It was on the opposite side of the landing that what Mme. Fortin pompously called" Maxence's apartment" was situated.
It consisted of a sort of antechamber, almost as large as a handkerchief (decorated by the Fortins with the name of dining-room), a bedroom, and a closet called a dressing-room in the lease.
Nothing could be more gloomy than this lodging, in which the ragged paper and soiled paint retained the traces of all the wanderers who had occupied it since the opening of the Hotel des Folies. The dislocated ceiling was scaling off in large pieces; the floor seemed affected with the dry-rot; and the doors and windows were so much warped and sprung, that it required an effort to close them.
The furniture was on a par with the rest.
"How everything does wear out!" sighed Mme. Fortin. "It isn't ten years since I bought that furniture."
In point of fact it was over fifteen, and even then she had bought it secondhanded, and almost unfit for use. The curtains retained but a vague shade of their original color. The veneer was almost entirely off the bedstead. Not a single lock was in order, whether in the bureau or the secretary. The rug had become a nameless rag; and the broken springs of the sofa, cutting through the threadbare stuff, stood up threateningly like knife-blades.
The most sumptuous object was an enormous China stove, which occupied almost one-half of the hall-dining-room. It could not be used to make a fire; for it had no pipe. Nevertheless, Mme. Fortin refused obstinately to take it out, under the pretext that it gave such a comfortable appearance to the apartment. All this elegance cost Maxence forty-five francs a month, and five francs for the service; the whole payable in advance from the 1st to the 3d of the month. If, on the 4th, a tenant came in without money, Mme.
Fortin squarely refused him his key, and invited him to seek shelter elsewhere.
"I have been caught too often," she replied to those who tried to obtain twenty-four hours' grace from her. "I wouldn't trust my own father till the 5th, he who was a superior officer in Napoleon's armies, and the very soul of honor."
It was chance alone which had brought Maxence, after the Commune, to the Hotel des Folies; and he had not been there a week, before he had fully made up his mind not to wear out Mme. Fortin's furniture very long. He had even already found another and more suitable lodging, when, about a year ago, a certain meeting on the stairs had modified all his views, and lent a charm to his apartment which he did not suspect.
As he was going out one morning to his office, he met on the very landing a rather tall and very dark girl, who had just come running up stairs. She passed before him like a flash, opened the opposite door, and disappeared. But, rapid as the apparition had been, it had left in Maxence's mind one of those impressions which are never obliterated. He could not think of any thing else the whole day; and after business-hours, instead of going to dine in Rue St. Gilles, as usual, he sent a despatch to his mother to tell her not to wait for him, and bravely went home.
But it was in vain, that, during the whole evening, he kept watch behind his door, left slyly ajar: he did not get a glimpse of the neighbor. Neither did she show herself on the next or the three following days; and Maxence was beginning to despair, when at last, on Sunday, as he was going down stairs, he met her again face to face. He had thought her quite pretty at the first glance: this time he was dazzled to that extent, that he remained for over a minute, standing like a statue against the wall.
And certainly it was not her dress that helped setting off her beauty. She wore a poor dress of black merino, a narrow collar, and plain cuffs, and a bonnet of the utmost simplicity. She had nevertheless an air of incomparable dignity, a grace that charmed, and yet inspired respect, and the carriage of a queen. This was on the 30th of July. As he was handing in his key, before leaving, "My apartment suits me well enough," said Maxence to Mme. Fortin:
"I shall keep it. And here are fifty francs for the month of August."
And, while the landlady was ****** out a receipt, "You never told me," he began with his most indifferent look, "that I had a neighbor."
Mme. Fortin straightened herself up like an old warhorse that hears the sound of the bugle.
"Yes, yes!" she said, -" Mademoiselle Lucienne."
"Lucienne," repeated Maxence: "that's a pretty name."
"Have you seen her?"
"I have just seen her. She's rather good looking."
The worthy landlady jumped on her chair. "Rather good looking!" she interrupted. "You must be hard to please, my dear sir; for I, who am a judge, I affirm that you might hunt Paris over for four whole days without finding such a handsome girl. Rather good looking! A girl who has hair that comes down to her knees, a dazzling complexion, eyes as big as this, and teeth whiter than that cat's. All right, my friend. You'll wear out more than one pair of boots running after women before you catch one like her."
That was exactly Maxence's opinion; and yet with his coldest look, "Has she been long your tenant, dear Mme. Fortin?" he asked.
"A little over a year. She was here during the siege; and just then, as she could not pay her rent, I was, of course, going to send her off; but she went straight to the commissary of police, who came here, and forbade me to turn out either her or anybody else. As if people were not masters in their own house!"
"That was perfectly absurd!" objected Maxence, who was determined to gain the good graces of the landlady.
"Never heard of such a thing!" she went on. "Compel you to lodge people free! Why not feed them too? In short, she remained so long, that, after the Commune, she owed me a hundred and eighty francs. Then she said, that, if I would let her stay, she would pay me each month in advance, besides the rent, ten francs on the old account. I agreed, and she has already paid up twenty francs."
"Poor girl!" said Maxence.
But Mme. Fortin shrugged her shoulders.
