The Enormous Room · Chapter 7 (3/5)

which provoked a tornado of laughter and some applause. Mooings, chirpings, cacklings⁠—there was a superb hen⁠—neighings, he-hawing, roarings, bleatings, growlings, quackings, peepings, screamings, bellowings, and⁠—something else, of course⁠—set The Enormous Room suddenly and entirely alive. Never have I imagined such a menagerie as had magically instated itself within the erstwhile soggy and dismal four walls of our chamber. Even such staid characters as Count Bragard set up a little bawling. Monsieur Pet-airs uttered a tiny aged crowing to my immense astonishment and delight. The dying, the sick, the ancient, the mutilated, made their contributions to the common pandemonium. And then, from the lower left darkness, sprouted one of the very finest noises which ever fell on human ears⁠—the noise of a little dog with floppy ears who was tearing after something on very short legs and carrying his very fuzzy tail straight up in the air as he tore; a little dog who was busier than he was wise, louder than he was big; a red-tongued foolish breathless intent little dog with black eyes and a great smile and woolly paws⁠—which noise, conceived and executed by The Lobster, sent The Enormous Room into an absolute and incurable hysteria.

The Fighting Sheeney was at a standstill. He knew not how to turn. At last he decided to join with the insurgents, and wailed brutally and dismally. That was the last straw: Rockyfeller, who could no longer (even by shouting to Judas) make himself heard, gave up conversation and gazed angrily about him; angrily yet fearfully, as if he expected some of these numerous bears, lions, tigers and baboons to leap upon him from the darkness. His livid super-disagreeable face trembled with the flickering cadence of the candle. His lean lips clenched with mortification and wrath. “Vous êtes chef de chambre,” he said fiercely to Judas⁠—“why don’t you make the men stop this? C’est emmerdant.” “Ah,” replied Judas smoothly and insinuatingly⁠—“They are only men, and boors at that; you can’t expect them to have any manners.” A tremendous group of Something Elses greeted this remark together with cries, insults, groans and linguistic trumpetings. I got up and walked the length of the room to the cabinet (situated as always by this time of night in a pool which was in certain places six inches deep, from which pool my sabots somewhat protected me) and returned, making as loud a clattering as I was able. Suddenly the voice of Monsieur Auguste leaped through the din in an

“Alors! c’est as-sez.”

The next thing we knew he had reached the window just below the cabinet (the only window, by the way, not nailed up with good long wire nails for the sake of warmth) and was shouting in a wild, high, gentle, angry voice to the sentinel below:

“Plan-ton! It is im-pos-si-ble to sleep!”

A great cry: “Yes! I am coming!” floated up⁠—every single noise dropped⁠—Rockyfeller shot out his hand for the candle, seized it in terror, blew it out as if blowing it out were the last thing he would do in this life⁠—and The Enormous Room hung silent; enormously dark, enormously expectant.⁠ ⁠…

Bang! Open the door. “Alors, qui, m’appelle? Qu’est-ce qu’on a foutu ici.” And the Black Holster, revolver in hand, flashed his torch into the inky stillness of the chamber. Behind him stood two plantons white with fear; their trembling hands clutching revolvers, the barrels of which shook ludicrously.

“C’est moi, plan-ton!” Monsieur Auguste explained that no one could sleep because of the noise, and that the noise was because “ce monsieur là” would not extinguish his candle when everyone wanted to sleep. The Black Holster turned to the room at large and roared: “You children of Merde don’t let this happen again or I’ll fix you every one of you.”⁠—Then he asked if anyone wanted to dispute this assertion (he brandishing his revolver the while) and was answered by peaceful snorings. Then he said by X Y and Z he’d fix the noisemakers in the morning and fix them good⁠—and looked for approbation to his trembling assistants. Then he swore twenty or thirty times for luck, turned, and thundered out on the heels of his fleeing confrères who almost tripped over each other in their haste to escape from The Enormous Room. Never have I seen a greater exhibition of bravery than was afforded by The Black Holster, revolver in hand, holding at bay the snoring and weaponless inhabitants of The Enormous Room. Vive les plantons. He should have been a gendarme.

Of course Rockyfeller, having copiously tipped the officials of La Ferté upon his arrival, received no slightest censure nor any hint of punishment for his deliberate breaking of an established rule⁠—a rule for the breaking of which anyone of the common scum (e.g., thank God, myself) would have got cabinot de suite. No indeed. Several of les hommes, however, got pain sec⁠—not because they had been caught in an act of vociferous protestation by the Black Holster, which they had not⁠—but just on principle, as a warning to the rest of us and to teach us a wholesome respect for (one must assume) law and order. One and all, they heartily agreed that it was worth it. Everyone knew, of course, that the Spy had peached. For, by Jove, even in The Enormous Room there was a man who earned certain privileges and acquired a complete immunity from punishment by squealing on his fellow-sufferers at each and every opportunity. A really ugly person, with a hard knuckling face and treacherous hands, whose daughter lived downstairs in a separate room apart from les putains (against which “dirty,” “filthy,” “whores” he could not say enough⁠—“Hi’d rather die than ’ave my daughter with them stinkin’ ’ores,” remarked once to me this strictly moral man, in Cockney English) and whose daughter (aged thirteen) was generally supposed to serve in a pleasurable capacity. One did not need to be warned against the Spy (as both B. and I were warned, upon our arrival)⁠—a single look at that phiz was enough for anyone partially either intelligent or sensitive. This phiz or mug had, then, squealed. Which everyone took as a matter of course and admitted among themselves that hanging was too good for him.

But the vast and unutterable success achieved by the Menagerie was this⁠—Rockyfeller, shortly after, left our ill-bred society for “l’hôpital”; the very same “hospital” whose comforts and seclusion Monsieur le Surveillant had so dextrously recommended to B. and myself. Rockyfeller kept The Fighting Sheeney in his way, in order to defend him when he went on promenade; otherwise our connection with him was definitely severed, his new companions being Muskowitz the Cockeyed Millionaire, and The Belgian Song Writer⁠—who told everyone to whom he spoke that he was a government official (“de la blague” cried the little Machine-Fixer, “c’est un menteur!” Adding that he knew of this person in Belgium and that this person was a man who wrote popular ditties). Would to Heaven we had got rid of the slave as well as the master⁠—but unfortunately The Fighting Sheeney couldn’t afford to follow his lord’s example. So he went on making a nuisance of himself, trying hard to curry favour with B. and me, getting into fights and bullying everyone generally.

Also this lionhearted personage spent one whole night shrieking and moaning on his paillasse after an injection by Monsieur Richard⁠—for syphilis. Two or three men were, in the course of a few days, discovered to have had syphilis for some time. They had it in their mouths. I don’t remember them particularly, except that at least one was a Belgian. Of course they and The Fighting Sheeney had been using the common dipper and drink pail. Le gouvernement français couldn’t be expected to look out for a little thing like venereal disease among prisoners: didn’t it have enough to do curing those soldiers who spent their time on permission trying their best to infect themselves with both gonorrhea and syphilis? Let not the reader suppose I am daydreaming: let him rather recall that I had had the honour of being a member of Section Sanitaire Vingt-et-Un, which helped evacuate the venereal hospital at Ham, with whose inhabitants (in odd moments) I talked and walked and learned several things about la guerre. Let the reader⁠—if he does not realise it already⁠—realise that This Great War for Humanity, etc., did not agree with some people’s ideas, and that some people’s ideas made them prefer to the glories of the front line the torments (I have heard my friends at Ham screaming a score of times) attendant upon venereal diseases. Or as one of my aforesaid friends told me⁠—after discovering that I was, in contrast to les américains, not bent upon making France discover America but rather upon discovering France and les français myself:

“Mon vieux, it’s quite simple. I go on leave. I ask to go to Paris, because there are prostitutes there who are totally diseased. I catch syphilis, and, when possible gonorrhea also. I come back. I leave for the front line. I am sick. The hospital. The doctor tells me: you must not smoke or drink, then you will be cured quickly. ‘Thanks, doctor!’ I drink all the time and I smoke all the time and I do not get well. I stay five, six, seven weeks. Perhaps a few months. At last, I am well. I rejoin my regiment. And now it is my turn to go on leave. I go. Again the same thing. It’s very pretty, you know.”

But about the syphilitics at La Ferté: they were, somewhat tardily to be sure, segregated in a very small and dirty room⁠—for a matter of, perhaps, two weeks. And the Surveillant actually saw to it that during this period they ate la soupe out of individual china bowls.

I scarcely know whether The Fighting Sheeney made more of a nuisance of himself during his decumbiture or during the period which followed it⁠—which period houses an astonishing number of fights, rows, bullyings, etc. He must have had a light case for he was cured in no time, and on everyone’s back as usual. Well, I will leave him for the nonce; in fact, I will leave him until I come to The Young Pole, who wore black puttees and spoke of The Zulu as “mon ami”⁠—the Young Pole whose troubles I will recount in connection with the second Delectable Mountain Itself. I will leave the Sheeney with the observation that he was almost as vain as he was vicious; for with what ostentation, one day when we were in the kitchen, did he show me a postcard received that afternoon from Paris, whereon I read “Comme vous êtes beau” and promises to send more money as fast as she earned it and, hoping that he had enjoyed her last present, the signature (in a big, adoring hand)

“Ta môme. Alice.”

and when I had read it⁠—sticking his map up into my face, The Fighting Sheeney said with emphasis:

“No travailler moi. Femme travaille, fait la noce, tout le temps. Toujours avec officiers anglais. Gagne beaucoup, cent francs, deux cent francs, trois cent francs, toutes les nuits. Anglais riches. Femme me donne tout. Moi no travailler. Bon, eh?”

Grateful for this little piece of information, and with his leer an inch from my chin, I answered slowly and calmly that it certainly was. I might add that he spoke Spanish by preference (according to Mexique very bad Spanish); for The Fighting Sheeney had made his home for a number of years in Rio, and his opinion thereof may be loosely translated by the expressive phrase, “it’s a swell town.”

A charming fellow, The Fighting Sheeney.

Now I must tell you what happened to the poor Spanish Whoremaster. I have already noted the fact that Count Bragard conceived an immediate fondness for this rolypoly individual, whose belly⁠—as he lay upon his back of a morning in bed⁠—rose up with the sheets, blankets and quilts as much as two feet above the level of his small, stupid head studded with chins. I have said that this admiration on the part of the admirable Count and R.A. for a personage of the Spanish Whoremaster’s profession somewhat interested me. The fact is, a change had recently come in our own relations with Vanderbilt’s friend. His cordiality toward B. and myself had considerably withered. From the time of our arrivals the good nobleman had showered us with favours and advice. To me, I may say, he was even extraordinarily kind. We talked painting, for example: Count Bragard folded a piece of paper, tore it in the centre of the folded edge, unfolded it carefully, exhibiting a good round hole, and remarking: “Do you know this trick? It’s an English trick, Mr. Cummings,” held the paper before him and gazed profoundly through the circular aperture at an exceptionally disappointing section of the altogether gloomy landscape, visible thanks to one of the ecclesiastical windows of The Enormous Room. “Just look at that, Mr. Cummings,” he said with quiet dignity. I looked. I tried my best to find something to the left. “No, no, straight through,” Count Bragard corrected me. “There’s a lovely bit of landscape,” he said sadly. “If I only had my paints here. I thought, you know, of asking my housekeeper to send them on from Paris⁠—but how can you paint in a bloody place like this with all these bloody pigs around you? It’s ridiculous to think of it. And it’s tragic, too,” he added grimly, with something like tears in his grey, tired eyes.

Or we were promenading The Enormous Room after supper⁠—the evening promenade in the cour having been officially eliminated owing to the darkness and the cold of the autumn twilight⁠—and through the windows the dull bloating colours of sunset pouring faintly; and the Count stops dead in his tracks and regards the sunset without speaking for a number of seconds. Then⁠—“it’s glorious, isn’t it?” he asks quietly. I say “Glorious indeed.” He resumes his walk with a sigh, and I accompany him. “Ce n’est pas difficile à peindre, un coucher du soleil, it’s not hard,” he remarks gently. “No?” I say with deference. “Not hard a bit,” the Count says, beginning to use his hands. “You only need three colours, you know. Very simple.” “Which colours are they?” I inquire ignorantly. “Why, you know of course,” he says surprised. “Burnt sienna, cadmium yellow, and⁠—er⁠—there! I can’t think of it. I know it as well as I know my own face. So do you. Well, that’s stupid of me.”

Or, his worn eyes dwelling benignantly upon my duffle-bag, he warns me (in a low voice) of Prussian Blue.

“Did you notice the portrait hanging in the bureau of the Surveillant?” Count Bragard inquired one day. “That’s a pretty piece of work, Mr. Cummings. Notice it when you get a chance. The green moustache, particularly fine. School of Cézanne.”⁠—“Really?” I said in surprise.⁠—“Yes, indeed,” Count Bragard said, extracting his tired-looking hands from his tired-looking trousers with a cultured gesture. “Fine young fellow painted that. I knew him. Disciple of the master. Very creditable piece of work.”⁠—“Did you ever see Cézanne?” I ventured.⁠—“Bless you, yes, scores of times,” he answered almost pityingly.⁠—“What did he look like?” I asked, with great curiosity.⁠—“Look like? His appearance, you mean?” Count Bragard seemed at a loss. “Why he was not extraordinary looking. I don’t know how you could describe him. Very difficult in English. But you know a phrase we have in French, ‘l’air pesant’; I don’t think there’s anything in English for it; il avait l’air pesant, Cézanne, if you know what I mean.

“I should work, I should not waste my time,” the Count would say almost weepingly. “But it’s no use, my things aren’t here. And I’m getting old too; couldn’t concentrate in this stinking hole of a place, you know.”