FRANTZ DE GALAIS

The race had ended too soon. It was half-past four and still daylight when Meaulnes found himself again in his room, his head full of the events of this extraordinary day. He sat down idly at the table, waiting for the dinner and the fête which would follow.

The great wind which had blown on the first evening blew again. It could be heard roaring like a torrent or passing by with the insistent hiss of a waterfall. Every now and then the damper in the grate shook.

For the first time Meaulnes felt the little pang that gets you at the close of too lovely a day. It occurred to him to light a fire, but he tried vainly to raise the rusted damper. Then he began to tidy the room; he hung up his handsome clothes on the pegs, arranged the disordered chairs in a row along the walls, as if he were anxious to make preparations for a long stay.

Remembering, however, that he ought to be ready to leave at a moment’s notice, he carefully folded his overall and his other school things like travelling clothes on the back of a chair and put his hobnailed shoes, still thick with mud, under the chair.

Then he sat down again and, feeling calmer, inspected his dwelling-room now set in order.

From time to time a drop of rain left a streak on the window which looked on the stable-yard and the fir wood. At peace since he had tidied his room, the big boy felt perfectly happy. There he was, mysterious, a stranger in the midst of this unknown world, in the room he had chosen. What he had found surpassed all his hopes. And it was enough now for his joy to recall, in the high wind, the face of that girl who turned towards him....

* * * * *

Night had fallen during this reverie, and he had not given a thought even to lighting the tall candles. A gust of wind banged the door of the dressing-room adjoining his, which also looked on the stable-yard. Meaulnes was about to close it when he noticed, in that room, a faint light as of a candle burning on the table. He put his head through the half-open door. Some one had got in there, by the window, no doubt, and was walking up and down with silent tread. So far as one could see it was a very young man with a long travelling cloak on his shoulders. Bareheaded, this young man paced up and down without a stop, like one distracted by some unbearable grief. From the window, which he had left wide open, the wind made his cloak flutter, and each time he passed close to the light a glint of brass buttons on his handsome frock coat caught the eye.

He was whistling between his teeth a kind of chanty such as sailors and prostitutes sing, to keep up their spirits in the pot-houses of seaports.

He stopped for an instant in the midst of his troubled walk, leaned over the table, searched in a box, took out several sheets of paper.... By the light of the candle Meaulnes saw in profile very fine and very aquiline features, clean-shaven, under a thick head of hair which was parted on one side. He had stopped whistling. He was very pale; his lips were half open, and he seemed short of breath as if he had received a violent blow on the heart.

Meaulnes wondered whether it would be wise to retire or to go in and put a hand on his shoulder like a friend and talk to him. But the other raised his head and saw him. He looked at him for a moment; then, without surprise, came up and said, steadying his voice:

‘I do not know you, sir, but I am pleased to see you. As you are here it is to you I will explain.... Listen!...’

He appeared completely broken. After he had said ‘Listen,’ he caught hold of Meaulnes by his coat lapel, as though to fix his attention. Then he turned his head towards the window, as if to collect his thoughts, blinked--and Meaulnes realized that he badly wanted to cry.

But suddenly he swallowed back this childlike grief and, still gazing at the window, he went on in an altered voice:

‘Well! listen; it’s all ended; the fête is ended. You can go down and tell them. I’ve come back alone. My fiancée will not come. Scruples, fear, lack of faith ... besides, sir, I must explain to you....’

But he could not go on. His face screwed up. He explained nothing. He suddenly turned away and went, in the dim light, to open and then close drawers full of clothes and books.

‘I am going to get ready to go away again,’ he said. ‘Let no one disturb me.’

He placed various things on the table, a dressing-case, a revolver....

And Meaulnes walked out, full of dismay, not daring to say a word or to shake hands.

Downstairs everybody seemed to have guessed something already. Nearly all the girls had changed dresses. In the main building dinner had started, but people ate in haste, anyhow, as at the moment of starting on a journey.

There was a constant going to and fro from this large kitchen hall to the bedrooms and stables. Those who had done eating formed groups and said ‘Good-bye’ to each other.

‘What’s happening?’ asked Meaulnes of a peasant boy who was making haste to finish his meal, a felt hat on his head and a table napkin tucked into his waistcoat:

‘We are leaving,’ he said. ‘It’s been decided quite suddenly. At five o’clock we found ourselves quite alone, all the guests together. We had waited as long as we possibly could. Too late for the lovers to turn up. Somebody said, “Let’s go” ... And everybody made ready to leave.’

Meaulnes made no reply. He did not mind going now. Had he not reached the end of his adventure?... Had he not this once obtained all that he wished for? Scarcely had he had time even quietly to go over in his mind the beautiful conversation of the morning. At the moment the only thing was to go. And soon he would come back--without trickery this time....

‘If you like to come with us,’ went on his companion, who was a boy of his own age, ‘look sharp and get ready; we are going to harness up at once.’

Meaulnes hurried out, leaving his meal unfinished and omitting to tell the guests what he knew. The park, the garden, and the yard were now plunged in total darkness. There were no lanterns that evening at the windows. But as this dinner was, after all, not unlike the meal at the conclusion of a wedding, the less considerate of the guests, who had perhaps been drinking, began to sing. As he went off, Meaulnes heard their cabaret songs fill the air of the park which for two days had held so much grace and so much wonder. And it proved the beginning of confusion and chaos. He passed close to the fish-pond into which he had looked, that very morning, at his own reflection. How everything seemed changed already ... with this song, sung in chorus, which reached him in snatches:

Where has’t come from, little wanton? Your cap is in two Your hair all askew...

And this one, too:

My shoes are red ... Good-bye, my lover ... My shoes are red ... Good-bye forever!

As he reached the foot of the stairs leading to his isolated lodging, some one came down and bumped into him in the dark, saying: ‘Good-bye, sir!’--and wrapping himself in his cloak as if it were very cold, disappeared. It was Frantz de Galais.

* * * * *

The candle which Frantz had left in his room was still burning. Nothing had been touched. Only, written on a conspicuous sheet of note-paper, were these words:

‘My fiancée has disappeared, letting me know that she cannot be my wife; that she was a dressmaker and not a princess. I do not know what will become of me. I am going away. I no longer wish to live. May Yvonne forgive me for not saying good-bye to her, but she could not do anything for me....’

It was the end of the candle, the flame of which guttered, flickered a moment and went out. Meaulnes returned to his own room and shut the door. In spite of the darkness he made out all the things which he had tidied, in full daylight and in full happiness, a few hours before. Garment after garment, all intact, he found again his old wretched suit, from his hobnailed shoes to his clumsy belt with the brass buckle. He undressed and dressed again swiftly, but distraught, placing his borrowed clothes on a chair, putting on the wrong waistcoat....

Under the windows, in the stable-yard, the bustle of departure had begun. Pulling, shouting, and pushing, each one wanted to get his vehicle out of the confused crowd in which it was hemmed. From time to time a man would climb on the driver’s seat of a trap or on the hood of a big covered cart and search about with his light. The reflection of the lantern came in at the window; for a brief moment the room around Meaulnes, once familiar and where everything had been so friendly, breathed again, lived again.... And thus it was that, carefully closing the door, he left this mysterious place which no doubt he was never again to see.