Kabanata Kabanata 7 · THE STREET OF THE FOUR WINDS

. THE STREET OF THE FOUR WINDS

“Ferme tes yeux à demi,

Croise tes bras sur ton sein,

Et de ton cœur endormi

Chasse à jamais tout dessein.”

* * * *

“Je chante la nature,

Les étoiles du soir, les larmes du matin,

Les couchers de soleil à l’horizon lointain,

Le ciel qui parle au cœur d’existence future!”

I

The animal paused on the threshold, interrogative, alert, ready for

flight if necessary. Severn laid down his palette, and held out a hand

of welcome. The cat remained motionless, her yellow eyes fastened upon

Severn.

“Puss,” he said, in his low, pleasant voice, “come in.”

The tip of her thin tail twitched uncertainly.

“Come in,” he said again.

Apparently she found his voice reassuring, for she slowly settled upon

all fours, her eyes still fastened upon him, her tail tucked under her

gaunt flanks.

He rose from his easel smiling. She eyed him quietly, and when he

walked toward her she watched him bend above her without a wince; her

eyes followed his hand until it touched her head. Then she uttered a

ragged mew.

It had long been Severn’s custom to converse with animals, probably

because he lived so much alone; and now he said, “What’s the matter,

puss?”

Her timid eyes sought his.

“I understand,” he said gently, “you shall have it at once.”

Then moving quietly about he busied himself with the duties of a host,

rinsed a saucer, filled it with the rest of the milk from the bottle on

the window-sill, and kneeling down, crumbled a roll into the hollow of

his hand.

The creature rose and crept toward the saucer.

With the handle of a palette-knife he stirred the crumbs and milk

together and stepped back as she thrust her nose into the mess. He

watched her in silence. From time to time the saucer clinked upon the

tiled floor as she reached for a morsel on the rim; and at last the

bread was all gone, and her purple tongue travelled over every unlicked

spot until the saucer shone like polished marble. Then she sat up, and

coolly turning her back to him, began her ablutions.

“Keep it up,” said Severn, much interested, “you need it.”

She flattened one ear, but neither turned nor interrupted her toilet.

As the grime was slowly removed Severn observed that nature had

intended her for a white cat. Her fur had disappeared in patches,

from disease or the chances of war, her tail was bony and her spine

sharp. But what charms she had were becoming apparent under vigorous

licking, and he waited until she had finished before re-opening the

conversation. When at last she closed her eyes and folded her forepaws

under her breast, he began again very gently: “Puss, tell me your

troubles.”

At the sound of his voice she broke into a harsh rumbling which he

recognized as an attempt to purr. He bent over to rub her cheek and

she mewed again, an amiable inquiring little mew, to which he replied,

“Certainly, you are greatly improved, and when you recover your plumage

you will be a gorgeous bird.” Much flattered, she stood up and marched

around and around his legs, pushing her head between them and making

pleased remarks, to which he responded with grave politeness.

“Now, what sent you here,” he said—“here into the Street of the Four

Winds, and up five flights to the very door where you would be welcome?

What was it that prevented your meditated flight when I turned from my

canvas to encounter your yellow eyes? Are you a Latin Quarter cat as I

am a Latin Quarter man? And why do you wear a rose-coloured flowered

garter buckled about your neck?” The cat had climbed into his lap, and

now sat purring as he passed his hand over her thin coat.

“Excuse me,” he continued in lazy soothing tones, harmonizing with

her purring, “if I seem indelicate, but I cannot help musing on this

rose-coloured garter, flowered so quaintly and fastened with a silver

clasp. For the clasp is silver; I can see the mint mark on the edge,

as is prescribed by the law of the French Republic. Now, why is this

garter woven of rose silk and delicately embroidered,—why is this

silken garter with its silver clasp about your famished throat? Am

I indiscreet when I inquire if its owner is your owner? Is she some

aged dame living in memory of youthful vanities, fond, doting on you,

decorating you with her intimate personal attire? The circumference of

the garter would suggest this, for your neck is thin, and the garter

fits you. But then again I notice—I notice most things—that the

garter is capable of being much enlarged. These small silver-rimmed

eyelets, of which I count five, are proof of that. And now I observe

that the fifth eyelet is worn out, as though the tongue of the clasp

were accustomed to lie there. That seems to argue a well-rounded form.”

The cat curled her toes in contentment. The street was very still

outside.

He murmured on: “Why should your mistress decorate you with an article

most necessary to her at all times? Anyway, at most times. How did

she come to slip this bit of silk and silver about your neck? Was it

the caprice of a moment,—when you, before you had lost your pristine

plumpness, marched singing into her bedroom to bid her good-morning? Of

course, and she sat up among the pillows, her coiled hair tumbling to

her shoulders, as you sprang upon the bed purring: ‘Good-day, my lady.’

Oh, it is very easy to understand,” he yawned, resting his head on the

back of the chair. The cat still purred, tightening and relaxing her

padded claws over his knee.

“Shall I tell you all about her, cat? She is very beautiful—your

mistress,” he murmured drowsily, “and her hair is heavy as burnished

gold. I could paint her,—not on canvas—for I should need shades and

tones and hues and dyes more splendid than the iris of a splendid

rainbow. I could only paint her with closed eyes, for in dreams alone

can such colours as I need be found. For her eyes, I must have azure

from skies untroubled by a cloud—the skies of dreamland. For her lips,

roses from the palaces of slumberland, and for her brow, snow-drifts

from mountains which tower in fantastic pinnacles to the moons;—oh,

much higher than our moon here,—the crystal moons of dreamland. She

is—very—beautiful, your mistress.”

The words died on his lips and his eyelids drooped.

The cat, too, was asleep, her cheek turned up upon her wasted flank,

her paws relaxed and limp.

II

“It is fortunate,” said Severn, sitting up and stretching, “that we

have tided over the dinner hour, for I have nothing to offer you for

supper but what may be purchased with one silver franc.”

The cat on his knee rose, arched her back, yawned, and looked up at him.

“What shall it be? A roast chicken with salad? No? Possibly you prefer

beef? Of course,—and I shall try an egg and some white bread. Now for

the wines. Milk for you? Good. I shall take a little water, fresh from

the wood,” with a motion toward the bucket in the sink.

He put on his hat and left the room. The cat followed to the door, and

after he had closed it behind him, she settled down, smelling at the

cracks, and cocking one ear at every creak from the crazy old building.

The door below opened and shut. The cat looked serious, for a moment

doubtful, and her ears flattened in nervous expectation. Presently she

rose with a jerk of her tail and started on a noiseless tour of the

studio. She sneezed at a pot of turpentine, hastily retreating to the

table, which she presently mounted, and having satisfied her curiosity

concerning a roll of red modelling wax, returned to the door and sat

down with her eyes on the crack over the threshold. Then she lifted her

voice in a thin plaint.

When Severn returned he looked grave, but the cat, joyous and

demonstrative, marched around him, rubbing her gaunt body against his

legs, driving her head enthusiastically into his hand, and purring

until her voice mounted to a squeal.

He placed a bit of meat, wrapped in brown paper, upon the table, and

with a penknife cut it into shreds. The milk he took from a bottle

which had served for medicine, and poured it into the saucer on the

hearth.

The cat crouched before it, purring and lapping at the same time.

He cooked his egg and ate it with a slice of bread, watching her busy

with the shredded meat, and when he had finished, and had filled and

emptied a cup of water from the bucket in the sink, he sat down, taking

her into his lap, where she at once curled up and began her toilet.

He began to speak again, touching her caressingly at times by way of

emphasis.

“Cat, I have found out where your mistress lives. It is not very far

away;—it is here, under this same leaky roof, but in the north wing

which I had supposed was uninhabited. My janitor tells me this. By

chance, he is almost sober this evening. The butcher on the rue de

Seine, where I bought your meat, knows you, and old Cabane the baker

identified you with needless sarcasm. They tell me hard tales of your

mistress which I shall not believe. They say she is idle and vain and

pleasure-loving; they say she is harebrained and reckless. The little

sculptor on the ground floor, who was buying rolls from old Cabane,

spoke to me to-night for the first time, although we have always bowed

to each other. He said she was very good and very beautiful. He has

only seen her once, and does not know her name. I thanked him;—I don’t

know why I thanked him so warmly. Cabane said, ‘Into this cursed Street

of the Four Winds, the four winds blow all things evil.’ The sculptor

looked confused, but when he went out with his rolls, he said to me, ‘I

am sure, Monsieur, that she is as good as she is beautiful.’”

The cat had finished her toilet, and now, springing softly to the

floor, went to the door and sniffed. He knelt beside her, and

unclasping the garter held it for a moment in his hands. After a while

he said: “There is a name engraved upon the silver clasp beneath the

buckle. It is a pretty name, Sylvia Elven. Sylvia is a woman’s name,

Elven is the name of a town. In Paris, in this quarter, above all,

in this Street of the Four Winds, names are worn and put away as the

fashions change with the seasons. I know the little town of Elven, for

there I met Fate face to face and Fate was unkind. But do you know that

in Elven Fate had another name, and that name was Sylvia?”

He replaced the garter and stood up looking down at the cat crouched

before the closed door.

“The name of Elven has a charm for me. It tells me of meadows and clear

rivers. The name of Sylvia troubles me like perfume from dead flowers.”

The cat mewed.

“Yes, yes,” he said soothingly, “I will take you back. Your Sylvia is

not my Sylvia; the world is wide and Elven is not unknown. Yet in the

darkness and filth of poorer Paris, in the sad shadows of this ancient

house, these names are very pleasant to me.”

He lifted her in his arms and strode through the silent corridors to

the stairs. Down five flights and into the moonlit court, past the

little sculptor’s den, and then again in at the gate of the north wing

and up the worm-eaten stairs he passed, until he came to a closed door.

When he had stood knocking for a long time, something moved behind the

door; it opened and he went in. The room was dark. As he crossed the

threshold, the cat sprang from his arms into the shadows. He listened

but heard nothing. The silence was oppressive and he struck a match.

At his elbow stood a table and on the table a candle in a gilded

candlestick. This he lighted, then looked around. The chamber was vast,

the hangings heavy with embroidery. Over the fireplace towered a carved

mantel, grey with the ashes of dead fires. In a recess by the deep-set

windows stood a bed, from which the bedclothes, soft and fine as lace,

trailed to the polished floor. He lifted the candle above his head. A

handkerchief lay at his feet. It was faintly perfumed. He turned toward

the windows. In front of them was a _canapé_ and over it were flung,

pell-mell, a gown of silk, a heap of lace-like garments, white and

delicate as spiders’ meshes, long, crumpled gloves, and, on the floor

beneath, the stockings, the little pointed shoes, and one garter of

rosy silk, quaintly flowered and fitted with a silver clasp. Wondering,

he stepped forward and drew the heavy curtains from the bed. For a

moment the candle flared in his hand; then his eyes met two other eyes,

wide open, smiling, and the candle-flame flashed over hair heavy as

gold.

She was pale, but not as white as he; her eyes were untroubled as a

child’s; but he stared, trembling from head to foot, while the candle

flickered in his hand.

At last he whispered: “Sylvia, it is I.”

Again he said, “It is I.”

Then, knowing that she was dead, he kissed her on the mouth. And

through the long watches of the night the cat purred on his knee,

tightening and relaxing her padded claws, until the sky paled above the

Street of the Four Winds.