"Will not ces dames give themselves the trouble of entering? The streets are not gay at this hour."
We went in. A dog and a woman came forth from a smaller inner room to greet us; of the two the dog was obviously the personage next in point of intelligence and importance to the master. The woman had a snuffed-out air, as of one whose life had died out of her years ago. She blinked at us meekly as she dropped a timid courtesy; at a low word of command she turned a pitifully patient back on us all. There were years of obedience to orders written on its submissive curves; and she bent it once more over her kettles; both she and the kettles were on the bare floor. It was the poorest of all the Villerville interiors we had as yet seen; the house was also, perhaps, the oldest in the village. It and the old church had been opposite neighbors for several centuries. The shop and the living-room were all in one; the low window was a counter by day and a shutter by night. Within, the walls were bare as were the floors. Three chairs with sunken leather covers, and a bed with a mattress also sunken—a hollow in a pine frame, was the equipment in furniture. The poverty was brutal; it was the naked, unabashed poverty of the middle ages, with no hint of shame or effort of concealment. The colossus whom the low roof covered was as unconscious of the barrenness of his surroundings as were his own walls. This hovel was his home; he had made us welcome with the manners of a king.
Meanwhile the dog was sniffing at our skirts. After a tour of observation and inspection he wagged his tail, gave a short bark, and seated himself by Charm. The giant's eyes twinkled.
"You see, mesdames, it is a dog with a mind—he knows in an instant who are the right sort. And eloquence, also—he is one who can make speeches with his tail. A dog's tongue is in his tail, and this one wags his like an orator!"
Some one else, as well as the dog, possessed the oratorical gift. The cobbler's voice was the true speaker's voice—rich, vibrating, sonorous, with a deep note of melody in it. Pose and gestures matched with the voice; they were flexible and picturesquely suggestive.
"If you care for oratory—" Charm smiled out upon the huge but mobile face—"you are well placed. The village lies before you. You can always see the play going on, and hear the speeches—of the passers-by."
The large mouth smiled back. But at Charm's first sentence the keen Norman eyes had fixed their twinkling glitter on the girl's face. They seemed to be reading to the very bottom of her thought and being. The scrutiny was not relaxed as he answered.
"Yes, yes, it is very amusing. One sees a little of everything here. Le monde qui passe—it makes life more diverting; it helps to kill the time. I look out from my perch, like a bird—a very old one, and caged"—and he shook forth a great laugh from beneath the wide leather apron.
The woman, hearing the laugh, came out into the room.
"E'ben—et toi—what do you want?"