Kitabı oku: «Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau», sayfa 21
“No,” said Cesar; “but that won’t keep me from saving up everything to pay you.”
“Irrational folly!” cried Pillerault. “In matters of honor I ought to be believed. What nonsense were you saying just now? How have you robbed your creditors when you have paid them all in full?”
Cesar looked earnestly at Pillerault, and Pillerault was touched to see, for the first time in three years, a genuine smile on the face of his poor nephew.
“It is true,” he said, “they would be paid; but it would be selling my daughter.”
“And I wish to be bought!” cried Cesarine, entering with Popinot.
The lovers had heard Birotteau’s last words as they came on tiptoe through the antechamber of their uncle’s little appartement, Madame Birotteau following. All three had driven round to the creditors who were still unpaid, requesting them to meet at Alexandre Crottat’s that evening to receive their money. The all-powerful logic of the enamored Popinot triumphed in the end over Cesar’s scruples, though he persisted for some time in calling himself a debtor, and in declaring that he was circumventing the law by a substitution. But the refinements of his conscience gave way when Popinot cried out: “Do you want to kill your daughter?”
“Kill my daughter!” said Cesar, thunderstruck.
“Well, then,” said Popinot, “I have the right to convey to you the sum which I conscientiously believe to be your share in my profits. Do you refuse it?”
“No,” said Cesar.
“Very good; then let us go at once to Crottat and settle the matter, so that there may be no backing out of it. We will arrange about our marriage contract at the same time.”
A petition for reinstatement with corroborative documents was at once deposited by Derville at the office of the procureur-general of the Cour Royale.
During the month required for the legal formalities and for the publication of the banns of marriage between Cesarine and Anselme, Birotteau was a prey to feverish agitation. He was restless. He feared he should not live till the great day when the decree for his vindication would be rendered. His heart throbbed, he said, without cause. He complained of dull pains in that organ, worn out as it was by emotions of sorrow, and now wearied with the rush of excessive joy. Decrees of rehabilitation are so rare in the bankrupt court of Paris that seldom more than one is granted in ten years.
To those persons who take society in its serious aspects, the paraphernalia of justice has a grand and solemn character difficult perhaps to define. Institutions depend altogether on the feelings with which men view them and the degree of grandeur which men’s thoughts attach to them. When there is no longer, we will not say religion, but belief among the people, whenever early education has loosened all conservative bonds by accustoming youth to the practice of pitiless analysis, a nation will be found in process of dissolution; for it will then be held together only by the base solder of material interests, and by the formulas of a creed created by intelligent egotism.
Bred in religious ideas, Birotteau held justice to be what it ought to be in the eyes of men, – a representation of society itself, an august utterance of the will of all, apart from the particular form by which it is expressed. The older, feebler, grayer the magistrate, the more solemn seemed the exercise of his function, – a function which demands profound study of men and things, which subdues the heart and hardens it against the influence of eager interests. It is a rare thing nowadays to find men who mount the stairway of the old Palais de Justice in the grasp of keen emotions. Cesar Birotteau was one of those men.
Few persons have noticed the majestic solemnity of that stairway, admirably placed as it is to produce a solemn effect. It rises, beyond the outer peristyle which adorns the courtyard of the Palais, from the centre of a gallery leading, at one end, to the vast hall of the Pas Perdus, and at the other to the Sainte-Chapelle, – two architectural monuments which make all buildings in their neighborhood seem paltry. The church of Saint-Louis is among the most imposing edifices in Paris, and the approach to it through this long gallery is at once sombre and romantic. The great hall of the Pas Perdus, on the contrary, presents at the other end of the gallery a broad space of light; it is impossible to forget that the history of France is linked to those walls. The stairway should therefore be imposing in character; and, in point of act, it is neither dwarfed nor crushed by the architectural splendors on either side of it. Possibly the mind is sobered by a glimpse, caught through the rich gratings, of the Place du Palais-de-Justice, where so many sentences have been executed. The staircase opens above into an enormous space, or antechamber, leading to the hall where the Court holds its public sittings.
Imagine the emotions with which the bankrupt, susceptible by nature to the awe of such accessories, went up that stairway to the hall of judgment, surrounded by his nearest friends, – Lebas, president of the Court of Commerce, Camusot his former judge, Ragon, and Monsieur l’Abbe Loraux his confessor. The pious priest made the splendors of human justice stand forth in strong relief by reflections which gave them still greater solemnity in Cesar’s eyes. Pillerault, the practical philosopher, fearing the danger of unexpected events on the worn mind of his nephew, had schemed to prepare him by degrees for the joys of this festal day. Just as Cesar finished dressing, a number of his faithful friends arrived, all eager for the honor of accompanying him to the bar of the Court. The presence of this retinue roused the honest man to an elation which gave him strength to meet the imposing spectacle in the halls of justice. Birotteau found more friends awaiting him in the solemn audience chamber, where about a dozen members of the council were in session.
After the cases were called over, Birotteau’s attorney made his demand for reinstatement in the usual terms. On a sign from the presiding judge, the procureur-general rose. In the name of his office this public prosecutor, the representative of public vindictiveness, asked that honor might be restored to the merchant who had never really lost it, – a solitary instance of such an appeal; for a condemned man can only be pardoned. Men of honor alone can imagine the emotions of Cesar Birotteau as he heard Monsieur de Grandville pronounce a speech, of which the following is an abridgement: —
“Gentlemen,” said that celebrated official, “on the 16th of January, 1820, Birotteau was declared a bankrupt by the commercial tribunal of the Seine. His failure was not caused by imprudence, nor by rash speculations, nor by any act that stained his honor. We desire to say publicly that this failure was the result of a disaster which has again and again occurred, to the detriment of justice and the great injury of the city of Paris. It has been reserved for our generation, in which the bitter leaven of republican principles and manners will long be felt, to behold the notariat of Paris abandoning the glorious traditions of preceding centuries, and producing in a few years as many failures as two centuries of the old monarchy had produced. The thirst for gold rapidly acquired has beset even these officers of trust, these guardians of the public wealth, these mediators between the law and the people!”
On this text followed an allocution, in which the Comte de Grandville, obedient to the necessities of his role, contrived to incriminate the Liberals, the Bonapartists, and all other enemies of the throne. Subsequent events have proved that he had reason for his apprehension.
“The flight of a notary of Paris who carried off the funds which Birotteau had deposited in his hands, caused the fall of your petitioner,” he resumed. “The Court rendered in that matter a decree which showed to what extent the confidence of Roguin’s clients had been betrayed. A concordat was held. For the honor of your petitioner, we call attention to the fact that his proceedings were remarkable for a purity not found in any of the scandalous failures which daily degrade the commerce of Paris. The creditors of Birotteau received the whole property, down to the smallest articles that the unfortunate man possessed. They received, gentlemen, his clothes, his jewels, things of purely personal use, – and not only his, but those of his wife, who abandoned all her rights to swell the total of his assets. Under these circumstances Birotteau showed himself worthy of the respect which his municipal functions had already acquired for him; for he was at the time a deputy-mayor of the second arrondissement and had just received the decoration of the Legion of honor, granted as much for his devotion to the royal cause in Vendemiaire, on the steps of the Saint-Roch, which were stained with his blood, as for his conciliating spirit, his estimable qualities as a magistrate, and the modesty with which he declined the honors of the mayoralty, pointing out one more worthy of them, the Baron de la Billardiere, one of those noble Vendeens whom he had learned to value in the dark days.”
“That phrase is better than mine,” whispered Cesar to Pillerault.
“At that time the creditors, who received sixty per cent of their claims through the aforesaid relinquishment on the part of this loyal merchant, his wife, and his daughter of all that they possessed, recorded their respect for their debtor in the certificate of bankruptcy granted at the concordat which then took place, giving him at the same time a release from the remainder of their claims. This testimonial is couched in terms which are worthy of the attention of the Court.”
Here the procureur-general read the passage from the certificate of bankruptcy.
“After receiving such expressions of good-will, gentlemen, most merchants would have considered themselves released from obligation and free to return boldly into the vortex of business. Far from so doing, Birotteau, without allowing himself to be cast down, resolved within his conscience to toil for the glorious day which has at length dawned for him here. Nothing disheartened him. Our beloved sovereign granted to the man who shed his blood on the steps of Saint-Roch an office where he might earn his bread. The salary of that office the bankrupt laid by for his creditors, taking nothing for his own wants; for family devotion has supported him.”
Birotteau pressed his uncle’s hand, weeping.
“His wife and his daughter poured their earnings into the common fund, for they too espoused the noble hope of Birotteau. Each came down from the position she had held and took an inferior one. These sacrifices, gentlemen, should be held in honor, for they are harder than all others to bear. I will now show you what sort of task it was that Birotteau imposed upon himself.”
Here the procureur-general read a summing-up of the schedule, giving the amounts which had remained unpaid and the names of the creditors.
“Each of these sums, with the interest thereon, has been paid, gentlemen; and the payment is not shown by receipts under private seal, which might be questioned: they are payments made before a notary, properly authenticated; and according to the inflexible requirements of this Court they have been examined and verified by the proper authority. We now ask you to restore Birotteau, not to honor, but to all the rights of which he was deprived. In doing this you are doing justice. Such exhibitions of character are so rare in this Court that we cannot refrain from testifying to the petitioner how heartily we applaud his conduct, which an august approval has already privately encouraged.”
The prosecuting officer closed by reading his charge in the customary formal terms.
The Court deliberated without retiring, and the president rose to pronounce judgement.
“The Court,” he said, in closing, “desires me to express to Birotteau the satisfaction with which it renders such a judgment.
Clerk, call the next case.”
Birotteau, clothed with the caftan of honor which the speech of the illustrious procureur-general had cast about him, stood dumb with joy as he listened to the solemn words of the president, which betrayed the quiverings of a heart beneath the impassibility of human justice. He was unable to stir from his place before the bar, and seemed for a moment nailed there, gazing at the judges with a wondering air, as though they were angels opening to him the gates of social life. His uncle took him by the arm and led him from the hall. Cesar had not as yet obeyed the command of Louis XVIII., but he now mechanically fastened the ribbon of the Legion of honor to his button-hole. In a moment he was surrounded by his friends and borne in triumph down the great stairway to his coach.
“Where are you taking me, my friends?” he said to Joseph Lebas, Pillerault, and Ragon.
“To your own home.”
“No; it is only three o’clock. I wish to go to the Bourse, and use my rights.”
“To the Bourse!” said Pillerault to the coachman, making an expressive sign to Joseph Lebas, for he saw symptoms in Cesar which led him to fear he might lose his mind.
The late perfumer re-entered the Bourse leaning on the arms of the two honored merchants, his uncle and Joseph Lebas. The news of his rehabilitation had preceded him. The first person who saw them enter, followed by Ragon, was du Tillet.
“Ah! my dear master,” he cried, “I am delighted that you have pulled through. I have perhaps contributed to this happy ending of your troubles by letting that little Popinot drag a feather from my wing. I am as glad of your happiness as if it were my own.”
“You could not be otherwise,” said Pillerault. “Such a thing can never happen to you.”
“What do you mean by that?” said du Tillet.
“Oh! all in good part,” said Lebas, smiling at the malicious meaning of Pillerault, who, without knowing the real truth, considered the man a scoundrel.
Matifat caught sight of Cesar, and immediately the most noted merchants surrounded him and gave him an ovation boursiere. He was overwhelmed with flattering compliments and grasped by the hand, which roused some jealousy and caused some remorse; for out of every hundred persons walking about that hall fifty at least had “liquidated” their affairs. Gigonnet and Gobseck, who were talking together in a corner, looked at the man of commercial honor very much as a naturalist must have looked at the first electric-eel that was ever brought to him, – a fish armed with the power of a Leyden jar, which is the greatest curiosity of the animal kingdom. After inhaling the incense of his triumph, Cesar got into the coach to go to his own home, where the marriage contract of his dear Cesarine and the devoted Popinot was ready for signature. His nervous laugh disturbed the minds of the three old friends.
It is a fault of youth to think the whole world vigorous with its own vigor, – a fault derived from its virtues. Youth sees neither men nor things through spectacles; it colors all with the reflex glory of its ardent fires, and casts the superabundance of its own life upon the aged. Like Cesar and like Constance, Popinot held in his memory a glowing recollection of the famous ball. Constance and Cesar through their years of trial had often, though they never spoke of it to each other, heard the strains of Collinet’s orchestra, often beheld that festive company, and tasted the joys so swiftly and so cruelly chastised, – as Adam and Eve must have tasted in after times the forbidden fruit which gave both death and life to all posterity; for it appears that the generation of angels is a mystery of the skies.
Popinot, however, could dream of the fete without remorse, nay, with ecstasy. Had not Cesarine in all her glory then promised herself to him – to him, poor? During that evening had he not won the assurance that he was loved for himself alone? So when he bought the appartement restored by Grindot, from Celestin, when he stipulated that all should be kept intact, when he religiously preserved the smallest things that once belonged to Cesar and to Constance, he was dreaming of another ball, – his ball, his wedding-ball! He made loving preparation for it, imitating his old master in necessary expenses, but eschewing all follies, – follies that were now past and done with. So the dinner was to be served by Chevet; the guests were to be mostly the same: the Abbe Loraux replaced the chancellor of the Legion of honor; the president of the Court of Commerce, Monsieur Lebas, had promised to be there; Popinot invited Monsieur Camusot in acknowledgment of the kindness he had bestowed upon Birotteau; Monsieur de Vandenesse and Monsieur de Fontaine took the place of Roguin and his wife. Cesarine and Popinot distributed their invitations with much discretion. Both dreaded the publicity of a wedding, and they escaped the jar such scenes must cause to pure and tender hearts by giving the ball on the evening of the day appointed for signing the marriage-contract.
Constance found in her room the gown of cherry velvet in which she had shone for a single night with fleeting splendor. Cesarine cherished a dream of appearing before Popinot in the identical ball-dress about which, time and time again, he had talked to her. The appartement was made ready to present to Cesar’s eyes the same enchanting scene he had once enjoyed for a single evening. Neither Constance, nor Cesarine, nor Popinot perceived the danger to Cesar in this sudden and overwhelming surprise, and they awaited his arrival at four o’clock with a delight that was almost childish.
Following close upon the unspeakable emotion his re-entrance at the Bourse had caused him, the hero of commercial honor was now to meet the sudden shock of felicity that awaited him in his old home. He entered the house, and saw at the foot of the staircase (still new as he had left it) his wife in her velvet robe, Cesarine, the Comte de Fontaine, the Vicomte de Vandenesse, the Baron de la Billardiere, the illustrious Vauquelin. A light film dimmed his eyes, and his uncle Pillerault, who held his arm, felt him shudder inwardly.
“It is too much,” said the philosopher to the happy lover; “he can never carry all the wine you are pouring out to him.”
Joy was so vivid in their hearts that each attributed Cesar’s emotion and his stumbling step to the natural intoxication of his feelings, – natural, but sometimes mortal. When he found himself once more in his own home, when he saw his salon, his guests, the women in their ball-dresses, suddenly the heroic measure in the finale of the great symphony rang forth in his head and heart. Beethoven’s ideal music echoed, vibrated, in many tones, sounding its clarions through the membranes of the weary brain, of which it was indeed the grand finale.
Oppressed with this inward harmony, Cesar took the arm of his wife and whispered, in a voice suffocated by a rush of blood that was still repressed: “I am not well.”
Constance, alarmed, led him to her bedroom; he reached it with difficulty, and fell into a chair, saying: “Monsieur Haudry, Monsieur Loraux.”
The Abbe Loraux came, followed by the guests and the women in their ball-dresses, who stopped short, a frightened group. In presence of that shining company Cesar pressed the hand of his confessor and laid his head upon the bosom of his kneeling wife. A vessel had broken in his heart, and the rush of blood strangled his last sigh.
“Behold the death of the righteous!” said the Abbe Loraux solemnly, pointing to Cesar with the divine gesture which Rembrandt gave to Christ in his picture of the Raising of Lazarus.
Jesus commanded the earth to give up its prey; the priest called heaven to behold a martyr of commercial honor worthy to receive the everlasting palm.
ADDENDUM
The following personages appear in other stories of the Human Comedy
Bianchon, Horace
Father Goriot
The Atheist’s Mass
The Commission in Lunacy
Lost Illusions
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
A Bachelor’s Establishment
The Secrets of a Princess
The Government Clerks
Pierrette
A Study of Woman
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
Honorine
The Seamy Side of History
The Magic Skin
A Second Home
A Prince of Bohemia
Letters of Two Brides
The Muse of the Department
The Imaginary Mistress
The Middle Classes
Cousin Betty
The Country Parson
In addition, M. Bianchon narrated the following:
Another Study of Woman
La Grande Breteche
Bidault (known as Gigonnet)
The Government Clerks
Gobseck
The Vendetta
The Firm of Nucingen
A Daughter of Eve
Birotteau, Cesar
A Bachelor’s Establishment
At the Sign of the Cat and Racket
Birotteau, Abbe Francois
The Lily of the Valley
The Vicar of Tours
Braschon
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
Camusot
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
A Bachelor’s Establishment
Cousin Pons
The Muse of the Department
At the Sign of the Cat and Racket
Camusot de Marville, Madame
The Vendetta
Jealousies of a Country Town
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
Cousin Pons
Cardot, Jean-Jerome-Severin
A Start in Life
Lost Illusions
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
A Bachelor’s Establishment
At the Sign of the Cat and Racket
Chaffaroux
A Prince of Bohemia
The Middle Classes
Chiffreville, Monsieur and Madame
The Quest of the Absolute
Claparon, Charles
A Bachelor’s Establishment
Melmoth Reconciled
The Firm of Nucingen
A Man of Business
The Middle Classes
Cochin, Emile-Louis-Lucien-Emmanuel
The Government Clerks
The Firm of Nucingen
The Middle Classes
Cochin, Adolphe
The Firm of Nucingen
Crevel, Celestin
Cousin Betty
Cousin Pons
Crottat, Monsieur and Madame
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
Crottat, Alexandre
Colonel Chabert
A Start in Life
A Woman of Thirty
Cousin Pons
Derville, Madame
Gobseck
Desmartes, Jules
The Thirteen
Desmartes, Madame Jules
The Thirteen
Finot, Andoche
A Bachelor’s Establishment
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
The Government Clerks
A Start in Life
Gaudissart the Great
The Firm of Nucingen
Fontaine, Comte de
The Chouans
Modeste Mignon
The Ball at Sceaux
The Government Clerks
Gaudissart, Felix
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
Cousin Pons
Honorine
Gaudissart the Great
Gobseck, Jean-Esther Van
Gobseck
Father Goriot
The Government Clerks
The Unconscious Humorists
Gobseck, Sarah Van
Gobseck
The Maranas
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
The Member for Arcis
Granville, Vicomte de (later Comte)
The Gondreville Mystery
Honorine
A Second Home
Farewell (Adieu)
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
A Daughter of Eve
Cousin Pons
Grindot
Lost Illusions
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
A Start in Life
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
Beatrix
The Middle Classes
Cousin Betty
Guillaume
At the Sign of the Cat and Racket
Haudry (doctor)
The Thirteen
A Bachelor’s Establishment
The Seamy Side of History
Cousin Pons
Keller, Francois
Domestic Peace
Eugenie Grandet
The Government Clerks
The Member for Arcis
Keller, Adolphe
The Middle Classes
Pierrette
La Billardiere, Athanase-Jean-Francois-Michel, Baron Flamet de
The Chouans
The Government Clerks
Lebas, Joseph
At the Sign of the Cat and Racket
Cousin Betty
Lebas, Madame Joseph (Virginie)
At the Sign of the Cat and Racket
Cousin Betty
Lenoncourt, Duc de
The Lily of the Valley
Jealousies of a Country Town
The Gondreville Mystery
Beatrix
Listomere, Baronne de
The Vicar of Tours
The Muse of the Department
Loraux, Abbe
A Start in Life
A Bachelor’s Establishment
Honorine
Lourdois
At the Sign of the Cat and Racket
Matifat (wealthy druggist)
A Bachelor’s Establishment
Lost Illusions
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
The Firm of Nucingen
Cousin Pons
Matifat, Madame
The Firm of Nucingen
Matifat, Mademoiselle
The Firm of Nucingen
Pierrette
Molineux, Jean-Baptiste
A Second Home
The Purse
Mongenod
The Seamy Side of History
Montauran, Marquis Alphonse de
The Chouans
Nucingen, Baron Frederic de
The Firm of Nucingen
Father Goriot
Pierrette
Lost Illusions
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
Another Study of Woman
The Secrets of a Princess
A Man of Business
Cousin Betty
The Muse of the Department
The Unconscious Humorists
Nucingen, Baronne Delphine de
Father Goriot
The Thirteen
Eugenie Grandet
Melmoth Reconciled
Lost Illusions
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
The Commission in Lunacy
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
Modeste Mignon
The Firm of Nucingen
Another Study of Woman
A Daughter of Eve
The Member for Arcis
Palma (banker)
The Firm of Nucingen
Gobseck
Lost Illusions
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
The Ball at Sceaux
Popinot, Jean-Jules
Honorine
The Commission in Lunacy
The Seamy Side of History
The Middle Classes
Popinot, Anselme
Gaudissart the Great
Cousin Pons
Cousin Betty
Popinot, Madame Anselme
A Prince of Bohemia
Cousin Betty
Cousin Pons
Protez and Chiffreville
The Quest of the Absolute
Rabourdin, Xavier
The Government Clerks
At the Sign of the Cat and Racket
The Middle Classes
Ragon, M. and Mme.
An Episode Under the Terror
Roguin
Eugenie Grandet
A Bachelor’s Establishment
Pierrette
The Vendetta
Roguin, Madame
At the Sign of the Cat and Racket
Pierrette
A Second Home
A Daughter of Eve
Saillard, Madame
The Government Clerks
Sommervieux, Madame Theodore de (Augustine)
At the Sign of the Cat and Racket
Thirion
The Vendetta
Jealousies of a Country Town
Thouvenin
Cousin Pons
Tillet, Ferdinand du
The Firm of Nucingen
The Middle Classes
A Bachelor’s Establishment
Pierrette
Melmoth Reconciled
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
The Secrets of a Princess
A Daughter of Eve
The Member for Arcis
Cousin Betty
The Unconscious Humorists
Trailles, Comte Maxime de
Father Goriot
Gobseck
Ursule Mirouet
A Man of Business
The Member for Arcis
The Secrets of a Princess
Cousin Betty
Beatrix
The Unconscious Humorists
Vaillant, Madame
Facino Cane
Vandenesse, Marquise Charles de
The Ball at Sceaux
Ursule Mirouet
A Daughter of Eve
Vandenesse, Comte Felix de
The Lily of the Valley
Lost Illusions
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
Letters of Two Brides
A Start in Life
The Marriage Settlement
The Secrets of a Princess
Another Study of Woman
The Gondreville Mystery
A Daughter of Eve
Werbrust
The Firm of Nucingen
