Jack by Alphonse Daudet (web ebook reader txt) 📖

ticket over the little inclosures to recognize certain animals from his own land. With mingled pain and pleasure he looked at the kangaroos, and seemed to suffer in seeing them in the limited space which they covered in three leaps.
He stood in silence before the light grating where the antelopes were inclosed. The birds, too, awakened his compassion. The ostriches and cassowaries looked mournful enough in the shade of their solitary exotic; but the parrots and smaller birds in a long cage, without even a green leaf or twig, were absolutely pitiful, and Madou thought of the Academy Moronval and of himself. The plumage of the birds was dull and torn; they told a tale of past battles, of dismal flutterings against the bars of their prison-house. Even the rose-colored flamingoes and the long-billed ibex, who seem associated with the Nile and the desert and the immovable sphinx, all assumed a thoroughly commonplace aspect among the white peacocks and the little Chinese ducks that paddled at ease in their miniature pond.
By degrees the garden filled up with people, and there suddenly appeared at the end of the avenue so strange and fantastic a spectacle that Madou stood still in silent ecstasy. He saw the heads of two elephants, who were slowly approaching, waving their trunks slowly, and bearing on their broad backs a crowd of women with light umbrellas, of children with straw hats and colored ribbons. Following the elephant came a giraffe carrying his small and haughty head very high. This singular caravan wound through the circuitous road, with many nervous laughs and terrified cries.
Under the glowing sunlight every tint of color was thrown out in relief upon the thick and rugged skin of the elephants, who extended their trunks either toward the tops of the trees or to the pockets of the spectators, shaking their long ears when gently touched by some child, or by the umbrella of some laughing girl on their backs.
"What is the matter, Madou; you tremble. Are you ill?" asked Jack. Madou was absolutely faint with emotion, but when he learned that he too could mount the clumsy animals, his grave face became almost tragic in expression. Jack refused to accompany him, and remained with his mother, whom he considered too grave for this fete-day. He liked to walk close at her side, or linger behind her in the dust of her long silken skirts, which she disdained to lift. They seated themselves, and watched the little black boy climb on the back of the elephant. Once there, the child seemed in his native place. He was no longer an exile, nor the awkward schoolboy, nor the little servant, humiliated by his menial duties and by his master's tyranny. He seemed imbued with new life, and his eyes sparkled with energy and determination. Happy little king! Two or three times he went around the garden. "Again! again!" he cried, and over the little bridge, between the inclosures of the kangaroos and other animals, he went to and fro, excited almost to madness by the heavy long strides of the elephant. Kerika, Dahomey, war-like scenes, and the hunt, all returned to his memory. He spoke to the elephant in his native tongue, and as he heard the sweet African voice, the huge creature shut his eyes with delight and trumpeted his pleasure. The zebras neighed, and the antelopes started in terror, while from the great cage of tropical birds, where the sun shone most fully, came warblings and flutterings of wings, discordant screams, and an enraged chatter, all the tumult, in short, on a small scale, of a primeval forest in the tropics.
But it was growing late. Madou must awaken from this beautiful dream. Besides, as soon as the sun dropped behind the horizon, the wind rose keen and cold, as so often happens in the early spring. This wintry chill affected the spirits of the children, and they grew strangely quiet and sad. Madame de Barancy for a wonder was also very silent. She had something she wished to say, and she probably found some difficulty in selecting her words, for she left them unsaid until the last moment. Then she took Jack's hand in hers. "Listen, child, I have some bad news to tell you!"
He understood at once that some great misfortune was impending, and he turned his supplicating eyes toward his mother. She continued in a low, quick voice,--
"I am going away, my son, on a long journey; I am obliged to leave you behind, but I will write to you. Do not cry, dear, for it hurts me; I shall not be gone long, and we shall soon see each other again. Yes, very soon, I promise you." And she threw out mysterious hints of a fortune to come, and money affairs, and other things that were not at all interesting to the child, who in reality paid little attention to her words, for he was weeping silently but chokingly. The gay streets seemed no longer the Paris of the morning, the sunshine was gone, the flowers on the corner-stands were faded, and all was very dreary, for he saw through eyes dim with tears, and the child was about to lose his mother.


CHAPTER VII.~~MADOU'S FLIGHT.
Some time after this a letter arrived at the academy from D'Argenton.
The poet wrote to announce that the death of a relative had so changed the position of his private affairs that he must offer his resignation as Professor of Literature. In a somewhat abrupt postscript he added that Madame de Barancy was obliged to leave Paris for an indefinite time, and that she confided her little Jack to M. Moronval's paternal care. In case of illness or accident to the child, a letter could be forwarded to the mother under cover to D'Argenton.
"The paternal care of Moronval!" Had the poet laughed aloud as he penned these words? Did he not know perfectly well the child's fate at the academy as soon as it was understood that his mother had left Paris, and that nothing more was to be expected from her?
The arrival of this letter threw Moronval into a terrible fit of rage, which rage shook the equilibrium of the academy as a violent tornado might have done in the tropics.
The countess gone! and gone too, apparently, with that brainless fellow, who had neither wit nor imagination. Was it not shameful that a woman of her years--for she was by no means in her earliest youth--should be so heartless as to leave her child alone in Paris, among strangers.
But even while he pitied Jack, Moronval said to himself, "Wait a while, young man, and I will show you how paternally I shall manage you."
But if he was enraged when he thought of the Review, his cherished project, he was more indignant that D'Argenton and Ida should have made use of him and his house to advance their own plans. He hurried off to the Boulevard Haussmann to learn all he could; but the mystery was no nearer elucidation.
Constant was expecting a letter from her mistress, and knew only that she had broken entirely with all past relations; that the house was to be given up, and the furniture sold.
"Ah! sir," said Constant, mournfully, "it was an unfortunate day for us when we set foot in your old barracks!"
The preceptor returned home convinced that at the termination of the next quarter Jack would be withdrawn from the school. Deciding, therefore, that the child was no longer a mine of wealth, he determined to put an end to all the indulgences with which he had been treated. Poor Jack after this day sat at the table no longer as an equal, but as the butt for all the teachers. No more dainties, no more wine for him. There were constant allusions made to D'Argenton: he was selfish and vain, a man totally without genius; as to his noble birth, it was more than doubtful; the chateau in the mountains, of which he discoursed so fluently, existed only in his imagination. These fierce attacks on the man whom he detested, amused the child; but something prevented him from joining in the servile applause of the other children, who eagerly laughed at each one of Moronval's witticisms. The fact was, that Jack dreaded the veiled allusions to his mother with which these remarks invariably terminated. He, to be sure, rarely caught their full meaning, but he saw by the contemptuous laughter that they were far from kindly. Madame Moronval would sometimes interrupt the conversation by a friendly word to Jack, or by sending him on some trifling errand. During his absence, she administered a reproof to her husband and his friends.
"Pshaw!" said Labassandre, "he does not understand." Perhaps he did not fully, but he comprehended enough to make his heart very sore.
He had known for a long time that he had a father whose name was not the same as his own, that his mother had no husband; and, one day, when one of the schoolboys made some taunting allusion, he flew at him in a rage. The boy was nearly choked; his cries summoned Moronval to the scene, and Jack for the first time was severely flogged.
From that day the charm was broken, and Jack's daily life did not greatly differ from that of Madou, who was at this time very unhappy. The pleasant weather, and the day at the _Jardin d'Aclimation_, had given him a terrible fit of homesickness. His melancholy at first took the form of a sullen revolt against his exacting masters. Suddenly all this was changed, the boy's eyes grew bright, and he seemed to go about the house and the garden as if in a dream.
One night the black boy was undressing, and Jack heard him singing to himself in a language that was strange.
"What are you singing, Madou?"
"I am not singing, sir; I'm talking negro talk!" and Madou confided to his friend his intention of running away from school. He had thought of it for some time, and was only waiting for pleasant weather; and now he meant to go to Dahomey, and find Kerika. If Jack would go with him, they would go to Marseilles on foot, and then go on board some vessel. Nothing could happen to them, for he had his amulet all safe. Jack made many objections. Dahomey had no charms for him. He thought of the copper basin, and the terrible heads, with an emotion of sick horror; and, besides, how could he go so far from his mother?
"Good," said Madou; "you can remain here, and I will go alone."
"And when?"
"To-morrow," answered the negro, resolutely closing his eyes as if he knew that he would need all the strength that sleep could give him.
The next morning, when Jack passed through the large recitation-room, he saw Madou busily scrubbing the floor, and concluded that he had relinquished his project.
The classes were busy for an hour or two, when Moronval appeared. "Where is Madou?" he asked abruptly. "He has gone to market," answered madame. Jack, however, said to himself that Madou would not return.
In a little while Moronval came back and asked the same question. His wife answered, uneasily, that she could not understand the boy's prolonged absence.
Dinner-time came, but no Madou, no vegetables, and no meat.
"Something must have happened," said Madame Moronval, more indulgent than her impatient husband, who paced up and down the corridor with his rod in his hand, while the hungry schoolboys were quite ready to devour each other. Finally, Madame Moronval sallied forth herself to buy some provisions; and on her return, burdened with packages, she was greeted by an enthusiastic shout from the children, who, when the fierceness of their hunger abated, ventured on surmises as to Madou's whereabouts.