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The servant who opened the door was
twin sister to that efficient and hideous creature
bearing a soup tureen into the First French Picture. Her round red
face shone like freshly
washed china. She had a pair of immense bare arms to match, and
a quantity of mottled
hair arranged in a sort of bow. I stammered in a ridiculous, breathless
fashion, as though a
pack of Russian wolves were behind me rather than five flights of
beautifully polished
French stairs.
" Have you a room? "
The servant girl did not know. She would ask Madame. Madame was
at dinner. " Will you
come in, please ? " Through the dark hall, guarded by a large
black stove that had the
appearance of a headless cat with one red all-seeing eye in the
middle of its stomach, I
followed her into the salon. " Please to sit down," said
the servant girl, closing the door
behind her. I heard her list [sic] slippers shuffle along the corridor,
the sound of another
door opening—a little clamour—instantly suppressed.
Silence followed. The salon was
long and narrow, with a yellow floor dotted with white mats. White
muslin curtains hid the
windows : the walls were white, decorated with pictures of pale
ladies drifting down
cypress avenues to forsaken temples, and moons rising over boundless
oceans. You would
have thought that all the long years of Madame's virginity had been
devoted to the making
of white mats—that her childish voice had lisped its numbers
in crochet work stitches. I
did not dare to begin counting them. They rained upon me from every
possible place, like
impossible snowflakes. Even the piano stool was buttoned into one
embroidered with P. F.
I had been looking for a resting place all the morning. At the
start I flew up innumerable
stairs as though they were major scales—the most cheerful
things in the world— but after
repeated failures the scales had resolved into the minor, and my
heart which was quite cast
down by this time, leapt up again at these signs and tokens of virtue
and sobriety. " A
woman with such sober passions," thought I, " is bound
to be quiet and clean, with few
babies and a much absent husband. Mats are not the sort of things
that lend themselves in
their making to cheerful singing. Mats are essentially the fruits
of pious solitude. I shall
certainly take a room here." And I began to dream of unpacking
my clothes in a little white
room, and getting into a kimono and lying on a white bed, watching
the curtains float out
from the window in the delicious autumn air that smelled of apples
and honey . . . until the
door opened and a tall thin woman in a lilac pinafore came in, smiling
in a vague fashion.
" Madame Seguin ? " " Yes, Madame."
I repeated the familiar story. A quiet room. Removed from any church
bells, or crowing
cocks, or little boys' schools, or railway stations. " There
are none of such things anywhere
near here," said Madame, looking very surprised. " I have
a very beautiful room to let, and
quite unexpectedly. It has been occupied by a young gentleman from
Buenos Ayres whose
father died, unfortunately, and implored him to return home immediately.
Quite natural,
indeed." "Oh, very ! " said I, hoping that the Hamlet-like
apparition was at rest again and
would not invade my solitude to make certain of his son's obedience.
"If Madame will follow me." Down a dark corridor, round
a corner I felt my way. I wanted
to ask Madame if this was where Buenos Ayres pere appeared unto
his son, but I did not
dare to.
" Here—you see. Quite away from everything," said
Madame.
I have always viewed with a proper amount of respect and abhorrence
those penetrating
spirits who are not susceptible to appearances. What is there to
believe in except
appearances ? I have nearly always found that they are the only
things worth enjoying at
all, and if ever an innocent child lays its head upon my knee and
begs for the truth of the
matter, I shall tell it the story of my one and only nurse, who,
knowing my horror of
gooseberry jam, spread a coating of apricot over the top of the
jam jar. As long as I
believed it apricot I was happy, and learning wisdom, I contrived
to eat the apricot and
leave the gooseberry behind. " So, you see, my little innocent
creature," I shall end, " the
great thing to learn in this life is to be content with appearances,
and shun the vulgarities
of the grocer and the philosopher."
Bright sunlight streamed through the windows of the delightful
room. There was an alcove
for the bed, a writing table was placed against the window, a couch
against the wall. And
outside the window I looked down upon an avenue of gold and red
trees and up at a range
of mountains white with fresh fallen snow.
"One hundred and eighty francs a month," murmured Madame,
smiling at nothing, but
seeming to imply by her manner "of course this has nothing
to do with the matter."
I said, "That is too much. I cannot afford more than one hundred
and fifty francs."
"But," explained Madame, " the size ! the alcove.
And the extreme rarity of being
overlooked by so many mountains."
"Yes," I said.
"And then the food. There are four meals a day, and breakfast
in your room if you wish it."
"Yes," I said, more feebly.
"And my husband a professor at the Conservatoire—that
again is so rare." Courage is like
a disobedient dog. Once it starts running away, it flies all the
faster for your attempts to
recall it. "One hundred and sixty," I said.
"If you agree to take it for two months I will accept,"
said Madame very quickly. I agreed.
Marie helped to unstrap my boxes. She knelt on the floor, grinning
and scratching her big
red arms. "Ah, how glad I am Madame has come," she said.
"Now we shall have some life
again. Monsieur Arthur, who lived in this room—he was a gay
one. Singing all day, and
sometimes dancing. Many a time Mademoiselle Ambatielos would be
playing and he'd
dance for an hour without stopping."
"Who is Mademoiselle Ambatielos ? " I asked.
"A young lady, studying at the Conservatoire," said Marie,
sniffing in a very friendly
fashion. "But she gives lessons, too. Ah, mon Dieu, sometimes
when I'm dusting her room
I think her fingers will drop off. She plays all day long. But I
like that—that's life, noise is.
That's what I say. You'll hear her soon. Up and down she goes !"
said Marie, with extreme
heartiness.
"But," I cried, loathing Marie, "how many other people
are staying here ? "
Marie shrugged. "Nobody to speak of. There's the Russian gentleman,
a priest he is, and
Madame's three children—and that's all. The children are lively
enough," she said, filling
the washstand pitcher, "but then, there's the baby—the
boy! Ah, you'll know about him,
poor little one, soon enough!" She was so detestable, I would
not ask her anything further.
I waited until she had gone, and leaned against the window-sill,
watching the sun deepen
in the trees until they seemed full and trembling with gold, and
wondering what was the
matter with the mysterious baby.
All through the afternoon Mademoiselle Ambatielos and the piano
warred with the
Appassionata Sonata. They shattered it to bits and remade it to
their heart's desire—they
unpicked it—and tried it in various styles. They added a little
touch—caught up
something. Finally they decided that the only thing of importance
was the loud pedal. The
mysterious baby, hidden behind Heaven knows how many doors, cried
with such curious
persistence that
I had to strain my ears, wondering if it was a baby or an engine
or a far-off whistle. At
dusk Marie, accompanied by the two little girls, brought me a lamp.
My appearance
disturbed these charming children to such an extent that they rushed
up and down the
corridor in a frenzied state for half an hour afterwards, bumping
themselves against the
walls, and shrieking with derisive laughter. At eight the gong sounded
for supper. I was
hungry. The corridor was filled with the warm, strong smell of cooked
meat. "Well," I
thought, "at any rate, judging by the smell the food must be
good." And feeling very
frightened I entered the dining room.
Two rows of faces turned to watch me. M. Seguin introduced me, rapped
on the table with
the soup spoon, and the two little girls, impudent and scornful,
cried "Bon soir, Madame,"
while the baby, half washed away by his afternoon performance, emptied
his cup of milk
over his head while Madame Seguin showed me my seat. In the confusion
caused by this
last episode, and by his being carried away by Marie, screaming
and spitting with rage, I
sat down
next to the Russian priest and opposite Mademoiselle Ambatielos.
M. Seguin took a loaf
of bread from a three-legged basket at his elbow and carved it against
his chest. Soup was
served—with vermicelli letters of the alphabet floating in
it. These were last straws to the
little Seguins' table manners.
"Maman, Yvonne's got more letters than me." "Maman,
Helene keeps taking my letters
out with her spoon." "Children ! Children ! Quiet, quiet!"
said Madame Seguin gently. "No,
don't do it." Helene seized Yvonne's plate and pulled it towards
her. "Stop," said M.
Seguin, who was like a rat, with spectacles all misted over with
soup steam. "Helene, leave
the table. Go to Marie." Exit Helene, with her apron over her
head.
Soup was followed by chestnuts and brussels sprouts. All the time
the Russian priest, who
wore a pale blue tie with a buttoned frock coat and a moustache
fierce as a Gogol novel,
kept up a flow of conversation with Mademoiselle Ambatielos. She
looked very young.
She was stout, with a high firm bust decorated with a spray of artificial
roses. She never
ceased touching the roses or her blouse or hair, or looking at her
hands—with a smile
trembling on her mouth and her blue eyes wide and staring. She seemed
half intoxicated
with her fresh young body.
I saw you this morning when you didn't see me," said the
priest. "You didn't." "I did." "He
didn't, did he, Madame?" Madame Seguin smiled, and carried
away the chestnuts,
bringing
back a dish of pears.
"I hope you will come into the salon after dinner," she
said to me. "We always chat a
little—we are such a small family party." I smiled, wondering
why pears should follow
chestnuts. "I must apologise for baby," she went on. "He
is so nervous. But he spends his
day in a room at the other end of the appartement to you. You will
not be troubled. Only
think of it. He passes whole days banging his little head against
the floors and walls. The
doctors cannot understand it at all." M. Seguin pushed back
his chair, said grace. I
followed desperately into the salon. "I expect you have been
admiring my mats," said
Madame Seguin,
with more animation than she had hitherto shown. "People always
imagine they are the
product of my industry. But alas, no ! They are all made by my friend
Madame Kummer,
who has the pension on the first floor."
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