Fumbling at his shirt
collar, apologising for being late, assuring us that he had dined, he
introduced his friend to the company as a young man of genius, of
extraordinary genius. Don't I remember Villiers's nervous, hysterical
voice! Don't I remember the journalist's voice when he asked Ninon's
lover if he sold his pictures, creating at once a bad impression? By
some accident a plate was given to him, out of which one of the cats
had been fed. The plate might have been given to any one else:
Villiers would not have minded, and as for Cabaner, he never knew what
he was eating; but it was given to the journalist. Now I remember the
young man misconducted himself badly; he struck the table with his
fist, and said, "Et bien, je casse tout." Yes, it was he who wrote the
article entitled "Ninon's Table d'hote" in the _Gil Blas_, and
from it she learned for the first time how the world viewed her
hospitality, how misinterpreted were her efforts to benefit the arts
and the artists. Somebody told me this story: who I cannot tell; it is
all so long ago. But it seems to me that I remember hearing that it
was this article that killed her.
The passing of things is always a moving subject for meditation, and
it is strange how accident will bring back a scene, explicit in every
detail--a tree taking shape upon the dawning sky, the hairy ugliness
of the ape in its branches, and along the grey grass a waddling squad
of the ducks betaking themselves to the pond, a poet talking to a
_commercant's_ wife, Madame de Calvador leaning on a lover's arm.
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