Читать книгу The Iron Mistress - Paul Iselin Wellman - Страница 27

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Outside, Narcisse said, “My congratulations.”

“For what?” Bowie asked.

“Your shoulders. I have always felt that my sister had an eye for fine male shoulders, but I never saw her succumb so readily before.”

He laughed at Bowie’s flush, gave him a sidewise glance, cocked his hat on the side of his head, and whistled a little tune.

“I see you’ve no notion how well we progressed,” he said presently. “I’ll confess to you now that I expected to find the atmosphere at home slightly more frigid than that which I’m informed surrounds the northern pole. Instead—Judalon’s most charming smiles, and an invitation to our ball!”

“That was on your account.”

“My sister would do nothing on my account.”

Narcisse twirled his cane and set his hat straighter on his head. Beside him Bowie walked silently, his mind going back to the girl they had just left, half wondering, half depressed. At the door of the Rouge et Noir, Henri Pinchon met them, bowing as low as his belly would permit.

“Monsieur de Bornay—Monsieur Bowie——” He smiled fawningly.

“We were so crowded at the time of Monsieur Bowie’s arrival ... the small room was all we had at the moment. But a suite of two bedrooms and a parlor looking upon the street is now available. I took the liberty of having the luggage removed to it. Your friends await you there.”

Bowie said, “The suite—it costs more?”

“Nothing to concern you, monsieur. I dislike annoying my guests about expenses when they are with me. Everything’s kept on the tally. Your mere signature is all that’s required for anything you desire——”

“But I——”

“A friend of Monsieur de Bornay’s is welcome to the best this poor house affords.” Again the fawning smile at Narcisse.

Bowie considered uneasily. He had less than one hundred dollars—a large sum to his brothers and himself—but one which seemed to be fading fast here. The smaller accommodations had been satisfactory to him: he was accustomed to worse. But looking at Narcisse, he could think of nothing to say against the new arrangement. Above all, his pride did not wish to admit to this young man either his poverty or his hesitancy about spending what seemed taken for granted.

“Won’t you have dinner with me?” he asked.

“I regret—another invitation,” Narcisse said. “But I’ll drop around for you in the morning. It’s my custom each forenoon to take exercise in fencing. A man must keep in practice.”

“So it seems,” Bowie said dryly.

Nez Coupé and Audubon, he found, had taken possession of the new quarters, which were almost magnificent by comparison with the old. That evening the small Cajun edified them with an account of the glories of New Orleans: glories which appeared to be chiefly feminine. To judge by Nez Coupé’s statements, the arrival of a certain personage from the bayou country had created something like a hurricane in the female hearts of the French Market quarter, even though that personage’s nose, owing to a previous misadventure with a knife, did not quite meet the more classical standards of beauty.