On Rue du Helder, near the boulevard, in front of a handsome house, three street messengers had their regular stand.

On the afternoon of which we are writing, all three were at their post. One lay at full length on his crochets, which he had placed on the ground, horizontally, in such wise as to form a sort of cot-bed; it was rather narrow, but its occupant had become so accustomed to it that he had no difficulty in maintaining his place, and never fell over the side.

Another was sitting on a stone bench against the house. He was smoking a pipe, and had in his hands a disgustingly greasy and dirty pack of cards, with which he was apparently practising the false cut and divers other tricks of that sort.

The third messenger was on his feet, leaning against the wall, with his eyes fixed on the topmost floor of a high building almost opposite.

The man lying on the crochets seemed to be in the prime of life; he was of medium height, but the breadth of his shoulders and the size of the muscles in his sinewy limbs pointed him out as a man with whom it would be dangerous to quarrel. His face was frank and good-humored; his small, light blue eyes expressed recklessness and merriment; his nose was rather large, and sometimes red at the end; his full lips denoted a kindly and obliging disposition; and his abundant light hair, which blew about at the pleasure of the wind, surmounted a high forehead, wherein the brain must have had ample room to exercise its faculties.

He was dressed like most messengers,—a jacket and loose trousers; but he wore no neckerchief; his shirt, fastened by a button, disclosed a neck much whiter than one would have supposed from the color of his hands and face. The invariable habit of wearing nothing about his neck at any season of the year, even when the cold was most severe, was responsible for the sobriquet of Sans-Cravate, which had come to be the only name by which the messenger was known to the persons who employed him, and even to most of his friends.

The person seated on the stone bench, who seemed intent upon his cards, was short, and heavily pock-marked; his hair was dark brown and very thick, and hung low over a narrow forehead; the man's face indicated intelligence and cunning, and the evil expression of his gray eyes seemed to forbid the judgment we are accustomed to form of a person with a low forehead. A small nose, much too retroussÉ, tightly closed lips, and a protruding chin, made of Monsieur Jean Ficelle a decidedly ugly individual, and one who would by no means inspire the confidence which we like to feel in a messenger, unless his unusual mobility of feature were successful in deceiving those who tried to read his thoughts.

The third messenger, who stood against the wall, with his eyes constantly fixed on the attics of the opposite house, was a tall, slender young man of graceful figure; although he also wore loose trousers and a jacket, there was in his bearing an indefinable something, which, while perhaps it could not be called refinement, distinguished it from the vulgar slouchiness of his companions; and as, generally speaking, a person's face almost always fulfils the promise of his bearing, so this young man, whose features were regular and attractive, had not the usual expression of those of his calling. A high, well-shaped forehead; beautiful black hair, brushed aside with a lack of coquetry that was not without charm; brown eyes, with a tender and melancholy expression; a mouth of an ordinary type, supplied with handsome teeth; an oval face, almost always pale, but indicative of a delicate constitution rather than of ill health—such was that one of the three messengers who was known as Paul, and who, in truth, seemed but ill adapted for his trade.

"If Bastringuette hasn't sold her violets, I shall have a chance to sup in my mind's eye to-day. Business is dull, but the appetite keeps right along. CrÉdiÉ! what a lot of rooms there are to let in my belly! and unfurnished lodgings in my stomach! How the devil am I to furnish it all?

We'll sing that song for our supper, and we shan't be troubled with indigestion. But Bastringuette don't like that tune—nor do I, for that matter."

It was Sans-Cravate who made these reflections aloud, as he turned over on his crochets. After a moment's silence, he continued:

"If a fellow hadn't his cutty to comfort him when his pocket's empty, how he would curse his destiny! Bah! what's the odds! Am I going to have an attack of the dismals? am I going to join the ranks of the snivellers? Never! It don't bring in a sou to be sad; and then, as another song says, which I like much better:

"Isn't that so, boys? Well! don't all answer at once; I shouldn't know you if you did."

As he spoke, Sans-Cravate turned and looked at his comrades. He shrugged his shoulders when he saw Jean Ficelle playing with his cards, and muttered:

"The deuce! there's Jean Ficelle practising his tricks! Cards are his vocation. But damn me if I ever play piquet with you again! Infernal Ficelle![A] you are too well named."

The person addressed paid no attention, he was so engrossed by his cards. Thereupon Sans-Cravate turned to Paul and said, with a smile:

"Ah! this is a bird of another color. 'Tis love, love, love, that makes the world go round! And here's a young spark as has laid in a good stock of it. Well, Paul, even if you give yourself a stiff neck standing like that, with your head in the air, you won't succeed in opening the windows on the fourth floor, if Mademoiselle Dumanchon, the dressmaker, wants 'em to stay shut. Mademoiselle Dumanchon don't let her girls go out to walk the streets; indeed, she has plenty of work, because, they say, she knows her business. She makes dresses that give a bust to women without any, and that hide the hips of those who have too much. That's genuine talent! I am surprised that she lives on the fourth floor; to be sure, lodgings in this quarter are pretty high.—Come, Paul, tell me, haven't you seen your little girl to-day?"

The young messenger who was looking in the air turned to Sans-Cravate and replied:

"My little girl? What do you mean? I don't understand you."

"Oh, well! if we're going to play the stupid, if we have secrets from our friends—that's a different matter, and you'd better say so. Do you suppose I don't know that you're in love with one of the dressmaker's apprentices, a pretty little thing named Elina, who takes short, quick steps when she passes us, which doesn't prevent her casting a sly glance in your direction?"

"Really, Sans-Cravate! do you think she looks at me when she passes?"

"You don't see her yourself, I suppose, you fox?"

"Oh! I assure you, Sans-Cravate, that I have never said a word to that young woman which could make her suspect that I dare to think of her. I think her very pretty, that is true; and then, she is so pleasant and so courteous when she gives me an errand to do! There are so many people who treat us messengers as if we were brutes or savages!"

"When anybody takes that tone with me, I pay him back in his own coin. If people are decent, I am amiable; if they're insolent, then I'm brutal! and be damned to 'em!"

"But when one is obliged to work for his living, he must work for everybody."

"Not at all! I choose my patrons. Indeed, I very often fold my arms."

"Several times Mademoiselle Elina has taken me with her to carry boxes, and she always talks to me so kindly—— Ah! it makes me forget that I am only a poor messenger."

"In short, you are in love with the girl; that's the whole story."

"Oh, no! Sans-Cravate, you're mistaken; and, anyway, what good would it do me to love that charming creature? Can a man of my class, one of the common people, presume to raise his eyes to someone who will not come down to his level?"

"Look you, a man always presumes, and does his reasoning afterward. And then, it don't seem to me that a dressmaker's apprentice is such a very great personage; and, even if you are a messenger, aren't you as good a man as another? If a duchess would have me, I'd adore her, duchess and all.—Great God! if Bastringuette should hear me, she'd make me go without tobacco."

"Yes," said Paul, with a sigh, "a messenger's trade requires that he be an honest man. I don't blush for my calling, I assure you. And yet, there was a time when I was justified in hoping that I might occupy a higher station. A most excellent man, happening to see me, when I was ten years old, in the charitable institution where I was brought up, took a fancy to me and offered to take charge of me, as he needed someone to do errands for him. Monsieur Desroches was a respectable tradesman, and his proposition was thankfully accepted. I left that refuge of the unfortunate, where I had passed my childhood, and went to live with my new patron, in the Marais. As he was satisfied with the zeal and promptitude with which I did the errands he gave me to do, Monsieur Desroches had me taught to read and write and cipher, and employed me in his office; and every day he would give me a friendly tap on the shoulder, and say: 'You're doing well, Paul; keep on, and you'll make your way.'"

"Good! He was what I call a fine old cove! And that's how it is that you know so much, and that you're so much better set up than the rest of us. Well, why didn't you stay with that fine old fellow? I suppose you played some prank or other. Dame! boys will be boys!"

"Oh, no! not that at all! I would never have left good Monsieur Desroches. But after I had lived with him eight years, he and his wife treating me like their own child, my benefactor was utterly ruined by a bad failure; and the poor man died of grief, because he was compelled to ask for time to pay his notes."

"Sapristi! you ought to have kept some of that man's seed. His kind are not common in the market."

"I was eighteen years old at that time. I tried to find a place, to get into some business house; but I couldn't find anything. However, I had to earn money, for one must live; so I soon made up my mind: I bought a pair of crochets and started in as a messenger."

"And you did well. There is no foolish trade, as one of the old troubadours said! But how did you happen to come into this quarter instead of staying in the Marais, where you were known?"

"That was just the reason. People there had seen me every day, dressed—I might almost say, fashionably, and I didn't care to have them see me in this jacket. For, I tell you, Sans-Cravate, although you may set your mind on making the best of it, there are times when you can't help remembering the past."

"I understand your feeling, especially as I myself—— Mine is another kind; but the idea's the same. I mean that I sometimes think of my father, and my poor mother, and my sister Adeline, or Liline, as I call her—such a pretty creature she is. Ah! I might have stayed with them all, in our little village in Auvergne. My father often said to me: 'Stay with us, Étienne (they didn't call me Sans-Cravate there), stay with us and take care of my little farm. We have enough to live on. What are you going to do in Paris?'—But, damnation! my feet itched; I couldn't stay still. I said to my father: 'Let me go; I mean to make my fortune, and bring back a big marriage portion for Liline.'—So he let me go, and it's amazing how I pile up the money! I never have a sou! I tell you, Paul, when I think of that, I am ashamed of myself; I would give myself a good thrashing, if I could."

"Don't get excited, my dear Sans-Cravate; if your father has enough to live on, of course he doesn't count on you."

"I went to see them two years and a half ago; I knew it would please father, and I myself was glad enough to see 'em all and give 'em a kiss. I had succeeded in saving thirty francs, and I said to myself: 'With thirty francs and a good stick, I can walk home as comfortably as you please.' So I started; but Jean Ficelle started with me, and the second day my money was all gone. However, I got there after a while. I saw my sister, who was fifteen then—I am six years older than she is; she is almighty pretty, and such fine manners and language! There's a Madame de Clermont, who has taken a fancy to her and often sends for her to go and visit her. Then my poor father is left all alone in the village. But he says: 'I can't interfere with what that lady chooses to do for my child's good.'—He hoped I would stay with him, but I couldn't. When a man has had a taste of this rascally Paris, can he make up his mind to live in a village?—I said to my father: 'I am in a fair way to get rich; I must go back to Paris, or else I shall miss my opportunity; I will come back when I have money enough.'—And off I went; and when I got here, my trousers were torn so that you could see my posterior; and at the barrier, they thought I was trying to smuggle, and ran after me, singing out: 'What are you hiding there?'—'I'm hiding nothing,' says I; 'on the contrary, I'm showing too much; collect a duty on it, if you choose.'—And—— Well, you don't seem to be listening. So much for talking to a lover; it's the same as talking to yourself."

While Sans-Cravate was speaking, Paul had turned his eyes toward the dressmaker's windows again, and seemed, in fact, to have ceased to listen to his comrade. But at that moment the third messenger, who had not spoken, uttered a grunt of satisfaction and jumped up from the bench, crying:

"I have it, I have done it; oh! I have it as neat as you please!"

"What is it that you have, Jean Ficelle?" asked Sans-Cravate.

The person addressed raised his head and replied, with a disdainful glance at his comrades:

"Oh! something that I can use to take greenhorns in."

"Another new game, I'll bet; for you're a very devil of a gambler!"

"Well, why not? Games of chance are tabooed in Paris, but the sharks and blacklegs in good society find a way to play, all the same. They have secret meetings, where they can ruin themselves as nice as you please, on the pretence of having a little dance."

"How do you know?"

"Oh! I know everything. Well, then, why shouldn't the small fry, the less select society, have the same chance? But they go about it more openly. The men who run games of chance set them up in the open air, all ready to cut stakes at sight of a policeman or a detective. You don't know anything about it, you fellows; you are greenhorns. Just listen to me a minute, for your instruction."

"A nice kind of instruction we are likely to get from you, I fancy."

"But it's always a help, even if it's only to keep you from being taken in by sharpers.—Come, Sans-Cravate, come and sit down with me."

Sans-Cravate concluded to take his seat on the stone bench, beside Jean Ficelle, who continued, with the important air of one who considers himself much more intelligent than those to whom he speaks:

"Near the barriers, under the arches of the bridges, on the outer boulevards, and in the neighborhood of the wine market, are the places where you will usually find the men in blouses and plain caps who are called croupiers, which means: men who run a game. In the summertime, if you should go and look under the arches of the bridge over the canal near Pont d'Austerlitz, you would see a number of games in full blast. You see groups of men—first, the croupiers and their confederates (for wherever there's games of chance, there's confederates); then, peasants, countrymen, and workmen with their loaves under their arms; these are the pigeons, who let themselves be plucked by the bait of a possible gain."

"What a lot this Jean Ficelle knows!—You seem to have made a study of it!"

"In my own interest, in order not to be a pigeon! They play biribi, table-basse, jarretiÈres, trois noix, and sometimes loto; but the first three are played most. The game of jarretiÈres, you know, consists in sticking a pin into the edge of a piece of cloth. The man who runs the game always uses the skirt of his frock-coat. If I had one on, I'd show you how it's done. He lifts up one corner, presses it very tight, and holds it out to you in such a way that to stick a pin into the edge seems to be the simplest thing in the world."

"Well?"

"But not much; because the croupier, when he picks up the hem of his coat, is smart enough to turn it under; so that you always stick your pin into the middle of the cloth when you think you're sticking it into the edge."

"I'd stick it into his ugly mug!—And table-basse, what's that?"

"You see a little table with a lot of little, numbered holes. They hand you a dicebox, with some balls; you throw the balls on the table at random, and they roll into the holes; then they add up the numbers and give you the prize corresponding to the total. The big prizes are never won; you never get the silver watch, the piece of plate, or the drinking cup, that they show to entice you; but a flint and steel, or a save-all—that's all your twenty sous ever wins."

"Very pretty, indeed! a choice lot they must be! But what did you mean just now when you sung out: 'I've got it! I know how it's done!'"

"Oh! that's the most popular of all the games—biribi."

"Biribi?"

"I'll show you that; you play it with just three cards, see; and one of 'em's biribi. Look, the ace of hearts! Now, to win, all you have to do is guess where biribi is. But the croupier's skill consists in always showing you the under card, and that is always biribi; then he moves his cards this way and that, and you think you can follow it with your eyes. Like this: now, follow the ace of hearts, follow it carefully; do you know which of the three it is now?"

Sans-Cravate, who had kept his eyes on the cards, placed his hand on one of them, saying:

"This is the ace of hearts."

"How much do you bet?"

"A glass of beer."

"Done!"

Jean Ficelle turned the card and showed his wondering comrade that it was not biribi.

Sans-Cravate was stupefied. Jean Ficelle repeated the trick twice, and won two more glasses of beer.

"Are you a sorcerer?" cried the other.

"Oh, no! But you don't see that, when I move the cards about, I always throw the one that's on top, although I make believe to throw the one on the bottom. That's how they gull the peasant, who thinks he hasn't taken his eyes off biribi. But if by any chance the pigeon guesses right, just when he's going to put his hand on the card which is really biribi, a confederate, who is always on hand, says to him: 'Not that one, my man; the other one, to the left. I am sure of it, and, to prove it, I'll bet a hundred sous.' The peasant is persuaded by the confederate's confidence, he takes up the card on which the other has bet five francs, and he is smoked.—I say there, you man of sighs, come and play biribi with us a while."

Paul glanced at the cards and shook his head.

"I don't care for card playing," he said.

"We must kill time, especially when we've nothing to do. Come and play for a glass of beer—that won't ruin you."

"I don't want to play."

"Humph! what a poor cuss that fellow is!" said Jean Ficelle, turning back to Sans-Cravate. "He'll never spend a sou with his friends. I don't call that being a man, myself."

"Paul is more sensible, wiser, than we are; he saves his money and he does well."

"Saves his money—hum! I don't feel so sure what he does with his money; he gets mighty little good out of it. He's pale as an egg, and his jacket's all patched at the elbows. Dame! perhaps he spends it all to seduce his girl. Women aren't to be caught with nothing but sighs. They like to have money spent on 'em—dressmakers, especially. They say that they have to have dinners and theatre tickets and jewelry. Little Elina probably spends it all for him. She has the look of a sly little coquette——"

On hearing Elina's name, Paul ran up to Jean Ficelle, seized his left arm, and shook it roughly.

"What's that you say?" he exclaimed. "You dare to talk about Mademoiselle Elina! If I am not mistaken, you had the effrontery to make remarks about that young lady! Be careful, Jean! I am not ill-tempered; but if you should be unlucky enough to insult her, why, I would stamp on you as I do on these cards!"

"Let alone of me, I say! Will you let alone of me? Stupid fool—to walk on my cards!"

"A terrible calamity! A fine business for a messenger, isn't it? to learn thieves' and blacklegs' tricks, to study ways of cheating other people! Instead of handling cards so skilfully, you would do much better to mend your crochets and your saw. But you prefer to play cards!"

"Ah, Ça! isn't it about time for the fellow to stop? What airs he puts on! and why, I should like to know! A miserable foundling, with no father nor mother—and he undertakes to preach to other people! Go and hunt up your parents—that would be a better business for you."

Paul lowered his eyes at the word foundling, and his face assumed an expression of profound sadness; he released his hold on Jean's arm, and, stepping back to the wall, stood leaning against it without speaking a word.

But Sans-Cravate, who knew that nothing wounded Paul so deeply as to be reminded that he had been abandoned by his parents, and who saw the sorrowful expression of his face, rose abruptly and shook his clenched fist under Jean Ficelle's nose, saying:

"You're a miserable cur! and if your nose wasn't so turned-up already that I can see your brain, I'd turn it up a little more for you. You know that the poor fellow is unhappy because he knows nothing about his family; but it isn't any crime, and it's better to have no family at all than to come of low-lived stock! But it hurts him when anyone speaks of it; and you remind him of it on purpose! It was a mean, dirty trick! I have a good mind to thrash you. Come, try a little bout with me; I'll give you a good dust bath, to cool you off."

Sans-Cravate had already seized Jean about the waist; but Paul hastened to intervene, and forced Sans-Cravate to release his hold.

"I don't want you to fight my battles," he said. "When I choose to teach Jean a lesson, I can do it myself all right. A man is always strong when he is not afraid. When he called me a foundling, he said no more than the truth, and I have no right to thrash him for that. But let him beware how he insults Mademoiselle Elina, or makes such remarks as he made just now about dressmakers—for then he would have a chance to see what my arm weighs."

Jean Ficelle eyed Paul contemptuously, and muttered, with a shrug:

"Yes, he's about as strong as a flea; he can't carry a commode upstairs!"

But a glance from Sans-Cravate made him change his tone on the instant, and he added, with an affectation of good humor:

"But why does he throw my cards on the ground? if it amuses me to play biribi, ain't I at liberty to do it? Vive la charte! When all's said and done, Sans-Cravate, you owe me three glasses of beer; are you going to pay them?"

"With what, I wonder? I wouldn't ask anything better than to rinse my gullet, for I'm dried up with thirst; but I haven't a monaco!"

Thereupon Jean Ficelle went up to Sans-Cravate, and whispered in his ear, with a glance at Paul:

"Borrow a little tin of him; you're a friend of his, and friends always lend to each other. If I had any, it would be at your service; but I'm as strapped as you are."

"Paul has no more than the rest of us," replied Sans-Cravate, in an undertone; "I saw him breakfasting this morning on an old dry crust and a glass of cocoa! When a man eats a meal like that, it means that he ain't lined with gold."

"But what does he do with his money, then? for he earns more than we do; his luck is indecent. As all the women of the quarter think he's good-looking, they always choose him to do their errands; the windfalls pass us by, and are all for him. So he must have money, for he never spends any; he always refuses to play cards, or drink, or go to the wine shop. I tell you again, he's a mean cuss, who saves up his money, like the miser he is!"

"There you go again! Jean Ficelle, you're spoiling for a thrashing. Paul is my friend, and I like him; let him do what he pleases with his money, it's none of our business. One thing I'm sure of is that he's a fine fellow, for I saw him one evening run after a gentleman and give him back a twenty-franc piece he'd given him by mistake for twenty sous. I'm not sure you'd do as much, Biribi."

"Bah! who knows! You're stuck on that greenhorn; and yet, if I chose to be mean, I could tell you some things about him that would open your eyes; but you see things crooked——"

"What are you talking about? More nonsense, I'll bet."

Jean Ficelle pretended to hesitate and to reflect as to whether he should say anything more, but at that moment three young men turned into Rue du Helder from the boulevard and walked toward the messengers.

"Ah! here come customers!" cried Sans-Cravate; "I shall have some supper to-night!"