afew evenings afterwards bigourdin gave a dinner of ceremony to the viriots—and a dinner of ceremony in provincial france is a very ceremonious and elaborate affair. all day long there had been anxious preparations. félise abandoning the fabrique, toiled assiduously with euphémie, while bigourdin, expert chef like all good hotel-keepers, controlled everything with his master touch. the crazily ceremonious hour of seven-thirty was fixed upon; not only on account of its ceremoniousness, but because by that time the commercial travellers would have finished their meal and melted away. the long middle table was replaced by a round table prodigally adorned with flowers and four broad tricolour ribbons, each like the sash of monsieur le maire, radiating from under a central silver épergne laden with fruit of which a pineapple was the crown. a bewildering number of glasses of different shapes stood at each place, to be filled each kind in its separate order with the wine ordained for each separate course. martin rehearsed the wine service over and over again with a solemn bigourdin. as a lieutenant he had the plongeur (or washer-up of glass and crockery) from the café de l’univers, an earnest neophyte tense with the excitement of practising a higher branch of his profession.
hosts and guests were ceremoniously attired; bigourdin and the elder viriot suffocated in tightly buttoned frock-coats of venerable and painful fit; lucien, more dashing, wore a morning coat (last cry of bond street) acquired recently from the “high life” emporium in paris; all three men retained yellow dogskin gloves until they sat down to table. madame viriot, stout and placid, appeared in her black silk dress and an old lace collar and her very best hat with her very best black ostrich feather secured by the old rose-diamond buckle, famous throughout the valley of the dordogne, which had belonged to her great-great-grandmother; and, lastly, félise wore a high-necked simple frock of dazzling whiteness which might have shewn up her delicate dark colouring had not her cheeks been inordinately pale.
bigourdin had madame viriot on his right, monsieur viriot on his left, and félise sat between monsieur viriot and lucien. every one was most ceremoniously polite. it was “mon cher viriot,” and “mon cher bigourdin,” and the formal “vous” instead of the “mon vieux” and the “tu” of the café and of ordinary life; also, “chère madame,” and “monsieur lucien” and “ma nièce.” and although from childhood félise and lucien had called each other by their christian names, it was now “monsieur” and “mademoiselle” between them. you see, marriage is in france a deuce of a ceremony which begins months before anybody dreams of setting the wedding bells a-ringing. this dinner of ceremony was the first scene of the first act of the elaborate drama which would end on the curtain being run down to the aforesaid wedding-bells. really, when one goes into the question, and considers all the barbed wire entanglements that french law and custom interpose between two young people who desire to become man and wife, one not only wonders how any human pair can go through the ordeal and ever marry at all, but is profoundly convinced that france is the most moral country on the face of the globe. as a matter of fact, it is.
it was a long meal of many courses. martin, aided by the plongeur, acquitted himself heroically. manners professional and individual, and also the strain of service prevented him from attending to the conversation. but what he could not avoid overhearing did not impress him with its brilliance. it was a self-conscious little company. it threw about statistics as to the state of the truffle crop; it listened to lucien’s modest anecdotes of his military career; it decided that parisians were greatly to be pitied in that fate compelled them to live in paris instead of brant?me. even the flush of good cheer failed to inspire it with heartiness. for this perhaps the scared unresponsiveness of one of the chief personages was responsible.
“are you fond of dogs, mademoiselle?” asked lucien, valiant in small talk.
“oui, monsieur,” replied félise.
“have you any now, mademoiselle?”
“non, monsieur,” replied félise.
“the beautiful poodle that was so clever is dead, i believe,” remarked madame viriot in support of her son.
“oui, madame,” replied félise.
however alluring to the young frenchman about to marry may be timid innocence with downcast eyes, yet, when it is to such a degree monosyllabic, conversation does not sparkle. martin, accustomed to her tongue wagging charmingly, wondered at her silence. what more attractive companion could she desire than the beau sabreur by her side? and she ate next to nothing. when she was about to decline a bécasse au fumet, as to the success of which euphémie’s heart was beating like a sledge-hammer, he whispered in her ear,
“just a little bit. do.”
and as she helped herself, he saw the colour mount to her neck. he felt quite pleased at having prevailed on her to take nourishment.
what happened after the meal in the private salon, where félise, according to sacred rite, served coffee and liqueurs, martin did not know. he was too busy with euphémie and the chambermaid and baptiste and the plongeur in cleaning up after the banquet. besides, as the waiter of the establishment, what should he have been doing in that ceremonious gathering?
when the work was finished and a concluding orgy on broken meats and half emptied bottles had been temperately concluded, and euphémie for the hundredth time had been informed of the exact appreciation which each particular dish had received from monsieur and madame viriot—“young people, you see,” she explained, “have their own affairs and they see everything rose-coloured, and you could give them boiled horse-liver and they wouldn’t know the difference between that and ris-de-veau à l’impériale; it doesn’t matter what you put into the stomachs of children; but with old, serious folks, it is very important. i made the stomach of monsieur viriot the central idea of my dinner—i have known the stomach of monsieur viriot for twenty years—also that of madame, for old ladies, voyez-vous, know more than you think”—and when the weary and zealous servants had gone their separate ways, martin locked up, and, escaping from the generous atmosphere of the kitchen, entered the dimly lit vestibule with the idea of smoking a quiet cigarette before going to bed. there he found bigourdin, sprawling his great bulk over the cane-seated couch.
“did things go all right?” he asked.
“wonderfully. everybody dined well. they can go to the ban and arrière-ban of their friends and relations and say that there is not such a cuisine in périgord as at the h?tel des grottes. and the service was excellent. not the smallest hitch. i congratulate you and thank you, mon ami. but ouf!”—he took a great breath of relief—“i am glad it is over. i was not built for the formalities of society. ?a vous fatigue!”
“it’s also fatiguing from the waiter’s point of view,” laughed martin.
“but it is all necessary when one has a young girl to marry. the father and mother of the young man expect it. it is very complicated. soon there will be the formal demand in marriage. they will wear gloves—c’est idiot—but what would you have? it is the custom. and then there will be a dinner of ceremony at the viriots’. he has some chambertin in his cellar, my old friend viriot—ah, mon petit martin!”—he blew a kiss to the purple goddess beloved of bacchus and by him melted into each cobwebbed bottle—“it is the only thing that reconciles me to it. truth to say, one dines abominably at the viriots. if he does not produce some of that chambertin, i withdraw the dowry of félise.”
“it’s all arranged then?” martin asked.
“all what?”
“the marriage.”
“without doubt.”
“then monsieur lucien has been accepted by mademoiselle félise? i mean, he has proposed to her, as we english say?”
“mais non!” cried bigourdin, with a shocked air. “lucien is a correctly brought up young man and would not offend the proprieties in that matter. it is not the affair of lucien and félise, it is the affair of the two families, the parents; and for félise i am in loco parentis. propose to félise! what are you talking about?”
“it all interests me so much,” replied martin. “in england we manage differently. when a man wants to marry a girl, he asks her, and when they have fixed up everything between themselves, they go and announce the fact to their families.”
to which bigourdin made the amazing answer:
“c’est le phlègme britannique!”
british phlegm! when a man takes his own unphlegmatic way with a maid! martin could find no adequate retort. he was knocked into a cocked hat. he threw away his cigarette and, being very tired, half stifled a yawn. bigourdin responded mightily and rose to his feet.
“allons dodo,” said he. “all this has been terribly fatiguing.”
so fatiguing had it all been that félise, for the first time since the chicken-pox and measles of childhood, remained in her bed the next day. euphémie, her personal attendant, found her in the morning a wan ghost with a splitting headache, and forbade her to rise. she filled her up with tilleul, the decoction of lime-leaves which in french households is the panacea for all ills, and, good and comfortable gossip, extolled, in gallic hyperbole, the dazzling qualities of monsieur lucien. at last, fever-eyed and desperate, félise sat up in bed and pointed to the door.
“ma bonne euphémie, laisse-moi tranquille! va-t’en! fich’-moi la paix!”
euphémie gaped in bewilderment. it was as though a dove had screamed:
“leave me alone! go away! go to blazes!”
“ah, la! la! ma pauvre petite!” euphémie knew not what she was saying, but she went. she went to bigourdin and told him that mademoiselle was in delirium, she had brain-fever, and if he wanted to save her reason, he must send at once for the doctor. the doctor came, diagnosed a chill on the vaguest of symptoms, and ordered soupe à l’huile. this invalid fare is a thin vegetable soup with a layer of salad oil floating on the top with the object of making the liquid slip gratefully down the gullet: the french gullet, be it understood. félise, in spite of her lifelong french training, had so much of england lingering in her ?sophagus, that it abhorred soupe à l’huile. the good doctor’s advice failed. she fasted in bed all day, declaring that, headache apart, she was perfectly well, and the following morning, a wraith of herself, arose and went about her ordinary avocations.
“but what is the matter with her?” asked bigourdin of martin. “nothing could have disagreed with her at that abominable dinner, because she didn’t eat anything.”
as martin could throw no light on the sudden malady of félise, bigourdin lit a cigarette and inhaled a huge puff.
“it needs a woman, voyez-vous, to look after a young girl. men are no good. there are a heap of secrets——” with his arms he indicated mount blanc piled on mount everest. “i shall be glad when she is well and duly married. perhaps the approaching betrothal affects her. women have nerves like that. she is anxious to know the result of the negotiations. at the present moment the viriots are free to make or make not their demand. it would be good to reassure her a little. what do you think?”
martin gave utterance to the profound apophthegm: “there is nothing so upsetting as uncertainty.”
“that is my idea!” cried bigourdin. “pardon me for consulting you on these details so intimate and a little sacred. but you have a clear intelligence and a loyal heart.”
so it came to pass that, after déjeuner, bigourdin took félise into their own primly and plushily furnished salon, and, like an amiable bull in a boudoir, proceeded to smash up the whole of her universe.
“there is no doubt,” he proclaimed, “monsieur and madame viriot have dreamed of it for ten years. i give you a dowry—there is no merit in it, because i love you like my own daughter—but i give you a dowry such as there are not many in périgord. lucien loves you. he is bon gar?on. it has never entered his head to think of another woman for his wife. it is all arranged. in two or three days—you must allow for the convenances—monsieur viriot and lucien will call on me. so, my dear little angel, do not be afraid.”
félise had listened to this, white-faced and hollow-eyed. “but i don’t want to marry lucien, mon oncle!”
“comment? you don’t want to marry lucien?”
“no, mon oncle.”
“but——” he swept the air with a protesting gesture.
“i have already told you so,” said félise.
“but, ma chère petite, that wasn’t serious. it was because you had some stupid and beautiful idea of not deserting me. that is all imbecile. young people must marry, sacrebleu! so that the race is perpetuated, and fathers and mothers and uncles don’t count.”
“but what has that to do with it, mon oncle?” protested félise. “i find lucien very charming; but i don’t love him. if i loved him, i would marry him. but as i don’t love him, i can’t marry him.”
“but marry him and you will love him,” cried bigourdin, as millions of french fathers and uncles have cried for the last three or four hundred years. “it is very simple. what more do you want than a gallant fellow like lucien?”
then, of course, she broke down, and began to cry. bigourdin, unused to feminine tears, tried to clutch his hair. if it had been longer than half an inch of upstanding bristle, he would have torn it.
“you don’t understand, mon oncle,” she sobbed, with bowed head. “it is only my mother who can advise me. i must see my mother.”
bigourdin put his arm round the girl’s slender shoulders. “your mother, my poor félise, sees nobody.”
she raised her head and flashed out: “she sees my father. she lives with him in the same house. why shouldn’t she see me?”
“tiens, tiens, my little félise,” said bigourdin soothingly. “there is no need for you to consult your mother. both your father and your mother have a long while ago decided that you should marry lucien. do you think i would take a step of which they did not approve?”
“a long while ago is not to-day,” sobbed félise. “i want to talk to my mother.”
bigourdin walked across the salon, with his back to her, and snapped his fingers in peculiar agitation, and muttered below his breath: “nom de dieu, de nom de dieu, de nom de dieu!” kindest-hearted of mortals though he was, he resented the bottom being knocked out of his scheme of social existence. for years he had looked forward to this alliance with the viriots. personally he had nothing to gain: on the contrary, he stood to lose the services of félise and a hundred thousand francs. but he had set his heart on it, and so had the viriots. to go to them and say, “my niece refuses to marry your son,” would be a slash of the whip across their faces. his failure to bring up a young girl in the proper sentiments would be a disgrace to him in the eyes of the community. he felt hurt, too, because he no longer sufficed her; she wanted her mother; and it was out of the question that she should go to her mother. no wonder he swore to himself softly.
“but, mon dieu,” said he, turning round. “what have you against lucien?”
whereupon they went over all the argument again. she did not love lucien. she didn’t want to marry lucien. she would not marry a man she did not love.
“then you will die an old maid,” said bigourdin. “an old maid, figure-toi! it would be terrible!”
félise sniffed at such terrors. bigourdin, in desperation, asked what he was to tell the viriots. “the truth,” said félise. but what was the truth?
“tell me, my little félise,” said he, gently, “there is, by chance, no one else?”
then félise waxed indignant and routed the unhappy man. she gave him to understand that she was a jeune fille bien élevée and was not in the habit of behaving like a kitchenmaid. it was cruel and insulting to accuse her of clandestine love-affairs. and bigourdin, bound by his honourable conventions, knew that she was justified in her resentment. again he plucked at his bristles, scared by the spectacle of outraged maidenhood. the tender-eyed dove had become a flashing little eagle. a wilier man than he might have suspected the over-protesting damsel. woman-like, she pressed her advantage.
“mon oncle, i love you with all my heart, but you are a man and you don’t understand.”
“that is absolutely true,” said he.
“so you see there is only one person i can explain it to, and that is my mother.”
thus she completed the vicious little circle. and again the helpless bigourdin walked across the salon and turned his back on her and muttered the incantation which brings relief to distracted man. but this time she went up to him and put an arm round his great body and laid her face against his sleeve.
“tu sais, je suis bien malheureuse.”
it was a knife stuck in the honest fellow’s heart. he caught her to him and in his turn protested vehemently. he would not allow her to be unhappy. he would cut off his head rather than allow her to be unhappy. he would do anything—his french caution forbade an offer to send the viriots packing—anything in reason to bring the colour back to her white cheeks.
suddenly he had an inspiration which glowed all over his broad face and caused him to hold her out at arms’ length and laugh joyously.
“you can’t see your mother—but there is your good aunt clothilde. she will be a second mother to you. a woman so pious and so sympathetic. you will be able to tell her all your troubles. she has married a regiment of daughters. what she doesn’t know of young girls isn’t worth knowing. you are tired, you are ill. you need a change, a little holiday. go and spend a month with her, and when you come back we’ll see what can be done with regard to lucien. i’ll write to her now.”
and without waiting to hear her demure “bien, mon oncle,” he escaped to the bureau where he should find the writing materials which did not profane the sacred primness of the salon, and plunged into correspondence. félise, left alone, pondered for a moment or two, with faint wrinkling of her smooth forehead, and then, sketching a gesture of fatalistic resignation, went off to the kitchen, where a great special boiling of goose livers was in progress. on the way she met martin carrying a load of porcelain pots. but she passed him by coldly; and for the rest of the day she scarcely threw at him a couple of words.
meanwhile bigourdin beamed over the letter to his elder sister clothilde, a comfortable and almost opulent widow who lived at chartres. they had not met for a dozen years, it is true, and she had only once seen félise; but the sense of the family is very strong in france, especially where marriage alliances are concerned, and he had no doubt that she would telegraph, as requested, and authorise him to entrust félise to her keeping. verily it had been an inspiration. it was a solution of difficulties. the viriots had given signs of an almost indecent hurry, which naturally had scared félise. a month was a long time. clothilde was a woman of experience, tact and good sense. she would know how to bring félise to a reasonable state of mind. if she did not succeed—well—he was not the man to force his little félise into a distasteful marriage. in any case he had a month’s respite.
having stated his case at length, he went out into the town to post such an important letter at the central postes et télégraphes, and on the way back, looked in at the shop of the very respectable madame chauvet, who, with her two elderly daughters, sold crucifixes and rosaries and books of devotion and candles and all that would supply the devout needs of the religious population. and after a prolonged and courtly conversation, he induced madame chauvet, in consideration of their old friendship, her expenses and an honorarium of twenty francs, to undertake the safe convoy of félise from brant?me to the house of madame robineau, her aunt clothilde, at chartres.