Poor Relations

Schmucke came out at the sound of Topinard's voice. He had just signed. He held the money in his hand.

"Thees ees for die liddle German maiden und for you," he said.

"Oh! my dear M. Schmucke, you have given away your wealth to inhuman wretches, to people who are trying to take away your good name. I took this paper to a good man, an attorney who knows this Fraisier, and he says that you ought to punish such wickedness; you ought to let them summon you and leave them to get out of it. – Read this," and Schmucke's imprudent friend held out the summons delivered in the Cite Bordin.

Standing in the notary's gateway, Schmucke read the document, saw the imputations made against him, and, all ignorant as he was of the amenities of the law, the blow was deadly. The little grain of sand stopped his heart's beating. Topinard caught him in his arms, hailed a passing cab, and put the poor German into it. He was suffering from congestion of the brain; his eyes were dim, his head was throbbing, but he had enough strength left to put the money into Topinard's hands.

Schmucke rallied from the first attack, but he never recovered consciousness, and refused to eat. Ten days afterwards he died without a complaint; to the last he had not spoken a word. Mme. Topinard nursed him, and Topinard laid him by Pons' side. It was an obscure funeral; Topinard was the only mourner who followed the son of Germany to his last resting-place.

Fraisier, now a justice of the peace, is very intimate with the President's family, and much valued by the Presidente. She could not think of allowing him to marry "that girl of Tabareau's," and promised infinitely better things for the clever man to whom she considers she owes not merely the pasture-land and the English cottage at Marville, but also the President's seat in the Chamber of Deputies, for M. le President was returned at the general election in 1846.

Every one, no doubt, wishes to know what became of the heroine of a story only too veracious in its details; a chronicle which, taken with its twin sister the preceding volume, La Cousine Bette, proves that Character is a great social force. You, O amateurs, connoisseurs, and dealers, will guess at once that Pons' collection is now in question. Wherefore it will suffice if we are present during a conversation that took place only a few days ago in Count Popinot's house. He was showing his splendid collection to some visitors.

"M. le Comte, you possess treasures indeed," remarked a distinguished foreigner.

"Oh! as to pictures, nobody can hope to rival an obscure collector, one Elie Magus, a Jew, an old monomaniac, the prince of picture-lovers," the Count replied modestly. "And when I say nobody, I do not speak of Paris only, but of all Europe. When the old Croesus dies, France ought to spare seven or eight millions of francs to buy the gallery. For curiosities, my collection is good enough to be talked about – "

"But how, busy as you are, and with a fortune so honestly earned in the first instance in business – "

"In the drug business," broke in Popinot; "you ask how I can continue to interest myself in things that are a drug in the market – "

"No," returned the foreign visitor, "no, but how do you find time to collect? The curiosities do not come to find you."

"My father-in-law owned the nucleus of the collection," said the young Vicomtess; "he loved the arts and beautiful work, but most of his treasures came to him through me."

"Through you, madame? – So young! and yet have you such vices as this?" asked a Russian prince.

Russians are by nature imitative; imitative indeed to such an extent that the diseases of civilization break out among them in epidemics. The bric-a-brac mania had appeared in an acute form in St. Petersburg, and the Russians caused such a rise of prices in the "art line," as Remonencq would say, that collection became impossible. The prince who spoke had come to Paris solely to buy bric-a-brac.

"The treasures came to me, prince, on the death of a cousin. He was very fond of me," added the Vicomtesse Popinot, "and he had spent some forty odd years since 1805 in picking up these masterpieces everywhere, but more especially in Italy – "

"And what was his name?" inquired the English lord.

"Pons," said President Camusot.

"A charming man he was," piped the Presidente in her thin, flute tones, "very clever, very eccentric, and yet very good-hearted. This fan that you admire once belonged to Mme. de Pompadour; he gave it to me one morning with a pretty speech which you must permit me not to repeat," and she glanced at her daughter.

"Mme. la Vicomtesse, tell us the pretty speech," begged the Russian prince.

"The speech was as pretty as the fan," returned the Vicomtesse, who brought out the stereotyped remark on all occasions. "He told my mother that it was quite time that it should pass from the hands of vice into those of virtue."

The English lord looked at Mme. Camusot de Marville with an air of doubt not a little gratifying to so withered a woman.

"He used to dine at our house two or three times a week," she said; "he was so fond of us! We could appreciate him, and artists like the society of those who relish their wit. My husband was, besides, his one surviving relative. So when, quite unexpectedly, M. de Marville came into the property, M. le Comte preferred to take over the whole collection to save it from a sale by auction; and we ourselves much preferred to dispose of it in that way, for it would have been so painful to us to see the beautiful things, in which our dear cousin was so much interested, all scattered abroad. Elie Magus valued them, and in that way I became possessed of the cottage that your uncle built, and I hope you will do us the honor of coming to see us there."

Gaudissart's theatre passed into other hands a year ago, but M. Topinard is still the cashier. M. Topinard, however, has grown gloomy and misanthropic; he says little. People think that he has something on his conscience. Wags at the theatre suggest that his gloom dates from his marriage with Lolotte. Honest Topinard starts whenever he hears Fraisier's name mentioned. Some people may think it strange that the one nature worthy of Pons and Schmucke should be found on the third floor beneath the stage of a boulevard theatre.

Mme. Remonencq, much impressed with Mme. Fontaine's prediction, declines to retire to the country. She is still living in her splendid shop on the Boulevard de la Madeleine, but she is a widow now for the second time. Remonencq, in fact, by the terms of the marriage contract, settled the property upon the survivor, and left a little glass of vitriol about for his wife to drink by mistake; but his wife, with the very best intentions, put the glass elsewhere, and Remonencq swallowed the draught himself. The rascal's appropriate end vindicates Providence, as well as the chronicler of manners, who is sometimes accused of neglect on this head, perhaps because Providence has been so overworked by playwrights of late.

Pardon the transcriber's errors.

ADDENDUMThe following personages appear in other stories of the Human Comedy

Baudoyer, Isidore

The Government Clerks

The Middle Classes

Berthier (Parisian notary)

Cousin Betty

Berthier, Madame

The Muse of the Department

Bixiou, Jean-Jacques

The Purse

A Bachelor's Establishment

The Government Clerks

Modeste Mignon

Scenes from a Courtesan's Life

The Firm of Nucingen

The Muse of the Department

Cousin Betty

The Member for Arcis

Beatrix

A Man of Business

Gaudissart II.

The Unconscious Humorists

Braulard

A Distinguished Provincial at Paris

Cousin Betty

Brisetout, Heloise

Cousin Betty

The Middle Classes

Camusot

A Distinguished Provincial at Paris

A Bachelor's Establishment

The Muse of the Department

Cesar Birotteau

At the Sign of the Cat and Racket

Camusot de Marville

Jealousies of a Country Town

The Commission in Lunacy

Scenes from a Courtesan's Life

Camusot de Marville, Madame

The Vendetta

Cesar Birotteau

Jealousies of a Country Town

Scenes from a Courtesan's Life

Cardot (Parisian notary)

The Muse of the Department

A Man of Business

Jealousies of a Country Town

Pierre Grassou

The Middle Classes

Chanor

Cousin Betty

Crevel, Celestin

Cesar Birotteau

Cousin Betty

Crottat, Alexandre

Cesar Birotteau

Colonel Chabert

A Start in Life

A Woman of Thirty

Desplein

The Atheist's Mass

Lost Illusions

The Thirteen

The Government Clerks

Pierrette

A Bachelor's Establishment

The Seamy Side of History

Modeste Mignon

Scenes from a Courtesan's Life

Honorine

Florent

Cousin Betty

Fontaine, Madame

The Unconscious Humorists

Gaudissart, Felix

Scenes from a Courtesan's Life

Cesar Birotteau

Honorine

Gaudissart the Great

Godeschal, Francois-Claude-Marie

Colonel Chabert

A Bachelor's Establishment

A Start in Life

The Commission in Lunacy

The Middle Classes

Godeschal, Marie

A Bachelor's Establishment

A Start in Life

Scenes from a Courtesan's Life

Gouraud, General, Baron

Pierrette

Graff, Wolfgang

Cousin Betty

Granville, Vicomte de (later Comte)

The Gondreville Mystery

Honorine

A Second Home

Farewell (Adieu)

Cesar Birotteau

Scenes from a Courtesan's Life

A Daughter of Eve

Grassou, Pierre

Pierre Grassou

A Bachelor's Establishment

Cousin Betty

The Middle Classes

Hannequin, Leopold

Albert Savarus

Beatrix

Cousin Betty

Haudry (doctor)

Cesar Birotteau

The Thirteen

A Bachelor's Establishment

The Seamy Side of History

Lebrun (physician)

Scenes from a Courtesan's Life

Louchard

Scenes from a Courtesan's Life

Madeleine

Scenes from a Courtesan's Life

Magus, Elie

The Vendetta

A Marriage Settlement

A Bachelor's Establishment

Pierre Grassou

Matifat (wealthy druggist)

Cesar Birotteau

A Bachelor's Establishment

Lost Illusions

A Distinguished Provincial at Paris

The Firm of Nucingen

Minard, Prudence

The Middle Classes

Pillerault, Claude-Joseph

Cesar Birotteau

Popinot, Anselme

Cesar Birotteau

Gaudissart the Great

Cousin Betty

Popinot, Madame Anselme

Cesar Birotteau

A Prince of Bohemia

Cousin Betty

Popinot, Vicomte

Cousin Betty

Rivet, Achille

Cousin Betty

Schmucke, Wilhelm

A Daughter of Eve

Ursule Mirouet

Scenes from a Courtesan's Life

Stevens, Dinah

A Marriage Settlement

Stidmann

Modeste Mignon

Beatrix

The Member for Arcis

Cousin Betty

The Unconscious Humorists

Thouvenin

Cesar Birotteau

Vinet

Pierrette

The Member for Arcis

The Middle Classes

Vinet, Olivier

The Member for Arcis

The Middle Classes

Vivet, Madeleine

Scenes from a Courtesan's Life

Scenes from a Courtesan's Life