I.

I was at one time employed in a government office. Every day from ten o’clock until four I became a voluntary prisoner in a depressing office, adorned with yellow pasteboard boxes, and filled with the musty odor of old papers. There I lunched on Italian cheese and apples which I roasted at the grate. I read the morning papers, even to the advertisements; I rhymed verses, and I attended to the affairs of state to the extent of drawing at the end of each month a salary which barely kept me from starving.

I recall to-day one of my companions in captivity at that epoch.

He was called Achille Meurtrier, and certainly his fierce look and tall form seemed to warrant that name. He was a great big fellow, about forty years old, not too much chest or shoulders, but who increased his apparent size by wearing felt hats with wide brims, ample and short coats, large plaid trousers, and neckties of a sanguine red under rolling collars. He wore a full beard, long hair, and was very proud of his hairy hands.

The chief boast of Meurtrier, otherwise the best and most amiable of companions, was to trifle with an athletic constitution, to possess the biceps of a prize-fighter, and, as he said himself, not to know his own strength. He never made a gesture, even in the exercise of his peaceful profession, that did not have for its object to convince the spectators of his prodigious vigor. Did he have to take from its case a half-empty pasteboard box, he advanced towards the shelf with the heavy step of a street porter, grasped the box solidly with a tight hand, and carried it with a stiff arm as far as the next table, with a shrugging of shoulders and frowning of brow worthy of Milo of Crotona. He carried this manner so far that he never used less apparent effort even to lift the lightest objects, and one day when he held in his right hand a basket of old papers I saw him extend his left arm horizontally as if to make a counterpoise to the tremendous weight.

I ought to say that this robust creature inspired me with a profound respect, for I was then, even more than to-day, physically weak and delicate, and in consequence filled with admiration for that energetic physique which I lacked.

The conversations of Meurtrier were not of a nature to diminish the admiration with which he inspired me.

In the summer, above all, on Monday mornings, when we had returned to the office after our Sunday holiday, he had an inexhaustible fund of stories concerning his adventures and feats of strength. After taking off his felt-hat, his coat, and his vest, and wiping the perspiration from his forehead with the sleeve of his shirt, to indicate his sanguine and ardent temperament, he would thrust his hands deep in the pockets of his trousers, and, standing near me in an attitude of perpendicular solidity, begin a monologue something as follows:

“What a Sunday, my boy! Positively no fatigue can lay me up. Think of it: yesterday was the regatta at Joinville-le-Pont; at six o’clock in the morning the rendezvous at Bercy, at The Mariners, for the crew of the Marsouin; the sun is up; a glass of white wine and we jump into our rowing suits, seize an oar and give way—one-two, one-two—as far as Joinville; then overboard for a swim before breakfast—strip to swimming drawers, a jump overboard, and look out for squalls. After my bath I have the appetite of a tiger. Good! I seize the boat by one hand and I call out, ‘Charpentier, pass me a small ham.’ Three motions in one time and I have finished it to the bone. ‘Charpentier, pass me the brandy-flask.’ Three swallows and it is empty.”

A bearded man stands with his hands in his pockets, feet wide apart.So the description would continue—dazzling, Homeric.

“It is the hour for the regatta—noon—the sun just overhead. The boats draw up in line on the sparkling river, before a tent gaudy with streamers. On the bank the mayor with his staff of office, gendarmes in yellow shoulder-belts, and a swarm of summer dresses, open parasols, and straw hats. Bang! the signal-gun is fired. The Marsouin shoots ahead of all her competitors and easily gains the prize—and no fatigue! We go around Marne, and, returning, dine at CrÉteil. How cool the evening in the dusky arbor, where pipes glow through the darkness, and moths singe their wings in the flame of the omelette au kirsch. At the end of a dessert, served on decorated plates, we hear from the ball-room the call of the cornet—‘Take places for the quadrille!’ But already a rival crew, beaten that same morning, has monopolized the prettiest girls. A fight!—teeth broken, eyes blackened, ugly falls, and whacks below the belt; in a word, a poem of physical enthusiasm, of noisy hilarity, of animal spirits, without speaking of the return at midnight, through crowded stations, with girls whom we lift into the cars, friends separated calling from one end of the train to the other, and fellows playing a horn upon the roof.”And the evenings of my astonishing companion were not less full of adventure than his Sundays. Collar-and-elbow wrestling in a tent, under the red light of torches, between him—simple amateur—and Du Bois, the iron man, in person; rat-chases near the mouths of sewers, with dogs as fierce as tigers; sanguinary encounters at night, in the most dangerous quarters, with ruffians and nose-eaters, were the most insignificant episodes of his nightly career. Nor do I dare relate other adventures of a more intimate character, from which, as the writers of an earlier day would say in noble style, a pen the least timorous would recoil with horror.

However painful it may be to confess an unworthy sentiment, I am obliged to say that my admiration for Meurtrier was not unmixed with regret and bitterness. Perhaps there was mingled with it something of envy. But the recitation of his most marvellous exploits had never awakened in me the least feeling of incredulity, and Achille Meurtrier easily took his place in my mind among heroes and demigods, between Roland and Pirithous.

II.

At this time I was a great wanderer in the suburbs, and I occupied the leisure of my summer evenings by solitary walks in those distant regions, as unknown to the Parisians of the boulevards as the country of the Caribbees, and of whose sombre charm I endeavored later to tell in verse.

One evening in July, hot and dusty, at the hour when the first gas-lights were beginning to twinkle in the misty twilight, I was walking slowly from Vaugirard through one of those long and depressing suburban streets lined on each side by houses of unequal height, whose porters and porteresses, in shirt sleeves and in calico, sat on the steps and imagined that they were taking the fresh air. Hardly any one passing in the whole street; perhaps, from end to end, a mason, white with plaster, a sergeant-de-ville, a child carrying home a four-pound loaf larger than himself, or a young girl hurrying on in hat and cloak, with a leather bag on her arm; and every quarter-hour the half-empty omnibus coming back to its place of departure with the heavy trot of its tired horses.

Stumbling now and then on the pavement—for asphalt is an unknown luxury in these places—I went down the street, tasting all the delights of a stroller. Sometimes I stopped before a vacant lot to watch, through the broken boards of the fence, the fading glories of the setting sun and the black silhouettes of the chimneys thrown against a greenish sky. Sometimes, through an open window on the ground-floor, I caught sight of an interior, picturesque and familiar: here a jolly-looking laundress holding her flat-iron to her cheek; there workmen sitting at tables and smoking in the basement of a cabaret, while an old Bohemian with long gray hair, standing before them, sang something about “Liberty,” accompanying himself on a guitar about the color of bouillon—the scenes of Chardin and Van Ostade.

Suddenly I stopped.

One of these personal pictures had caught my eye by its domestic and charming simplicity.

She looked so happy and peaceful in her quiet little room, the dear old lady in her black gown and widow’s cap, leaning back in an easy-chair covered with green Utrecht velvet, and sitting quietly with her hands folded on her lap. Everything around her was so old and simple, and seemed to have been preserved, less through a wise economy than on account of hallowed memories, since the honey-moon with monsieur of the high complexion, in a frock-coat and flowered waistcoat, whose oval crayon ornamented the wall.

By two lamps on the mantle-shelf every detail of the old-fashioned furniture could be distinguished, from the clock on a fish of artificial and painted marble to the old and antiquated piano, on which, without doubt, as a young girl, in leg-of-mutton sleeves and with hair dressed À la Grecque, she had played the airs of Romagnesi.Certainly a loved and only daughter, remaining unmarried through her affection for her mother, piously watched over the last years of the widow. It was she, I was sure, who had so tenderly placed her dear mother; she who had put the ottoman under her feet, she who had put near her the inlaid table, and arranged on it the waiter and two cups. I expected already to see her coming in carrying the evening coffee—the sweet, calm girl, who should be dressed in mourning like the widow, and resemble her very much.

Absorbed by the contemplation of a scene so sympathetic, and by the pleasure of imagining that humble poem, I remained standing some steps from the open window, sure of not being noticed in the dusky street, when I saw a door open and there appeared—oh, how far he was from my thoughts at that moment—my friend Meurtrier himself, the formidable hero of tilts on the river and frays in unknown places.A sudden doubt crossed me. I felt that I was on the point of discovering a mystery.

It was indeed he. His terrible hairy hand held a tiny silver coffee-pot, and he was followed by a poodle which greatly embarrassed his steps—a valiant and classic poodle, the poodle of blind clarionet-players, a poor beggar’s poodle, a poodle clipped like a lion, with hairy ruffles on his four paws, and a white mustache like a general of the Gymnase.

“Mamma,” said the giant, in a tone of ineffable tenderness, “here is your coffee. I am sure that you will find it nice to-night. The water was boiling well, and I poured it on drop by drop.”

“Thank you,” said the old lady, rolling her easy-chair to the table with an air; “thank you, my little Achille. Your dear father said many a time that there was not my equal at making coffee—he was so kind and indulgent, the dear, good man—but I begin to believe that you are even better than I.”

At that moment, and while Meurtrier was pouring out the coffee with all the delicacy of a young girl, the poodle, excited no doubt by the uncovered sugar, placed his forepaws on the lap of his mistress.

“Down, MÉdor,” she cried, with a benevolent indignation. “Did any one ever see such a troublesome animal? A man in an apron pours liquid into a coffee pot.Look here, sir! you know very well that your master never fails to give you the last of his cup. By-the-way,” added the widow, addressing her son, “you have taken the poor fellow out, have you not?”

“Certainly, mamma,” he replied, in a tone that was almost infantile. “I have just been to the creamery for your morning milk, and I put the leash and collar on MÉdor and took him with me.”“And he has attended to all his little wants?”

“Don’t be disturbed. He doesn’t want anything.”

Reassured on this point, important to canine hygiene, the good dame drank her coffee, between her son and her dog, who each regarded her with an inexpressible tenderness.

It was assuredly unnecessary to see or hear more. I had already descried what a peaceful family life—upright, pure, and devoted—my friend Meurtrier hid under his chimerical gasconades. But the spectacle with which chance had favored me was at once so droll and so touching that I could not resist the temptation to watch for some moments longer. That indiscretion sufficed to show me the whole truth.

Yes, this type of roisterers, who seemed to have stepped from one of the romances of Paul de Kock—this athlete, this despot of bar-rooms and public-houses—performed simply and courageously, in these lowly rooms in the suburbs, the sublime duties of a sister of charity. This intrepid oarsman had never made a longer voyage than to conduct his mother to mass or vespers every Sunday. This billiard expert knew only how to play bÉzique. This trainer of bull-dogs was the submissive slave of a poodle. This Mauvaise-Philibert was an Antigone.

III.

The next morning, on arriving at the office, I asked Meurtrier how he had employed the previous evening, and he instantly improvised, without a moment’s hesitation, an account of a sharp encounter on the boulevard at two in the morning, when he had knocked down with a single blow of his fist, having passed his thumb through the ring of his keys, a terrible street rough. I listened, smiling ironically, and thinking to confound him; but remembering how respectable a virtue is which is hidden even under an absurdity, I struck him amicably on the shoulder, and said, with conviction:

“Meurtrier, you are a hero!”