it was, not so many years ago, called the rue de l'empire, but republics are proverbially sensitive. once they are established they become morbidly desirous of obliterating a past wherein no republic flourished. the street is therefore dedicated to st. gingolphe to-day. to-morrow? who can tell?
it is presumably safe to take it for granted that you are located in the neighbourhood of the louvre, on the north side of the river which is so unimportant a factor to paris. for all good englishmen have been, or hope in the near future to be, located near this spot. all good americans, we are told, relegate the sojourn to a more distant future.
the bridge to cross is that of the holy fathers. so called to-day. once upon a time—but no matter. bridges are peculiarly liable to change in troubled times. the rue st. gingolphe is situated between the boulevard st. germain and quai voltaire. one hears with equal facility the low-toned boom of the steamers' whistle upon the river, and the crack of whips in the boulevard. once across the bridge, turn to the right, and go along the quay, between the lime-trees and the bookstalls. you will probably go slowly because of the bookstalls. no one worth talking to could help doing so. then turn to the left, and after a few paces you will find upon your right hand the rue st. gingolphe. it is noted in the directory “botot” that this street is one hundred and forty-five mètres long; and who would care to contradict “botot,” or even to throw the faintest shadow of a doubt upon his statement? he has probably measured.
if your fair and economical spouse should think of repairing to the bon-marché to secure some of those wonderful linen pillow-cases (at one franc forty) with your august initial embroidered on the centre with a view of impressing the sleeper's cheek, she will pass the end of the rue st. gingolphe on her way—provided the cabman be honest. there! you cannot help finding it now.
the street itself is a typical parisian street of one hundred and forty-five mètres. there is room for a baker's, a café, a bootmaker's, and a tobacconist who sells very few stamps. the parisians do not write many letters. they say they have not time. but the tobacconist makes up for the meanness of his contribution to the inland revenue of one department by a generous aid to the other. he sells a vast number of cigarettes and cigars of the very worst quality. and it is upon the worst quality that the government makes the largest profit. it is in every sense of the word a weed which grows as lustily as any of its compeers in and around oran, algiers, and bonah.
the rue st. gingolphe is within a stone's-throw of the école des beaux-arts, and in the very centre of a remarkably cheap and yet respectable quarter. thus there are many young men occupying apartments in close proximity—and young men do not mind much what they smoke, especially provincial young men living in paris. they feel it incumbent upon them to be constantly smoking something—just to show that they are parisians, true sons of the pavement, knowing how to live. and their brightest hopes are in all truth realised, because theirs is certainly a reckless life, flavoured as it is with “number one” tobacco, and those “little corporal” cigarettes which are enveloped in the blue paper.
the tobacconist's shop is singularly convenient. it has, namely, an entrance at the back, as well as that giving on to the street of st. gingolphe. this entrance is through a little courtyard, in which is the stable and coach-house combined, where madame perinère, a lady who paints the magic word “modes” beneath her name on the door-post of number seventeen, keeps the dapper little cart and pony which carry her bonnets to the farthest corner of paris.
the tobacconist is a large man, much given to perspiration. in fact, one may safely make the statement that he perspires annually from the middle of april to the second or even third week in october. in consequence of this habit he wears no collar, and a man without a collar does not start fairly on the social race. it is always best to make inquiries before condemning a man who wears no collar. there is probably a very good reason, as in the case of mr. jacquetot, but it is to be feared that few pause to seek it. one need not seek the reason with much assiduity in this instance, because the tobacconist of the rue st. gingolphe is always prepared to explain it at length. french people are thus. they talk of things, and take pleasure in so doing, which we, on this side of the channel, treat with a larger discretion.
mr. jacquetot does not even wear a collar on sunday, for the simple reason that sunday is to him as other days. he attends no place of worship, because he acknowledges but one god—the god of most frenchmen—his inner man. his pleasures are gastronomical, his sorrows stomachic. the little shop is open early and late, sundays, week-days, and holidays. moreover, the tobacconist—mr. jacquetot himself—is always at his post, on the high chair behind the counter, near the window, where he can see into the street. this constant attention to business is almost phenomenal, because frenchmen who worship the god of mr. jacquetot love to pay tribute on fête-days at one of the little restaurants on the place at versailles, at duval's, or even in the palais royal. mr. jacquetot would have loved nothing better than a pilgrimage to any one of these shrines, but he was tied to the little tobacco store. not by the chains of commerce. oh, no! when rallied by his neighbours for such an unenterprising love of his own hearth, he merely shrugged his heavy shoulders.
“what will you?” he would say; “one has one's affairs.”
now the affairs of mr. jacquetot were, in the days with which we have to do, like many things on this earth, inasmuch as they were not what they seemed.
it would be inexpedient, for reasons closely connected with the tobacconist of the rue st. gingolphe, as well as with other gentlemen still happily with us in the flesh, to be too exact as to dates. suffice it, therefore, to say that it was only a few years ago that mr. jacquetot sat one evening as usual in his little shop. it happened to be a tuesday evening, which is fortunate, because it was on tuesdays and saturdays that the little barber from round the corner called and shaved the vast cheeks of the tobacconist. mr. jacquetot was therefore quite presentable—doubly so, indeed, because it was yet march, and he had not yet entered upon his summer season.
the little street was very quiet. there was no through traffic, and folks living in this quarter of paris usually carry their own parcels. it was thus quite easy to note the approach of any passenger, when such had once turned the corner. some one was approaching now, and mr. jacquetot threw away the stump of a cheap cigar. one would almost have said that he recognised the step at a considerable distance. young people are in the habit of considering that when one gets old and stout one loses in intelligence; but this is not always the case. one is apt to expect little from a fat man; but that is often a mistake. mr. jacquetot weighed seventeen stone, but he was eminently intelligent. he had recognised the footstep while it was yet seventy mètres away.
in a few moments a gentleman of middle height paused in front of the shop, noted that it was a tobacconist's, and entered, carrying an unstamped letter with some ostentation. it must, by the way, be remembered that in france postage-stamps are to be bought at all tobacconists'.
the new-comer's actions were characterised by a certain carelessness, as if he were going through a formula—perfunctorily—without admitting its necessity.
he nodded to mr. jacquetot, and rather a pleasant smile flickered for a moment across his face. he was a singularly well-made man, of medium height, with straight, square shoulders and small limbs. he wore spectacles, and as he looked at one straight in the face there was a singular contraction of the eyes which hardly amounted to a cast—moreover, it was momentary. it was precisely the look of a hawk when its hood is suddenly removed in full daylight. this resemblance was furthered by the fact that the man's profile was birdlike. he was clean-shaven, and there was in his sleek head and determined little face that smooth, compact self-complacency which is to be noted in the head of a hawk.
the face was small, like that of a greek bust, but in expression it suggested a yet older people. there was that mystic depth of expression which comes from ancient egypt. no one feature was obtrusive—all were chiselled with equal delicacy; and yet there was only one point of real beauty in the entire countenance. the mouth was perfect. but the man with a perfect mouth is usually one whom it will be found expedient to avoid. without a certain allowance of sensuality no man is genial—without a little weakness there is no kind heart. this frenchman's mouth was not, however, obtrusively faultless. it was perfect in its design, but, somehow, many people failed to take note of the fact. it is so with the “many,” one finds. the human world is so blind that at times it would be almost excusable to harbour the suspicion that animals see more. there may be something in that instinct by which dogs, horses, and cats distinguish between friends and foes, detect sympathy, discover antipathy. it is possible that they see things in the human face to which our eyes are blinded—intentionally and mercifully blinded. if some of us were a little more observant, a few of the human combinations which we bring about might perhaps be less egregiously mistaken.
it was probably the form of the lips that lent pleasantness to the smile with which mr. jacquetot was greeted, rather than the expression of the velvety eyes, which had in reality no power of smiling at all. they were sad eyes, like those of the women one sees on the banks of the upper nile, which never alter in expression—eyes that do not seem to be busy with this life at all, but fully occupied with something else: something beyond to-morrow or behind yesterday.
“not yet arrived?” inquired the new-comer in a voice of some distinction. it was a full, rich voice, and the french it spoke was not the french of mr. jacquetot, nor, indeed, of the rue st. gingolphe. it was the language one sometimes hears in an old chateau lost in the depths of the country—the vast unexplored rural districts of france—where the bearers of dangerously historical names live out their lives with a singular suppression and patience. they are either biding their time or else they are content with the past and the part played by their ancestors therein. for there is an old french and a new. in paris the new is spoken—the very newest. were it anything but french it would be intolerably vulgar; as it is, it is merely neat and intensely expressive.
“not yet arrived, sir,” said the tobacconist, and then he seemed to recollect himself, for he repeated:
“not yet arrived,” without the respectful addition which had slipped out by accident.
the new arrival took out his watch—a small one of beautiful workmanship, the watch of a lady—and consulted it. his movements were compact and rapid. he would have made a splendid light-weight boxer.
“that,” he said shortly, “is the way they fail. they do not understand the necessity of exactitude. the people—see you, mr. jacquetot, they fail because they have no exactitude.”
“but i am of the people,” moving ponderously on his chair.
“essentially so. i know it, my friend. but i have taught you something.”
the tobacconist laughed.
“i suppose so. but is it safe to stand there in the full day? will you not pass in? the room is ready; the lamp is lighted. there is an agent of the police always at the end of the street now.”
“ah, bah!” and he shrugged his shoulders contemptuously. “i am not afraid of them. there is only one thing to be feared, citizen jacquetot—the press. the press and the people, bien entendu.”
“if you despise the people why do you use them?” asked jacquetot abruptly.
“in default of better, my friend. if one has not steam one uses the river to turn the mill-wheel. the river is slow; sometimes it is too weak, sometimes too strong. one never has full control over it, but it turns the wheel—it turns the wheel, brother jacquetot.”
“and eventually sweeps away the miller,” suggested the tobacconist lightly. it must be remembered that though stout he was intelligent. had he not been so it is probable that this conversation would never have taken place. the dark-eyed man did not look like one who would have the patience to deal with stupid people.
again the pleasant smile flickered like the light of a fire in a dark place.
“that,” was the reply, “is the affair of the miller.”
“but,” conceded jacquetot, meditatively selecting a new cigar from a box which he had reached without moving from his chair, “but the people—they are fools, hein!”
“ah!” with a protesting shrug, as if deprecating the enunciation of such a platitude.
then he passed through into a little room behind the shop—a little room where no daylight penetrated, because there was no window to it. it depended for daylight upon the shop, with which it communicated by a door of which the upper half was glass. but this glass was thickly curtained with the material called turkey-red, threefold.
and the tobacconist was left alone in his shop, smoking gravely. there are some people like oysters, inasmuch as they leave an after-taste behind them. the man who had just gone into the little room at the rear of the tobacconist's shop of the rue st. gingolphe in paris was one of these. and the taste he left behind him was rather disquieting. one was apt to feel that there was a mistake somewhere in the ordering of human affairs, and that this man was one of its victims.
in a few minutes two men passed hastily through the shop into the little room, with scarcely so much as a nod for mr. jacquetot.
