Esmeralda | Page 8

the utterance of this brief sentence had betrayed to my practiced ear a peculiar accent--an accent which, strange to say, bore a likeness to that of our friends downstairs, and which caused me to stop a moment at the lodge of the concierge, and ask her a question or so.
"Have we a new occupant upon the fifth floor?" I inquired. "A person who speaks English?"
She answered me with a dubious expression.
"You must mean the strange young man upon the sixth," she said. "He is a new one and speaks English. Indeed, he does not speak anything else, or even understand a word. Mon Dieu! the trials one encounters with such persons,--endeavoring to comprehend, poor creatures, and failing always,--and this one is worse than the rest and looks more wretched--as if he had not a friend in the world."
"What is his name?" I asked.
"How can one remember their names?--it is worse than impossible. This one is frightful. But he has no letters, thank Heaven. If there should arrive one with an impossible name upon it, I should take it to him and run the risk."
Naturally, Cl��lie, to whom I related the incident, was much interested. But it was some time before either of us saw the hero of it again, though both of us confessed to having been upon the watch for him. The concierge could only tell us that he lived a secluded life--rarely leaving his room in he daytime, and seeming to be very poor.
"He does not work and eats next to nothing," she said. "Late at night he occasionally carries up a loaf, and once he treated himself to a cup of bouillon from the restaurant at the corner--but it was only once, poor young man. He is at least very gentle and well-conducted."
So it was not to be wondered at that we did not see him. Cl��lie mentioned him to her young friend, but Mademoiselle's interest in him was only faint and ephemeral. She had not the spirit to rouse herself to any strong emotion.
"I dare say he's an American," she said. "There are plenty of Americans in Paris, but none of them seem a bit nearer to me than if they were French. They are all rich and fine, and they all like the life here better than the life at home. This is the first poor one I have heard of."
Each day brought fresh unhappiness to her. Madame was inexorable. She spent a fortune upon toilette for her, and insisted upon dragging her from place to place, and wearying her with gayeties from which her sad young heart shrank. Each afternoon their equipage was to be seen upon the Champs Elys��es, and each evening it stood before the door waiting to bear them to some place of festivity.
Mademoiselle's b��te noir, the marquis, who was a debilitated roue in search of a fortune, attached himself to them upon all occasions.
"Bah!" said Cl��lie with contempt, "she amazes one by her imbecility--this woman. Truly, one would imagine that her vulgar sharpness would teach her that his object is to use her as a tool, and that having gained Mademoiselle's fortune, he will treat them with brutality and derision."
But she did not seem to see--possibly she fancied that having obtained him for a son-in-law, she would be bold and clever enough to outwit and control him. Consequently, he was encouraged and fawned upon, and Mademoiselle grew thin and pale and large-eyed, and wore continually an expression of secret terror.
Only in her visits to our fifth floor did she dare to give way to her grief, and truly at such times both my Cl��lie and I were greatly affected. Upon one occasion indeed she filled us both with alarm.
"Do you know what I shall do?" she said, stopping suddenly in the midst of her weeping. "I'll bear it as long as I can, and then I'll put an end to it. There's--there's always the Seine left, and I've laid awake and thought of it many a night. Father and me saw a man taken out of it one day, and the people said he was a Tyrolean, and drowned himself because he was so poor and lonely--and--and so far from home."
Upon the very morning she made this speech I saw again our friend of the sixth floor. In going down-stairs I came upon him, sitting upon one of the steps as if exhausted, and when he turned his face upward, its pallor and haggardness startled me. His tall form was wasted, his eyes were hollow, the peculiarities I had before observed were doubly marked--he was even emaciated.
"Monsieur," I said in English, "you appear indisposed. You have been ill. Allow me to assist you to your room."
"No, thank you," he answered. "It's only weakness. I--I sorter give out. Don't trouble yourself.