THE EARLY YEARS OF JEAN SANTEUIL :>II
with nervous grimaces, sometimes known as the Paganini of the
Peignoir.' On 4 May came the disaster of the Charity Bazaar. A
fire started in a cinema booth (,The most amazing invention of
the century, admission 50 centimes'); and in ten minutes the
temporary building in the Cours la Reine, with its wooden walls,
roof of tarred canvas and insufficient exits, was a charred ruin.
One hundred and forty-three prominent figures in society, mostly
ladies, were burned alive. Montesquiou-who would certainly
have behaved with his undoubted courage and nobility if he had
been there, but as it happened was not-was maliciously
rumoured to have used his famous cane in forcing a way out.
Lorrain, in an article on the 14th, gleefully resumed his criticism
of the Boldini portrait. 'He seems hypnotised in adoration of his
cane, that battle-axe for live ladies and tongs for removal of the
corpses of dead ones, henceforth so dismally celebrated in the
annals of masculine elegance.' So Montesquiou in tum had to
fight a duel, not, strangely enough, with Lorrain but with Henri
de Regnier. The Count had arranged on 5 June an afternoon visit
to Baroness Adolphe de Rothschild's art-collection, during the
course of which Delafosse obliged with a recital. While the guests
were collecting their hats and sticks before leaving, Regnier's
wife (nee Marie de Heredia, a friend of Proust in her girlhood)
took the opportunity to remark: "That's a splendid cane for a
bazaar, you could hit dozens of women without breaking it"; and
Regnier, instead of making peace, joined in with: "You'd look
still better with a fan!" "I'd feel far more at home with a sword,"
replied Montesquiou with dignity; and swords it was, a more
dangerous weapon in the etiquette of duelling than the pistols
chosen by Lorrain.^1 They fought at the Pre aux Clercs in the
Bois on 9 June, wim Barres as Montesquiou's second, Beraud,
this time on the other side, as Regnier'S, and Dr Pozzi in attend-. ance as Montesquiou's doctor. Count Robert's idea of duelling
was to whirl his sword like the sails of a windinill. A few moments
after joining combat for the third time he received a wound in
the thumb, bled profusely, and retired to Touraine to recuperate.
The numerous spectators had included more than one priest sent
by noble ladies to give 'Quiou-Quiou', in case of need, me last
1 With pistols it was bad form not to miss your opponent, unless you had
an exceptionally serious grievance; but with swords the combatants were in
honour bound to go on fighting until one was hurt.