In the Quarter | Page 4

roof dripped with moisture. Far down in the dark court the gas-jets flickered and flared. From the distance came the softened rumble of a midnight cab, which, drawing nearer and nearer and passing the h?tel with a rollicking rattle of wheels and laughing voices, died away on the smooth pavement by the Luxembourg Gardens. The voice had stopped capriciously in the middle of the song. Gethryn turned back into the room whistling the air. His eye fell on Satan sitting behind his bars in crumpled malice.
"Poor old chap," laughed the master, "want to come out and hop around a bit? Here, Gummidge, we'll remove temptation out of his way," and he lifted the docile tabby, who increased the timbre of her song to an ecstatic squeal at his touch, and opening his bedroom door, gently deposited her on his softest blankets. He then reinstated the raven on his bust of Pallas, and Satan watched him from thence warily as he fussed about the studio, sorting brushes, scraping a neglected palette, taking down a dressing gown, drawing on a pair of easy slippers, opening his door and depositing his boots outside. When he returned the music had begun again.
"What on earth does she mean by singing at a quarter to one o'clock?" he thought, and went once more to the window. "Why -- that is really beautiful."
Oui! c'est un r��ve, Oui! c'est un r��ve doux d'amour. La nuit lui pr��te son myst��re, Il doit finir -- il doit finir avec le jour.
The song of H��l��ne ceased. Gethryn leaned out and gazed down at the lighted windows under his. Suddenly the light went out. He heard someone open the window, and straining his eyes, could just discern the dim outline of a head and shoulders, unmistakably those of a girl. She had perched herself on the windowsill. Presently she began to hum the air, then to sing it softly. Gethryn waited until the words came again:
Oui, c'est un r��ve --
and then struck in with a very sweet baritone:
Oui, c'est un r��ve --
She never moved, but her voice swelled out fresh and clear in answer to his, and a really charming duet came to a delightful finish. Then she looked up. Gethryn was reckless now.
"Shall it be, then, only a dream?" he laughed. Was it his fate that made him lean out and whisper, "Is it, then, only a dream, H��l��ne?"
There was nothing but the rustling of the chestnut branches to answer his folly. Not another sound. He was half inclined to shut his window and go in, well satisfied with the silence and beginning to feel sleepy. All at once from below came a faint laugh, and as he leaned out he caught the words:
"Paris, H��l��ne bids you good night!"
"Ah, Belle H��l��ne!" -- he began, but was cut short by the violent opening of a window opposite.
"Bon dieu de bon dieu!" howled an injured gentleman. "To sleep is impossible, tas d'imbeciles! -- "
And H��l��ne's window closed with a snap.
Two
The day broke hot and stifling. The first sunbeams which chased the fog from bridge and street also drove the mists from the cool thickets of the Luxembourg Garden, and revealed groups of dragoons picketed in the shrubbery.
"Dragoons in the Luxembourg!" cried the gamins to each other. "What for?"
But even the gamins did not know -- yet.
At the great Ateliers of Messieurs Bouguereau and Lefebvre the first day of the week is the busiest -- and so, this being Monday, the studios were crowded.
The heat was suffocating. The walls, smeared with the refuse of a hundred palettes, fairly sizzled as they gave off a sickly odor of paint and turpentine. Only two poses had been completed, but the tired models stood or sat, glistening with perspiration. The men drew and painted, many of them stripped to the waist. The air was heavy with tobacco smoke and the respiration of some two hundred students of half as many nationalities.
"Dieu! quel chaleur!" gasped a fat little Frenchman, mopping his clipped head and breathing hard.
"Clifford," he inquired in English, "ees eet zat you haf a so great -- a -- heat chez vous?"
Clifford glanced up from his easel. "Heat in New York? My dear Deschamps, this is nothing."
The other eyed him suspiciously.
"You know New York is the capital of Galveston?" said Clifford, slapping on a brush full of color and leaning back to look at it.
The Frenchman didn't know, but he nodded.
"Well, that's very far south. We suffer -- yes, we suffer, but our poor poultry suffer more."
"Ze -- ze pooltree? Wat eez zat?"
Clifford explained.
"In summer the fire engines are detailed to throw water on the hens to keep their feathers from singeing. Singeing spoils the flavor."
The Frenchman growled.
"One of our national institutions is the `Hen's Mutual Fire Insurance Company,' supported by the Government," added Clifford.
Deschamps snorted.
"That