CHAPTER XXIV

A CAPITAL

What a noise, what busy people! What ideas for the

future in a brain of twenty! What distraction offered by

love.--_Barnave_.

Finally he saw some black walls near a distant mountain. It was the

citadel of Besançon. "How different it would be for me," he said

with a sigh, "if I were arriving at this noble military town to be

sub-lieutenant in one of the regiments entrusted with its defence."

Besançon is not only one of the prettiest towns in France, it abounds

in people of spirit and brains. But Julien was only a little peasant,

and had no means of approaching distinguished people.

He had taken a civilian suit at Fouqué's, and it was in this dress that

he passed the drawbridge. Steeped as he was in the history of the siege

of 1674, he wished to see the ramparts of the citadel before shutting

himself up in the seminary. He was within an ace two or three times

of getting himself arrested by the sentinel. He was penetrating into

places which military genius forbids the public to enter, in order to

sell twelve or fifteen francs worth of corn every year.

The height of the walls, the depth of the ditches, the terrible aspect

of the cannons had been engrossing him for several hours when he passed

before the great café on the boulevard. He was motionless with wonder;

it was in vain that he read the word _café_, written in big characters

above the two immense doors. He could not believe his eyes. He made an

effort to overcome his timidity. He dared to enter, and found himself

in a hall twenty or thirty yards long, and with a ceiling at least

twenty feet high. To-day, everything had a fascination for him.

Two games of billiards were in progress. The waiters were crying out

the scores. The players ran round the tables encumbered by spectators.

Clouds of tobacco smoke came from everybody's mouth, and enveloped them

in a blue haze. The high stature of these men, their rounded shoulders,

their heavy gait, their enormous whiskers, the long tailed coats which

covered them, everything combined to attract Julien's attention. These

noble children of the antique Bisontium only spoke at the top of their

voice. They gave themselves terrible martial airs. Julien stood still

and admired them. He kept thinking of the immensity and magnificence

of a great capital like Besançon. He felt absolutely devoid of the

requisite courage to ask one of those haughty looking gentlemen, who

were crying out the billiard scores, for a cup of coffee.

But the young lady at the bar had noticed the charming face of this

young civilian from the country, who had stopped three feet from

the stove with his little parcel under his arm, and was looking at

the fine white plaster bust of the king. This young lady, a big

_Franc-comtoise_, very well made, and dressed with the elegance

suitable to the prestige of the café, had already said two or three

times in a little voice not intended to be heard by any one except

Julien, "Monsieur, Monsieur." Julien's eyes encountered big blue eyes

full of tenderness, and saw that he was the person who was being spoken

to.

He sharply approached the bar and the pretty girl, as though he had

been marching towards the enemy. In this great manœuvre the parcel fell.

What pity will not our provincial inspire in the young lycée scholars

of Paris, who, at the early age of fifteen, know already how to enter

a café with so distinguished an air? But these children who have such

style at fifteen turn commonplace at eighteen. The impassioned timidity

which is met with in the provinces, sometimes manages to master its own

nervousness, and thus trains the will. "I must tell her the truth,"

thought Julien, who was becoming courageous by dint of conquering his

timidity as he approached this pretty girl, who deigned to address him.

"Madame, this is the first time in my life that I have come to

Besançon. I should like to have some bread and a cup of coffee in

return for payment."

The young lady smiled a little, and then blushed. She feared the ironic

attention and the jests of the billiard players might be turned against

this pretty young man. He would be frightened and would not appear

there again.

"Sit here near me," she said to him, showing him a marble table almost

completely hidden by the enormous mahogany counter which extended into

the hall.

The young lady leant over the counter, and had thus an opportunity of

displaying a superb figure. Julien noticed it. All his ideas changed.

The pretty young lady had just placed before him a cup, some sugar, and

a little roll. She hesitated to call a waiter for the coffee, as she

realised that his arrival would put an end to her _tête-à-tête_ with

Julien.

Julien was pensively comparing this blonde and merry beauty with

certain memories which would often thrill him. The thought of the

passion of which he had been the object, nearly freed him from all

his timidity. The pretty young woman had only one moment to save the

situation. She read it in Julien's looks.

"This pipe smoke makes you cough; come and have breakfast to-morrow

before eight o'clock in the morning. I am practically alone then."

"What is your name?" said Julien, with the caressing smile of happy

timidity.

"Amanda Binet."

"Will you allow me to send you within an hour's time a little parcel

about as big as this?"

The beautiful Amanda reflected a little.

"I am watched. What you ask may compromise me. All the same, I will

write my address on a card, which you will put on your parcel. Send it

boldly to me."

"My name is Julien Sorel," said the young man. "I have neither

relatives nor acquaintances at Besançon."

"Ah, I understand," she said joyfully. "You come to study law."

"Alas, no," answered Julien, "I am being sent to the Seminary."

The most complete discouragement damped Amanda's features. She called

a waiter. She had courage now. The waiter poured out some coffee for

Julien without looking at him.

Amanda was receiving money at the counter. Julien was proud of having

dared to speak: a dispute was going on at one of the billiard tables.

The cries and the protests of the players resounded over the immense

hall, and made a din which astonished Julien. Amanda was dreamy, and

kept her eyes lowered.

"If you like, Mademoiselle," he said to her suddenly with assurance, "I

will say that I am your cousin."

This little air of authority pleased Amanda. "He's not a mere nobody,"

she thought. She spoke to him very quickly, without looking at him,

because her eye was occupied in seeing if anybody was coming near the

counter.

"I come from Genlis, near Dijon. Say that you are also from Genlis and

are my mother's cousin."

"I shall not fail to do so."

"All the gentlemen who go to the Seminary pass here before the café

every Thursday in the summer at five o'clock."

"If you think of me when I am passing, have a bunch of violets in your

hand."

Amanda looked at him with an astonished air. This look changed Julien's

courage into audacity. Nevertheless, he reddened considerably, as he

said to her. "I feel that I love you with the most violent love."

"Speak in lower tones," she said to him with a frightened air.

Julien was trying to recollect phrases out of a volume of the _Nouvelle

Héloise_ which he had found at Vergy. His memory served him in good

stead. For ten minutes he recited the _Nouvelle Héloise_ to the

delighted Mademoiselle Amanda. He was happy on the strength of his own

bravery, when suddenly the beautiful Franc-comtoise assumed an icy

air. One of her lovers had appeared at the café door. He approached

the bar, whistling, and swaggering his shoulders. He looked at Julien.

The latter's imagination, which always indulged in extremes, suddenly

brimmed over with ideas of a duel. He paled greatly, put down his

cup, assumed an assured demeanour, and considered his rival very

attentively. As this rival lowered his head, while he familiarly poured

out on the counter a glass of brandy for himself, Amanda ordered Julien

with a look to lower his eyes. He obeyed, and for two minutes kept

motionless in his place, pale, resolute, and only thinking of what was

going to happen. He was truly happy at this moment. The rival had been

astonished by Julien's eyes. Gulping down his glass of brandy, he said

a few words to Amanda, placed his two hands in the pockets of his big

tail coat, and approached the billiard table, whistling, and looking at

Julien. The latter got up transported with rage, but he did not know

what to do in order to be offensive. He put down his little parcel, and

walked towards the billiard table with all the swagger he could muster.

It was in vain that prudence said to him, "but your ecclesiastical

career will be ruined by a duel immediately on top of your arrival at

Besançon."

"What does it matter. It shall never be said that I let an insolent

fellow go scot free."

Amanda saw his courage. It contrasted prettily with the simplicity of

his manners. She instantly preferred him to the big young man with the

tail coat. She got up, and while appearing to be following with her eye

somebody who was passing in the street, she went and quickly placed

herself between him and the billiard table.

"Take care not to look askance at that gentleman. He is my

brother-in-law."

"What does it matter? He looked at me."

"Do you want to make me unhappy? No doubt he looked at you, why it may

be he is going to speak to you. I told him that you were a relative of

my mother, and that you had arrived from Genlis. He is a Franc-contois,

and has never gone beyond Dôleon the Burgundy Road, so say what you

like and fear nothing."

Julien was still hesitating. Her barmaid's imagination furnished her

with an abundance of lies, and she quickly added.

"No doubt he looked at you, but it was at a moment when he was asking

me who you were. He is a man who is boorish with everyone. He did not

mean to insult you."

Julien's eye followed the pretended brother-in-law. He saw him buy a

ticket for the pool, which they were playing at the further of the

two billiard tables. Julien heard his loud voice shouting out in a

threatening tone, "My turn to play."

He passed sharply before Madame Amanda, and took a step towards the

billiard table. Amanda seized him by the arm.

"Come and pay me first," she said to him.

"That is right," thought Julien. "She is frightened that I shall leave

without paying." Amanda was as agitated as he was, and very red. She

gave him the change as slowly as she could, while she repeated to him,

in a low voice,

"Leave the café this instant, or I shall love you no more, and yet I do

love you very much."

Julien did go out, but slowly. "Am I not in duty bound," he repeated

to himself, "to go and stare at that coarse person in my turn?" This

uncertainty kept him on the boulevard in the front of the café for an

hour; he kept looking if his man was coming out. He did not come out,

and Julien went away.

He had only been at Besançon some hours, and already he had overcome

one pang of remorse. The old surgeon-major had formerly given him some

fencing lessons, in spite of his gout. That was all the science which

Julien could enlist in the service of his anger. But this embarrassment

would have been nothing if he had only known how to vent his temper

otherwise than by the giving of a blow, for if it had come to a matter

of fisticuffs, his enormous rival would have beaten him and then

cleared out.

"There is not much difference between a seminary and a prison," said

Julien to himself, "for a poor devil like me, without protectors and

without money. I must leave my civilian clothes in some inn, where I

can put my black suit on again. If I ever manage to get out of the

seminary for a few hours, I shall be able to see Mdlle. Amanda again in

my lay clothes." This reasoning was all very fine. Though Julien passed

in front of all the inns, he did not dare to enter a single one.

Finally, as he was passing again before the Hôtel des Ambassadeurs, his

anxious eyes encountered those of a big woman, still fairly young, with

a high colour, and a gay and happy air. He approached her and told his

story.

"Certainly, my pretty little abbé," said the hostess of the

Ambassadeurs to him, "I will keep your lay clothes for you, and I will

even have them regularly brushed. In weather like this, it is not good

to leave a suit of cloth without touching it." She took a key, and

conducted him herself to a room, and advised him to make out a note of

what he was leaving.

"Good heavens. How well you look like that, M. the abbé Sorel," said

the big woman to him when he came down to the kitchen. I will go and

get a good dinner served up to you, and she added in a low voice, "It

will only cost twenty sous instead of the fifty which everybody else

pays, for one must really take care of your little purse strings."

"I have ten louis," Julien replied with certain pride.

"Oh, great heavens," answered the good hostess in alarm. "Don't talk

so loud, there are quite a lot of bad characters in Besançon. They'll

steal all that from you in less than no time, and above all, never go

into the cafés, they are filled with bad characters."

"Indeed," said Julien, to whom those words gave food for thought.

"Don't go anywhere else, except to my place. I will make coffee for

you. Remember that you will always find a friend here, and a good

dinner for twenty sous. So now you understand, I hope. Go and sit down

at table, I will serve you myself."

"I shan't be able to eat," said Julien to her. "I am too upset. I am

going to enter the seminary, as I leave you." The good woman, would not

allow him to leave before she had filled his pockets with provisions.

Finally Julien took his road towards the terrible place. The hostess

was standing at the threshold, and showed him the way.