Envy had turned Minard and his son green and yellow.
“That is well said and very true,” remarked Minard.
“Unanimously adopted!” cried Colleville. “Messieurs, we are men of honor; it suffices to understand each other on this point.”
“Whoso desires the end accepts the means,” said Phellion, emphatically.
At this moment, Mademoiselle Thuillier reappeared, followed by her two servants; the key of the cellar was hanging from her belt, and three bottles of champagne, three of hermitage, and one bottle of malaga were placed upon the table. She herself was carrying, with almost respectful care, a smaller bottle, like a fairy Carabosse, which she placed before her. In the midst of the hilarity caused by this abundance of excellent things—a fruit of gratitude, which the poor spinster in the delirium of her joy poured out with a profusion which put to shame the sparing hospitality of her usual fortnightly dinners—numerous dessert dishes made their appearance: mounds of almonds, raisins, figs, and nuts (popularly known as the “four beggars”), pyramids of oranges, confections, crystallized fruits, brought from the hidden depths of her cupboards, which would never have figured on the table-cloth had it not been for the “candidacy.”
“Celeste, they will bring you a bottle of brandy which my father obtained in 1802; make an orange-salad!” cried Brigitte to her sister-in-law. “Monsieur Phellion, open the champagne; that bottle is for you three. Monsieur Dutocq, take this one. Monsieur Colleville, you know how to pop corks!”
The two maids distributed champagne glasses, also claret glasses, and wine glasses. Josephine also brought three more bottles of Bordeaux.
“The year of the comet!” cried Thuillier, laughing, “Messieurs, you have turned my sister’s head.”
“And this evening you shall have punch and cakes,” she said. “I have sent to the chemists for some tea. Heavens! if I had only known the affair concerned an election,” she cried, looking at her sister-in-law, “I’d have served the turkey.”
A general laugh welcomed this speech.
“We have a goose!” said Minard junior.
“The carts are unloading!” cried Madame Thuillier, as “marrons glaces” and “meringues” were placed upon the table.
Mademoiselle Thuillier’s face was blazing. She was really superb to behold. Never did sisterly love assume such a frenzied expression.
“To those who know her, it is really touching,” remarked Madame Colleville.
The glasses were filled. The guests all looked at one another, evidently expecting a toast, whereupon la Peyrade said:—
“Messieurs, let us drink to something sublime.”
Everybody looked curious.
“To Mademoiselle Brigitte!”
They all rose, clinked glasses, and cried with one voice, “Mademoiselle Brigitte!” so much enthusiasm did the exhibition of a true feeling excite.
“Messieurs,” said Phellion, reading from a paper written in pencil, “To work and its splendors, in the person of our former comrade, now become one of the mayors of Paris—to Monsieur Minard and his wife!”
After five minutes’ general conversation Thuillier rose and said:—
“Messieurs, To the King and the royal family! I add nothing; the toast says all.”
“To the election of my brother!” said Mademoiselle Thuillier a moment later.
“Now I’ll make you laugh,” whispered la Peyrade in Flavie’s ear.
And he rose.
“To Woman!” he said; “that enchanting sex to whom we owe our happiness—not to speak of our mothers, our sisters, and our wives!”
This toast excited general hilarity, and Colleville, already somewhat gay, exclaimed:—
“Rascal! you have stolen my speech!”
The mayor then rose; profound silence reigned.
“Messieurs, our institutions! from which come the strength and grandeur of dynastic France!”
The bottles disappeared amid a chorus of admiration as to the marvellous goodness and delicacy of their contents.
Celeste Colleville here said timidly:—
“Mamma, will you permit me to give a toast?”
The good girl had noticed the dull, bewildered look of her godmother, neglected and forgotten—she, the mistress of that house, wearing almost the expression of a dog that is doubtful which master to obey, looking from the face of her terrible sister-in-law to that of Thuillier, consulting each countenance, and oblivious of herself; but joy on the face of that poor helot, accustomed to be nothing, to repress her ideas, her feelings, had the effect of a pale wintry sun behind a mist; it barely lighted her faded, flabby flesh. The gauze cap trimmed with dingy flowers, the hair ill-dressed, the gloomy brown gown, with no ornament but a thick gold chain—all, combined with the expression of her countenance, stimulated the affection of the young Celeste, who—alone in the world—knew the value of that woman condemned to silence but aware of all about her, suffering from all yet consoling herself in God and in the girl who now was watching her.
“Yes, let the dear child give us her little toast,” said la Peyrade to Madame Colleville.
“Go on, my daughter,” cried Colleville; “here’s the hermitage still to be drunk—and it’s hoary with age,” he added.
“To my kind godmother!” said the girl, lowering her glass respectfully before Madame Thuillier, and holding it towards her.
The poor woman, startled, looked through a veil of tears first at her husband, and then at Brigitte; but her position in the family was so well known, and the homage paid by innocence to weakness had something so beautiful about it, that the emotion was general; the men all rose and bowed to Madame Thuillier.
“Ah! Celeste, I would I had a kingdom to lay at your feet,” murmured Felix Phellion.
The worthy Phellion wiped away a tear. Dutocq himself was moved.
“Oh! the charming child!” cried Mademoiselle Thuillier, rising, and going round to kiss her sister-in-law.
“My turn now!” said Colleville, posing like an athlete. “Now listen: To friendship! Empty your glasses; refill your glasses. Good! To the fine arts—the flower of social life! Empty your glasses; refill your glasses. To another such festival on the day after election!”
“What is that little bottle you have there?” said Dutocq to Mademoiselle Thuillier.
“That,” she said, “is one of my three bottles of Madame Amphoux’ liqueur; the second is for the day of Celeste’s marriage; the third for the day on which her first child is baptized.”
“My sister is losing her head,” remarked Thuillier to Colleville.
The dinner ended with a toast, offered by Thuillier, but suggested to him by Theodose at the moment when the malaga sparkled in the little glasses like so many rubies.
“Colleville, messieurs, has drunk to friendship. I now drink, in this most generous wine, To my friends!”
An hurrah, full of heartiness, greeted that fine sentiment, but Dutocq remarked aside to Theodose:—
“It is a shame to pour such wine down the throats of such people.”
“Ah! if we could only make such wine as that!” cried Zelie, making her glass ring by the way in which she sucked down the Spanish liquid. “What fortunes we could get!”
Zelie