Once a Week (magazine)/Series 1/Volume 3/A head of hair for sale
A HEAD OF HAIR FOR SALE.
“But, Monsieur, it is very little.”
“I confess it, mademoiselle, the sum I offer is very insignificant.”
“See, monsieur, my hair is a good colour (it was a dainty rich brown), and it is very long (the perruquier’s mouth watered, for she unbound it, and it fell below her waist). Surely, monsieur, you will give me more than thirty francs?”
“On my word, mademoiselle, I could not offer you a sou more. Your hair is very beautiful, I admit, but in effect the article is a complete drug at present. Trade is dull, very dull, and I know not when I should have use for it. Keep it, mademoiselle, until the times improve. And besides, it is a pity that you should part with it at all.”
(The perruquier saw that the poor fish was ravenous, and he had hardly need to play his meagre bait. The rogue wished to appear indifferent, but he had at that moment in hand a commission from an aged child of fashion who would have given a year’s income for a natural flow of hair like that of the deprecating daughter of need.)
“Ah, well, monsieur! you are very hard, but I must take the sum you offer.”
There was only a thin partition between us and the bureau in which the bargain was being concluded, and we could tell by the sharp click of the perruquier’s scissors that the purchase was being consummated. The light entered the shop obliquely, and through the thinly veiled window of the bureau we could see the shorn lamb grasp the pittance with eager hands, while she hastily adjusted her bonnet, and with a challenging look in the glass, murmured in a low but distinct voice, as if to herself, “but I am still pretty.”
“And so you are,” thought we, as we inwardly exclaimed, “may Heaven temper its winds to your condition, poor child!” and took up our small purchase, and followed her. There was something in her manner and her meagre gentility of dress, which told us that she was on an errand of self-sacrifice, and may the guardian angels of poverty forgive the curiosity which tracked their protegée to her holy of holies.
It was a long walk, but her pace never flagged. Starting from the Avenue de Marigny, threading rapidly the crowded pavements of the Faubourg Sainte Honoré, passing over the Champs Elysées with a single glance at the luxurious equipages thronging the avenue up the Rue de Chaillot, and through the dingy streets leading to Passy, she at length entered a house which appeared as though it had long been a victim of the Court of Chancery. Against the dust-ridden and blistered door-post we saw carelessly lounging a card, which seemed as though itself was growing sallow with long deferred hope, inscribed with the words “apartements meublés.” It was a shallow pretext, but we rang the bell and our summons was deliberately answered by a porteress, whose ancient limbs seemed grating with the rust of years and inaction. She was an antique gem, was this concierge, and we thought if everything in the establishment were en suite, there must be a very vegetative sort of life going on there. Her sabots were of the heaviest, her blue woollen stockings of the most darned variety possible, her linsey-woolsey petticoat of the curtest, reaching barely to her calf, which was of the stoutest; her serge apron of the bluest, her neckerchief of the yellowest, her cap of the loftiest—mounting guard over her face—and her nose of the shortest; but there was a beam of good nature on her broad, wrinkled face, and we felt conscience, the Nemesis of rascality, nudging us, as we thought what unfounded hopes we were raising in her bosom.
“You have apartments to let, I believe.”
“Yes, will monsieur condescend to enter?”
“Thank you (the Rubicon passed). On what floor are they?”
“Au troisième, monsieur, and they are very comfortable. We are quiet here, monsieur, although not far from the resort of fashion, but we do not claim to be of the beau monde. Alas! no, we are not people of fashion, although our last tenant was a gentleman of position, for he had been valet to a great Duke.”
Monsieur was overpowered with regret, but he was a professional man in search of a première, and was afraid the ascent of three pair of stairs would be too fatiguing to his patients. He was charmed with the air of quiet comfort around him (Heaven forgive the flattering falsehood!); but he saw that it was impossible. However, would madame allow him to rest, and procure him a little wine?
The old lady’s garrulity came to a painful check; but with native tact she merely expressed her regret, and replied that monsieur was perfectly welcome to rest as long as he pleased. She had a little grandchild in attendance upon a sick lodger au quatrième, who would be delighted to fetch monsieur some wine.
Monsieur was all gratitude, and now that the ice was broken, he ventured to ask if the young lady who had just entered was a locataire.
“Oh! mademoiselle Marie, yes, monsieur. Her mother is the sick lodger of whom I have spoken. She is sick to the death, but mademoiselle is a good girl, a brave girl, though Heaven only knows how the poor thing bears it. The Virgin must hear her prayers, and carries the poor child through her struggles.”
The wine had now arrived and assisted in mellowing our plot. Madame Justine would have a small glass (we did not fear its strength, and poured her out a tumbler), and it gave more freedom to her tongue.
“Stay, mon chou,” said she to her grandchild, “how is madame this evening?”
The little “cabbage” eyed the franc piece we gave her with a glance of intense satisfaction, and replied: “Madame is worse, grandmère. She is excited, too; oh! so excited with Mademoiselle Marie.”
“Is it so, poor child, and why is she so excited?”
“Only because mademoiselle has had her hair cut; but it is no shorter than mine.” The little “cabbage” was polled as close as a child in a Dutch picture).
We saw that the time had come for making a clean breast of it, so we detailed to Madame Justine what we had witnessed in the perruquier’s shop, and hoped that madame would point out any way in which a friend could serve her lodgers. Madame Justine had grown loquacious under the stimulus of our faithful ally, the Modoc, but she seemed rather suspicious of our motives, and it required some explanation to reassure her.
“Monsieur,” said she, “is very good, but mademoiselle and her mother are very proud. They would starve before they would receive charity from a stranger.’”
“Are they so proud that they would reject the sympathy of a friend? Is there no way of aiding them without wounding their self-respect?’
“They are dead to those who should receive their love, and they shrink from the pity of strangers. Listen, monsieur, and you shall know their history.” Justine then gave us the following narration.
Marie’s father was an only child, and of a good family, and was educated for a physician. He was sent to Paris to study his profession; and, like many other young men under similar circumstances, he became gay in his living. “But,” said Justine, “he committed what would have been in any case a folly, and was in him a madness. He formed a connection with an actress, and eventually married her, and his family discarded him. He was mad, very mad, for he knew only enough of medicine to obtain a subordinate place with a surgeon, and they had need of all their romance to make their realities tolerable. Madame, however, was faithful, and Marie was born to them. Soon after this event monsieur died, his last moments being made bitter by the reflection that he was leaving his wife and child the prey of poverty, and Madame supported herself and child by the sale of fancy needlework, and giving lessons in music. She had offers of engagements at the theatres, but she refused them, and fought on single-handed against her destiny. She had a hard struggle with the world, poor lady, but she held her ground until about six months since, when she was put hors de combat, the doctors say, with consumption, and is following her husband at the quick step. Mademoiselle Marie is eighteen, and is a good girl, oh! a brave girl. She has stepped into the gap left by her prostrate mother, and monsieur le propriétaire is very forbearing; but I fear the poor child is nearly beaten in the double struggle with her heart and body. For you must know, monsieur, that Marie has a little affair. She is the fiancée of a sous officier, who is now struggling with death before Sebastopol. He has been honourably mentioned and decorated for his bravery, but since a long time Marie has only heard that he is in hospital with Crimean fever, and the poor child’s anxiety is touching when she speaks of him.”
Perhaps memory brought Justine a whiff of one of her own “little affairs,” out of a graveyard of the past, for a big tear at this stage of her narrative, went rolling bodily into the uplifted wine-glass, and before she could recover herself, the little “cabbage” came running down stairs in a state of great terror.
“What is the matter, mon chou? Is madame worse?”
“O, grandmère, she is in agonies! and mademoiselle wishes to have a doctor.”
We offered our services, and followed the “little cabbage” up stairs, and in the few moments that we waited for the acceptance of our services, we had time to take a survey of the apartment. It was naked in the extreme; but the few articles of furniture were arranged with so much taste and neatness, as almost to give it an air of comfort; and a bouquet of common flowers which Justine had that morning brought from the market of the Madeleine was placed in a vase in a window. The partition between the two rooms was very thin, and we could hear the feeble voice of the sick lady.
“Great God! is everything gone, my child, that you should sacrifice your beautiful hair?”
“It is no sacrifice, my dear mother, and it will be stronger than ever before you will be able to walk out with me.”
As we entered, Marie looked at us as if striving to recall our features, and then whispered to her mother, that a doctor was in attendance. We passed over to the bedside of the sick lady, and saw that Marie was right. Her hair would be stronger than ever, before her mother would be able to walk out with her.
The poor lady seemed exhausted by recent exertion; but in a short time she rallied, and murmured,—“I feel it is too late, my darling; may heaven repay your devotion!”
Marie looked at us inquiringly. We took the sick woman’s hand, and felt that the pulse beat feebly. Her mind began to wander in a light and unconnected manner, and her eyes were growing dull, and dallying with vacuity. We saw that the patient was suffering from the reaction of her late excitement; but we were conscious that a few hours more would hand her over to the grave, and we could only give her a little stimulant. Marie’s eyes intuitively read our verdict, and we saw the big tears rapidly chasing each other down her cheeks, while she gently smoothed the sufferer’s pillow, and whispered words of hope, which it cost her agonies to affect.
After a little while the poor lady seemed a little to revive, and Marie became almost importunate with her tender offices; but she was interrupted by the entrance of the “little cabbage,” who stole quietly into the room, and whispered a few words to Marie.
“Tell monsieur,” said the latter, “that we cannot see him now. Will he call again?”
“Grandmère has told him that madame is very ill, but he says that his business is urgent,” replied the cabbage.
The conversation was carried on in a whisper, but madame caught the purport. Her eyes brightened with a feverish brilliance, and she said in a voice, strong for her—
“What is that, my child? Let monsieur enter—who knows?” The last two words were uttered in a lower tone than the rest, as though they were the result of some thought flashing across her mind.
We stood passive. For although we knew the irruption of an urgent visitor was a matter of serious apprehension, we were aware that the duration of the poor lady’s existence could at worst be affected by but a few hours, and we met the glance of Marie with a silent assent. The “little cabbage” disappeared, and in a few moments returned, ushering in a tall man, far gone in years, whose demeanour stamped him as belonging to the higher ranks of society. He was clothed in deep mourning, and his face, which must have been handsome in his youth, was expressive of considerable haughtiness, overlaid and softened by the traces of painful suffering. We offered to withdraw, but Marie wished us to remain, and the stranger did not object. As he moved across the room to the bedside of madame, we whispered her perilous condition, and Marie looked up from her mother’s side imploringly.
“Mama is very ill, monsieur,” said she.
“I am grieved to hear it,” rejoined the stranger, in a low tremulous voice, not unmusical.
At the sound of his voice, madame, who had fallen into an attitude of rest, made an effort to raise herself upon her arms, and looked stedfastly into his face as if seeking to recall something from the past. The stranger observed the effort, and spoke again in his low nervous tone—
“Madame does not know me.”
“I have not that pleasure, monsieur,” said she, with apparent diffidence of her memory.
“You are Madame St. Auliere; and this,” pointing to Marie, “is your child.”
“You are right, monsieur. What then?”
“It is also my name,” he replied, and he paused, as if waiting for the effect, or to master his feelings.
Madame’s eyes lighted up as if by the kindling of an inward fire. A superhuman effort of will gave her momentary strength, and with almost a spring she raised herself in her bed, and, looking fixedly at the stranger, exclaimed—
“I see, it is true, you are the father of my husband—”
“And I am come to ask that the past may be forgotten, and to offer my regrets and my assistance. Will you accept them, and allow me to take up my duties as a parent?”
There was something like a glow of happiness on the flushed face of madame as she glanced towards Marie, and rejoined—
“Be it so, for his child’s sake. For me it comes too late. We have struggled long, and you have been very hard, monsieur.”
“My son was disobedient, and I was proud, but I am humbled; for I am left alone, and have long sought my lost child. Let those of us that remain, speak only of the future.”
These words were broken in their utterance, and it was evident that the speaker was suffering from violent emotion. Marie sat listening to the dialogue without uttering a word. Her face reflected the pleasure felt by her mother at this late reconciliation; but it was veiled and darkened by the anxiety she felt for her dying parent. Her arms were tenderly twined round her mother like a vine around the decayed tree which the next gale shall lay prostrate. She gazed wistfully in her mother’s face, and once almost fancied that the new hopes which had dawned upon their prospects had imparted fresh vitality to the sinking frame within her arms, but the illusion was only transitory. Mortality had gathered its supporters together for one last grand struggle with the champion of immortality, and the victory remained with the powers of the spirit world. Ere her grandfather had done speaking, Marie felt a shiver pass through the frame of her mother, which was the precursor of death. Her arms were suddenly called upon for additional support, and she gazed with a terrified look upon the bloodless cheeks and closed eyes of her mother, and then silently appealed to us. We saw that the sufferer had ceased to suffer; and that the angels were about to lead home another fugitive from its earthly prison, and we unwound the poor girl’s arms from the almost breathless clay.
The patient was soon beyond the reach of worldly ministration. Her pulse ceased to indicate the presence of life, and the brightest mirror would have passed unstained over her mouth. She was gone, and we retired from the presence of the grief that was too holy to be witnessed by a stranger.
When we descended, we found Justine all anxiety regarding the patient and her visitor. She scanned our features with an almost ludicrous mixture of curiosity and earnestness, and, with a volubility considerably accelerated by the remnant of our second bottle of wine, her questions followed each other with the haste of a flock of sheep, with a dog at their heels.
“Was madame better? Was monsieur, the visitor, an old friend? Did mademoiselle comfort herself tranquilly?”
We answered the first question in its order of precedence, and a single expression took possession of her face.
“Great God? and is it so, monsieur? And mademoiselle—?”
“Is with her grandfather,” we rejoined.
“Did monsieur say ‘her grandfather?’”
We replied in the affirmative.
“I see; Heaven is at length mindful of its own. Then monsieur will care for her, and the shorn lamb shall not be driven out into the wilderness,” exclaimed Justine.
We promised to call next day to inquire after Marie, and we kept our word. The wrinkles in Justine’s cheeks seemed to have very recently been the channels of an unwonted flow of water, which, in subsiding, had left the usual tide-marks on the banks. Mademoiselle, said she, had passed a wretched night. She had been desolate, inconsolable; but monsieur, son grandpère, was prodigal of his sympathy, and the poor child was growing more reconciled to her loss.
“After the funeral,” said Justine, “they will retire to the chateâu of monsieur, where Marie is to take the place of her deceased grandmère in the household. But I know not how long this arrangement will last,” continued she, “for events crowd in rather thickly at present. Marie has received by this day’s post a letter from her affianced, who is recovered, and about to return home to establish his health. He is a captain of his regiment now, and will not quietly submit to see his favourite conscript becoming the follower of another.”
A few days subsequently we received a handsome mourning ring from Marie’s grandfather, accompanied by a note containing warm, but unearned thanks from herself, and we have treasured both until now, as mementos of one of the most painful incidents in our professional career.