A Start in Life

Quite early in the autumn of that year, one Saturday morning, Pierrotin, his hands stuffed through holes in his blouse and into his pockets, was standing at the front gate of the Silver Lion, whence he had a perspective view of the inn kitchen, and beyond it of the long yard and the stables at the end, like black caverns. The Dammartin diligence had just started, and was lumbering after Touchard’s coaches. It was past eight o’clock. Under the wide archway, over which was inscribed on a long board, Hotel du Lion d’Argent, the stableman and coach-porters were watching the vehicles start at the brisk pace which deludes the traveler into the belief that the horses will continue to keep it up.

“Shall I bring out the horses, master?” said Pierrotin’s stable-boy, when there was nothing more to be seen.

“A quarter-past eight, and I see no passengers,” said Pierrotin. “What the deuce has become of them? Put the horses to, all the same.⁠—No parcels neither. Bless us and save us! This afternoon, now, he won’t know how to stow his passengers, as it is so fine, and I have only four booked. There’s a pretty outlook for a Saturday! That’s always the way when you’re wanting the ready! It’s dog’s work, and work for a dog!”

“And if you had any, where would you stow ’em? You have nothing but your two-wheel cab,” said the luggage-porter, trying to smooth down Pierrotin.

On coming out of the café, Pierrotin perceived, at the gate of the Silver Lion, the woman and youth whom his acumen had recognized as travelers; for the lady, with outstretched neck and an anxious face, was evidently looking for him. This lady, in a re-dyed black silk, a gray bonnet, and an old French cashmere shawl, shod in openwork silk stockings and kid shoes, held a flat straw basket and a bright blue umbrella. She had once been handsome, and now looked about forty; and her blue eyes, bereft of the sparkle that happiness might have given them, showed that she had long since renounced the world. Her dress no less than her person betrayed a mother entirely given up to her housekeeping and her son. If the bonnet-strings were shabby, the shape of it dated from three years back. Her shawl was fastened with a large broken needle, converted into a pin by means of a head of sealing-wax.

This person was impatiently awaiting Pierrotin to commend her son to his care; the lad was probably traveling alone for the first time, and she had accompanied him as far as the coach office, as much out of mistrust as out of motherly devotion. The son was in a way supplementary to his mother; and without the mother the son would have seemed less comprehensible. While the mother was content to display darned gloves, the son wore an olive-green overcoat, with sleeves rather short at the wrists, showing that he was still growing, as lads do between eighteen and nineteen.

Oscar wished his mother further as she stuffed the roll and the chocolate into his pocket.

There were two witnesses to the scene, two young men a few years older than the newly fledged schoolboy, better dressed than he, and come without their mothers, their demeanor, dress, and manner proclaiming the entire independence which is the end of every lad’s desire while still under direct maternal government. To Oscar, at this moment, these two young fellows epitomized the World.

“Mamma! says he,” cried one of the strangers, with a laugh.

The words reached Oscar’s ears, and in an impulse of intense irritation he shouted out:

“Goodbye, mother!”

It must be owned that Madame Clapart spoke rather too loud, and seemed to admit the passersby to bear witness to her affectionate care.

“What on earth ails you, Oscar?” said the poor woman, much hurt. “I do not understand you,” she added severely, fancying she could thus inspire him with respect⁠—a common mistake with women who spoil their children. “Listen, dear Oscar,” she went on, resuming her coaxing gentleness, “you have a propensity for talking to everybody, telling everything you know and everything you don’t know⁠—out of brag and a young man’s foolish self-conceit. I beg you once more to bridle your tongue. You have not seen enough of life, my dearest treasure, to gauge the people you may meet, and there is nothing more dangerous than talking at random in a public conveyance. In a diligence well-bred persons keep silence.”

The two young men, who had, no doubt, walked to the end of the yard and back, now made the sound of their boots heard once more under the

“Now,” thought he, as the coucou rolled down the hill from la Chapelle towards the plain of Saint-Denis, “shall I pass myself off as Étienne, or as Béranger?⁠—No, these bumpkins have never heard of either.⁠—A Carbonaro? The Devil! I might be nabbed.⁠—One of Marshal Ney’s sons? Pooh, what could I make of that? Tell them the story of my father’s death? That would hardly be funny.⁠—Suppose I were to have come back from the Government colony in America? They might take me for a spy, and regard me with suspicion.⁠—I will be a Russian Prince in disguise; I will cram them with fine stories about the Emperor Alexander!⁠—Or if I pretended to be Cousin, the Professor of Philosophy? How I could mystify them! No, that limp creature with the towzled hair looks as if he might have kicked his heels at lecture at the Sorbonne.⁠—Oh, why didn’t I think sooner of trotting them out? I can imitate an Englishman so well, I might have been Lord Byron traveling incog.⁠—Hang it! I have missed my chance.⁠—The executioner’s son? Not a bad way of clearing a space at breakfast.⁠—Oh! I know! I will have been in command of the troops under Ali, the Pasha of Janina.”

While he was lost in these meditations, the chaise was making its way through the clouds of dust which constantly blow up from the side paths of this much-trodden road.

“What a dust!” said Mistigris.

“King Henri is dead,” retorted his comrade. “If you said it smelt of vanilla now, you would hit on a new idea!”

“You think that funny,” said Mistigris. “Well, but it does now and then remind me of vanilla.”

“In the East⁠—” Georges began, meaning to concoct a story.

“In the least⁠—” said Mistigris’ master, taking up Georges.