Scaramouche

R >> Rafael Sabatini >> Scaramouche

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29

The sergeant grew more terrible than ever. "That is not the point.
The point is that you are committing what amounts to a theft, and
there's the gaol for thieves."

"Technically, I suppose you are right," sighed Andre-Louis, and
fell to combing his hair again, still looking up into the sergeant's
face. "But we have sinned in ignorance. We are grateful to you for
the warning." He passed the comb into his left hand, and with his
right fumbled in his breeches' pocket, whence there came a faint
jingle of coins. "We are desolated to have brought you out of your
way. Perhaps for their trouble your men would honour us by stopping
at the next inn to drink the health of... of this M. de La Tour d'
Azyr, or any other health that they think proper."

Some of the clouds lifted from the sergeant's brow. But not yet all.

"Well, well," said he, gruffly. "But you must decamp, you
understand." He leaned from the saddle to bring his recipient hand
to a convenient distance. Andre-Louis placed in it a three-livre
piece.

"In half an hour," said Andre-Louis.

"Why in half an hour? Why not at once?"

"Oh, but time to break our fast."

They looked at each other. The sergeant next considered the broad
piece of silver in his palm. Then at last his features relaxed from
their sternness.

"After all," said he, "it is none of our business to play the
tipstaves for M. de La Tour d'Azyr. We are of the marechaussee
from Rennes." Andre-Louis' eyelids played him false by flickering.
"But if you linger, look out for the gardes-champetres of the
Marquis. You'll find them not at all accommodating. Well, well
- a good appetite to you, monsieur," said he, in valediction.

"A pleasant ride, my captain," answered Andre-Louis.

The sergeant wheeled his horse about, his troop wheeled with him.
They were starting off, when he reined up again.

"You, monsieur!" he called over his shoulder. In a bound
Andre-Louis was beside his stirrup. "We are in quest of a scoundrel
named Andre-Louis Moreau, from Gavrillac, a fugitive from justice
wanted for the gallows on a matter of sedition. You've seen nothing,
I suppose, of a man whose movements seemed to you suspicious?"

"Indeed, we have," said Andre-Louis, very boldly, his face eager
with consciousness of the ability to oblige.

"You have?" cried the sergeant, in a ringing voice. "Where? When?"

"Yesterday evening in the neighbourhood of Guignen... "

"Yes, yes," the sergeant felt himself hot upon the trail.

"There was a fellow who seemed very fearful of being recognized
... a man of fifty or thereabouts... "

"Fifty!" cried the sergeant, and his face fell. "Bah! This man of
ours is no older than yourself, a thin wisp of a fellow of about
your own height and of black hair, just like your own, by the
description. Keep a lookout on your travels, master player. The
King's Lieutenant in Rennes has sent us word this morning that he
will pay ten louis to any one giving information that will lead to
this scoundrel's arrest. So there's ten louis to be earned by
keeping your eyes open, and sending word to the nearest justices.
It would be a fine windfall for you, that."

"A fine windfall, indeed, captain," answered Andre-Louis, laughing.

But the sergeant had touched his horse with the spur, and was
already trotting off in the wake of his men. Andre-Louis continued
to laugh, quite silently, as he sometimes did when the humour of a
jest was peculiarly keen.

Then he turned slowly about, and came back towards Pantaloon and
the rest of the company, who were now all grouped together, at gaze.

Pantaloon advanced to meet him with both hands out-held. For a
moment Andre-Louis thought he was about to be embraced.

"We hail you our saviour!" the big man declaimed. "Already the
shadow of the gaol was creeping over us, chilling us to the very
marrow. For though we be poor, yet are we all honest folk and not
one of us has ever suffered the indignity of prison. Nor is there
one of us would survive it. But for you, my friend, it might have
happened. What magic did you work?"

"The magic that is to be worked in France with a King's portrait.
The French are a very loyal nation, as you will have observed. They
love their King - and his portrait even better than himself,
especially when it is wrought in gold. But even in silver it is
respected. The sergeant was so overcome by the sight of that noble
visage - on a three-livre piece - that his anger vanished, and he
has gone his ways leaving us to depart in peace."

"Ah, true! He said we must decamp. About it, my lads! Come,
come... "

"But not until after breakfast," said Andre-Louis. "A half-hour
for breakfast was conceded us by that loyal fellow, so deeply was
he touched. True, he spoke of possible gardes-champetres. But he
knows as well as I do that they are not seriously to be feared, and
that if they came, again the King's portrait - wrought in copper
this time - would produce the same melting effect upon them. So, my
dear M. Pantaloon, break your fast at your ease. I can smell your
cooking from here, and from the smell I argue that there is no need
to wish you a good appetite."

"My friend, my saviour!" Pantaloon flung a great arm about the young
man's shoulders. "You shall stay to breakfast with us."

"I confess to a hope that you would ask me," said Andre-Louis.

CHAPTER II

THE SERVICE OF THESPIS

They were, thought Andre-Louis, as he sat down to breakfast with
them behind the itinerant house, in the bright sunshine that
tempered the cold breath of that November morning, an odd and yet
an attractive crew. An air of gaiety pervaded them. They affected
to have no cares, and made merry over the trials and tribulations
of their nomadic life. They were curiously, yet amiably, artificial;
histrionic in their manner of discharging the most commonplace of
functions; exaggerated in their gestures; stilted and affected in
their speech. They seemed, indeed, to belong to a world apart, a
world of unreality which became real only on the planks of their
stage, in the glare of their footlights. Good-fellowship bound them
one to another; and Andre-Louis reflected cynically that this
harmony amongst them might be the cause of their apparent unreality.
In the real world, greedy striving and the emulation of
acquisitiveness preclude such amity as was present here.

They numbered exactly eleven, three women and eight men; and they
addressed each other by their stage names: names which denoted their
several types, and never - or only very slightly - varied, no matter
what might be the play that they performed.

"We are," Pantaloon informed him, "one of those few remaining
staunch bands of real players, who uphold the traditions of the old
Italian Commedia dell' Arte. Not for us to vex our memories and
stultify our wit with the stilted phrases that are the fruit of a
wretched author's lucubrations. Each of us is in detail his own
author in a measure as he develops the part assigned to him. We are
improvisers - improvisers of the old and noble Italian school."

"I had guessed as much," said Andre-Louis, "when I discovered you
rehearsing your improvisations."

Pantaloon frowned.

"I have observed, young sir, that your humour inclines to the
pungent, not to say the acrid. It is very well. It is I suppose,
the humour that should go with such a countenance. But it may lead
you astray, as in this instance. That rehearsal - a most unusual
thing with us - was necessitated by the histrionic rawness of our
Leandre. We are seeking to inculcate into him by training an art
with which Nature neglected to endow him against his present needs.
Should he continue to fail in doing justice to our schooling... But
we will not disturb our present harmony with the unpleasant
anticipation of misfortunes which we still hope to avert. We love
our Leandre, for all his faults. Let me make you acquainted with
our company."

And he proceeded to introduction in detail. He pointed out the
long and amiable Rhodomont, whom Andre-Louis already knew.

"His length of limb and hooked nose were his superficial
qualifications to play roaring captains," Pantaloon explained.
"His lungs have justified our choice. You should hear him roar.
At first we called him Spavento or Epouvapte. But that was unworthy
of so great an artist. Not since the superb Mondor amazed the world
has so thrasonical a bully been seen upon the stage. So we
conferred upon him the name of Rhodomont that Mondor made famous;
and I give you my word, as an actor and a gentleman - for I am a
gentleman, monsieur, or was - that he has justified us."

His little eyes beamed in his great swollen face as he turned their
gaze upon the object of his encomium. The terrible Rhodomont,
confused by so much praise, blushed like a schoolgirl as he met the
solemn scrutiny of Andre-Louis.

"Then here we have Scaramouche, whom also you already know.
Sometimes he is Scapin and sometimes Coviello, but in the main
Scaramouche, to which let me tell you he is best suited - sometimes
too well suited, I think. For he is Scaramouche not only on the
stage, but also in the world. He has a gift of sly intrigue, an
art of setting folk by the ears, combined with an impudent
aggressiveness upon occasion when he considers himself safe from
reprisals. He is Scaramouche, the little skirmisher, to the very
life. I could say more. But I am by disposition charitable and
loving to all mankind."

"As the priest said when he kissed the serving-wench," snarled
Scaramouche, and went on eating.

"His humour, like your own, you will observe, is acrid," said
Pantaloon. He passed on. "Then that rascal with the lumpy nose
and the grinning bucolic countenance is, of course, Pierrot. Could
he be aught else?"

"I could play lovers a deal better," said the rustic cherub.

"That is the delusion proper to Pierrot," said Pantaloon,
contemptuously. "This heavy, beetle-browed ruffian, who has grown
old in sin, and whose appetite increases with his years, is
Polichinelle. Each one, as you perceive, is designed by Nature
for the part he plays. This nimble, freckled jackanapes is
Harlequin; not your spangled Harlequin into which modern degeneracy
has debased that first-born of Momus, but the genuine original zany
of the Commedia, ragged and patched, an impudent, cowardly,
blackguardly clown."

"Each one of us, as you perceive," said Harlequin, mimicking the
leader of the troupe, "is designed by Nature for the part he plays."

"Physically, my friend, physically only, else we should not have so
much trouble in teaching this beautiful Leandre to become a lover.
Then we have Pasquariel here, who is sometimes an apothecary,
sometimes a notary, sometimes a lackey - an amiable, accommodating
fellow. He is also an excellent cook, being a child of Italy, that
land of gluttons. And finally, you have myself, who as the father
of the company very properly play as Pantaloon the roles of father.
Sometimes, it is true, I am a deluded husband, and sometimes an
ignorant, self-sufficient doctor. But it is rarely that I find it
necessary to call myself other than Pantaloon. For the rest, I am
the only one who has a name - a real name. It is Binet, monsieur.

"And now for the ladies... First in order of seniority we have
Madame there." He waved one of his great hands towards a buxom,
smiling blonde of five-and-forty, who was seated on the lowest of
the steps of the travelling house. "She is our Duegne, or Mother,
or Nurse, as the case requires. She is known quite simply and
royally as Madame. If she ever had a name in the world, she has
long since forgotten it, which is perhaps as well. Then we have
this pert jade with the tip-tilted nose and the wide mouth, who
is of course our soubrette Columbine, and lastly, my daughter
Climene, an amoureuse of talents not to be matched outside the
Comedie Francaise, of which she has the bad taste to aspire to
become a member."

The lovely Climene - and lovely indeed she was - tossed her
nut-brown curls and laughed as she looked across at Andre-Louis.
Her eyes, he had perceived by now, were not blue, but hazel.

"Do not believe him, monsieur. Here I am queen, and I prefer to
be queen here rather than a slave in Paris."

"Mademoiselle," said Andre-Louis, quite solemnly, "will be queen
wherever she condescends to reign."

Her only answer was a timid - timid and yet alluring - glance from
under fluttering lids. Meanwhile her father was bawling at the
comely young man who played lovers - "You hear, Leandre! That is
the sort of speech you should practise."

Leandre raised languid eyebrows. "That?" quoth he, and shrugged.
"The merest commonplace."

Andre-Louis laughed approval. "M. Leandre is of a readier wit than
you concede. There is subtlety in pronouncing it a commonplace to
call Mlle. Climene a queen."

Some laughed, M. Binet amongst them, with good-humoured mockery.

"You think he has the wit to mean it thus? Bah! His subtleties are
all unconscious."

The conversation becoming general, Andre-Louis soon learnt what yet
there was to learn of this strolling band. They were on their way
to Guichen, where they hoped to prosper at the fair that was to open
on Monday next. They would make their triumphal entry into the town
at noon, and setting up their stage in the old market, they would
give their first performance that same Saturday night, in a new
canevas - or scenario - of M. Binet's own, which should set the
rustics gaping. And then M. Binet fetched a sigh, and addressed
himself to the elderly, swarthy, beetle-browed Polichinelle, who sat
on his left.

"But we shall miss Felicien," said he. "Indeed, I do not know what
we shall do without him."

"Oh, we shall contrive," said Polichinelle, with his mouth full.

"So you always say, whatever happens, knowing that in any case the
contriving will not fall upon yourself."

"He should not be difficult to replace," said Harlequin.

"True, if we were in a civilized land. But where among the rustics
of Brittany are we to find a fellow of even his poor parts?" M.
Binet turned to Andre-Louis. "He was our property-man, our machinist,
our stage-carpenter, our man of affairs, and occasionally he acted."

"The part of Figaro, I presume," said Andre-Louis, which elicited a
laugh.

"So you are acquainted with Beaumarchais!" Binet eyed the young
man with fresh interest.

"He is tolerably well known, I think."

"In Paris, to be sure. But I had not dreamt his fame had reached
the wilds of Brittany."

"But then I was some years in Paris - at the Lycee of Louis le
Grand. It was there I made acquaintance with his work."

"A dangerous man," said Polichinelle, sententiously.

"Indeed, and you are right," Pantaloon agreed. "Clever - I do not
deny him that, although myself I find little use for authors. But
of a sinister cleverness responsible for the dissemination of many
of these subversive new ideas. I think such writers should be
suppressed."

"M. de La Tour d'Azyr would probably agree with you - the gentleman
who by the simple exertion of his will turns this communal land into
his own property." And Andre-Louis drained his cup, which had been
filled with the poor vin gris that was the players' drink.

It was a remark that might have precipitated an argument had it not
also reminded M. Binet of the terms on which they were encamped
there, and of the fact that the half-hour was more than past. In a
moment he was on his feet, leaping up with an agility surprising in
so corpulent a man, issuing his commands like a marshal on a field
of battle.

"Come, come, my lads! Are we to sit guzzling here all day? Time
flees, and there's a deal to be done if we are to make our entry
into Guichen at noon. Go, get you dressed. We strike camp in twenty
minutes. Bestir, ladies! To your chaise, and see that you contrive
to look your best. Soon the eyes of Guichen will be upon you, and
the condition of your interior to-morrow will depend upon the
impression made by your exterior to-day. Away! Away!"

The implicit obedience this autocrat commanded set them in a whirl.
Baskets and boxes were dragged forth to receive the platters and
remains of their meagre feast. In an instant the ground was
cleared, and the three ladies had taken their departure to the
chaise, which was set apart for their use. The men were already
climbing into the house on wheels, when Binet turned to Andre-Louis.

"We part here, sir," said he, dramatically, "the richer by your
acquaintance; your debtors and your friends." He put forth his
podgy hand.

Slowly Andre-Louis took it in his own. He had been thinking swiftly
in the last few moments. And remembering the safety he had found
from his pursuers in the bosom of this company, it occurred to him
that nowhere could he be better hidden for the present, until the
quest for him should have died down.

"Sir," he said, "the indebtedness is on my side. It is not every
day one has the felicity to sit down with so illustrious and
engaging a company."

Binet's little eyes peered suspiciously at the young man, in quest
of irony. He found nothing but candour and simple good faith.

"I part from you reluctantly," Andre-Louis continued. "The more
reluctantly since I do not perceive the absolute necessity for
parting."

"How?" quoth Binet, frowning, and slowly withdrawing the hand which
the other had already retained rather longer than was necessary.

"Thus," Andre-Louis explained himself. "You may set me down as a
sort of knight of rueful countenance in quest of adventure, with no
fixed purpose in life at present. You will not marvel that what I
have seen of yourself and your distinguished troupe should inspire
me to desire your better acquaintance. On your side you tell me
that you are in need of some one to replace your Figaro - your
Felicien, I think you called him. Whilst it may be presumptuous of
me to hope that I could discharge an office so varied and so
onerous... "

"You are indulging that acrid humour of yours again, my friend,"
Binet interrupted him. "Excepting for that," he added, slowly,
meditatively, his little eyes screwed up, "we might discuss this
proposal that you seem to be making."

"Alas! we can except nothing. If you take me, you take me as I am.
What else is possible? As for this humour - such as it is - which
you decry, you might turn it to profitable account."

"How so?"

"In several ways. I might, for instance, teach Leandre to make
love."

Pantaloon burst into laughter. "You do not lack confidence in your
powers. Modesty does not afflict you."

"Therefore I evince the first quality necessary in an actor."

"Can you act?"

"Upon occasion, I think," said Andre-Louis, his thoughts upon his
performance at Rennes and Nantes, and wondering when in all his
histrionic career Pantaloon's improvisations had so rent the heart
of mobs.

M. Binet was musing. "Do you know much of the theatre?" quoth he.

"Everything," said Andre-Louis.

"I said that modesty will prove no obstacle in your career."

"But consider. I know the work of Beaumarchais, Eglantine, Mercier,
Chenier, and many others of our contemporaries. Then I have read, of
course, Moliere, Racine, Corneille, besides many other lesser French
writers. Of foreign authors, I am intimate with the works of Gozzi,
Goldoni, Guarini, Bibbiena, Machiavelli, Secchi, Tasso, Ariosto, and
Fedini. Whilst of those of antiquity I know most of the work of
Euripides, Aristophanes, Terence, Plautus... "

"Enough!" roared Pantaloon.

"I am not nearly through with my list," said Andre-Louis.

"You may keep the rest for another day. In Heaven's name, what can
have induced you to read so many dramatic authors?"

"In my humble way I am a student of man, and some years ago I made
the discovery that he is most intimately to be studied in the
reflections of him provided for the theatre."

"That is a very original and profound discovery," said Pantaloon,
quite seriously. "It had never occurred to me. Yet is it true.
Sir, it is a truth that dignifies our art. You are a man of parts,
that is clear to me. It has been clear since first I met you. I
can read a man. I knew you from the moment that you said
'good-morning.' Tell me, now: Do you think you could assist me
upon occasion in the preparation of a scenario? My mind, fully
engaged as it is with a thousand details of organization, is not
always as clear as I would have it for such work. Could you assist
me there, do you think?"

"I am quite sure I could."

"Hum, yes. I was sure you would be. The other duties that were
Felicien's you would soon learn. Well, well, if you are willing,
you may come along with us. You'd want some salary, I suppose?"

"If it is usual," said Andre-Louis.

"What should you say to ten livres a month?"

"I should say that it isn't exactly the riches of Peru."

"I might go as far as fifteen," said Binet, reluctantly. "But times
are bad."

"I'll make them better for you."

"I've no doubt you believe it. Then we understand each other?"

"Perfectly," said Andre-Louis, dryly, and was thus committed to the
service of Thespis.

CHAPTER II

THE COMIC MUSE

The company's entrance into the township of Guichen, if not exactly
triumphal, as Binet had expressed the desire that it should be, was
at least sufficiently startling and cacophonous to set the rustics
gaping. To them these fantastic creatures appeared - as indeed they
were - beings from another world.

First went the great travelling chaise, creaking and groaning on its
way, drawn by two of the Flemish horses. It was Pantaloon who drove
it, an obese and massive Pantaloon in a tight-fitting suit of scarlet
under a long brown bed-gown, his countenance adorned by a colossal
cardboard nose. Beside him on the box sat Pierrot in a white smock,
with sleeves that completely covered his hands, loose white trousers,
and a black skull-cap. He had whitened his face with flour, and he
made hideous noises with a trumpet.

On the roof of the coach were assembled Polichinelle, Scaramouche,
Harlequin, and Pasquariel. Polichinelle in black and white, his
doublet cut in the fashion of a century ago, with humps before and
behind, a white frill round his neck and a black mask upon the upper
half of his face, stood in the middle, his feet planted wide to
steady him, solemnly and viciously banging a big drum. The other
three were seated each at one of the corners of the roof, their legs
dangling over. Scaramouche, all in black in the Spanish fashion of
the seventeenth century, his face adorned with a pair of mostachios,
jangled a guitar discordantly. Harlequin, ragged and patched in
every colour of the rainbow, with his leather girdle and sword of
lath, the upper half of his face smeared in soot, clashed a pair of
cymbals intermittently. Pasquariel, as an apothecary in skull-cap
and white apron, excited the hilarity of the onlookers by his
enormous tin clyster, which emitted when pumped a dolorous squeak.

Within the chaise itself, but showing themselves freely at the
windows, and exchanging quips with the townsfolk, sat the three
ladies of the company. Climene, the amoureuse, beautifully gowned
in flowered satin, her own clustering ringlets concealed under a
pumpkin-shaped wig, looked so much the lady of fashion that you
might have wondered what she was dong in that fantastic rabble.
Madame, as the mother, was also dressed with splendour, but
exaggerated to achieve the ridiculous. Her headdress was a
monstrous structure adorned with flowers, and superimposed by little
ostrich plumes. Columbine sat facing them, her back to the horses,
falsely demure, in milkmaid bonnet of white muslin, and a striped
gown of green and blue.

The marvel was that the old chaise, which in its halcyon days may
have served to carry some dignitary of the Church, did not founder
instead of merely groaning under that excessive and ribald load.

Next came the house on wheels, led by the long, lean Rhodomont, who
had daubed his face red, and increased the terror of it by a pair
of formidable mostachios. He was in long thigh-boots and leather
jerkin, trailing an enormous sword from a crimson baldrick. He wore
a broad felt hat with a draggled feather, and as he advanced he
raised his great voice and roared out defiance, and threats of
blood-curdling butchery to be performed upon all and sundry. On
the roof of this vehicle sat Leandre alone. He was in blue satin,
with ruffles, small sword, powdered hair, patches and spy-glass, and
red-heeled shoes: the complete courtier, looking very handsome. The
women of Guichen ogled him coquettishly. He took the ogling as a
proper tribute to his personal endowments, and returned it with
interest. Like Climene, he looked out of place amid the bandits who
composed the remainder of the company.

Bringing up the rear came Andre-Louis leading the two donkeys that
dragged the property-cart. He had insisted upon assuming a false
nose, representing as for embellishment that which he intended for
disguise. For the rest, he had retained his own garments. No one
paid any attention to him as he trudged along beside his donkeys,
an insignificant rear guard, which he was well content to be.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29