Serge Panine | Page 9

and to whose aid he had come to save
the honor of the name. The mistress had not hesitated to help him, and
had prevented the signature of "Desvarennes" being protested. She had
not taunted him, having as large a heart as she had a mind. But Michel
had felt humiliated to see his own folk make a gap in the financial
edifice erected so laboriously by his wife. Out of this had gradually
sprung a sense of dissatisfaction with the Desvarennes of the other
branch, which manifested itself by a marked coolness, when, by chance,
his brother came to the house, accompanied by his son Savinien.
And then the paternity of his brother made him secretly jealous. Why
should that incapable fellow, who succeeded in nothing, have a son? It
was only those ne'er-do-well sort of people who were thus favored. He,
Michel, already called the rich Desvarennes, he had not a son. Was it
just? But where is there justice in this world?
The first time that she saw him with a downcast face the mistress had
questioned him, and he had frankly expressed his regrets. But he had
been so repelled by his wife, in whose heart a great trouble, steadily
repressed, however, had been produced, that he never dared to recur to
the subject.
He suffered in silence. But he no longer suffered alone. Like an
overflowing river that finds an outlet in the valley, which it inundates,
the longings for maternity, hitherto repressed by the preoccupations of
business, had suddenly seized Madame Desvarennes.

Strong and unyielding, she struggled and would not own herself
conquered. Still she became sad. Her voice sounded less sonorously in
the offices where she gave an order; her energetic nature seemed
subdued. Now she looked around her. She beheld prosperity made
stable by incessant work, respect gained by spotless honesty; she had
attained the goal which she had marked out in her ambitious dreams, as
being paradise itself. Paradise was there; but it lacked the angel. They
had no child.
From that day a change came over this woman, slowly but surely;
scarcely perceptible to strangers, but easy to be seen by those around
her. She became benevolent, and gave away considerable sums of
money, especially to children's "Homes." But when the good people
who governed these establishments, lured on by her generosity, came to
ask her to be on their committee of management, she became angry,
asking them if they were joking with her? What interest could those
brats have for her? She had other fish to fry. She gave them what they
needed, and what more could they want? The fact was she felt weak
and troubled before children. But within her a powerful and unknown
voice had arisen, and the hour was not far distant when the bitter wave
of her regrets was to overflow and be made manifest.
She did not like Savinien, her nephew, and kept all her sweetness for
the son of one of their old neighbors in the Rue Neuve-Coquenard, a
small haberdasher, who had not been able to get on, but continued
humbly to sell thread and needles to the thrifty folks of the
neighborhood. The haberdasher, Mother Delarue, as she was called,
had remained a widow after one year of married life. Pierre, her boy,
had grown up under the shadow of the bakery, the cradle of the
Desvarennes's fortunes.
On Sundays the mistress would give him a gingerbread or a cracknel,
and amuse herself with his baby prattle. She did not lose sight of him
when she removed to the Rue Vivienne. Pierre had entered the
elementary school of the neighborhood, and by his precocious
intelligence and exceptional application, had not been long in getting to
the top of his class. The boy had left school after gaining an exhibition

admitting him to the Chaptal College. This hard worker, who was in a
fair way of making his own position without costing his relatives
anything, greatly interested Madame Desvarennes. She found in this
plucky nature a striking analogy to herself. She formed projects for
Pierre's future; in fancy she saw him enter the Polytechnic school, and
leave it with honors. The young man had the choice of becoming a
mining or civil engineer, and of entering the government service.
He was hesitating what to do when the mistress came and offered him a
situation in her firm as junior partner; it was a golden bridge that she
placed before him. With his exceptional capacities he was not long in
giving to the house a new impulse. He perfected the machinery, and
triumphantly defied all competition. All this was a happy dream in
which Pierre was to her a real son; her home became his, and she
monopolized him completely. But suddenly a shadow