antine would have nothing to do at any price
with the arsenic pearls as a tonic. The Nabob was in consternation.
What was to be done? Send her back to Tunis with the children? It was
scarcely possible. He was decidedly in disgrace in that quarter. The
Hemerlingues were triumphant. A last affront had filled up the
measure. At Jansoulet's departure, the Bey had commissioned him to have
gold-pieces struck at the Paris Mint of a new design to the value of
several millions; then the order, suddenly withdrawn, had been given
to Hemerlingue. Publicly outraged, Jansoulet had replied by a public
demonstration, offering for sale all his possessions, his palace at
the Bardo given to him by the former Bey, his villas of La Marsu all of
white marble, surrounded by splendid gardens, his counting-houses which
were the largest and the most sumptuous in the city, and, charging,
finally, the intelligent Bompain to bring over to him his wife and
children in order to make a clear affirmation of a definitive departure.
After such an uproar, it was no easy thing for him to return there;
this was what he endeavoured to make evident to Mlle. Afchin, who only
replied to him by deep groans. He tried to console her, to amuse her,
but what distraction could be found to appeal to that monstrously
apathetic nature? And then, could he change the sky of Paris, restore to
the unhappy Levantine her _patio_ paved with marble, where she used to
pass long hours in a cool, delicious sleepiness, listening to the water
as it dripped on the great alabaster fountain with its three basins, one
over the other, and her gilded barge, with its awning of crimson, which
eight Tripolitan boatmen supple and vigorous rowed after sunset on the
beautiful lake of El-Baheira? However luxurious the apartment of the
Place Vendome might be, it could not compensate for the loss of these
marvels. And then she would be more miserable than ever. At last, a man
who was a frequent visitor to the house succeeded in lifting her out
of her despair. This was Cabassu, the man who described himself on his
cards as "professor of massage," a big, dark, thick-set man, smelling
of garlic and pomade, square-shouldered, hairy to the eyes, and who
knew stories of Parisian seraglios, tales within the reach of madame's
intelligence. Having once come to massage her, she wished to see him
again, retained him. He had to give up all his other clients, and
became, at the salary of a senator, the masseur o