In the main street amongst tall establishments of mart and worship was a high narrow housepressed between a coffee factory and a bootmaker’s. It had four flights of long dim echoingstairs, and at the top, in a room that was full of the smell of dried apples and mice, a man in themiddle age of life had sat reading Russian novels until he thought he was mad. Late was thehour, the night outside black and freezing, the pavements below empty and undistinguishablewhen he closed his book and sat motionless in front of the glowing but flameless fire. He felt hewas very tired yet he could not rest. He stared at a picture on the wall until he wanted to cry; itwas a colour print by Utamaro of a suckling child caressing its mother’s breastsas she sits infront of a blackbound mirror. Very chaste and decorative it was, in spite of its curious anatomy.
The man gazed, empty of sight though not of mind, until the sighing of the gas jet maddenedhim. He got up, put out the light, and sat down again in the darkness trying to compose his mindbefore the comfort of the fire. And he was just about to begin a conversation with himself when amouse crept from a hole in the skirting near the fireplace and scurried into the fender. The manhad the crude dislike for such sly nocturnal things, but this mouse was so small and bright, itsantics so pretty, that he drew his feet carefully from the fender and sat watching it almost withamusement. The mouse moved along the shadows of the fender, out upon the hearth, and satbefore the glow, rubbing its head, ears, and belly with its paws as if it were bathing itself with thewarmth, until, sharp and sudden, the fire sank, an ember fell, and the mouse flashed into its hole.
The man reached forward to the mantelpiece and put his hand upon a pocket lamp. Turning onthe beam, he opened the door of a cupboard beside the fireplace. Upon one of the shelves therewas a small trap baited with cheese, a trap made with a wire spring, one of those that smasheddown to break the back of ingenuous and unwary mice.
"Mean—so mean," he mused, "to appeal to the hunger of any living thing just in order todestroy it. "
He picked up the empty trap as if to throw it in the fire.
"I suppose I had better leave it though—the place swarms with them. " He still hesitated. "Ihope that little beastie won’t go and do anything foolish. " He put the trap back quite carefully,closed the door of the cupboard, sat down again and extinguished the lamp.
Was there any one else in the world so squeamish and foolish about such things! Even hismother, mother so bright and beautiful, even she had laughed at his childish horrors. He recalledhow once in his childhood, not long after his sister Yosine was born, a friendly neighbour hadsent him home with a bundle of dead larks tied by the feet "for supper. " The pitiful inanimity ofthe birds had brought a gush of tears; he had run weeping home and into the kitchen, and there hehad found a strange thing doing. It was dusk; mother was kneeling before the fire. He droppedthe larks.
"Mother!" he exclaimed softly. She looked at his tearful face.
"What’s the matter, Filip?" she asked, smiling too at his astonishment.
"Mother! What you doing?"
Her bodice was open and she was squeezing her breasts; long thin streams of milk spurted intothe fire with a plunging noise.
"Weaning your little sister," laughed mother. She took his inquisitive face and pressed itagainst the delicate warmth of her bosom, and he forgot the dead birds behind him.
"Let me do it, mother," he cried, and doing so he discovered the throb of the heart in hismother’s breast. Wonderful it was for him to experience it, although she could not explain it tohim.
"Why does it do that?"
"If it did not beat, little son, I should die and the Holy Father would take me from you. "
"God?"
She nodded. He put his hand upon his own breast. "Oh feel it, Mother!" he cried. Motherunbuttoned his little coat and felt the gentle tick tick with her warm palm.
"Beautiful!" she said.
"Is it a good one?"
She kissed his upsmiling lips. "It is good if it beats truly. Let it always beat truly, Filip, let italways beat truly. "
There was the echo of a sigh in her voice, and he had divined some grief, for he was very wise.
He kissed her bosom in his tiny ecstasy and whispered soothingly: "Little mother! little mother!"
In such joys he forgot his horror of the dead larks; indeed he helped mother to pluck them andspit them for supper.
It was a black day that succeeded, and full of tragedy for the child. A great bay horse with atawny mane had knocked down his mother in the lane, and a heavy cart had passed over her,crushing both her hands. She was borne away moaning with anguish to the surgeon who cut offthe two hands. She died in the night. For years the child’s dreams were filled with the horror ofthe stumps of arms, bleeding unendingly. Yet he had never seen them, for he was sleeping whenshe died.
While this old woe was come vividly before him he again became aware of the mouse. Hisnerves stretched upon him in repulsion, but he soon relaxed to a tolerant interest, for it was reallya most engaging little mouse. It moved with curious staccato scurries, stopping to rub its head orflicker with its ears; they seemed almost transparent ears. It spied a red cinder and skippedinnocently up to it…. sniffing…. sniffing … until it jumped back scorched. It would crouchas a cat does, blinking in the warmth, or scamper madly as if dancing, and then roll upon its siderubbing its head with those pliant paws. The melancholy man watched it until it came at last to rest and squatted meditatively upon its haunches, hunched up, looking curiously wise, apennyworth of philosophy; then once more the coals sank with a rattle and again the mouse wasgone.
The man sat on before the fire and his mind filled again with unaccountable sadness. He hadgrown into manhood with a burning generosity of spirit and rifts of rebellion in him that provedtoo exacting for his fellows and seemed mere wantonness to men of casual rectitudes. "Justiceand Sin," he would cry, "Property and Virtue—incompatibilities! There can be no sin in a worldof justice, no property in a world of virtue!" With an engaging extravagance and a certain clear-eyedhonesty of mind he had put his two and two together and seemed then to rejoice, as in sometopsy-turvy dream, in having rendered unto Caesar, as you might say, the things that were due to Napoleon! But this kind of thing could not pass unexpiated in a world of men living an infiniteregard for Property and a pride in their traditions of Virtue and Justice. They could indeedforgive him his sins but they could not forgive him his compassions. So he had to go seek formore melodious-minded men and fair unambiguous women. But rebuffs can deal more deadlyblows than daggers; he became timid—a timidity not of fear but of pride—and grew with theyears into misanthropy, susceptible to trivial griefs and despairs, a vessel of emotion that emptiedas easily as it filled, until he came at last to know that his griefs were half deliberate, his despairshalf unreal, and to live but for beauty—which is tranquillity—to put her wooing hand upon him.
Now, while the mouse hunts in the cupboard, one fair recollection stirs in the man’s mind—of Cassia and the harmony of their only meeting, Cassia who had such rich red hair, and eyes, yes,her eyes were full of starry enquiry like the eyes of mice. It was so long ago that he had forgottenhow he came to be in it, that unaccustomed orbit of vain vivid things—a village festival, alloranges and houp-là. He could not remember how he came to be there, but at night, in the court hall, he had danced with Cassia—fai
r and unambiguous indeed!—who had come like the windfrom among the roses and swept into his heart.
"It is easy to guess," he had said to her, "what you like most in the world. "
She laughed; "To dance? Yes, and you … ?"
"To find a friend. "
"I know, I know," she cried, caressing him with recognitions. "Ah, at times I quite love myfriends—until I begin to wonder how much they hate me!"
He had loved at once that cool pale face, the abundance of her strange hair as light as theautumn’s clustered bronze, her lilac dress and all the sweetness about her like a bush of lilies.
How they had laughed at the two old peasants whom they had overheard gabbling of trifles likesickness and appetite!
"There’s a lot of nature in a parsnip," said one, a fat person of the kind that swells grosslywhen stung by a bee, "a lot of nature when it’s young, but when it’s old it’s like everything else. "
"True it is. "
"And I’m very fond of vegetables, yes, and I’m very fond of bread. "
"Come out with me," whispered Cassia to Filip, and they walked out in the blackness ofmidnight into what must have been a garden.
"Cool it is here," she said, "and quiet, but too dark even to see your face—can you see mine?"
"The moon will not rise until after dawn," said he, "it will be white in the sky when thestarlings whistle in your chimney. "
They walked silently and warily about until they felt the chill of the air. A dull echo of themusic came to them through the walls, then stopped, and they heard the bark of a fox away in thewoods.
"You are cold," he whispered, touching her bare neck with timid fingers. "Quite, quite cold,"
drawing his hand tenderly over the curves of her chin and face. "Let us go in," he said, movingwith discretion from the rapture he desired. "We will come out again," said Cassia.
But within the room the ball was just at an end, the musicians were packing up theirinstruments and the dancers were flocking out and homewards, or to the buffet which was on aplatform at one end of the room. The two old peasants were there, munching hugely.
"I tell you," said one of them, "there’s nothing in the world for it but the grease of an owl’sliver. That’s it, that’s it! Take something on your stomach now, just to offset the chill of thedawn!"
Filip and Cassia were beside them, but there were so many people crowding the platform thatFilip had to jump down. He stood then looking up adoringly at Cassia, who had pulled a purplecloak around her.
"For Filip, Filip, Filip," she said, pushing the last bite of her sandwich into his mouth, andpressing upon him her glass of Loupiac. Quickly he drank it with a great gesture, and, flingingthe glass to the wall, took Cassia into his arms, shouting: "I’ll carry you home, the whole wayhome, yes, I’ll carry you!"
"Put me down!" she cried, beating his head and pulling his ears, as they passed among thedeparting dancers. "Put me down, you wild thing!"
Dark, dark was the lane outside, and the night an obsidian net, into which he walked carryingthe girl. But her arms were looped around him, she discovered paths for him, clinging moretightly as he staggered against a wall, stumbled upon a gulley, or when her sweet hair was caught in the boughs of a little lime tree.
"Do not loose me, Filip, will you, do not loose me," Cassia said, putting her lips against histemple.
His brain seemed bursting, his heart rocked within him, but he adored the rich grace of herlimbs against his breast. "Here it is," she murmured, and he carried her into a path that led to herhome in a little lawned garden where the smell of ripe apples upon the branches and the heavylustre of roses stole upon the air. Roses and apples! Roses and apples! He carried her right intothe porch before she slid down and stood close to him with her hands still upon his shoulders. He could breathe happily at the release, standing silent and looking round at the sky sprayed withwondrous stars but without a moon.
"You are stronger than I thought you, stronger than you look, you are really very strong," shewhispered, nodding her head to him. Opening the buttons of his coat she put her palm against hisbreast.
"Oh, how your heart does beat: does it beat truly—and for whom?"
He had seized her wrists in a little fury of love, crying: "Little mother, little mother!"
"What are you saying?" asked the girl; but before he could continue there came a footstepsounding behind the door, and the clack of a bolt….
What was that? Was that really a bolt or was it … was it … . the snap of the trap? The mansat up in his room intently listening, with nerves quivering again, waiting for the trap to kill thelittle philosopher. When he felt it was all over he reached guardedly in the darkness for thelantern, turned on the beam, and opened the door of the cupboard. Focussing the light upon thetrap he was amazed to see the mouse sitting on its haunches before it, uncaught. Its head was bowed, but its bead-like eyes were full of brightness, and it sat blinking, it did not flee.
"Shoosh!" said the man, but the mouse did not move. "Why doesn’t it go? Shoosh!" he saidagain, and suddenly the reason of the mouse’s strange behaviour was made clear. The trap hadnot caught it completely, but it had broken off both its forefeet, and the thing crouched thereholding out its two bleeding stumps humanly, too stricken to stir.
Horror flooded the man, and conquering his repugnance he plucked the mouse up quickly bythe neck. Immediately the little thing fastened its teeth in his finger; the touch was no more thanthe slight prick of a pin. The man’s impulse then exhausted itself. What should he do with it? Heput his hand behind him, he dared not look, but there was nothing to be done except kill it atonce, quickly, quickly. Oh, how should he do it? He bent towards the fire as if to drop the mouseinto its quenching glow; but he paused and shuddered, he would hear its cries, he would have tolisten. Should he crush it with finger and thumb? A glance towards the window decided him. He opened the sash with one hand and flung the wounded mouse far into the dark street. Closing thewindow with a crash he sank into a chair, limp with pity too deep for tears.
So he sat for two minutes, five minutes, ten minutes. Anxiety and shame filled him with heat.
He opened the window again, and the freezing air poured in and cooled him. Seizing his lanternhe ran down the echoing stairs, into the dark empty street, searching long and vainly for the little philosopher until he had to desist and return to his room, shivering, frozen to his very bones.
When he had recovered some warmth he took the trap from its shelf. The two feet dropped intohis hand; he cast them into the fire. Then he once more set the trap and put it back carefully intothe cupboard.
