The Nabob [46]
last sentence aloud, in the ear of a policeman who watched with a mistrustful eye the little man pass, gesticulating and nodding his head, the poor visionary awoke not. With admiration he saw himself returning home, announcing the news to his daughters, taking them to the theatre in the evening in celebration of the happy day. /Dieu!/ how pretty they looked in the front of their box, the Demoiselles Joyeuse, what a bouquet of rosy faces! And then, the next day, the two eldest asked in marriage by-- Impossible to determine by whom, for M. Joyeuse had just suddenly found himself once more beneath the arch of the Hemerlingue establishment, before the swing-door surmounted by a "counting-house" in letters of gold.
"I shall always be the same, it seems," said he to himself, laughing a little and passing his hand over his forehead, on which the perspiration stood in drops.
In a good humour as the result of this pleasant fancy and at the sight of the fire crackling in the suite of parquet-floored offices, with their screens of iron trellis-work and their air of secrecy in the cold light of the ground floor, where one could count the pieces of gold without dazzling his eyes, M. Joyeuse gave a gay greeting to the other clerks and slipped on his working coat and his black velvet cap. Suddenly, some one whistled from upstairs, and the cashier, applying his ear to the tube, heard the oily and gelatinous voice of Hemerlingue, the sole and veritable Hemerlingue--the other, the son, was always absent--asking for M. Joyeuse.
What! Could the dream be continuing?
He was conscious of a great agitation; took the little inside staircase which he had seen himself ascending just before so bravely, and found himself in the banker's private room, a narrow apartment, with a very high ceiling, furnished only with green curtains and enormous leather easy chairs of a size proportioned to the terrific bulk of the head of the house. He was there, seated at his desk which his belly prevented him from approaching very closely, obese, ill- shaped, and so yellow that his round face with its hooked nose, the head of a fat and sick owl, suggested as it were a light at the end of the solemn and gloomy room. A rich Moorish merchant grown mouldy in the damp of his little court-yard. Beneath his heavy eyelids, raised with an effort, his glance glittered for a second when the accountant entered; he signed to him to approach, and slowly, coldly, pausing to take breath between his sentences, instead of "M. Joyeuse, how many daughters have you?" he said this:
"Joyeuse, you have allowed yourself to criticise in the office our last operations in the Tunis market. Useless to defend yourself. Your remarks have been reported to me word for word. And as I am unable to admit them from the mouth of one in my service, I give you notice that dating from the end of this month you cease to be a member of my establishment."
A wave of blood mounted to the accountant's face, fell back, returned again, bringing each time a confused whizzing into his ears, into his brain a tumult of thoughts and images.
His daughters!
What was to become of them?
Employment is so hard to find at that period of the year.
Poverty appeared before his eyes and also the vision of an unfortunate man falling at Hemerlingue's feet, supplicating him, threatening him, springing at his throat in an access of despairing rage. All this agitation passed over his features like a gust of wind which throws the surface of a lake into ripples, fashioning there all manner of mobile whirlpools; but he remained mute, standing in the same place, and upon the master's intimation that he could withdraw, went down with tottering step to resume his work in the counting-house.
In the evening when he went home to the Rue Saint-Ferdinand, M. Joyeuse told his daughters nothing. He did not dare. The idea of darkening that radiant gaiety which was the life of the house, of making dull with heavy tears those pretty bright eyes, was insupportable to him. Timorous, too, and weak, he was of those who always
"I shall always be the same, it seems," said he to himself, laughing a little and passing his hand over his forehead, on which the perspiration stood in drops.
In a good humour as the result of this pleasant fancy and at the sight of the fire crackling in the suite of parquet-floored offices, with their screens of iron trellis-work and their air of secrecy in the cold light of the ground floor, where one could count the pieces of gold without dazzling his eyes, M. Joyeuse gave a gay greeting to the other clerks and slipped on his working coat and his black velvet cap. Suddenly, some one whistled from upstairs, and the cashier, applying his ear to the tube, heard the oily and gelatinous voice of Hemerlingue, the sole and veritable Hemerlingue--the other, the son, was always absent--asking for M. Joyeuse.
What! Could the dream be continuing?
He was conscious of a great agitation; took the little inside staircase which he had seen himself ascending just before so bravely, and found himself in the banker's private room, a narrow apartment, with a very high ceiling, furnished only with green curtains and enormous leather easy chairs of a size proportioned to the terrific bulk of the head of the house. He was there, seated at his desk which his belly prevented him from approaching very closely, obese, ill- shaped, and so yellow that his round face with its hooked nose, the head of a fat and sick owl, suggested as it were a light at the end of the solemn and gloomy room. A rich Moorish merchant grown mouldy in the damp of his little court-yard. Beneath his heavy eyelids, raised with an effort, his glance glittered for a second when the accountant entered; he signed to him to approach, and slowly, coldly, pausing to take breath between his sentences, instead of "M. Joyeuse, how many daughters have you?" he said this:
"Joyeuse, you have allowed yourself to criticise in the office our last operations in the Tunis market. Useless to defend yourself. Your remarks have been reported to me word for word. And as I am unable to admit them from the mouth of one in my service, I give you notice that dating from the end of this month you cease to be a member of my establishment."
A wave of blood mounted to the accountant's face, fell back, returned again, bringing each time a confused whizzing into his ears, into his brain a tumult of thoughts and images.
His daughters!
What was to become of them?
Employment is so hard to find at that period of the year.
Poverty appeared before his eyes and also the vision of an unfortunate man falling at Hemerlingue's feet, supplicating him, threatening him, springing at his throat in an access of despairing rage. All this agitation passed over his features like a gust of wind which throws the surface of a lake into ripples, fashioning there all manner of mobile whirlpools; but he remained mute, standing in the same place, and upon the master's intimation that he could withdraw, went down with tottering step to resume his work in the counting-house.
In the evening when he went home to the Rue Saint-Ferdinand, M. Joyeuse told his daughters nothing. He did not dare. The idea of darkening that radiant gaiety which was the life of the house, of making dull with heavy tears those pretty bright eyes, was insupportable to him. Timorous, too, and weak, he was of those who always