Читать книгу Housemaster - Major General John Hay Beith - Страница 7

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It was high noon, and the pavement cafés were filling up with voluble gentlemen ordering bock and grenadine and café crême, and discussing the affairs of the nation over the midday papers. Hat-less little midinettes, with arms linked and chattering gaily, went hurrying by to eat their frugal lunch in the Luxembourg Gardens. Some of the smaller shops were closing up altogether, what time their proprietors retreated from behind the counter to the back premises, there to indulge in the customary midi à deux heures dinner and siesta.

A family party came drifting down the Boulevard, after a conscientious morning at the Cluny Museum. As this is their sole appearance in this narrative, we need not itemise them. It will be sufficient to call them Pop, Mom, Sister, and Junior.

Sightseeing with one’s relatives is a gruesome pastime at the best, and this quartette were frankly making heavy weather of their outing.

“Well, we saw that dump, anyway,” remarked Pop, with resigned satisfaction. “Where do we go from here?”

“I got to sit down some place right now,” announced Mom. “My feet went flat on me.”

“Sure,” replied Pop heartily—perhaps a little too heartily. “Junior, you take your Mom and Sister right along to that caffay on the corner, and set down outside and order yourselves ice-cream sodas or sumpun. I’ll be right after you: I gotta stop in at that news-stand. Maybe they carry The Tribune.”

Having watched the convoy come safely to anchor at an iron table under the striped canopy of the Café des Trois Mousquetaires, Pop betook himself to a neighbouring newspaper kiosk of the undeviating Paris pattern, hung about, outside and in, with ephemeral literature of every type and colour.

In the square opening left in the front for the transaction of business was framed an agreeable vision—a small girl in a blue-linen frock, with a scarlet leather belt and a beret to match. She was perhaps fourteen. Her small nose turned slightly upward, and her shingled hair curled forward, in two sleek black whiskers, almost into her large, blue, trustful eyes. Behind her an elderly crone, oblivious to the literary feast around her, sat upon a pile of newspapers consuming spaghetti out of a handkerchief.

The vision greeted Pop with a seraphic smile.

“Monsieur désire——?”

“Say, can you speak English at all?” asked Pop nervously.

The vision smiled again, shyly.

“Un petit peu, M’sieur. A ver’ little. You like a nice journal—yes?”

“Sure. Got a Chicago Tribune?”

The blue eyes clouded sorrowfully.

“Ah, mais non, Monsieur! Je suis désolée. Pas de Tribune ici! You will get one on the Grand Boulevards only. But you like something else—yes?”

Pop gave a furtive glance in the direction of the Trois Mousquetaires, then leaned further into the kiosk.

“Say, you got any French papers? Pictures, and funny jokes?”

The vision dimpled all over.

“Mais oui, M’sieur! La Vie Parisienne, Le Sourire, Fantasio, Plaisirs Parisiens——” she handed these delectable journals out one by one. “Très, très chic! Regardez! Look at this picture. You like her—yes?”

“Sure,” mumbled Pop. “How much?”

“Twelve franc fifty, Monsieur. You buy some more, yes?”

Pop leaned still further into the kiosk.

“You got any postal cards?” he asked hoarsely.

“Mais oui. Verree funnee! I show you!”

Button Faringdon dived down below the little counter in search of the mirth-provoking stationery. When she came up again Pop’s flabby features and horn-rimmed spectacles had been replaced by the unbending countenance of Aunt Barbara—Aunt Barbara, with her umbrella in one hand and a bursting string-bag in the other.

“Come home, child!” she said—and Button came.