Tales of Two Countries Part 12

Charles went over to the stranger who sat by the door: "Give me the bill."

"You don't need our a.s.sistance, then?"

"No, thanks."

"So much the better," said the stranger, handing Charles a folded blue paper. Then he paid for his coffee and went.----Madame Virginie rose with a little shriek: "Alphonse! Oh, my G.o.d! Monsieur Alphonse is ill."

He slipped off his chair; his shoulders went up and his head fell on one side. He remained sitting on the floor, with his back against the chair.

There was a movement among those nearest; the doctor sprang over and knelt beside him. When he looked in Alphonse's face he started a little.

He took his hand as if to feel his pulse, and at the same time bent down over the gla.s.s which stood on the edge of the table.

With a movement of the arm he gave it a slight push, so that it fell on the floor and was smashed. Then he laid down the dead man's hand and bound a handkerchief round his chin.

Not till then did the others understand what had happened. "Dead? Is he dead, doctor? Monsieur Alphonse dead?"

"Heart disease," answered the doctor.

One came running with water, another with vinegar. Amid laughter and noise, the b.a.l.l.s could be heard cannoning on the inner billiard-table.

"Hush!" some one whispered. "Hush!" was repeated; and the silence spread in wider and wider circles round the corpse, until all was quite still.

"Come and lend a hand," said the doctor.

The dead man was lifted up; they laid him on a sofa in a corner of the room, and the nearest gasjets were put out.

Madame Virginie was still standing up; her face was chalk-white, and she held her little soft hand pressed against her breast. They carried him right past the buffet. The doctor had seized him under the back, so that his waistcoat slipped up and a piece of his fine white shirt appeared.

She followed with her eyes the slender, supple limbs she knew so well, and continued to stare towards the dark corner.

Most of the guests went away in silence. A couple of young men entered noisily from the street; a waiter ran towards them and said a few words.

They glanced towards the corner, b.u.t.toned their coats, and plunged out again into the fog.

The half-darkened cafe was soon empty; only some of Alphonse's nearest friends stood in a group and whispered. The doctor was talking with the proprietor, who had now appeared on the scene.

The waiters stole to and fro making great circuits to avoid the dark corner. One of them knelt and gathered up the fragments of the gla.s.s on a tray. He did his work as quietly as he could; but for all that it made too much noise.

"Let that alone until by-and-by," said the host, softly.--Leaning against the chimney-piece, Charles looked at the dead man. He slowly tore the folded paper to pieces, while he thought of his friend--

A GOOD CONSCIENCE.

An elegant little carriage, with two sleek and well-fed horses, drew up at Advocate Abel's garden gate.

Neither silver nor any other metal was visible in the harness; everything was a dull black, and all the buckles were leather-covered.

In the lacquering of the carriage there was a trace of dark green; the cushions were of a subdued dust-color; and only on close inspection could you perceive that the coverings were of the richest silk. The coachman looked like an English clergyman, in his close-b.u.t.toned black coat, with a little stand-up collar and stiff white necktie.

Mrs. Warden, who sat alone in the carriage, bent forward and laid her hand upon the ivory door-handle; then she slowly alighted, drew her long train after her, and carefully closed the carriage door.

You might have wondered that the coachman did not dismount to help her; the fat horses certainly did not look as though they would play any tricks if he dropped the reins.

But when you looked at his immovable countenance and his correct iron-gray whiskers, you understood at once that this was a man who knew what he was doing, and never neglected a detail of his duty.

Mrs. Warden pa.s.sed through the little garden in front of the house, and entered the garden-room. The door to the adjoining room stood half open, and there she saw the lady of the house at a large table covered with rolls of light stuff and scattered numbers of the _Bazar_.

"Ah, you've come just at the right moment, my dear Emily!" cried Mrs.

Abel, "I'm quite in despair over my dress-maker--she can't think of anything new. And here I'm sitting, ransacking the _Bazar_. Take off your shawl, dear, and come and help me; it's a walking-dress."

"I'm afraid I'm scarcely the person to help you in a matter of dress,"

answered Mrs. Warden.

Good-natured Mrs. Abel stared at her; there was something disquieting in her tone, and she had a vast respect for her rich friend.

"You remember I told you the other day that Warden had promised me--that's to say"--Mrs. Warden corrected herself--"he had asked me to order a new silk dress--"

"From Madame Labiche--of course!"--interrupted Mrs. Abel. "And I suppose you're on your way to her now? Oh, take me with you! It will be such fun!"

"I am not going to Madame Labiche's," answered Mrs. Warden, almost solemnly.

"Good gracious, why not?" asked her friend, while her good-humored brown eyes grew spherical with astonishment.

"Well, you must know," answered Mrs. Warden, "it seems to me we can't with a good conscience pay so much money for unnecessary finery, when we know that on the outskirts of the town--and even at our very doors--there are hundreds of people living in dest.i.tution--literally in dest.i.tution."

"Yes, but," objected the advocate's wife, casting an uneasy glance over her table, "isn't that the way of the world? We know that inequality--"

"We ought to be careful not to increase the inequality, but rather to do what we can to smooth it away," Mrs. Warden interrupted. And it appeared to Mrs. Abel that her friend cast a glance of disapprobation over the table, the stuffs, and the _Bazars_.

"It's only alpaca," she interjected, timidly.

"Good heavens, Caroline!" cried Mrs. Warden, "pray don't think that I'm reproaching you. These things depend entirely upon one's individual point of view--every one must follow the dictates of his own conscience."

The conversation continued for some time, and Mrs. Warden related that it was her intention to drive out to the very lowest of the suburbs, in order to a.s.sure herself, with her own eyes, of the conditions of life among the poor.

On the previous day she had read the annual report of a private charitable society of which her husband was a member. She had purposely refrained from applying to the police or the poor-law authorities for information. It was the very gist of her design personally to seek out poverty, to make herself familiar with it, and then to render a.s.sistance.

The ladies parted a little less effusively than usual. They were both in a serious frame of mind.

Mrs. Abel remained in the garden-room; she felt no inclination to set to work again at the walking-dress, although the stuff was really pretty.

She heard the m.u.f.fled sound of the carriage-wheels as they rolled off over the smooth roadway of the villa quarter.

"What a good heart Emily has," she sighed.

Nothing could be more remote than envy from the good-natured lady's character; and yet--it was with a feeling akin to envy that she now followed the light carriage with her eyes. But whether it was her friend's good heart or her elegant equipage that she envied her it was not easy to say. She had given the coachman his orders, which he had received without moving a muscle; and as remonstrance was impossible to him, he drove deeper and deeper into the queerest streets in the poor quarter, with a countenance as though he were driving to a Court ball.

At last he received orders to stop, and indeed it was high time. For the street grew narrower and narrower, and it seemed as though the fat horses and the elegant carriage must at the very next moment have stuck fast, like a cork in the neck of a bottle.