The Slaves of Paris - Émile Gaboriau (macos ebook reader .txt) 📗

of his arm. “Horrified at such a commencement, I entreated the lady superintendent, a hideous old woman in spectacles, to apprentice me to some other trade, but she sternly refused. She had made up her mind that I should be a tanner.”

“That was very nasty of her,” remarked Paul.

“It was, indeed; but from that day I made up my mind, and I determined to run away as soon as I could get a little money together. I therefore stuck steadily to the business, and by the end of the year, by means of the strictest economy, I found myself master of thirty francs. This, I thought, would do, and, with a bundle containing a change of linen, I started on foot for Paris. I was only thirteen, but I had been gifted by Providence with plenty of that strong will called by many obstinacy. I had made up my mind to be a painter.”

“And you kept your vow?”

“But with the greatest difficulty. Ah! I can close my eyes and see the place where I slept that first night I came to Paris. I was so exhausted that I did not awake for twelve hours. I ordered a good breakfast; and finding funds at a very low ebb, I started in search of work.”

Paul smiled. He, too, remembered his first day in Paris. He was twenty-two years of age, and had forty francs in his pocket.

“I wanted to make money⁠—for I felt I needed it⁠—to enable me to pursue my studies. A stout man was seated near me at breakfast, and to him I addressed myself.

“ ‘Look here,’ said I, ‘I am thirteen, and much stronger than I look. I can read and write. Tell me how I can earn a living.’

“He looked steadily at me, and in a rough voice answered, ‘Go to the market tomorrow morning, and try if one of the master masons, who are on the lookout for hands, will employ you.’ ”

“And you went?”

“I did; and was eagerly watching the head masons, when I perceived my stout friend coming toward me.

“ ‘I like the looks of you, my lad,’ he said; ‘I am an ornamental sculptor. Do you care to learn my trade?’

“When I heard this proposal, it seemed as if Paradise was opening before me, and I agreed with enthusiasm.”

“And how about your painting?”

“That came later on. I worked hard at it in all my hours of leisure. I attended the evening schools, and worked steadily at my art and other branches of education. It was a very long time before I ventured to indulge in a glass of beer. ‘No, no, André,’ I would say to myself, ‘beer costs six sous; lay the money by.’ Finally, when I was earning from eighty to a hundred francs a week, I was able to give more time to the brush.”

The recital of this life of toil and self-denial, so different from his own selfish and idle career, was inexpressibly mortifying to Paul; but he felt that he was called upon to say something.

“When one has talents like yours,” said he, “success follows as a matter of course.”

He rose to his feet, and affected to examine the sketches on the walls, though his attention was attracted to the covered picture on the easel. He remembered what the garrulous old portress had said about the veiled lady who sometimes visited the painter, and that there had been some delay in admitting him when he first knocked. Then he considered, for whom had the painter dressed himself with such care? and why had he requested him not to smoke? From all these facts Paul came to the conclusion that André was expecting the lady’s visit, and that the veiled picture was her portrait. He therefore determined to see it; and with this end in view, he walked round the studio, admiring all the paintings on the walls, maneuvering in such a manner as to imperceptibly draw nearer to the easel.

“And this,” said he, suddenly extending his hand toward the cover, “is, I presume, the gem of your studio?”

But André was by no means dull, and had divined Paul’s intention, and grasped the young man’s outstretched hand just as it touched the curtain.

“If I veil this picture,” said he, “it is because I do not wish it to be seen.”

“Excuse me,” answered Paul, trying to pass over the matter as a jest, though in reality he was boiling over with rage at the manner and tone of the painter, and considered his caution utterly ridiculous.

“At any rate,” said he to himself, “I will lengthen out my visit, and have a glimpse of the original instead of her picture;” and, with this amiable resolution, he sat down by the artist’s table, and commenced an apparently interminable story, resolved not to attend to any hints his friend might throw out, who was glancing at the clock with the utmost anxiety, comparing it every now and then with his watch.

As Paul talked on, he saw close to him on the table the photograph of a young lady, and, taking advantage of the artist’s preoccupation, looked at it.

“Pretty, very pretty!” remarked he.

At these words the painter flushed crimson, and snatching away the photograph with some little degree of violence, thrust it between the leaves of a book.

André was so evidently in a patina, that Paul rose to his feet, and for a second or two the men looked into each other’s eyes as two adversaries do when about to engage in a mortal duel. They knew but little of each other, and the same chance which had brought them together might separate them again at any moment, but each felt that the other exercised some influence over his life.

André was the first to recover himself.

“You must excuse me; but I was wrong to leave so precious an article about.”

Paul bowed with the air of a man who accepts an apology which he considers his due; and André went on⁠—

“I very rarely receive anyone except my friends; but