Camille | Page 8

Alexandre Dumas, fils
examples of our modern courtesan; the Marquis de T.
hesitated over a piece of furniture the price of which was being run
high by Mme. D., the most elegant and famous adulteress of our time;
the Duke of Y., who in Madrid is supposed to be ruining himself in
Paris, and in Paris to be ruining himself in Madrid, and who, as a
matter of fact, never even reaches the limit of his income, talked with
Mme. M., one of our wittiest story-tellers, who from time to time writes
what she says and signs what she writes, while at the same time he
exchanged confidential glances with Mme. de N., a fair ornament of the
Champs-Elysees, almost always dressed in pink or blue, and driving
two big black horses which Tony had sold her for 10,000 francs, and
for which she had paid, after her fashion; finally, Mlle. R., who makes
by her mere talent twice what the women of the world make by their
dot and three times as much as the others make by their amours, had
come, in spite of the cold, to make some purchases, and was not the
least looked at among the crowd.
We might cite the initials of many more of those who found themselves,
not without some mutual surprise, side by side in one room. But we
fear to weary the reader. We will only add that everyone was in the
highest spirits, and that many of those present had known the dead
woman, and seemed quite oblivious of the fact. There was a sound of
loud laughter; the auctioneers shouted at the top of their voices; the
dealers who had filled the benches in front of the auction table tried in
vain to obtain silence, in order to transact their business in peace. Never
was there a noisier or a more varied gathering.
I slipped quietly into the midst of this tumult, sad to think of when one
remembered that the poor creature whose goods were being sold to pay
her debts had died in the next room. Having come rather to examine

than to buy, I watched the faces of the auctioneers, noticing how they
beamed with delight whenever anything reached a price beyond their
expectations. Honest creatures, who had speculated upon this woman's
prostitution, who had gained their hundred per cent out of her, who had
plagued with their writs the last moments of her life, and who came
now after her death to gather in at once the fruits of their dishonourable
calculations and the interest on their shameful credit, How wise were
the ancients in having only one God for traders and robbers!
Dresses, cashmeres, jewels, were sold with incredible rapidity. There
was nothing that I cared for, and I still waited. All at once I heard: "A
volume, beautifully bound, gilt-edged, entitled Manon Lescaut. There
is something written on the first page. Ten francs."
"Twelve," said a voice after a longish silence.
"Fifteen," I said.
Why? I did not know. Doubtless for the something written.
"Fifteen," repeated the auctioneer.
"Thirty," said the first bidder in a tone which seemed to defy further
competition.
It had now become a struggle. "Thirty-five," I cried in the same tone.
"Forty."
"Fifty."
"Sixty."
"A hundred."
If I had wished to make a sensation I should certainly have succeeded,
for a profound silence had ensued, and people gazed at me as if to see
what sort of a person it was, who seemed to be so determined to
possess the volume.

The accent which I had given to my last word seemed to convince my
adversary; he preferred to abandon a conflict which could only have
resulted in making me pay ten times its price for the volume, and,
bowing, he said very gracefully, though indeed a little late:
"I give way, sir."
Nothing more being offered, the book was assigned to me.
As I was afraid of some new fit of obstinacy, which my amour propre
might have sustained somewhat better than my purse, I wrote down my
name, had the book put on one side, and went out. I must have given
considerable food for reflection to the witnesses of this scene, who
would nodoubt ask themselves what my purpose could have been in
paying a hundred francs for a book which I could have had anywhere
for ten, or, at the outside, fifteen.
An hour after, I sent for my purchase. On the first page was written in
ink, in an elegant hand, an inscription on the part of the giver. It
consisted of these words:
Manon to Marguerite.
Humility.
It was signed Armand Duval.
What was the meaning of the word Humility? Was Manon to recognise
in Marguerite, in the opinion of M. Armand Duval, her superior in vice
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