Madame du Barry

“ You are a good fellow. You would make Blanche a good husband. It's time for her to get married. She needs some one to protect her. I can't follow her about all the rest of my life. She is twenty-two. Why shouldn't she marry?"
Jules' ardor was cooled by this practical reasoning; it made him practical too. He told Madame Perrault again of his little property. He could well afford to marry, he said. He loved Mademoiselle Blanche with all his heart; he couldn't live without her; he would give up everything for her; he would follow her everywhere. ”

“ Jules replied, carelessly. "All over it. It's a wonderful country."
Mademoiselle Blanche sighed, and her mother glanced at her wistfully.
"But it's too far," Madame resumed with a shake of the head. "We could not go so far from the children."
"Then you have other children?" said the journalist. "Are they in the circus, too?"
For the first time, the girl's face brightened. "Oh, no!" she replied, with a suggestion of horror in her tone.
"They are very young," the mother explained. "Jeanne is only fourteen and Louise will be eleven next month. They are with my sister in Boulogne." ”

“ Blanche taught me that years ago. There's nothing like having a good daughter to take a mother down. She makes me feel ashamed every day of my life."
"That's just the way she makes me feel," Jules cried, delighted to find that some one else shared his feeling. "Then she's so gentle and so kind," he rhapsodized, "and she thinks so little about herself! Do you—do you think——Oh, that's what almost drives me to despair sometimes. I hardly dare go near her. I hardly dare to speak to her."
Madame Perrault took a deep breath.
"You almost make me feel young again," she said, with a smile. ”

“ Jules went on, fixing his eyes on Berthier's white beard. "Then Madame Perrault won't be tied down to Blanche, and there's no reason why you shouldn't be married, too."
"We might have a double marriage!" said the little man jocosely.
"No, no, no!" Madame exclaimed. "When I'm married I shall be married very quietly in Boulogne, without any fuss. These children shall be married first. Then some day, Félix, you and I shall walk to the church and it will be over in five minutes." ”

“ The Nubian servant is shown offering the marquise a demi-tasse which has just been poured from the covered oriental pot which succeeded the original Arabian-Turkish boiler, and was much in vogue at the time.
Coffee and Madame du Barry (or would [Pg 589] it be more polite to say Madame du Barry and coffee?) inspired the celebrated painting of Madame de Pompadour's successor in the affections of Louis "the well beloved." This is entitled "Madame du Barry at Versailles", and in the Versailles catalog it is described as painted by Decreuse after Drouais. ”

“ Charlotte's cheeks took on a deeper red.
"She tried to imitate Mademoiselle Blanche in the circus," she confessed.
"Ah, that accounts for the broken chair! Good night, Charlotte." Then, as the girl [pg 128] left the room, Madame Perrault sighed. "That Jeanne will be the death of me."
"I'll take her in hand when she comes to me," Berthier laughed. "We'll have to find a husband for her. That will cure her of her craze for the circus."
"A husband for Jeanne, little Jeanne!" Madame Perrault exclaimed in horror. "She's barely fourteen."
"And in two years she'll be a woman. ”

“ Everyone had suffered; but the heaviest blow had fallen upon the great house, for Madame Olsheffsky never returned to it. Her boat had been upset and carried away, with the sudden force of the current, and though Alexis managed to save himself by clinging to an uprooted pine tree, Madame Olsheffsky had been torn from him, and sucked under by the rush of the furious water.
Elena's face had grown pale and thin during these sad weeks, and she and Boris looked older; for they had begun to face the responsibilities of life, with no kind mother to stand between them and the hard reality. ”

“ Elena rushed towards her mother, and threw her arms round her neck. "We will! We will! Don't trouble about it, dear little mother," she cried. "What does it matter if we are all together. I will work and dig in the garden, and Boris can be taught to groom Toulu, and be useful—he really can be very sensible if he likes. Then Var-Vara will cook, and Adam and Daria can do the dusting. Oh, we shall manage beautifully!"
Madame Olsheffsky smiled through some tears. ”

“ On the Saturday evening following his first call on Mademoiselle Blanche, while Jules was sitting in the little apartment, he asked the girl if they might not pass Sunday together. "We might drive through the Bois into the country," he suggested.
She had been looking into the fire, and she glanced at him hesitatingly. "We always go to mass on Sunday morning," she said.
For a moment Jules appeared confused. "But can't you go to early mass?"
Madame Perrault, who was in the next room, called out: "It's no use trying to persuade her not to go to high mass, monsieur. ”

“ Mademoiselle Blanche had taken a seat on the trunk, and her mother sat beside her so that Jules might occupy her chair. When they were all adjusted, Madame Perrault resumed, turning to Jules, whose embarrassment she had observed.
[pg 36] "Monsieur Réju told me yesterday interviews were so important. They make people interested. They——"
"But the people are already interested in Mademoiselle Blanche," Durand interposed, gallantly. "That's why my confrère and I have come here. The Parisians want to know all about Mademoiselle. She's the sensation of the hour. Her name is on everybody's lips." ”

“ Madame Perrault believed that husband and wife ought never to be separated; it was bad for both of them. If she had her life to live over again, she would always travel with her husband, no matter how far he went.
Most of Jules' talk with Madame Perrault, however, consisted of a discussion of the qualities of her daughter, whose praises she constantly sang for him. Blanche's ambition, she said, was to provide dowries for her sisters; she had already accumulated a few thousand francs, and these she had set aside for the girls. She never seemed to think that she herself needed a dot. ”

“ Madeleine grieved at parting with the girl, but was consoled when Jules explained that she would probably be needed every night at the circus after Madame Perrault's return, for, of course, Monsieur Berthier would want to take his fiancée to the theatres. In speaking of Monsieur Berthier, Jules had adopted a facetious tone, which half-amused and half-pained Blanche.
"How droll it will be," he said one day, "to have two pairs of lovers billing and cooing together."
"Mamma doesn't bill and coo," the girl replied, with just a suggestion of resentment in her tone. "She's too sensible." ”

“ Madame Perrault replied. "It's the only day when Blanche is free. And you will bring your friend, perhaps, if he is still in Paris," she added amiably, with a quick glance and smile at the journalist from Marseilles. Then she produced two cards and passed them to the callers.
Jules murmured a civil response to the [pg 45] invitation, and, after bowing low to the ladies, he followed Durand and closed the door behind him. The expression of languishing pleasure in the journalist's face had given place to a look of hilarious merriment. ”

“ Now, I go at eight o'clock; so I have the rest of the day free."
Jules looked at Mademoiselle Blanche and smiled, and she smiled back.
"I like to hear the music," she explained apologetically.
"Oh, she's too religious for this world," Madame Perrault laughed. "I believe she'd go to mass every morning of her life if she [pg 73] didn't have to stay up so late at night. She ought to be in a convent instead of a circus."
"In a convent!" Jules exclaimed, in mock alarm.
"Don't you ever go to church?" the girl asked, turning to Jules. ”

“ There was the brooch from the Emperor of Russia, and the ring from the Prince of Roumania, a costly diamond, monsieur, so clear and beautiful, and the little gold watch studded with pearls from the King of Bavaria, the 'mad King' they call him, you know—and then—then the bracelet set with rubies from the Duchess of Merlino, when Blanche was in Bucharest. Ah, but we have none of these here. They are all at home, they—"
"Here in Paris?" Durand asked, impatiently.
"No, monsieur, in Boulogne," Madame Perrault answered, and Jules saw an expression of wonder and pain cross her daughter's face. ”

“ Tate asked, turning to his paper and searching for the theatrical columns.
"Madame Jules Le Baron, Father Dumény calls her. But I suppose she must have a stage name. Most of them have."
"I don't see that name in 'Under the Clock!' The Hippodrome? No, it isn't there. I wonder if this can be the one: [pg 193] 'On Monday evening next, Mademoiselle Blanche, the celebrated French acrobat, will give her remarkable performance on the trapeze and her great dive from the top of the Hippodrome.'"
Mrs. Tate sighed.
"Yes, it must be. Mademoiselle Blanche! How stagey it sounds! I wonder what she's like." ”

“ The next morning Madame Perrault learned through Pelletier that the circus in Vienna where Blanche had been engaged to appear was a little more than ninety feet high; so the plunge would be fifteen feet deeper than it was in Paris. This news created excitement in the family. It made Madame so nervous that she urged that the [pg 137] engagement be given up and an offer that had come from Nice be accepted; but Jules laughed at the idea.
"What's a difference of fifteen feet to Blanche?" he said. "It's just as easy for her to dive ninety feet as to dive seventy-five. ”

“ Then she questioned Blanche about the new performer, and Blanche repeated what Jules had told her and what she had since heard of the woman at the Hippodrome. Mrs. Tate was greatly interested, and laughed immoderately; afterward, however, when she had returned home and thought over the conversation, she regarded it more seriously.
"What do you think, Percy?" she said at the dinner table that night. "Those Hippodrome people have engaged a creature to dive into a tank of water from a platform. Of course, that's to take the place of Madame Le Baron's plunge. Could anything be more absurd? ”

“ Then, with a comic look [pg 120] in his eyes, he added as an afterthought: "What a very good person I must be!"
The next night, when Jules appeared in the rue St. Honoré for dinner, he found the little apartment crowded. Madame Perrault embraced him, and by addressing him as "my son," seemed to receive him formally into the family. Then she introduced the two girls, who were much larger than he had imagined them to be. Jeanne, rosy-cheeked and black-eyed, approached him fearlessly, and offered her hand with a smile ”

“ I am very tired though.”
“No wonder madame” said the maid throwing her pink Greecian nightdress over her head nimbly, “with so many clever people about, for the Countess only has the first class cream at her boat parties.”
“Hurrah” cried Selia “what a funny pillow!” and lo the bed she jumped in was built to the wall like a real boat’s bed and her pillow was like a life-buoy but made in feathers with a white linen cover and frilled [137] with real lace. ”

“ She has great reserve. With my Jeanne or Louise, I should know everything. But with Blanche, [pg 95] non! But I never pry into her secrets; I have learned better. She has a great deal of inner life; she thinks a great deal; she is not like the other flighty women that you see in the circus. If she had not been born to the circus, if she had been brought up as Louise has been, she would be a religieuse."
Jules would have become rhapsodical again if the whistle of the train had not sounded, and he was obliged hurriedly to help Madame Perrault into her compartment. ”

“ This woman is nothing to me and I am nothing to her but a friend. The ship is hers, and I am her servant, pledged to her service—that is all."
Velo shook his head. "Thou art more than a servant to her; thou art her toa (champion) , and we all have said from the first that she and thee would wed."
Again Barry laughed amusedly. "Thou wouldst marry me to her against my own will, Velo."
"She is beautiful, and a widow, and a fitting mate for a strong man like thee," replied Velo energetically. "I have seen many white women, but none so good to look upon as her. And she is a widow." ”

“ Of all her living beauty, living frailty, and living intelligence, there remains but this presentment.
It was customary to compare Mrs. Barry with French actresses; but it seems to me that the only French actress with whom Mrs. Barry may be safely compared is Mademoiselle, or, as she was called with glorious distinction, "the Champmeslé." This French lady was the original Hermione, Berenice, Monimia, and Phædra. These were written expressly for her by Racine, who trained her exactly as Rochester did Elizabeth Barry,—to some glory on the stage, and to some infamy off it. ”

“ Barry was otherwise remarkable, she had "a modest gaiety in her manners and address;" and though in Belvidera, Lady Randolph, Rutland, Euphrasia, Monimia, and Desdemona, she defied rivalry, she really preferred to act Lady Townley, Beatrice, the Widow Brady, Rosalind, and Biddy Tipkin. She acted tragedy, to gratify the house; comedy, to please herself; and she had a supreme indifference for the patronage of Ladies of Quality if she could only win the plaudits of the public at large. ”

“ It was plain at a glance that the girl was whole-heartedly happy, and whatever incongruity lay between her and these rough mountains he began to understand that her love for Barry and the child made ample amends. As for the other two, he always thought of them in the same instant, for if the child had her eyes and her hair from her mother, she had her nature from the man. They were together constantly, on walks up the mountain, when she rode Black Bart up the steep places: on dips into the valley, when he carried her before him on the stallion. ”