Notre Dame de Paris - Bartleby.com

Instead of the Egyptian, on the same carpet, of which the arabesques but a moment before seemed to
vanish beneath the fantastic weavings of her dances, the Archdeacon now beheld only the red and yellow
man; who, in order to earn an honest penny in his turn, was parading round the circle, his arms akimbo,
his head thrown back, very red in the face, and balancing a chair between his teeth. On this chair he had
fastened a cat which a woman in the crowd had lent him, and which was swearing with fright.
“Notre Dame!” cried the Archdeacon, as the mountebank, the perspiration pouring off his face, passed
before him with his pyramid of cat and chair—“What does Maître Pierre Gringoire here?”
The stern voice of the Archdeacon so startled the poor devil that he lost his balance, and with it his
whole erection, and the chair and the cat came toppling over right on to the heads of the spectators and in
the midst of a deafening uproar.
It is probable that Pierre Gringoire (for it was indeed he) would have had a fine account to settle with
the owner of the cat, not to speak of all the bruised and scratched faces round him, had he not hastily
availed himself of the tumult and taken refuge in the Cathedral, whither Claude Frollo beckoned him to
follow.
The Cathedral was already dark and deserted, the transepts were full of deepest shadow, and the lamps
of the chapels were beginning to twinkle like stars under the black vault of the roof. The great central
rose-window alone, whose thousand tints were flooded by a horizontal stream of evening sunshine,
gleamed in the shadow like a star of diamonds and cast its dazzling image on the opposite side of the
nave.
When they had proceeded a few steps, Dom Claude leaned against a pillar and regarded Gringoire
steadfastly. This look was not the one Gringoire had feared to encounter in his shame at being surprised
by so grave and learned a personage in his merry-andrew costume. There was in the priest’s gaze no
touch of disdain or mockery; it was serious, calm, and searching. The Archdeacon was the first to break
silence.
“Now Maître Pierre, you have many things to explain to me. And first, how comes it that I have seen
nothing of you for the last two months, and then find you in the public street in noble guise i’
sooth!—part red, part yellow, like a Caudebec apple!”
“Messire,” answered Gringoire plaintively, “it is in very truth a preposterous outfit, and you behold me
about as comfortable as a cat with a pumpkin on its head. It is, I acknowledge, an ill deed on my part to
expose the gentlemen of the watch to the risk of belabouring, under this motley coat, the back of a
Pythagorean philosopher. But what would you, my reverend master? The fault lies with my old doublet,
which basely deserted me at the beginning of winter under the protest that it was falling in rags, and that
it was under the necessity of reposing itself in the ragman’s pack. Que faire? Civilization has not yet
reached that point that one may go quite naked, as old Diogenes would have wished. Add to this that the
wind blew very cold, and the month of January is not the season to successfully initiate mankind into this
new mode. This coat offered itself, I accepted it, and abandoned my old black tunic, which, for a
hermetic such as I am, was far from being hermetically closed. Behold me then, in my buffoon’s habit,
like Saint-Genestus. What would you have?—it is an eclipse. Apollo, as you know, tended the flocks of
Admetes.”
“A fine trade this you have adopted!” remarked the Archdeacon.