第35章 THREE-QUARTER LENGTH PORTRAITS OF CERTAIN GOVERNME

Minard had married for love the daughter of a porter, an artificial-flower maker employed by Mademoiselle Godard. Zelie Lorrain, a pupil, in the first place, of the Conservatoire, then by turns a danseuse, a singer, and an actress, had thought of doing as so many of the working-women do; but the fear of consequences kept her from vice. She was floating undecidedly along, when Minard appeared upon the scene with a definite proposal of marriage. Zelie earned five hundred francs a year, Minard had fifteen hundred. Believing that they could live on two thousand, they married without settlements, and started with the utmost economy. They went to live, like dove-turtles, near the barriere de Courcelles, in a little apartment at three hundred francs a year, with white cotton curtains to the windows, a Scotch paper costing fifteen sous a roll on the walls, brick floors well polished, walnut furniture in the parlor, and a tiny kitchen that was very clean. Zelie nursed her children herself when they came, cooked, made her flowers, and kept the house. There was something very touching in this happy and laborious mediocrity. Feeling that Minard truly loved her, Zelie loved him. Love begets love,--it is the abyssus abyssum of the Bible. The poor man left his bed in the morning before his wife was up, that he might fetch provisions. He carried the flowers she had finished, on his way to the bureau, and bought her materials on his way back; then, while waiting for dinner, he stamped out her leaves, trimmed the twigs, or rubbed her colors. Small, slim, and wiry, with crisp red hair, eyes of a light yellow, a skin of dazzling fairness, though blotched with red, the man had a sturdy courage that made no show. He knew the science of writing quite as well as Vimeux. At the office he kept in the background, doing his allotted task with the collected air of a man who thinks and suffers. His white eyelashes and lack of eyebrows induced the relentless Bixiou to name him "the white rabbit." Minard--the Rabourdin of a lower sphere--was filled with the desire of placing his Zelie in better circumstances, and his mind searched the ocean of the wants of luxury in hopes of finding an idea, of making some discovery or some improvement which would bring him a rapid fortune. His apparent dulness was really caused by the continual tension of his mind; he went over the history of Cephalic Oils and the Paste of Sultans, lucifer matches and portable gas, jointed sockets for hydrostatic lamps,--in short, all the infinitely little inventions of material civilization which pay so well. He bore Bixiou's jests as a busy man bears the buzzing of an insect; he was not even annoyed by them. In spite of his cleverness, Bixiou never perceived the profound contempt which Minard felt for him. Minard never dreamed of quarrelling, however,--regarding it as a loss of time. After a while his composure tired out his tormentor. He always breakfasted with his wife, and ate nothing at the office. Once a month he took Zelie to the theatre, with tickets bestowed by du Bruel or Bixiou; for Bixiou was capable of anything, even of doing a kindness. Monsieur and Madame Minard paid their visits in person on New-Year's day. Those who saw them often asked how it was that a woman could keep her husband in good clothes, wear a Leghorn bonnet with flowers, embroidered muslin dresses, silk mantles, prunella boots, handsome fichus, a Chinese parasol, and drive home in a hackney-coach, and yet be virtuous; while Madame Colleville and other "ladies" of her kind could scarcely make ends meet, though they had double Madame Minard's means.

In the two bureaus were two clerks so devoted to each other that their friendship became the butt of all the rest. He of the bureau Baudoyer, named Colleville, was chief-clerk, and would have been head of the bureau long before if the Restoration had never happened. His wife was as clever in her way as Madame Rabourdin in hers. Colleville, who was son of a first violin at the opera, fell in love with the daughter of a celebrated danseuse. Flavie Minoret, one of those capable and charming Parisian women who know how to make their husbands happy and yet preserve their own liberty, made the Colleville home a rendezvous for all our best artists and orators. Colleville's humble position under government was forgotten there. Flavie's conduct gave such food for gossip, however, that Madame Rabourdin had declined all her invitations. The friend in Rabourdin's bureau to whom Colleville was so attached was named Thuillier. All who knew one knew the other.

Thuillier, called "the handsome Thuillier," an ex-Lothario, led as idle a life as Colleville led a busy one. Colleville, government official in the mornings and first clarionet at the Opera-Comique at night, worked hard to maintain his family, though he was not without influential friends. He was looked upon as a very shrewd man,--all the more, perhaps, because he hid his ambitions under a show of indifference. Apparently content with his lot and liking work, he found every one, even the chiefs, ready to protect his brave career.

During the last few weeks Madame Colleville had made an evident change in the household, and seemed to be taking to piety. This gave rise to a vague report in the bureaus that she thought of securing some more powerful influence than that of Francois Keller, the famous orator, who had been one of her chief adorers, but who, so far, had failed to obtain a better place for her husband. Flavie had, about this time--and it was one of her mistakes--turned for help to des Lupeaulx.