Serge Panine | Page 8

Feeling capable of carrying out large undertakings, and,
moreover, desirous of giving up the meannesses of retail trade,
Madame Desvarennes, one fine day, sent in a tender for supplying
bread to the military hospitals. It was accepted, and from that time the
house ranked among the most important. On seeing the Desvarennes
take their daring flight, the leading men in the trade had said:
"They have system and activity, and if they do not upset on the way,
they will attain a high position."
But the mistress seemed to have the gift of divination. She worked
surely--if she struck out one way you might be certain that success was
there. In all her enterprises, "good luck" stood close by her; she scented
failures from afar, and the firm never made a bad debt. Still Michel
continued to tremble. The first mill had been followed by many more;
then the old system appeared insufficient to Madame Desvarennes. As
she wished to keep up with the increase of business she had steam-
mills built,--which are now grinding three hundred million francs'
worth of corn every year.
Fortune had favored the house immensely, but Michel continued to
tremble. From time to time when the mistress launched out a new
business, he timidly ventured on his usual saying:
"Wife, you're going to ruin us."
But one felt it was only for form's sake, and that he himself no longer
meant what he said. Madame Desvarennes received this plaintive
remonstrance with a calm smile, and answered, maternally, as to a
child:
"There, there, don't be frightened."

Then she would set to work again, and direct with irresistible vigor the
army of clerks who peopled her counting-houses.
In fifteen years' time, by prodigious efforts of will and energy, Madame
Desvarennes had made her way from the lonely and muddy Rue
Neuve- Coquenard to the mansion in the Rue Saint-Dominique. Of the
bakery there was no longer question. It was some time since the
business in the Rue Vivienne had been transferred to the foreman of the
shop. The flour trade alone occupied Madame Desvarennes's attention.
She ruled the prices in the market; and great bankers came to her office
and did business with her on a footing of equality. She did not become
any prouder for it, she knew too well the strength and weakness of life
to have pride; her former plain dealing had not stiffened into self-
sufficiency. Such as one had known her when beginning business, such
one found her in the zenith of her fortune. Instead of a woollen gown
she wore a silk one, but the color was still black; her language had not
become refined; she retained the same blunt familiar accent, and at the
end of five minutes' conversation with any one of importance she could
not resist calling him "my dear," to come morally near him. Her
commands had more fulness. In giving her orders, she had the manner
of a commander-in-chief, and it was useless to haggle when she had
spoken. The best thing to do was to obey, as well and as promptly as
possible.
Placed in a political sphere, this marvellously gifted woman would
have been a Madame Roland; born to the throne, she would have been
a Catherine II.; there was genius in her. Sprung from the lower ranks,
her superiority had given her wealth; had she come from the higher, the
great mind might have governed the world.
Still she was not happy; she had been married fifteen years, and her
fireside was devoid of a cradle. During the first years she had rejoiced
at not having a child. Where could she have found time to occupy
herself with a baby? Business engrossed her attention; she had no
leisure to amuse herself with trifles. Maternity seemed to her a luxury
for rich women; she had her fortune to make. In the struggle against the
difficulties attending the enterprise she had begun, she had not had time

to look around her and perceive that her home was lonely. She worked
from morning till night. Her whole life was absorbed in this work, and
when night came, overcome with fatigue, she fell asleep, her head filled
with cares which stifled all tricks of the imagination.
Michel grieved, but in silence; his feeble and dependent nature missed
a child. He, whose mind lacked occupation, thought of the future. He
said to himself that the day when the dreamt-of fortune came would be
more welcome if there were an heir to whom to leave it. What was the
good of being rich, if the money went to collateral relatives? There was
his nephew Savinien, a disagreeable urchin whom he looked on with
indifference; and he was biased regarding his brother, who had all but
failed several times in business,