الفصل الفصل 200 · BABET, GUEULEMER, CLAQUESOUS, AND MONTPARNASSE

A quartette of ruffians, Claquesous, Gueulemer, Babet, and Montparnasse

governed the third lower floor of Paris, from 1830 to 1835.

Gueulemer was a Hercules of no defined position. For his lair he had

the sewer of the Arche-Marion. He was six feet high, his pectoral

muscles were of marble, his biceps of brass, his breath was that of a

cavern, his torso that of a colossus, his head that of a bird. One

thought one beheld the Farnese Hercules clad in duck trousers and a

cotton velvet waistcoat. Gueulemer, built after this sculptural

fashion, might have subdued monsters; he had found it more expeditious

to be one. A low brow, large temples, less than forty years of age, but

with crow’s-feet, harsh, short hair, cheeks like a brush, a beard like

that of a wild boar; the reader can see the man before him. His muscles

called for work, his stupidity would have none of it. He was a great,

idle force. He was an assassin through coolness. He was thought to be a

creole. He had, probably, somewhat to do with Marshal Brune, having

been a porter at Avignon in 1815. After this stage, he had turned

ruffian.

The diaphaneity of Babet contrasted with the grossness of Gueulemer.

Babet was thin and learned. He was transparent but impenetrable.

Daylight was visible through his bones, but nothing through his eyes.

He declared that he was a chemist. He had been a jack of all trades. He

had played in vaudeville at Saint-Mihiel. He was a man of purpose, a

fine talker, who underlined his smiles and accentuated his gestures.

His occupation consisted in selling, in the open air, plaster busts and

portraits of “the head of the State.” In addition to this, he extracted

teeth. He had exhibited phenomena at fairs, and he had owned a booth

with a trumpet and this poster: “Babet, Dental Artist, Member of the

Academies, makes physical experiments on metals and metalloids,

extracts teeth, undertakes stumps abandoned by his brother

practitioners. Price: one tooth, one franc, fifty centimes; two teeth,

two francs; three teeth, two francs, fifty. Take advantage of this

opportunity.” This _Take advantage of this opportunity_ meant: Have as

many teeth extracted as possible. He had been married and had had

children. He did not know what had become of his wife and children. He

had lost them as one loses his handkerchief. Babet read the papers, a

striking exception in the world to which he belonged. One day, at the

period when he had his family with him in his booth on wheels, he had

read in the _Messager_, that a woman had just given birth to a child,

who was doing well, and had a calf’s muzzle, and he exclaimed: “There’s

a fortune! my wife has not the wit to present me with a child like

that!”

Later on he had abandoned everything, in order to “undertake Paris.”

This was his expression.

Who was Claquesous? He was night. He waited until the sky was daubed

with black, before he showed himself. At nightfall he emerged from the

hole whither he returned before daylight. Where was this hole? No one

knew. He only addressed his accomplices in the most absolute darkness,

and with his back turned to them. Was his name Claquesous? Certainly

not. If a candle was brought, he put on a mask. He was a ventriloquist.

Babet said: “Claquesous is a nocturne for two voices.” Claquesous was

vague, terrible, and a roamer. No one was sure whether he had a name,

Claquesous being a sobriquet; none was sure that he had a voice, as his

stomach spoke more frequently than his voice; no one was sure that he

had a face, as he was never seen without his mask. He disappeared as

though he had vanished into thin air; when he appeared, it was as

though he sprang from the earth.

A lugubrious being was Montparnasse. Montparnasse was a child; less

than twenty years of age, with a handsome face, lips like cherries,

charming black hair, the brilliant light of springtime in his eyes; he

had all vices and aspired to all crimes.

The digestion of evil aroused in him an appetite for worse. It was the

street boy turned pickpocket, and a pickpocket turned garroter. He was

genteel, effeminate, graceful, robust, sluggish, ferocious. The rim of

his hat was curled up on the left side, in order to make room for a

tuft of hair, after the style of 1829. He lived by robbery with

violence. His coat was of the best cut, but threadbare. Montparnasse

was a fashion-plate in misery and given to the commission of murders.

The cause of all this youth’s crimes was the desire to be well-dressed.

The first grisette who had said to him: “You are handsome!” had cast

the stain of darkness into his heart, and had made a Cain of this Abel.

Finding that he was handsome, he desired to be elegant: now, the height

of elegance is idleness; idleness in a poor man means crime. Few

prowlers were so dreaded as Montparnasse. At eighteen, he had already

numerous corpses in his past. More than one passer-by lay with

outstretched arms in the presence of this wretch, with his face in a

pool of blood. Curled, pomaded, with laced waist, the hips of a woman,

the bust of a Prussian officer, the murmur of admiration from the

boulevard wenches surrounding him, his cravat knowingly tied, a

bludgeon in his pocket, a flower in his buttonhole; such was this dandy

of the sepulchre.