A climax was reached when one gentleman, after communicating with M. Zola by letter through various channels and receiving no answer from him, ascertained my address and called there.  As servants are not always to be depended upon, we had made it virtually a rule at home that whenever a stranger was seen at the front door my wife herself should, if possible, answer it.  And she did so in the instance I am referring to.

Well, the gentleman first asked for me, and on learning that I was absent, he explained that he was a friend, a private friend of M. Zola, whom he wished to see on an important private matter.  Could she, my wife, oblige him with M. Zola’s address?  No, she could not; he had better write, and his letter would be duly forwarded by me.  Then the applicant started on another story.  It was no use his writing, he must see me.  Should I be at home on the morrow?  The matter was of great importance, it would mean a large sum of money for myself and so on.  My wife had not much confidence in what was told her, but she requested the visitor to leave his name and address in order that I might make an appointment with him, should I think such a course advisable.

She was, at the moment, far more amazed and amused than indignant.  She bade the gentleman keep his money, and then showed him to the door.  To me that evening she did not mention the incident, and, indeed, I only heard of it after I had taken the trouble to communicate with M. Zola respecting the gentleman’s urgent private business, which (so it turned out) was purely and simply connected with journalism, my visitor having acted on behalf of the owner of a well-known London newspaper.

I do not know whether his principal had any knowledge of his impudent attempt at bribery.  For my own part I much regret that my wife (I suppose in the interests of peace) should have kept it from me at that time as she did, for the gentleman might otherwise have experienced, as he deserved, a rather unpleasant ten minutes.

XII

THE FINAL RESTING-PLACE

At last the time arrived when it became necessary to remove M. Zola from his country quarters, and by his desire Wareham and I then looked around us for a suitable suburban hotel.  The autumn was now far spent and M. Zola felt confident that he would be back in Paris by the end of the year.  Had he foreseen that his exile would prove so long, he would certainly have sent for a couple of his French servants, and have set up a quiet establishment in some other furnished house.  But for another month or two he considered that hotel accommodation would well suffice.

The place selected for him by Wareham and myself was the Queen’s Hotel, Upper Norwood, and there he remained from late in the autumn of 1898 until his departure from England.