Mlle. Fouchette Part 3

Where adults would have been suspected and probably searched, first by the customs officers and then by the police, Fouchette went unchallenged. Her towering basket, under which bent the frail little half-starved figure, marked her scarcely more conspicuously than her ready wit and cheerful though coa.r.s.e retorts to would-be sympathizers.

Her load was delivered to those who examined its contents out of her sight. The price went back by another carrier,--a patron of the Rendez-Vous pour Cochers. "La pet.i.te chiffonniere" was widely known in the small world of the Porte de Charenton.

As for Fouchette,--well, she has already, in her laconic way, given about all that she knew of her earlier history. Picked up in a rag-heap by a chiffonniere of the barrier, she had succeeded to a brutal life that had in five years reduced her to the physical level of the spaniel, Tartar. In fact, her position was really inferior, since the dog was never beaten and had always plenty to eat.

Instead of killing her, as would have been the fate of one of the lower animals subjected to the same treatment, all this had seemed to toughen the child,--to render her physically and morally as hard as nails.

It would be too much or too little--according to the point of view--to a.s.sume that Fouchette was patient under her yoke and that she went about her tasks with the docility of a well-trained animal. On the contrary, she not only rebelled in spirit, but she often resisted with all her feeble strength, fighting, feet, hands, and teeth, with feline ferocity. Having been brought to the level of brutes, she had become a brute in instinct, in her sensibility to kindness, her pig-headedness, resentment of injury, and dogged resistance.

On her ninth birthday--which, however, was unknown--Monsieur Podvin, over his fourth bottle, offered to put her up against the dog of his convive of the moment, so much was he impressed with Fouchette's fighting talent. Fouchette, who was serving the wine, was not unmindful of the implied compliment. She glanced at the animal and then at its owner with a bitter smile that in her catlike jaws seemed almost a snarl,--

"I'd much rather fight le Cochon," said she.

"Ho! ho! ho!" roared the man, who was a dirty ruffian of two hundred pounds, mostly alcohol, and who enjoyed the fitting sobriquet of "le Cochon," from his appearance and characteristic grunt.

"Voila!" cried Monsieur Podvin; "that's Fouchette!"

"Pardieu! but what a little scorcher!" exclaimed the ruffian, rather admiringly.

"The dog is honest and decent," said the child, turning her steely blue eyes on the man.

"Fouchette!"

The peremptory voice was that of "the" Podvin behind the zinc. Such plain talk--any talk at all about "honesty" and "decency"--at the Rendez-Vous pour Cochers was interdicted. And had the girl noted the look which followed her retreating figure she might have gone abroad the next morning with less confidence.

From that time on these two, ruffian and child, snapped at each other whenever they came in contact,--which, as the man was an habitue of the place, and occasional a.s.sistant of Monsieur Podvin in his business of scouring the wood of Vincennes for booty, was pretty nearly every day. For in addition to her labors as a rag-picker Fouchette was compelled to wait upon customers in the wine-shop and run errands and perform pretty much all the work of housekeeping for the Podvins. Her foraging expeditions merely filled in the time when customers were not expected.

Strange as it may appear, Fouchette liked this extra hour or so abroad better than any other duty of the day,--it was freedom and independence. With her high pannier strapped to her slender back and iron hook in hand she roamed about the streets of Charenton, sometimes crossing over through ancient Conflans and coming home by the Marne and Seine. There were only footpads, low-browed rascals, thieves, and belated robbers about at this hour, before the trams began to make their trips to and from Paris, but these people never disturbed the pet.i.te chiffonniere, save to sometimes exchange the foul witticisms of the slums, in which contests the ready tongue and extensive vocabulary of little Fouchette invariably left a track of good-humor. They knew she hadn't a sou, and, besides, was one of their cla.s.s.

Fouchette was a s.h.i.+ning example of what environment can make of any human being, taken sufficiently young and having no vacation.

Up to this particular morning Fouchette had accepted her position in life philosophically as a necessary condition, and with no more consideration of the high and mighty of this world than the high and mighty had for her. Slowly and by insensible degrees, since she was too young to mark the phenomena in any case, she had been forged and hammered into a living piece of moral obliquity,--and yet the very first contact with an innocent mind and kindly sympathy awoke in her childish breast a subtle consciousness that something was wrong.

She fell asleep later, worn out with toil and sore from bruises, her thin arm flung across Tartar's neck, to dream of a plump young face, a pair of big, dark, soulful eyes that searched and found her heart. The noise of the revelling robbers above her faded into one sweet, deep, mellow voice that was music to her ears. And the powerful odors that impregnated the atmosphere of the cellar and rendered it foul to suffocation--dampness and dog and dregs of wine, and garlic and decaying vegetables--became the languorous breath of June flowers.

Ah! the beautiful young lady! The beautiful flowers!

Their perfume seemed to choke her, like the deadly tuberoses piled upon a coffin.

She tried to cry out, but her mouth was crowded full of something, and she awoke to find herself in the brutal hands of some one in the darkness. She kicked and scratched and struggled in vain, to be quickly vanquished by a brutish blow.

Tartar! Tartar!

Oh, if Tartar were only there!

When she came to herself she was conscious of being carried in her own basket on the back of one who stepped heavily and somewhat uncertainly along the road.

She was doubled up like a half-shut jack-knife, her feet and head uppermost, and had great difficulty in breathing by reason of her cramped position and the ill-smelling rags with which she was covered.

Besides which, she felt sick from the cruel blow in her stomach.

Yet her senses were keenly alert.

She was well aware who had her; for the man gave out his characteristic grunt with every misstep, and there was no one else in the world likely to do her serious physical injury.

She knew that it was still dark, both from the way the man walked and from the cool dampness of the atmosphere with which she was familiar.

Yes, it was le Cochon.

She knew him for an escaped convict, for a murderer as well as a robber, and that he would slit a throat for twenty sous if there were fair promise of immunity.

She felt instinctively that she was lost.

All at once the man stopped, went on, paused again.

Then she heard other footsteps. They grew louder. They were evidently approaching. They were the heavy, hob-nailed shoes of some laborer on his way to work.

Her heart stood still for a few moments as she listened, then beat wildly with renewed hope.

If she could only cry out; but the rag that filled her mouth made giving the alarm impossible.

Finally, after some hesitation, her abductor moved on as if to meet the coming footsteps, slowly, and leaning far over now and then, in apparent attempt to counterfeit the occupation of a rag-picker. And at such moments the child felt that she was standing on the back of her neck.

The heavy tramp of the stranger grew nearer--was upon them.

"Bonjour!" called out a cheerful, manly voice.

"Bonjour, monsieur!" replied le Cochon, humbly.

"You are abroad early this morning."

"It is necessary, if an honest chiffonnier would live these times."

"Possible. Good luck to you."

"Thanks, monsieur."

The steps had never paused and were quickly growing fainter down the road, while the young heart within the basket grew fainter and fainter with the fading sounds.

This temporary hope thus crushed was more cruel than her former despair.

Her bearer uttered a low volley of horrible imprecations directed towards the unknown.

He stopped suddenly, and, unstrapping the basket from his shoulders, placed it on the ground.

Fouchette smelled the morning vapors of the river; discerned now the distinct gurgle of the flood.

As the robber took the rags from the basket and pulled her roughly forth, the full significance of her perilous situation rushed upon her. She trembled so that she could scarcely stand,--would have toppled over the edge of the quai but for the strong arm of le Cochon, who restrained her.

"Not yet, pet.i.te," said he.