The Catholic World Volume I Part 37

"Oh, that was at Ma.r.s.eilles; and I came on here with Mouton. We dance," she continued in a firmer voice; "we go out with a man called Emile, who plays the organ very well, and he has another dog like Mouton,' only not at all clever: the stupid creature can only hold a basket in his mouth, and beg for sous; he has no talent." She shrugged her shoulders, and continued, "We live with Emile and his wife; they are not always kind to me; but I love Jean."

"Who is this Jean?" I asked.

"Ah! he is a poor boy," she replied; the whole expression of her countenance softening at his name, and her sallow cheeks crimsoning with a tender flush. "He is lame; he cannot walk, and is pulled about in a little carriage; but he does not like to beg, so Emile will not take him out with us."

"Is Emile his father?" I asked.

"No, monsieur; his father is dead but his mother is Emile's wife. I take care of Jean myself."

"Are they good to you?"

"Yes, pretty well. You see I dance for them, and people give more money because I am there; and then Mouton is so clever; one does not easily meet with a dog like that, who will stand on his hind-legs for an hour together, and dance as he does. Look at his dress too;" and she pulled out of the bosom of her frock Mouton's paraphernalia, and displayed it with evident pride. "In my opinion now, there is no such dress as that for a dog in all Paris," she said, as she held it up admiringly to the lamp. "Jean made those shoes; ar'n't they droll? And the wig; look, that is superb!"

"Who made the wig?" I asked.

"Ah! it was a little boy who is apprenticed to a wigmaker," she answered. "Monsieur, it was a bargain between us; he wanted something from me, and--and I said I would give it him if he made a wig for Mouton; and this is the wig. He is not bad himself, that little boy; but he is not at all so good as Jean."

"How old is Jean?" I asked.

"He is twelve years old, monsieur."

"And you?"

"I am ten," she replied, with a little sigh and a blush. "But I may grow still, may I not?" she asked timidly, looking up into my face so pathetically, that I had hardly sufficient gravity to answer, "Yes, of course; you will doubtless grow for a long time yet."

"Ah! that is exactly what Jean says," she exclaimed gaily; then added in a lower voice, "Jean says he likes little people best; but, you see, he may say that because he likes me."

I answered nothing to this; and presently she roused herself from a little reverie, and said, "Now we shall dance for you, because it gets late, and I must go home."

"If you like to remain here all night," I said, "the wife of the concierge will let you sleep in a little {265} room off theirs, down stairs; and when you have had some breakfast, you can then return."

"No, no," she repeated sharply; "I will not sleep here; I go home to Jean."

"Will Emile be glad to see you?"

"That depends; if he is cross, he will beat me for staying so long; but it does not matter; I wished to stay, and I liked my dinner, and this warm fire" (she looked wistfully at it). "Monsieur is very good.

Come, Mouton, my friend; wake yourself up."

The dog rose, shook himself, and patiently allowed himself to be dressed once more. He took an unfair advantage of his mistress, however, when she knelt down to put on his shoes, and licked her face.

"Ah, _cochon_, how often must I box your ears for that trick!" she said, as she gave him a tap on the side of his head, for the liberty.

"Come now, walk along." The dog paced soberly toward the door on his hind-legs.--"That is the _ancien regime_," she explained to me.--"Now, Mouton, show us how people walk at the present day." The dog stopped, and at once imitated the short, mincing step of a Parisian belle, shaking his hoop from side to side in most ludicrous fashion; and as he reached his mistress, he dropped a little awkward courtesy.

"That is well," she said. "Now sing for us like Madame G----," naming a famous opera-singer, whose fame was then at its height, and she laid a light piece of music-paper across his paws. The dog looked closely down on the paper for an instant, licked his lips, looked round at an imaginary audience, and then throwing back his head, and fixing his black eyes on the ceiling, he uttered a howl so shrill and piercing that I stopped my ears; he then ceased for an instant, looked at his music attentively, then at his audience, and again uttered that ear-piercing howl. "That is enough," said Poucette; "bow to the company." The dog rose and sank with the grace almost of the prima donna herself.

"Now, Mouton, we are going to dance;" and taking the animal by its paw, she put the other arm round it, and the two whirled round in a waltz, keeping admirable time to a tune which Poucette whistled. "Now read a book, and rest yourself whilst I dance;" and again the piece of music was laid on Mouton's paws, and he bent his eyes on it, apparently with the most devoted attention, whilst Poucette slipped off her heavy sabots, and with naked feet thrust into a pair of old satin slippers, which she produced from some pocket in her dress, she executed a sort of fancy dance, half Cachuca, half Bolero, throwing herself into pretty, graceful att.i.tudes, with a step as light as a fairy's; then, as she approached Mouton in the figure, she lifted the music, and taking him by one paw, she led him forward to the front of my chair on the points of her toes, the two courtesying nearly to the ground, when Mouton affectionately kissed his mistress on the cheek.

"There, it is over now," said Poucette; "that is all. He does not know the minuet perfectly yet: next week, perhaps, we shall try it for the _Jour de l'An_."

"Well done!" I exclaimed, and clapped my hands. "He is a famous dog; and you--you dance beautifully."

Mouton came to be patted and made much of; and his mistress now announced her intention of going home at once. Finding it useless to try and induce her to stay, I offered to go with her myself, and see her safely through the still crowded streets; but this she firmly declined.

"No, not to-night," she said. "You may come to-morrow, if you will be so kind, but not to-night. You have been very good, monsieur; I am not ungrateful. You may come to-morrow; Rue----, No.----, quite close to Notre Dame." She took my hand, raised it to her lips, courtesied, and was gone.

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I followed her down stairs, and watched the little figure hurrying along with a firm step, upright as a dart, the light from the gas-lamps falling now and then on the spangles of her dress, and making them twinkle for an instant; and the dark outline of Mouton following closely behind her, under the shadow of the houses.

Presently they crossed the street, and disappeared in the distance; and I turned and walked up stairs to my cosey well-lighted room, to think over the strange life of a street dancing-girl.

After this, I made inquiries about Poucette in the part of the town where she lived, and visited the man Emile and his wife often. Here I found the cripple boy Jean, to whom Poucette clung with a tenacity of affection that was touching to witness. He had had a fall as an infant, so his mother said, and never had walked; but his fingers were skilful in making toys, baskets, and small rush-mats, which Poucette sold during her daily rounds. To him she devoted her affections, her life, with a steady ardor not often met with at her age. Toward others, she was always grave, distant, often haughty and bitter in her expressions of anger, but to him never. However tired she might return home after dancing or selling his wares on the boulevard, she never showed him that she was so; if he wished to go out, she drew him in a rude wooden sledge to the gardens of the Luxembourg; and the two would sit there by the hour together on Sundays, criticising the pa.s.sers-by as they walked about in their gay dresses. At night, if the invalid was restless or in pain, Poucette sat beside him, sometimes till day dawned, with a sympathizing cheerful face, ready to attend upon every want. There she shone; but take away Jean out of her world, and Poucette stood forth a vixen. Madame Emile, who was herself somewhat of a shrew, vowed that if it were not that she and Jean were so bound up together, and nothing could separate them, she must have sent away Poucette long ago. "No one could endure her temper, monsieur," she would declare to me; and when she began upon this subject, madame waxed eloquent. "She is a girl such as there is not besides in Paris.

For Jean, she will give up dress, company, the theatre, everything; but except for him, she would not go one step out of her way to be made an empress. It is not natural that. After she first came here, we had a great deal of trouble with her, and Emile beat her well; but then she would run away in a rage, and come back again during the night, for fear Jean should want something. Now we are more used to her, and we let her have her own way pretty much."

Jean I could get nothing out of except a "Bonjour, monsieur" at entering and on leaving his house. He sat silently plaiting his mats or carving toys with his long fingers, looking as if he neither heard nor understood what we were talking about; but he carefully repeated all the conversation afterward to his friend Poucette, for she told me so often when we were together. She used to come and see me at my rooms, when it was wet, or business was slack; and I succeeded in finding a customer for her wares in a toy-merchant, who promised to take all Jean's work at a reasonable price, and was liberal toward the two children. Poucette was thus able to give up her public dancing, and stay more at home; and the toyman's daughter taught her dainty embroidery, in which her skilful fingers soon excelled. She tamed down wonderfully that winter, and even made some efforts to learn reading, as I suggested to her what a source of pleasure it would be to Jean, whose thirst for hearing stories related was intense, if he could read them for himself. But she was very slow at this; the letters proved a heavy task to learn, and when we came to spelling, I often despaired; still she toiled on, and when I left Paris in May, she could read a very little.

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Six months pa.s.sed, and again I turned my steps to my old winter-quarters. The summer and autumn had been spent by me partly in England, partly in Switzerland. My protege was unable to write, and I had heard nothing of her since I left Paris. I had not returned there longer than a week, when I set off into the _cite_, to discover again my little pupil. It was much the same sort of a day as that on which we had first met; cold, dank, misty rain kept falling, and streets were wet and sloppy. The part of the town where Poucette lived was wretchedly poor, dingy, and dirty-looking, especially in such weather as I now visited it, and the reputed haunt of thieves and evil-doers of various kinds. I picked my way along narrow ill-paved streets, with the gutters in the middle, and at last I reached her old abode. There was no one stirring about; but the door was ajar. I pushed it open, and walked in. The dwelling had once been some n.o.bleman's hotel in bygone days, and its rooms were large and lofty, and at present each inhabited by different poor families. Emile's was on the ground floor--a long room, formerly used either as a guard-room or for playing billiards in. It had one large window, opening in the center, and crossed outside with thick iron bars, which partially excluded the light. I was confused on entering from the outer air, and at first could only perceive that the room was filled with a crowd of people, of various ages and s.e.xes, but all of the lowest order, some sitting, some standing. A woman came forth to meet me, whom I recognized as Madame Emile, sobbing and holding her ap.r.o.n to her eyes. "Ah, mon Dieu, mon Dieu!" she whispered, as she looked at me and clasped her hands piteously; "the poor Poucette, how hard it is! Monsieur, you are welcome; but this is a sorrowful time; she is much hurt." She led me gently through the various groups, all sorrowfully silent, toward a low pallet, at the head of the room, where, crushed, bleeding, and now insensible from pain, lay the form of poor Poucette. "What is this?" I asked in a whisper. "How did it happen?"

"Ah, it was a vile remise," eagerly answered a dozen voices. "She was returning home yesterday from selling the mats, and the driver was drunk. She fell in crossing, and he did not see her. The wheel crushed her poor chest. Ah, she will die, the unhappy child!"

"Where is Jean?" I asked.

His mother silently pointed out what looked like a bundle of clothes huddled up in the bed beside the dying child. She was dying, my poor Poucette. One of the kind-hearted surgeons from the _hopital_ had been to see her early that morning, and p.r.o.nounced that beside the blow on her chest, which was of itself a dangerous one, severe internal injuries had taken place, which must end her life in a few hours. Poor Poucette! I seated myself by the little couch in the dark room, which was so soon to be filled by the presence of death, and presently the surgeon came again. All eyes turned anxiously toward him as he walked to the bed, and kneeling down beside it, carefully examined the poor little sufferer, whose only sign of consciousness was a groan of anguish now and then.

"Can nothing be done for her?" I asked, as he rose to his feet and stood by the bed, looking pityingly down at the two children.

"Nothing whatever," he said, with a mournful shake of his head. "She will not last through the night."

"Does she suffer?" I asked.

"Acutely, but it will not be for long. Mortification is setting in rapidly." He paused, then added: "She will probably regain consciousness at the last;" and left the room.

Slowly the weary hours glided on; gradually the moans became weaker, and the pulse quick and fitful. Suddenly she opened her eyes, and looked at me inquiringly; then her eyes fell {268} on Jean, who lay at her side, and uttered an exclamation of joy. "I am not in pain now,"

she said faintly; "that is over.--Ah, my good monsieur, you said you would return. I am glad."

"I am grieved to find you thus, Poucette," I whispered. "Can I do anything for you?"

"Perhaps you would like to have Mouton," she said calmly, as if thinking aloud.

"I will keep him, if you like it," I replied. "Is there anything else you would like?"

"Only Jean, dear Jean," and her soft dark eyes were fixed timidly yet imploringly on my face.

"I will take care of Jean."

"The good G.o.d reward you, my kind monsieur! That is all that I want.-- Adieu, madame. Adieu, my good friends. It is over." Just then Mouton raised himself on his hind-legs by the bed, and peered anxiously into her face. She put out her little right hand, and gently patted his head; then, with a last effort, she turned round from us, and flung one tiny arm round the crippled boy at her side. "Je t'aime toujours,"

she whispered, as she bent over and kissed him. It was a last effort.

A slight shiver pa.s.sed over the little figure; one long-drawn sigh escaped the white lips. Poucette was gone to her mother; the wanderer had been taken home; the desolate one was comforted!