Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 53: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

3 _. BORROWED PLUMES, hands, the distinction with which she pre- sided. He could scarcely have named what he had eaten. But he felt immensely bucked up when, over coffee and a wee cor- dial, she commented on his recital: “ But then, mon cher, since you are skilled in la boxe, you shall make much money in Paris!” George reminded her that his record did not justify such a conclusion. “Ah! But American boxers have the reclame here. And it was a mees-take, that. You have learn by it. It shall not happen again.” George pondered this idea, recalling that the general run of French pugilists did not compare with even our second and third raters. Many a wornout old war horse had crossed the Atlantic to reap a hatful of francs in the Paris ring! He glanced up to speak further of this, and caught again the look of anguish in his companion’s eyes. “Tell me, please!” he urged. “ You are distressed. Is—is it because Count Vau- dreuil did not come? Can I help in any way?” Mme. Volontiers hesitated, her fingers nervously tapping the little coffee spoon against its tiny cup. Suddenly she de- cided. “JT will be as frank as you have been, my friend,” she said. ‘I will confess that when I learn that Count Vaudreuil has gone away, for a little I think I shall faint. It is to go far, far back in my life when I was a small, little girl in a convent in the Midi. And not so far away is a military school for noble young gentlemen. So, often we see them on Sundays, at mass in the old church of the village. And—sometimes— we manage at other times, through a crack in the wall as they say. “‘ When I am sixteen, a young lieutenant of the school, who is Monsieur le comte de Vaudreuil, falls in love with me. He is then seventeen. We make our promises. I have a little, so pretty ring; only, I dare not wear it on my finger, comprenez? So, it is always on a ribbon about my neck. But one day I have a mal a la gorge—a bad throat, with fever. They put me into the infirmary; and there the ring is dis- to be exact. 679 ‘f covered, And, since it bears a family crest, the story is out of the bag! You know that Edouard is of a great family. I must not tell you more; but he is address as cousin by the King of Spain, and by three other monarchs; he can go in any court, even at the Vatican he is a noble. ‘So this innocent little affair with poor me, it raise what you call a blizzard. In it I am freeze—froze, almost. For, rich in blood, Edouard is poor in purse. He be- longs to the moneyless branch of his fam- ily. A council is called. I am lectured. I expect I am to be burn alive. Edouard is taken from military school, and sent home. And pretty soon he is married to a girl of the lesser nobility, but very, very rich. She whom you saw; madame la com- tesse. ° “Understand me, mon cher, I have no redress. No promise breach, as you call it. These marriages are all arrange; Edouard has no rights, I none. But because he is fine and honest, he insist upon them mak- ing me a little arrangement. So, it is settle that I have a sum of money—not large— put in bank for me. In Credit Lyonais, For I am penniless. My peo- ple were bourgeois; my father an avocat of Tours, who died, together with my — mother, before I can remember them at all. “T leave the convent, then, but not with the broken heart. We were only boy and girl. I think Edouard was in love with me, a little; but me, I was in love with love! And with the glamour of Edouard’s so great name. I am easily console with my little fortune. I am a rventiére; living on my own little income. It is not enough for fine clothes, and a big house; but I am happy in my studio in the Marais, with my fat black cat, and my little kitchen where I cook myself good things to eat, which I bring home in the baby carriage, as mon= sieur well knows. “ But always there is the serpent in the garden, not so? And the serpent with me is a lobster. My brother, the only one left of my family, is a great criminal; a redi- viste, many times convicted. And because he has big, red hands and a gros nez, also red, his intimates call him Langouste; lob- EOMICDOOKS & . (E(0)