第 17 页

grandiose magnificence, at that hour of vagueness, when falling night

imparts to cities a dreamy semblance, the infinite of human immensity.

Motionless and hesitating in presence of the opening expanse, Pierre

distressfully pondered as to whither he should go now that all which he

had so passionately sought to achieve since the morning had suddenly

crumbled away. Was he still bound for the Duvillard mansion in the Rue

Godot-de-Mauroy? He no longer knew. Then the exasperating remembrance,

with its cruel irony, returned to him. Since Laveuve was dead, of what

use was it for him to kill time and perambulate the pavements pending the

arrival of six o'clock? The idea that he had a home, and that the most

simple course would be to return to it, did not even occur to him. He

felt as if there were something of importance left for him to do, though

he could not possibly tell what it might be. It seemed to him to be

everywhere and yet very far away, to be so vague and so difficult of

accomplishment that he would certainly never be in time or have

sufficient power to do it. However, with heavy feet and tumultuous brain

he descended the steps and, yielding to some obstinate impulse, began to

walk through the flower-market, a late winter market where the first

azaleas were opening with a little shiver. Some women were purchasing

Nice roses and violets; and Pierre looked at them as if he were

interested in all that soft, delicate, perfumed luxury. But suddenly he

felt a horror of it and went off, starting along the Boulevards.

He walked straight before him without knowing why or whither. The falling

darkness surprised him as if it were an unexpected phenomenon. Raising

his eyes to the sky he felt astonished at seeing its azure gently pale

between the slender black streaks of the chimney funnels. And the huge

golden letters by which names or trades were advertised on every balcony

also seemed to him singular in the last gleams of the daylight. Never

before had he paid attention to the motley tints seen on the

house-fronts, the painted mirrors, the blinds, the coats of arms, the

posters of violent hues, the magnificent shops, like drawing-rooms and

boudoirs open to the full light. And then, both in the roadway and along

the foot-pavements, between the blue, red or yellow columns and kiosks,

what mighty traffic there was, what an extraordinary crowd! The vehicles

rolled along in a thundering stream: on all sides billows of cabs were

parted by the ponderous tacking of huge omnibuses, which suggested lofty,

bright-hued battle-ships. And on either hand, and farther and farther,

and even among the wheels, the flood of passengers rushed on incessantly,

with the conquering haste of ants in a state of revolution. Whence came

all those people, and whither were all those vehicles going? How

stupefying and torturing it all was.

Pierre was still walking straight ahead, mechanically, carried on by his

gloomy reverie. Night was coming, the first gas-burners were being

lighted; it was the dusk of Paris, the hour when real darkness has not

yet come, when the electric lights flame in the dying day. Lamps shone

forth on all sides, the shop-fronts were being illumined. Soon, moreover,

right along the Boulevards the vehicles would carry their vivid starry

lights, like a milky way on the march betwixt the foot-pavements all

glowing with lanterns and cordons and girandoles, a dazzling profusion of

radiance akin to sunlight. And the shouts of the drivers and the jostling

of the foot passengers re-echoed the parting haste of the Paris which is

all business or passion, which is absorbed in the merciless struggle for

love and for money. The hard day was over, and now the Paris of Pleasure

was lighting up for its night of _fete_. The cafes, the wine shops, the

restaurants, flared and displayed their bright metal bars, and their

little white tables behind their clear and lofty windows, whilst near

their doors, by way of temptation, were oysters and choice fruits. And

the Paris which was thus awaking with the first flashes of the gas was

already full of the gaiety of enjoyment, already yielding to an unbridled

appetite for whatsoever may be purchased.

However, Pierre had a narrow escape from being knocked down. A flock of

newspaper hawkers came out of a side street, and darted through the crowd

shouting the titles of the evening journals. A fresh edition of the "Voix

du Peuple" gave rise, in particular, to a deafening clamour, which rose

above all the rumbling of wheels. At regular intervals hoarse voices

raised and repeated the cry: "Ask for the 'Voix du Peuple'--the new

scandal of the African Railway Lines, the repulse of the ministry, the

thirty-two bribe-takers of the Chamber and the Senate!" And these

announcements, set in huge type, could be read on the copies of the

paper, which the hawkers flourished like banners. Accustomed as it was to

such filth, saturated with infamy, the crowd continued on its way without

paying much attention. Still a few men paused and bought the paper, while

painted women, who had come down to the Boulevards in search of a dinner,

trailed their skirts and waited for some chance lover, glancing

interrogatively at the outside customers of the cafes. And meantime the

dishonouring shout of the newspaper hawkers, that cry in which there was

both smirch and buffet, seemed like the last knell of the day, ringing

the nation's funeral at the outset of the night of pleasure which was

beginning.

Then Pierre once more remembered his morning and that frightful house in

the Rue des Saules, where so much want and suffering were heaped up. He

again saw the yard filthy like a quagmire, the evil-smelling staircases,

the sordid, bare, icy rooms, the families fighting for messes which even

stray dogs would not have eaten; the mothers, with exhausted breasts,

carrying screaming children to and fro; the old men who fell in corners

like brute beasts, and died of hunger amidst filth. And then came his

other hours with the magnificence or the quietude or the gaiety of the

_salons_ through which he had passed, the whole insolent display of

financial Paris, and political Paris, and society Paris. And at last he

came to the dusk, and to that Paris-Sodom and Paris-Gomorrah before him,

which was lighting itself up for the night, for the abominations of that

accomplice night which, like fine dust, was little by little submerging

the expanse of roofs. And the hateful monstrosity of it all howled aloud

under the pale sky where the first pure, twinkling stars were gleaming.

A great shudder came upon Pierre as he thought of all that mass of

iniquity and suffering, of all that went on below amid want and crime,

and all that went on above amid wealth and vice. The _bourgeoisie_,

wielding power, would relinquish naught of the sovereignty which it had

conquered, wholly stolen, while the people, the eternal dupe, silent so

long, clenched its fists and growled, claiming its legitimate share. And

it was that frightful injustice which filled the growing gloom with

anger. From what dark-breasted cloud would the thunderbolt fall? For

years he had been waiting for that thunderbolt which low rumbles

announced on all points of the horizon. And if he had written a book full

of candour and hope, if he had gone in all innocence to Rome, it was to

avert that thunderbolt and its frightful consequences. But all hope of

the kind was dead within him; he felt that the thunderbolt was

inevitable, that nothing henceforth could stay the catastrophe. And never

before had he felt it to be so near, amidst the happy impudence of some,

and the exasperated distress of others. And it was gathering, and it

would surely fall over that Paris, all lust and bravado, which, when

evening came, thus stirred up its furnace.

Tired out and distracted, Pierre raised his eyes as he reached the Place

de l'Opera. Where was he then? The heart of the great city seemed to beat

on this spot, in that vast expanse where met so many thoroughfares, as if

from every point the blood of distant districts flowed thither along

triumphal avenues. Right away to the horizon stretched the great gaps of

the Avenue de l'Opera, the Rue du Quatre-Septembre, and the Rue de la

Paix, still showing clearly in a final glimpse of daylight, but already

starred with swarming sparks. The torrent of the Boulevard traffic poured

across the Place, where clashed, too, all that from the neighbouring

streets, with a constant turning and eddying which made the spot the most

dangerous of whirlpools. In vain did the police seek to impose some

little prudence, the stream of pedestrians still overflowed, wheels

became entangled and horses reared amidst all the uproar of the human

tide, which was as loud, as incessant, as the tempest voice of an ocean.

Then there was the detached mass of the opera-house, slowly steeped in

gloom, and rising huge and mysterious like a symbol, its lyre-bearing

figure of Apollo, right aloft, showing a last reflection of daylight

amidst the livid sky. And all the windows of the house-fronts began to

shine, gaiety sprang from those thousands of lamps which coruscated one

by one, a universal longing for ease and free gratification of each

desire spread with the increasing darkness; whilst, at long intervals,

the large globes of the electric lights shone as brightly as the moons of

the city's cloudless nights.

But why was he, Pierre, there, he asked himself, irritated and wondering.

Since Laveuve was dead he had but to go home, bury himself in his nook,

and close up door and windows, like one who was henceforth useless, who

had neither belief nor hope, and awaited naught save annihilation. It was

a long journey from the Place de l'Opera to his little house at Neuilly.

Still, however great his weariness, he would not take a cab, but retraced

his steps, turning towards the Madeleine again, and plunging into the

scramble of the pavements, amidst the deafening uproar from the roadway,

with a bitter desire to aggravate his wound and saturate himself with

revolt and anger. Was it not yonder at the corner of that street, at the

end of that Boulevard, that he would find the expected abyss into which

that rotten world, whose old society he could hear rending at each step,

must soon assuredly topple?

However, when Pierre wished to cross the Rue Scribe a block in the

traffic made him halt. In front of a luxurious cafe two tall,

shabbily-clad and very dirty fellows were alternately offering the "Voix

du Peuple" with its account of the scandals and the bribe-takers of the

Chamber and the Senate, in voices so suggestive of cracked brass that

passers-by clustered around them. And here, in a hesitating, wandering

man, who after listening drew near to the large cafe and peered through

its windows, Pierre was once again amazed to recognise Salvat. This time

the meeting struck him forcibly, filled him with suspicion to such a

point that he also stopped and resolved to watch the journeyman engineer.

He did not expect that one of such wretched aspect, with what seemed to

be a hunk of bread distending his old ragged jacket, would enter and seat

himself at one of the cafe's little tables amidst the warm gaiety of the

lamps. However, he waited for a moment, and then saw him wander away with

slow and broken steps as if the cafe, which was nearly empty, did not

suit him. What could he have been seeking, whither had he been going,

since the morning, ever on a wild, solitary chase through the Paris of

wealth and enjoyment while hunger dogged his steps? It was only with

difficulty that he now dragged himself along, his will and energy seemed

to be exhausted. As if quite overcome, he drew near to a kiosk, and for a

moment leant against it. Then, however, he drew himself up again, and

walked on further, still as it were in search of something.

And now came an incident which brought Pierre's emotion to a climax. A

tall sturdy man on turning out of the Rue Caumartin caught sight of

Salvat, and approached him. And just as the new comer without false pride

was shaking the workman's hand, Pierre recognised him as his brother

Guillaume. Yes, it was indeed he, with his thick bushy hair already white

like snow, though he was but seven and forty. However, his heavy

moustaches had remained quite dark without one silver thread, thus

lending an expression of vigorous life to his full face with its lofty

towering brow. It was from his father that he had inherited that brow of

impregnable logic and reason, similar to that which Pierre himself

possessed. But the lower part of the elder brother's countenance was

fuller than that of his junior; his nose was larger, his chin was square,

and his mouth broad and firm of contour. A pale scar, the mark of an old

wound, streaked his left temple. And his physiognomy, though it might at

first seem very grave, rough, and unexpansive, beamed with masculine

kindliness whenever a smile revealed his teeth, which had remained

extremely white.

While looking at his brother, Pierre remembered what Madame Theodore had

told him that morning. Guillaume, touched by Salvat's dire want, had

arranged to give him a few days' employment. And this explained the air

of interest with which he now seemed to be questioning him, while the

engineer, whom the meeting disturbed, stamped about as if eager to resume

his mournful ramble. For a moment Guillaume appeared to notice the

other's perturbation, by the embarrassed answers which he obtained from

him. Still, they at last parted as if each were going his way. Then,

however, almost immediately, Guillaume turned round again and watched the

other, as with harassed stubborn mien he went off through the crowd. And

the thoughts which had come to Guillaume must have been very serious and

very pressing, for he all at once began to retrace his steps and follow

the workman from a distance, as if to ascertain for certain what

direction he would take.

Pierre had watched the scene with growing disquietude. His nervous

apprehension of some great unknown calamity, the suspicions born of his