The cab stopped suddenly in front of beautiful gilded gates. It was the Luxembourg, and through the tall railings they caught a glimpse of well-kept lawns, splashing fountains and richly dressed children playing. From the distance came the stirring strains of a brass band.
The coachman drove up to the curb and Jefferson jumped down, assisting Shirley to alight. In spite of Shirley's protest Jefferson insisted on paying.
"Combien?" he asked the cocher.
The jehu, a surly, thick-set man with a red face and small, cunning eyes like a ferret, had already sized up his fares for two sacre foreigners whom it would be flying in the face of Providence not to cheat, so with unblushing effrontery he answered:
"Dix francs, Monsieur!" And he held up ten fingers by way of illustration.
Jefferson was about to hand up a ten-franc piece when Shirley indignantly interfered. She would not submit to such an imposition. There was a regular tariff and she would pay that and nothing more. So, in better French than was at Jefferson's command, she exclaimed:
"Ten francs? Pourquoi dix francs? I took your cab by the hour. It is exactly two hours. That makes four francs." Then to Jefferson she added: "Give him a franc for a pourboire—that makes five francs altogether."
Jefferson, obedient to her superior wisdom, held out a five-franc piece, but the driver shrugged his shoulders disdainfully. He saw that the moment had come to bluster so he descended from his box fully prepared to carry out his bluff. He started in to abuse the two Americans whom in his ignorance he took for English.
"Ah, you sale Anglais! You come to France to cheat the poor Frenchman. You make me work all afternoon and then pay me nothing. Not with this coco! I know my rights and I'll get them, too."
All this was hurled at them in a patois French, almost unintelligible to Shirley, and wholly so to Jefferson. All he knew was that the fellow's attitude was becoming unbearably insolent and he stepped forward with a gleam in his eye that might have startled the man had he not been so busy shaking his fist at Shirley. But she saw Jefferson's movement and laid her hand on his arm.