The Martian: A Novel

Then back to Le Gue des Aulnes. And one evening, after a good supper at Grandmaman Laferte's, the diligence de Paris came jingling and rumbling through the main street of La Tremblaye, flashing right and left its two big lamps, red and blue. And we three boys, after the most grateful and affectionate farewells, packed ourselves into the coupe, which had been retained for us, and rumbled back to Paris through the night.

There was quite a crowd to see us off. Not only Lafertes, but others--all sorts and conditions of men, women, and children--and among them three or four of Barty's charcoal-burning friends; one of whom, an old man with magnificent black eyes and an immense beard, that would have been white if he hadn't been a charcoal-burner, kissed Barty on both cheeks, and gave him a huge bag full of some kind of forest berry that is good to eat; also a young cuckoo (which Barty restored to liberty an hour later); also a dormouse and a large green lizard; also, in a little pasteboard box, a gigantic pale green caterpillar four inches long and thicker than your thumb, with a row of shiny blue stars in relief all along each side of its back--the most beautiful thing of the kind you ever saw.

"Pioche bien ta geometrie, mon bon petit Josselin! c'est la plus belle science au monde, crois-moi!" said M. Laferte to Barty, and gave him the hug of a grizzly-bear; and to me he gave a terrific hand-squeeze, and a beautiful double-barrelled gun by Lefaucheux, for which I felt too supremely grateful to find suitable thanks. I have it now, but I have long given up killing things with it.

I had grown immensely fond of this colossal old "bourru bienfaisant," as he was called in La Tremblaye, and believe that all his moroseness and brutality were put on, to hide one of the warmest, simplest, and tenderest hearts in the world.

Before dawn Barty woke up with such a start that he woke me:

"Enfin! ca y est! quelle chance!" he exclaimed.

"Quoi, quoi, quoi?" said I, quacking like a duck.

"Le nord--c'est revenu--it's just ahead of us--a little to the left!"

We were nearing Paris.

And thus ended the proudest and happiest time I ever had in my life. Indeed I almost had an adventure on my own account--_une bonne fortune_, as it was called at Brossard's by boys hardly older than myself. I did not brag of it, however, when I got back to school.

It was at "Les Laiteries," or "Les Poteries," or "Les Crucheries," or some such place, the charming abode of Monsieur et Madame Pelisson--only their name wasn't Pelisson, or anything like it. At dinner I sat next to a Miss ----, who was very tall and wore blond side ringlets. I think she must have been the English governess.

We talked very much together, in English; and after dinner we walked in the garden together by starlight arm in arm, and she was so kind and genial to me in English that I felt quite chivalrous and romantic, and ready to do doughty deeds for her sake.

Then, at M. Pelisson's request, all the company assembled in a group for evening prayer, under a spreading chestnut-tree on the lawn: the prayer sounded very much like the morning or evening prayer at Brossard's, except that the Almighty was addressed as "toi" instead of "vous"; it began:

"Notre Pere qui es aux cieux--toi dont le regard scrutateur penetre jusque dans les replis les plus profonds de nos coeurs"--and ended, "Ainsi soit-il!"

The night was very dark, and I stood close to Miss ----, who stood as it seemed with her hands somewhere behind her back. I was so grateful to her for having talked to me so nicely, and so fond of her for being English, that the impulse seized me to steal my hand into hers--and her hand met mine with a gentle squeeze which I returned; but soon the pressure of her hand increased, and by the time M. le Cure had got to "au nom du Pere" the pressure of her hand had become an agony--a thing to make one shriek!

"Ainsi soit-il!" said M. le Cure, and the little group broke up, and Miss ---- walked quietly indoors with her arm around Madame Pelisson's waist, and without even wishing me good-night--and my hand was being squeezed worse than ever.

"Ah ha! Lequel de nous deux est vole, petit coquin?" hissed an angry male voice in my ear--(which of us two is sold, you little rascal?).

And I found my hand in that of Monsieur Pelisson, whose name was something else--and I couldn't make it out, nor why he was so angry. It has dawned upon me since that each of us took the other's hand by Mistake for that of the English governess!

All this is beastly and cynical and French, and I apologize for it--but it's true.

It was a black Monday for me when school began again after that ideal vacation. The skies they were ashen and sober, and the leaves they were crisped and sere. But anyhow I was still en quatrieme, and Barty was in it too--and we sat next to each other in "L'etude des grands."

There was only one etude now; only half the boys came back, and the pavillon des petits was shut up, study, class-rooms, dormitories, and all--except that two masters slept there still.

Eight or ten small boys were put in a small school-room in the same house as ours, and had a small dormitory to themselves, with M. Bonzig to superintend them.

I made up my mind that I would no longer be a cancre and a cretin, but work hard and do my little best, so that I might keep up with Barty and pass into the troisieme with him, and then into Rhetorique (seconde), and then into Philosophie (premiere)--that we might do our humanities and take our degree together--our "_Bachot_," which is short for Baccalaureat-es-lettres. Most Especially did I love Monsieur Durosier's class of French Literature--for which Merovee always rang the bell himself.

My mother and sister were still at Ste.-Adresse, Havre, with my father; so I spent my first Sunday that term at the Archibald Rohans', in the Rue du Bac.

I had often seen them at Brossard's, when they came to see Barty, but had never been at their house before.

They were very charming people.

Lord Archibald was dressing when we got there that Sunday morning, and we sat with him while he shaved--in an immense dressing-room where there were half a dozen towel-horses with about thirty pairs of newly ironed trousers on them instead of towels, and quite thirty pairs of shiny boots on trees were ranged along the wall. James, an impeccable English valet, waited on "his lordship," and never spoke unless spoken to.

"Hullo, Barty! Who's your friend?"

"Bob Maurice, Uncle Archie."

And Uncle Archie shook hands with me most cordially.

"And how's the north pole this morning?"

"Nicely, thanks, Uncle Archie."