第一百六十八章 一 古代客厅
一 古代客厅
吉尔诺曼先生住在塞尔万多尼街时，常在许多极好、极高贵的客厅里走动。虽然吉尔诺曼先生是个平民，他却得以进入贵族社会。他有着双份的才智，一是天生的，二是别人硬塞给他的。因此，人们甚至找他、款待他。他去任何地方，都得以主角自居。有些人无论如何都要有影响力，喜欢别人为他们忙碌；不能成为神谕时，他们就扮演小丑。吉尔诺曼先生不属于这类人；他在所出入的保王派客厅里的主宰地位，丝毫未伤及他的自尊。他在哪里都是神谕。他曾与德·波纳尔德先生，甚至与本吉-皮伊-瓦莱先生分庭抗礼。
一八一七年左右，他每周总是雷打不动地去附近费鲁街的德·T男爵夫人府上消磨两个下午。德·T夫人是位可敬体面的夫人，其丈夫在路易十六时期曾任法国驻柏林大使。德·T男爵生前曾狂热地陷入神经兴奋和磁力幻觉之中，在流亡期间破产身亡，留下的全部财产只是一些关于梅斯梅尔及其木桶的非常奇特的回忆录，共十大卷手稿，用红色摩洛哥皮装订，书口烫金。德·T夫人出于骄傲，没有出版这些回忆录，仅靠一份不知来源的微薄收入维持生计。
德·T夫人远远地离开宫廷，过着“成分混杂的社会”——正如她自己所说——在贵族式的孤独中，既骄傲又贫穷。每两周一次，几位朋友聚在她那寡妇守着的炉边，这便构成了一个纯粹的保王派客厅。他们在那儿喝茶，对时代、宪章、波拿巴分子、蓝绶带的滥用或路易十八的雅各宾主义，发出悲叹或惊恐的呼声，调子随着风向在挽歌或颂歌之间摇摆；他们低声谈论着先生（后来的查理十世）带来的希望。
在那儿，当卖鱼妇把拿破仑称为“尼古拉”的歌曲传来时，大家欣喜若狂。世上最精致、最迷人的公爵夫人们，也会为下面这首针对“联邦主义者”的诙谐诗句如痴如醉：
把你那垂在外面的衬衫下摆
重新塞进你的裤子里。
别让人说爱国者们
已经升起了白旗！20
他们在那儿用一些被认为恶毒的双关语、自认有毒的文字游戏、四行诗乃至对句取乐；例如，针对德索勒内阁——一个温和的政府，成员包括德卡兹和德塞尔先生——他们写道：
为了加固那在基础上摇摇欲坠的宝座，
必须更换土壤、暖房和蜂箱。21
或者，他们拟定一份贵族院名单，“一个可恶的雅各宾派议院”，并从这个名单中组合姓氏，例如，组成下面这样的短语：达马斯·萨布朗·古维翁-圣西尔。——这一切都做得兴高采烈。在那个圈子里，他们讽刺革命。他们用我不知道何种欲望，以相反的意义来为同样的愤怒增添锋芒。他们唱着自己的那支《事情会好的》：
啊！会好的会好的会好的！
把波拿巴分子吊在路灯柱上！
歌曲就像断头台；它们无区别地砍下，今天这个脑袋，明天那个。这只是换了个花样而已。
在属于这个时代的福阿尔代斯事件（1816年）中，他们支持巴斯蒂德和若西翁，因为福阿尔代斯是个“波拿巴分子”。他们把自由派称为“朋友们和兄弟们”；这是最致命的侮辱。
像某些教堂的钟楼一样，德·T夫人的客厅有两只公鸡。一只是吉尔诺曼先生，另一只是拉莫特-瓦卢瓦伯爵，关于此人，人们带着一种尊敬低声议论：“你知道吗？那就是项链事件中的那个拉莫特。”在党派中确实会发生这种奇怪的宽恕。
让我们补充一点：在资产阶级中，荣誉的地位会因过于随便的交往而受损；必须提防准入之人；同样，靠近冷淡的人会损失热量，接近受鄙视的人则会减少敬意。上流社会的古老团体自认高于这条法则，如同高于其他法则一样。蓬巴杜夫人的兄弟马里尼，有权进入苏比斯亲王殿下家。尽管有？不，因为有。杜巴里，沃贝尔尼埃的教父，在黎塞留元帅先生家极受欢迎。这个社会是奥林匹斯山。墨丘利和盖梅内亲王在那里都是自家人。一个小偷在那里会受到接纳，只要他是个神。
拉莫特伯爵在一八一五年已是七十五岁的老人，除了他那沉默寡言的神态、冰冷分明的大脸、极其得体的举止、扣子一直系到领带的大衣，以及他那总是交叉着的长腿，穿着宽大下垂、焦茶色的长裤外，别无惊人之处。他的脸也是这种颜色。
这位德·拉莫特先生之所以在这个客厅里“受尊重”，是因为他的“名声”，而且奇怪却又真实的是，因为他的瓦卢瓦姓氏。
至于吉尔诺曼先生，他的声望绝对是头等的。尽管他轻浮，却丝毫不影响他的尊严，他有一种派头，是威严、庄重、正直和高尚的，带着资产阶级的方式；而他高龄更增添了这一点。活一个世纪是不会不受影响的。岁月最终会在一个人头的周围形成一种可敬的散乱。
此外，他说出的话具有旧时代岩石的真正闪光。因此，当普鲁士国王在帮助路易十八复辟后，以鲁平伯爵的名义前来拜访这位后裔时，这位太阳王的后代接待他，多少像是把他当作勃兰登堡侯爵，带着最巧妙的傲慢。吉尔诺曼先生称赞道：“凡是法兰西国王之外的国王，都是地方诸侯。”有一天，有人在他面前提出并回答了一个问题：“《法兰西信使报》的编辑被判了什么刑？”“缓刑。”“多余了‘缓’字，”吉尔诺曼先生指出。22 这类言论使他拥有了地位。
在纪念波旁王朝复辟周年纪念日的感恩赞美诗歌中，他看到德·塔列朗先生经过时说：“邪恶先生大人来了。”
吉尔诺曼先生总是由他的女儿陪同，那位个子高大的小姐，年过四十，看上去却像五十，还有一个七岁的漂亮小男孩，白白净净，玫瑰红的脸蛋，清新可爱，眼睛快乐而信赖。这个孩子每次出现在这个客厅，周围都会响起窃窃私语：“他真漂亮！多可惜！可怜的孩子！”这个孩子就是我们前文提到过的那个。人们叫他“可怜的孩子”，因为他父亲是“卢瓦尔河地区的匪徒”。
这个卢瓦尔河地区的匪徒就是吉尔诺曼先生的女婿，前文已经提到过，吉尔诺曼先生称他为“家庭的耻辱”。
When M. Gillenormand lived in the Rue Servandoni, he had frequented
many very good and very aristocratic salons. Although a bourgeois, M.
Gillenormand was received in society. As he had a double measure of
wit, in the first place, that which was born with him, and secondly,
that which was attributed to him, he was even sought out and made much
of. He never went anywhere except on condition of being the chief
person there. There are people who will have influence at any price,
and who will have other people busy themselves over them; when they
cannot be oracles, they turn wags. M. Gillenormand was not of this
nature; his domination in the Royalist salons which he frequented cost
his self-respect nothing. He was an oracle everywhere. It had happened
to him to hold his own against M. de Bonald, and even against M.
Bengy-Puy-Vallée.
About 1817, he invariably passed two afternoons a week in a house in
his own neighborhood, in the Rue Férou, with Madame la Baronne de T., a
worthy and respectable person, whose husband had been Ambassador of
France to Berlin under Louis XVI. Baron de T., who, during his
lifetime, had gone very passionately into ecstasies and magnetic
visions, had died bankrupt, during the emigration, leaving, as his
entire fortune, some very curious Memoirs about Mesmer and his tub, in
ten manuscript volumes, bound in red morocco and gilded on the edges.
Madame de T. had not published the memoirs, out of pride, and
maintained herself on a meagre income which had survived no one knew
how.
Madame de T. lived far from the Court; “a very mixed society,” as she
said, in a noble isolation, proud and poor. A few friends assembled
twice a week about her widowed hearth, and these constituted a purely
Royalist salon. They sipped tea there, and uttered groans or cries of
horror at the century, the charter, the Bonapartists, the prostitution
of the blue ribbon, or the Jacobinism of Louis XVIII., according as the
wind veered towards elegy or dithyrambs; and they spoke in low tones of
the hopes which were presented by Monsieur, afterwards Charles X.
The songs of the fishwomen, in which Napoleon was called _Nicolas_,
were received there with transports of joy. Duchesses, the most
delicate and charming women in the world, went into ecstasies over
couplets like the following, addressed to “the federates”:—
Refoncez dans vos culottes
Le bout d’ chemis’ qui vous pend.
Qu’on n’ dis’ pas qu’ les patriotes
Ont arboré l’ drapeau blanc?20
There they amused themselves with puns which were considered terrible,
with innocent plays upon words which they supposed to be venomous, with
quatrains, with distiches even; thus, upon the Dessolles ministry, a
moderate cabinet, of which MM. Decazes and Deserre were members:—
Pour raffermir le trône ébranlé sur sa base,
Il faut changer de sol, et de serre et de case.21
Or they drew up a list of the chamber of peers, “an abominably Jacobin
chamber,” and from this list they combined alliances of names, in such
a manner as to form, for example, phrases like the following: _Damas.
Sabran. Gouvion-Saint-Cyr_.—All this was done merrily. In that society,
they parodied the Revolution. They used I know not what desires to give
point to the same wrath in inverse sense. They sang their little _Ça
ira: _—
