obliged to say, ‘Too fast, Pitou, too fast.’

Pitou stopped; he had not perceived that he was going too fast, it being his usual pace. He saw that Sebastian was pale and put of breath. He took him on his shoulders and carried him.

As it was not tho first time that Pitou had carried Sebastian, Sebastian made no objection.

They thus reached Largny. There Sebastian, feeling that Pitou was panting, declared that he had rested long enough, and that he was ready to walk at any pace that might suit Pitou.

Half an hour after this, Pitou was at the entrance of Haramont. They advanced towards the cottage in which Pitou had been born, in which Sebastian had been nursed. Pitou knew every stone in Haramont, and yet he could not find the cottage. He was obliged to inquire what had become of it, and the person he applied to showed him a small house built of stone, with a slated roof. The garden of this house was surrounded by a wall. Aunt Angelique had sold her sister’s house, and the new proprietor, having full right to do so, had pulled down everything the old walls, which had again become dust the old door with a hole cut in it to allow ingress to the cat the old windows, with their panes half glass, half paper, upon which had appeared in strokes the elementary lessons Pitou had received In writing the thatched roof with its green moss, and the plants which had grown and blossomed on its summit. The gate was closed, and lying on the threshold was a big black dog, who showed his teeth to Pitou.

‘Come,’ said Pitou, the tears starting from his eyes; ‘let us begone, Sebastian. Let us go to a place where at least I am sure that nothing will have changed.’

And Pitou dragged Sebastian to the cemetery where his mother had been buried. He was right, the poor boy I There, nothing had been changed; only the grass had grown it grows so rapidly in cemeteries that there was

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some chance oven that he would not be able to recognise his mother’s grave. Fortunately, at the sarnie time that the grass had grown, a branch of a weeping-willow which Pitou had planted, had, in three years become a tree. He went straight to the tree and kissed the earth which it overshadowed. When he rose from the ground, he felt the branches of the willow, agitated by the wind, waving around his head. He then stretched out his arms, and clasping th branches, pressed them to his heart. The two youths remained a considerable time by the side of this grave, and evening was approaching. It was necessary that they should leave it, the only thing that appeared to have any remembrance of Pitou. He again kissed the ground, took Sebastian by the hand, and left the cemetery. All the inhabitants of the village were either in the fields or in the woods; few persons, therefore, had seen Pitou; and disguised as he was by his helmet and his long sabre, among those persons no one had recognised him. He therefore took the road to Villers-Cotterfits, a delightful road which runs through the forest for nearly three-quarters of a league without meeting any living or animated object to divert his grief. Sebastian followed, mute and pensive as himself. They arrived at Villers-Cotter ts at about five in the afternoon.

PITOU arrived at Villers-CotterSts by that part of the park which is called the Pheasantry. He walked across the dancing place, always abandoned during the week, and to which he had three weeks previously conducted Catherine. What a number of things had happened to Pitou and to France during those three weeks 1 Then, having followed the long avenue of chestnut-trees, he reached the square before the chateau, and knocked at the back door of the college presided over by the Abbe Fortier. It was full three years since Pitou had left Haramont, while it was only three weeks since he had left Villers-Cotterftta. It was therefore very natural that he should not have been recognised at Haramont, and that he should have been recognised at Viller-Cotterets. In a moment a rumour ran through the town that Pitou had

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returned there with young Sebastian Gilbert; that both oi them had gone into the house of the Abbe Fortier; that Sebastian looked much the same as when he had left them, but that Pitou had a helmet and a long sword.

The result of this was that a great crowd had assembled at the principal gate : for they calculated that if Pitou had gone into the chateau by the small private door, he would come out of it by the great gate in the Rue de Soissona. This was his direct road for going to the Pleux.

Pitou remained at the Abbe Fortier’s only long enough to deliver into the hands of the abbe’s sister the letter from the doctor, the young lad himself, and five double louis destined to pay his board. The Abbe Fortier had gone out with his pupils to give them a walk.

The Abb6 Fortier’s sister was at first much terrified when sh aaw so formidable a soldier advancing through the garden; but soon, beneath the dragoon’s helmet, she recognised the placid and honest face of Pitou, which somewhat tranquilhscd her. And finally, the sight of the five double louis reassured her altogether.

Pitou, after having delivered the letter and the five double louis, embraced Sebastian, and left the house, clapping his helmet on his head with due military bravado.

Sebastian had shed some tears on separating from Pitou, although the separation was not to be of long duration, and notwithstanding that his society was not exceedingly amusing; but his hilarity, his mildness, had touched the heart of young Gilbert. There was one thing which diminished Sebastian’s grief, which was that Pitou promised that he would often go to see him. One thing diminished Pitou ‘s regret, and this was that Sebastian thanked him for his promise.

But now let us for a while follow our hero from the house of the Abbe Fortier to that of his Aunt Angelique. On leaving the Abb6 Fortier’s house, Pitou found some twenty persons who were waiting for him. Hia strange equipment, a description of which had been given throughout the town, was in part known to those assembled. On seeing him thus return from Paris, where so much fighting was going on, they presumed that Pitou had been fighting too, and they wished to hear the news. This news Pitou communicated with his accustomed majesty the taking of the Bastille, the exploits of M. Billot ana: of M. MailJard, oi Messieurs Elie and Hullin; how Billot had

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fallen into the ditch of the fortress, and how he, Pitou, had dragged him out of it; finally, how they had saved M. Gilbert, who during six or seven days had been one of the prisoners confined there. The auditors already knew most of the details that Pitou had related to them; but they had read all these details in the newspapers of the day, and however faithful the editor of a newspaper may be in hi* writings, he always knows less than an ocular witness who relates the incidents.

The result of all this was that in about an hour’s conversation at the door of the Abbi Fortier, in which he gave a succinct narrative, the Rue de Soissons was crowded with auditors, when one of the persons present, observing some signs of anxiety in Pitou’s countenance, took upon himself to say :

‘But he is fatigued, poor Pitou, and w are keeping him here upon his legs instead of allowing him to go to his Aunt Angelique’* house, poor dear woman, who will be fo delighted at seeing him again.’

‘It is not that I am fatigued,’ said Pitou, ‘but that I am hungry. I have never been fatigued, but I am always hungry.

Then, and in consequence of this ingenuous declaration, the crowd, who highly respected the cravings of Pitou’s stomach, respectfully made way for him to pass, and Pitou, followed by some persons more inveterately curious than the rest, was permitted to wend hi* way to the Pleux that is to say, to the house of hi* Aunt Angelique. Aunt Axigelique was not at home; she had gone doubtless to visit some neighbours, and the door was locked. Several person* then invited Pitou to go to their houses and take the nourishment he stood in need of; but Pitou proudly-refused.

‘But.’ said they to him ‘you see, dear Pitou, that your aunt’s door is locked.’

‘The door of an aunt cannot remain locked before an obedient and hungry nephew,’ said Pitou majestically.

Drawing his long sabre, the sight of which made men and children start back with affright, he introduced the point of it between the bolt and the staple of the lock, gave a vigorous jerk, and the door new open, to the great admiration of all present, who no longer doubted the great exploits of Pitou, since they saw him with so much audacity expose himself to the anger of the ill-tempered old maid.

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We have said that Pitou was hungry, so hungry that it had been perceived by the change in his countenance. Therefore he lost no time; he went straight to the kneading-trough and cupboard. In former times we say former times, although scarcely three weeks had elapsed since Pitou’s departure; for, in our opinion, time is to be measured, not by its duration, but by the events which have occurred m^former times, Pitou, unless urged on by the evil spirit, or by irresistible hunger, both of them infernal powers, and which much resemble each other in former times Pitou would have seated himself upon the threshold of the closed door, and humbly waited the return of Aunt Angelique; when she had returned, would have bowed to her with a soft smile; then, standing aside, would have made room for her to pass, would have followed her into the house, would have gone for a loaf and a knife that she might measure out his portion to him; then, his share being cut off, he would have cast a longing eye, a single look, tearful and magnetic he thought it so at least magnetic to such a degree as to call forth the cheese or any other dainty from the shelf of the cupboard.

But now Pitou, having become a man, no longer acted thus : he tranquilly raised the lid of the bread-trough, drew from his pocket his long clasp-knife, took the loaf and angularly cut off a slice which might have weighed a good two pounds.

Then he let fall the loaf into the trough again, and the cover on the trough.

After which, without allowing his equanimity to be at all disturbed, he went to the cupboard. At the time when Pitou was one of the household, the avaricious aunt would provide only viands of a coarse description, such as Marolles cheese, or thin slices of highly-salted bacon, surrounded by the verdant leaves of an enormous cabbage; but since this fabulous devourer had left the country, the aunt, in despite of her avarice, would cook up for herself dishes that would last her a whole week, but which were of a much more succulent description. Sometimes it would be a good piece of beef a-la-mode, surrounded by carrots and onions, stewed in the gravy; sometimes a haricot of mutton with savoury potatoes, big as a child’s head, or long as cucumbers; sometimes a calf’s foot, flavoured with some ghalots in vinegar, to give it more piquancy; sometimes it was a gigantic omelet made in the great frying-pan and

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variegated with a quantity of chives and parsley, or enamelled with slices of bacon, one of which sufficed for the dinner of the old woman, even on the days when she had the greatest appetite.

Pitou was in great good luck. He had fallen upon a day when Aunt Angelique had cooked an old cock with rice, which had boiled so long, surrounded with its bland covering of paste, that the bones had left the flesh, and the flesh haa become almost tender. Pitou had not even the courtesy to utter one word of admiration on seeing this great marvel. Spoiled by good living, he forgot, the ungrateful fellow 1 that such magnificence had never until then inhabited the cupboard of Aunt Angelique. He held his great hunch of bread in his right hand. He seized the vast dish in his left, and held it in equilibrium by the pressure of his immense square thumb, buried as far as the first joint in the unctuous mess, the odour of which was grateful to his olfactory organs.

At this moment it appeared to Pitou that a shadow interposed between the fight of the doorway and himself. PO turned round smiling, for Pitou’s was one of those artless dispositions whose faces always give evidence of the satisfaction of their hearts. The shadow was the body of Aunt Angelique. In former times, at the sight of Aunt Angelique, Pitou would have let fall the dish, and while Aunt Angelique would have bent forward in despair to pick up the fragments of her fowl and the grains of rice, he would have bounded over her head, and would have taken to his heels, carrying off his bread under his arm. But Pitou was no longer the same; his helmet and his sabre had less changed him, physically speaking, than his having associated with the great philosophers of the day had changed him morally. Instead of flying terrified from his aunt, he approached her with a gracious smile, opened wide his arms, and, although she endeavoured to escape the pressure, embraced her with all his might, squeezing the old maid so energetically to his breast, while his hands, the one loaded with the dish containing the fowl and rice, and the other with the bread and knife, were crossed behind her back,