“Where is the broomstick?” said Fau, in a menacing tone, and making a clatter with the bows, assagais, and fishing tackle which hung behind the door.

  “Adsum!” called Alexandre, pointing to Tom, who, at this well-known sound, had jumped quickly up and approached Fau with an innocent and friendly kind of apologetic manner.

  “That is right at last,” said Fau; “be a good fellow, now; I have come on purpose for you all the way from the Café Procope to the Faubourg Saint-Denis.”

  Tom shook his head up and down, down and up.

  “All right; now shake hands with your friends. Well done!”

  “Are you going to take him away?” said Decamps.

  “A little way,” said Fau, “and we are going to get him something pleasant, too!”

  “And where are you going together?.”

  “To the bal masqué, that is all.... Come, come, Tom, let us be going, my friend. We have a cabriolet hired by the hour.”

  And as if Tom understood the force of this last argument, he went down the, stairs four steps at a time, followed by his chaperon.

  When they reached the coach, the driver opened the door, lowered the steps, and Tom guided by Fau, got inside the conveyance as if he had been accustomed to go out driving every day of his life.

  “Well, I never!” said the driver; “that is a funny dress. One would take him for a real bear. Where am I to drive you, my good people?”

  “To the Odéon,” replied Fau.

  “Grrooonn!” said Tom.

  “There — there — no need to get angry,” said the driver; “it is a good step, but we shall get there all in good time.”

  In point of fact, half an hour later the coach stopped at the door of the theatre. Fau got out first and paid the fare; then he gave Tom a hand, took two tickets at the box-office, and entered the hall without the slightest objection being raised by the officials.

  The second turn they took round the room, people began to follow Tom. The truth with which the new arrival imitated the gait of the animal whose skin he bore struck some of the learned in natural history. The investigators then drew gradually closer, and, wishing to find out if his talent for imitation extended also to the voice, they gave little tugs at the hair on his tail or pinched his ears.

  “Grrooonn!” growled Tom.

  A cry of admiration burst from the circle. It was absolutely life-like.

  Fau led Tom to the refreshment stall, and gave him some sweet pastry, of which he was very fond, and the voracity with which he ate was so exactly like that of the real animal that the gallery roared with laughter. Then he gave him a glass of water, which Tom took carefully between his paws, as he was in the habit of doing when by chance Decamps did him the honour of asking him to dine at table, and he drank it at one gulp. Then the enthusiasm reached its highest point.

  At this moment, when Fau came to leave the counter, he found such a tightly-packed circle round them, that he began to fear Tom might be tempted to have recourse to his teeth and claws to clear a way, and this would have complicated matters a good deal; so he led him aside into a corner, put him with his back resting against the angle of the walls, and ordered him to remain there until further orders. This was, as we have said, a form of drill perfectly familiar to Tom, as it was the way he had been taught to mount guard, and, moreover, suited well the natural indolence of his character. Thus, far more scrupulously obeying his orders than many a National Guard of my acquaintance, he did his turn of sentry-go, patiently waiting for his relief. A Harlequin then gave him his stick to complete the parody, and Tom gravely placed his heavy paw atop of his wooden musket.

  “Are you aware,” said Fau to the obliging son of Bergamo, “who it is you have just lent your stick to?”

  “No,” replied Harlequin.

  “Can’t you guess?

  “No! I haven’t a notion!”

  “Come, look again. The grace of his movements, the neck for ever bent over the left shoulder, like Alexander the Great’s — the perfect mimicry... what! you don’t recognize him?”

  “No, upon my word of honour!”

  “Odry,” whispered Fau; “Odry, in the costume he wears in ‘The Bear and the Pacha.’”

  “But — he plays the white bear.”

  “Exactly. That is why he has borrowed Vernet’s bearskin, to make the disguise perfect.”

  “Oh, nonsense! You are joking,” said the Harlequin. “Grrooonn!” said Tom.

  “Ah, now I recognize his voice,” said Fau’s new acquaintance. “You should tell him to disguise it better. How strange I did not know him sooner.”

  “Yes, I will,” said Fau, walking towards the hall; “but we must not bother him too much,- for fear of offending him. I will try and get him to dance the minuet.”

  “Oh — really?”

  “He promised he would. Tell your friends that, so that no one may go playing tricks on him.”

  “All right.”

  Fau crossed the room, and the Harlequin, delighted, went from one masker to another to tell them the news, and to repeat the advice given; upon which everybody discreetly fell back. Just then, the band struck up the first bars of the gallop, and all made for the dancing room; but, before following his companion, the facetious Harlequin advanced towards Tom on tip-toes, and, whispering in his ear, said:

  “I know you, my pretty fellow!”

  “Grrooonn!” answered Tom.

  ‘Oh, groon, groon, groon, as much as you please; but you are going to dance the minuet; you will dance the minuet, my dear, good Odry?”

  Tom nodded his head slowly up and down, down and up, as he always did when asked questions, and the Harlequin, satisfied with this sign of assent, went off to find a Columbine with whom to dance the galop himself.

  While this dance was going on, Tom was left alone with the barmaid, he standing motionless on his part, but with longing eyes fixed on the pyramids of tarts and cakes with which the buffet was crowned. The girl noticed his marked attention to her wares, and seeing an opening for a sale she took a plate and stretched out her arm; Tom extended his paw, and politely took a tart, then a second, and then a third. The barmaid went on handing tarts, and Tom accepted them thankfully, so that he was well on in his second dozen when the galop finished and the dancers came back to the crush-room. Harlequin had recruited a Shepherdess and a Pierrette, and he introduced these ladies as partners for the minuet.

  Then, as an old acquaintance, he came up to Tom and whispered a few words to him. Tom, whom his repast had put into a charming frame of mind, replied with one of his most amiable grunt. The Harleqruin turned towards the spectators, andannounced that, the Signor Odry consented with great pleasure to gratify, the wishes of the assembly. At these words rounds of applause, mingled with cries of “To the saloon!” broke forth; the Pierrette and the Shepherdess each took one of Tom’s paws. Tom, for his part, like gallant cavalier, followed where they led, looking from one to the other of his two partners with an air of great astonishment, and was soon in the middle of the floor. All took up positions to watch, some in the boxes, some in the balconies, while the majority stood round in a circle, and the band struck up.

  The minuet was Tom’s strong point, and the masterpiece of Fau’s course of instruction. This success was assured from the first opening of the first figure, and the enthusiasm rose as the dance went on. Towards the end the applause was deafening. Tom was carried in triumph to the stage box. There the Shepherdess took off her crown of roses and placed it on his head. The whole house clapped and shouted, one voice even crying, “Long live Odry the First!”

  Tom leant on the balustrade of his box with a grace all his own. Just as his triumph was complete, the first bars of the next country dance were played, and the crowd ran off to take their places, except a few courtiers of the new king, who stayed on in the hope of getting some free passes for the theatre out of him. But to all their requests Tom replied with nothing but his everlasting “Grooonn.”

  As the joke began to be monotonous, one by one fell away from the neighbourhood of the obstinate vizier of the great Shah-i-Baham, acknowledging his talent as a figure dancer, but declaring his conversation most insipid. Soon only three or four persons cared to notice him, and in an hour’s time he was left absolutely alone. Sic transit gloria mundi.

  At last the time for closing the ballroom drew near; the floor was gradually cleared, the boxes were empty. Some stray dim rays of dawn were creeping in through the windows of the foyer when the box-opener, going her rounds, heard from one of the stage boxes of the lower tier a prolonged sound of snoring, which betrayed the presence of some belated masker. She opened the door and found Tom, who, tired out with the stormy night he had spent, had retired to the back of his box, and resigned himself to slumber. The rules on this point are strict, and every box-opener is a bond slave to rules and regulations. Therefore she entered the box, and with that politeness which is characteristic of the estimable class of society to which she had the honour to belong, she pointed out to Tom that it was nearly six o’clock in the morning, which was surely high time to be starting homewards.

  “Grrooonn!” said Tom.

  “I quite understand,” replied the courteous official; “you are more than half asleep, my good man. But you would sleep better still in your own bed. Come! come! And your wife must be getting anxious, too. He does not hear a word, upon my soul! What a hard sleeper he is! “She tapped him on the shoulder.

  “Grrooonn!”

  “All right, all right. But really, there’s a time for everything; and this is not the time for larks. Besides, we know who you are, my noble gentleman. Look, they are lowering the footlights and putting out the lustre. Shall I send for a coach for you?”

  “Grrooonn!”

  “Get along with your nonsense, the Odéon is not a pothouse; come, be off. Ah, so that is the way you take it! Oh, Monsieur Odry, for shame! To an actress as was too! Very well, Monsieur Odry, I shall call the guard; the Commissary has not gone to bed yet. Ah, you won’t obey the rules! You use your fists! You would strike a woman! We’ll soon see! Hi! Commissary! Mister Commissary!”

  “What is the matter now?” growled the fireman on duty.

  “Help, fireman, help!” cried the distressed damsel. “Hi, hi! Police!”

  “What’s the row?” came from the Sergeant who was in command of the patrol.

  “It’s Mother What’s-her-name shouting for help from the stage boxes.”

  “Coming.”

  “Here, this way, Sergeant!” cried the woman.

  “Coming, coming. Where are you, my dear?”

  “Come on, there are no steps. Here, here! He is in the corner right against the stage door. Oh, the ruffian! He’s as strong as a Turk.”

  “Grooonn!” grunted Tom.

  “There, do you hear? Is that, I ask you, the language of a Christian gentleman?”

  “Come, come, my friend,” said the Sergeant, who, as his eyes got accustomed to the gloom, began to make out Tom in the darkness. “We all know what it is to be young, and there — I’m like other people. I like a bit of fun, don’t I, darlint? But I’ve got to obey orders. Time’s up now for being in quarters; so, smart with the left foot! Double! March!”

  “Grooonn!’

  “Bravo! bravo! A perfect imitation of a bear’s growl. But we’ve got to try another sort of game now. Come, come, mate, just keep your temper, and come along quietly. Ah, you won’t? You want to give trouble! Very good, we shall have the laugh on our side presently. Here, my lads, just lay hold of this bruiser and run him out into the street.”

  “He won’t budge, sergeant.”

  “He won’t? But what are our musket butts for? Give it him about the legs.”

  “Grooonn! Grrooonn!...”

  “Hit him hard, lay it on stiff.”

  “Look here, sergeant,” said one of the Municipal Guards, “I’ve got a notion it’s a real bear. I laid hold of the scruff of his neck just now, and the skin seems firm on the flesh.”

  “Oh, then, if it is a bear, we must treat it with kindness, and get the owner to pay us for our care of it. Go and fetch the fireman’s lantern.”

  “Grrooonn!”

  “Bear or no bear,” said one of the men, “he’s had a good licking, and if he’s got any memory at all, he won’t forget the Municipal Guard in a hurry.”

  “Here is, what you want,” said one of the patrol, bringing the lantern.

  “Put the light close to the prisoner’s face.”

  The soldier obeyed.

  “It is an animal’s snout,” pronounced the Sergeant.

  “Oh, Christ!” said the box-opener, bolting for her life. “A real bear!”

  “Well, yes — a real bear. We must see if he carries a passport and conduct him to his domicile; there will no doubt be a reward. He has probably strayed away, and, being partial to society, he entered the Odéon, while the ball was going on.”

  “Grrooonn!”

  “There, you see, he admits the fact.”

  “Look here, look here,” said one of the soldiers. “There is a little bag hung round his neck.”

  “Open the bag.”

  “A card!”

  “Read the card.”

  The soldier took it and read:

  “MY name is Tom. I reside at 109, Faubourg Saint-Denis. I have five francs in my purse, two to pay the hackney coach, and three as a reward for the person bringing me back.”

  “Gospel truth, there are the five francs!” said the municipal guardian.

  “The citizen’s papers are quite in order,” said the Sergeant.

  “Now for two volunteers to conduct him to his place of domicile.”

  “Here!” said the policemen in chorus.

  “No promotion by favour; all to go by seniority and merit. Let the two men holding most good-conduct badges have the benefit of the affair. Go, my sons.”

  Two Municipal Guards came up to Tom, passed a rope round his neck, and, for the sake of extra precaution, took three turns of it round his muzzle. Tom made no resistance. The butt-ends had made him as supple as a glove. Forty paces from the Odéon one of the Guards said, “It’s a fine night. Suppose we don’t take a coach; we shall be giving our gentleman a nice little walk.”

  “And then we shall each have fifty sous instead of thirty.”

  Motion carried unanimously.

  In half an hour’s time they were at the door of No. 109. At the third time of knocking the doorkeeper opened the door herself, half asleep.

  “Here, Mother Wake-her-up,” said one of the Municipal Guards, “we have brought one of your lodgers home. Do you recognize him as a member of your menagerie?”

  “My goodness! Yes, I do,” said the portière. “It is Monsieur Decamps’ bear.”

  The same day a bill amounting to seven and a half francs for tarts and cakes was presented at Monsieur Odry’s house. But the vizier of Shah-i-Baham easily proved an alibi; he was on guard at the Tuileries.

  As for Tom, from that day forth he walked in great terror of that respectable corps which had beaten him with their butt ends, and had made him travel, on foot, although he had paid his full cab fare.

  Thus no one will be surprised that, when he saw the face of the municipal guardian appear in the doorway of the sitting-room, be beat a retreat to the uttermost end of the garden. Nothing makes a man more bold than seeing his enemy giving ground before him. Moreover, as we have said, this guardian was not wanting in courage; so he set out in pursuit of Tom, who, finding himself driven into a corner, tried to climb the wall. But finding, after a few attempts, that he could not escape that way, he faced his foe, and, standing on his hind legs, prepared to make a sound defence, utilizing for the purpose the boxing lessons which his friend Fau had given him.

  The municipal guardian, on his part, threw himself promptly and properly into the first position and proceeded to attack secundum artem. At the third lunge, he feinted at the head and cut at the leg. Tom defended with the second guard. The municipal then threatened a cut to the right; Tom recovered and countered heavily at the sword arm, and catching the hilt a blow with the full force of his fist, he bent back his enemy’s wrist so violently that he dislocated it. The municipal dropped his sabre, and was thus at the mercy of his adversary.

  Happily for him, and unhappily for Tom, the Commissary arrived at this moment on the scene. He saw the act of rebellion against the arm of the law, took his sash from his pocket and wound it three times round his waist. Then feeling himself supported by the guard, sent the Corporal and his nine men into the garden with orders to deploy into line of battle, and himself took post, on the veranda behind, to superintend the firing. Tom, preoccupied with these manoeuvres, allowed the Municipal Guard to retreat, which he did, holding his right hand in his left, and remained himself upright and motionless against the wall.

  Then the trial began. Tom, accused of having, during the night, broken into an inhabited dwelling, and having attempted to commit murder on the person of a public official, which said attempted murder only failed owing to circumstances which were independent of his will, and being unable to produce witnesses in his defence, was condemned to suffer the penalty of death. Consequently, the Corporal was desired to proceed with the execution of the sentence, and gave the order to his men to handle their firearms.

  Upon this, dead silence fell upon the crowd which had assembled behind the patrol, and was broken only by the voice of the Corporal giving his words of command. One after another he went through the twelve motions of loading. Notwithstanding his instructions, after the word “Present,” he turned back once more to the Commissary before giving the fatal word, “Fire!” and a murmur of compassion ran through the assembly.

  But the Commissary of Police, who had been disturbed in the midst of his breakfast, was inexorable; he raised his hand as a signal to proceed.

  “Fire!” said the Corporal.

  The soldiers fired, and the unfortunate Tom fell pierced with eight bullets.

  At this very moment Alexandre Decamps came back with a letter from M. Cuvier, giving Tom admission to the Jardin des Plantes, and making him the successor of Martin.

 

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