bridget had gone home. virtue ann was putting on the table the bread and chocolate that was to compose eugene’s frugal meal, and the boy himself was sitting in a dull fashion by the window in so deep a revery that he did not hear the door-bell ring, and did not see sergeant hardy come into the room.
he only started, and looked up when the words, “at your service, sir,” uttered in deep voice, fell upon his ear.
at them he roused himself, and rose to his feet; but the sergeant neither bowed nor offered to shake hands with him in a friendly way as he usually did. his only greeting besides the words that he had spoken was a military salute. then he stood stiffly against the wall as if waiting for something.
“will you sit down?” asked eugene.
[pg 98]
“against orders,” said the sergeant. “i’ve come to arrest you.”
“to arrest me,” repeated eugene wonderingly; “what is it that i have done?”
“warrant for arrest on two charges,” said the sergeant.
“will you mention them,” asked eugene frigidly, and yet politely, for he had great respect for any one in authority.
“first charge,” said the sergeant abruptly, “disdainful despicability of my wife’s affections; second charge, murderous and malicious designs against your own precious and peculiar self.”
eugene did not know the meaning of despicability; but he saw the mischievous glitter in the sergeant’s eye, and he suspected that there was a joke somewhere. “suppose i refuse to go,” he said with much calmness and deliberation.
“i’d pick up your little french figure, and put it under my arm, and you’d be in jail in no time,” said the sergeant.
“so i am to go to prison,” said eugene.
[pg 99]
“yes, sir—private jail, permitted through the clemency of the law.”
eugene smiled a little wearily, then he eyed the sergeant all over. he had penetration enough to discover that the man had come there with the determination of taking him away, and he knew that he might as well yield first as last.
“i surrender,” he said grandly; “may i ask you, mr. officer, until when i am to be in prison?”
“six weeks,” said the sergeant promptly.
“will you show me the warrant for my arrest?” said eugene.
the sergeant hesitated, then he thrust his hand into his pocket, and drew out a little wet handkerchief.
“i found my wife crying when i went home,” he said. “she was offended and annoyed. i took this little muslin rag away from her, and gave her my big ‘mooshawr’ you call it, don’t you?”
“no,” said eugene; “it will be a lettre de cachet in this case. virtue ann,” he went on,[pg 100] addressing the maid who stood gaping at them in the doorway, “will you put together in a bag some things for me. it is necessary that i accompany this gentleman to—you did not mention the name of the prison,” and he turned to the sergeant.
“to the bastille,” said the sergeant, grinning delightedly at the opportunity of showing a little knowledge of french history.
“to the bastille,” repeated eugene. “so be it. as a prisoner has no longer rights, will you arrange for the furniture of these rooms to be sold, and some money paid to my servant?”
“yes, sir,” said the sergeant again saluting him.
eugene went to a desk in the corner of the room, and took out some photographs and private papers, also a miniature portrait of his grandfather, which he put into a black bag that virtue ann brought in and laid on the table.
at last he announced himself ready; and the sergeant, who had stood by the door during[pg 101] the preparations made for departure, stepped forward, and took the bag in his hand.
virtue ann began to fidget miserably with her apron, while eugene looked at her with an unmoved face.
“i can’t let you go, pretty little dear,” she said at last, standing in front of him, and affectionately smoothing his shoulder with her rough hand.
“i beg that you will compose yourself,” said eugene coolly.
“aren’t you sorry to leave me?” cried virtue ann wildly. “you little cold, cold fish.”
“why should i be sorry?” said eugene, holding back his head; “you have been false to me.”
“false! oh, dear, now just hear him,” said virtue ann. “well, you’ve got to let me kiss you anyway, you bad-hearted little thing;” and she stroked his black, glossy head, and pressed her lips to his forehead in a motherly way.
eugene made a slight grimace, and drew himself away from her, while the sergeant[pg 102] looked on with an amused smile, and muttered, “i’d like to know what it is about that child that makes the women crazy. it must be out of sheer, clear contrariness, because he doesn’t like them, or else it’s his fascinating manners. he isn’t handsome—not a bit handsomer than i am; come on, young sir,” and he began to march down-stairs.
“before we get in the street,” he said, pausing in the lobby, “give me your parole, sir, that you won’t try to escape.”
eugene hesitated to give it.
“you couldn’t go far,” said the sergeant, “for i’d be sure to catch you.”
“very well,” said the boy; “i yield to the inevitable. i will not try to escape until a letter comes from france.”
“all right, mussoo,” replied the sergeant; and he tramped on.
eugene was hungry and tired and inwardly disheartened, though he kept a calm exterior, and he was well pleased to arrive in front of the sergeant’s house.
[pg 103]
“i guess we’ll excuse your attendance at the public table of the jail this evening,” said the sergeant cheerfully. “walk right along this way to your cell, sir.”
eugene followed him down the hall to a little bedroom at the back of the house. it was furnished in pale colors, and a pretty white bed stood in the middle of it. the window was open, and a big bowl of flowers was placed on a small table beside the bed.
“you’re to have solitary imprisonment till to-morrow morning,” said the sergeant trying to speak sternly. “your jailer will bring you some supper presently. she’s a woman, so you will treat her harmoniously.”
eugene, still holding his cap in his hand, went and stood by one of the open windows. he was not grateful to the sergeant for introducing him to so charming a prison. he was filled with a blind, wild anger at the fate, as he called it, that had laid him under an obligation to these strangers whom he regarded as below himself in the social scale; and he was all the more angry because, child[pg 104] though he was, he had the acuteness to reflect that in the natural course of things his dissatisfaction would pass away. the more he thought about it the more angry he became; and yet so great control was he able to exert over his feelings when he was disposed to do so, that hardly a trace of his inward disquiet and rebellion appeared on his impassive face.
“good-night, prisoner,” said the sergeant abruptly. “i’m going now. pleasant dreams to you.”
“good-night, jailer,” said eugene in a repressed voice; “some day i will thank you, but not yet.”
the sergeant shrugged his broad shoulders and walked out to the dining-room.
“bess,” he said, laughing softly to himself, as he watched his wife flying around the room a pink spot on each cheek, “i’ve trapped your fine foreign bird for you. tame him now if you can.”
“i’ll tame him,” said mrs. hardy, tossing her fluffy white head; and she went on with[pg 105] her occupation of loading a tray with dainties for the young prisoner.
“he’ll see his grandfather to-night sure, and all his ancestors,” said the sergeant grumblingly, as his eyes wandered over the tray, “if he eats all that. what are you thinking of, bess,—rich plum-pudding and candy for a child this time of day.”
“i thought perhaps he would like to look at them,” said mrs. hardy; “and there are plenty of substantial things. see this corn bread and chicken, and these vegetables.”
“but he mayn’t pick them out.”
“oh, yes, he will! he is a sensible boy at heart,” said mrs. hardy; and she fairly ran from the room and down the hall with the tray.
eugene opened the door when she called to him, and at the sight of his pallid face she almost dropped the tray.
in silence he cleared the table for her to rest it on. in silence she put it down and gazed at him. at last she said nervously, “i thought you’d rather have your supper in here alone than to come to the table with us.”
[pg 106]
“thank you for your benevolence,” he said, inclining his head.
mrs. hardy twisted her face like a child about to cry. “let me help you unpack your bag,” she said hastily. “the supper things won’t get cold for a few minutes.”
eugene opened the bag, and she shook out the clothes as carefully as if they had belonged to a child of her own. then she showed him some hooks behind a curtain where he could hang them. “and there is the bath-room,” she went on, opening the hall door. “perhaps you will like to take a warm bath by and by. i will put some fresh towels in for you. now i shall leave you alone, and not bother you until the morning. good-night;” and she looked at him wistfully.
eugene opened the door for her, and stood in polite weariness beside it. then one by one big tears began to roll down his cheeks. he did not know why they came there, and he made no effort to brush them away.
“do you remember your mother?” asked mrs. hardy softly.
[pg 107]
“no, madam; she died when i was an infant.”
“and have you never had a woman to love you and call you her child, and tuck you in your little bed at night?” asked mrs. hardy.
“i have always had a bonne, a nurse,” said eugene—“many of them; but my grandfather is the only mother i have had.”
“and is there no one in the world that you love now—no one that you cling to?”
“i have the memory of my grandfather and of his majesty the emperor.”
“you’re the queerest little boy i ever saw. you are something like the chinese. they worship their ancestors.”
“possibly,” said eugene with a doubtful glance, as if he questioned the truth of her statement.
“and you really don’t care for any one,” said mrs. hardy. “you must excuse my curiosity; but i never saw man, woman, or child like you.”
“i must care for myself,” said eugene solemnly.
[pg 108]
“i know what is the matter with you,” said mrs. hardy triumphantly. “it’s just the trouble your great emperor suffered from. he hadn’t much faith in human nature, and he despised women.”
“the great emperor was but a man,” said eugene stiffly.
“he was concentrated selfishness,” said mrs. hardy. “i am selfish, my husband is, everybody is; but napoleon was worse than we are. but why do you cry?” for the tears were still rolling down eugene’s cheeks in a slow and sober procession.
he dabbed at his face with his handkerchief. “i will tell you,” he said earnestly. “since you have been speaking, i have been looking out that window toward the park where your homeless cats live. i did not comprehend about them the other day; now my soul enters the cats’ bodies, as we might say, and i feel the dismay that must fill them when they have lost their homes and their protectors. it is horrible. one becomes filled with anguish and bewilderment. where shall one turn?”
[pg 109]
“do you know what that feeling is that makes you, as you suppose, cry for the cats?” asked mrs. hardy with great gentleness.
while eugene paused to frame a reply, she went on, “it is sympathy. you are beginning to understand, and you are on the high road that leads away from selfishness. usually we begin with the human family and descend to the animals. you are going backward. your pity for the cats makes you see in them something more than mere hairy creatures crawling over the ground, as you styled them the other day.”
“i see in them suffering beings,” said eugene intensely. “their situation is like mine.” he stopped abruptly, and leaned his head on the arm that he had stretched out against the wall.
“when my husband was a lad he disliked animals and was cruel to them,” said mrs. hardy. “then he had a serious illness. two kittens that his mother owned used to sit on his bed, and watch him affectionately. he got to love them; and now he has the kindest[pg 110] heart for dumb animals, and also for men and women, of any man i know. now i will leave you, for you are tired. good-night, dear boy. god bless you;” and she went quietly away, and left him alone as she knew he wished to be.
