Sylvia regarding her own doll could not help feeling that this was a most inappropriate name for her father; she wondered why her mother called him that and decided finally that it must be because he was shorter than she was. The evening begun so disastrously ended most cheerfully; when Françoise and Marie arrived back at midnight, they escaped even the mildest rebuke from their mother.
Sylvia’s father kept his promise about teaching her English, and she was granted the great pleasure of being admitted to his room every evening when he returned from work. This room until now had always been a Bluebeard’s chamber, not merely for Sylvia, but for every one else in the house. To be sure Sylvia had sometimes, when supper was growing cold, peeped in to warn her father of fleeting time, but it had always been impressed upon her that in no circumstances was she to enter the room; though she had never seen in these quick glimpses anything more exciting than her father sitting in his shirt-sleeves and reading in a tumble-down arm-chair, there had always been the sense of a secret. Now that she was made free of this apartment she perceived nothing behind the door but a bookcase fairly full of books, nothing indeed anywhere that seemed to merit concealment, unless it were some pictures of undressed ladies looking at themselves in a glass. Once she had an opportunity of opening one of the books and she was astonished, when her father came in and caught her, that he said nothing, for she felt sure that her mother would have been very angry if she had seen her reading such a book. She had blushed when her father found her; when he had said nothing and even laughed in a queer unpleasant sort of a way, she had blushed still more deeply. Yet whenever she had a chance she read these books afterward and henceforth regarded her father with an affectionate contempt which was often expressed too frankly to please her mother, who finally became so much irritated by it that she sent her away to Bruxelles to stay with Elène, her eldest married sister. Sylvia did not enjoy this visit very much, because her brother-in-law was always making remarks about her personal appearance, comparing it most unfavorably with his wife’s. It seemed that Elène had recently won a prize for beauty at the Exposition, and though Sylvia would have been suitably proud of this family achievement in ordinary circumstances, this continual harping upon it to her own disadvantage made her wish that Elène had been ignobly defeated.
“Strange her face should be so round and yours such a perfect oval,” Elène’s husband would say. “And her lips are so thin and her eyes so much lighter than yours. She’s short, too, for her age. I don’t think she’ll ever be as tall as you. But of course every one can’t be beautiful.”
“Of course they can’t,” Sylvia snapped. “If they could, Elène might not have won the prize so easily.”
“She’s not a great beauty, but she has a tongue. And she’s smart,” her brother-in-law concluded.
Sylvia used to wonder why every one alluded to her tongue. Her mother had told her just before she was sent to Bruxelles that the priest had put too much salt on it when she was christened. She resolved to be silent in future; but this resolve reacted upon her nerves to such an extent that she wrote home to Lille and begged to be allowed to come back. There had been diplomacy in the way she had written to her father in English rather than to her mother in French. Such a step led her mother to suppose that she repented of criticizing her father; it also prevented her sister Elène from understanding the letter and perhaps writing home to suggest keeping her in Bruxelles. Sylvia was overjoyed at receiving an early reply from her mother bidding her come home, and sending stamps for her to buy a picture post-card album, which would be much cheaper in Belgium; she was enjoined to buy one picture post-card and put it in the album, so that the customs officials should not charge duty.
Sylvia had heard a great deal of smuggling and was thrilled by the illegal transaction, which seemed to her the most exciting enterprise of her life. She said good-by to Bruxelles without regret; clasping her album close, she waited anxiously for the train to start, thinking to herself that Elène only kept on putting her head into the carriage window to make stupid remarks because the compartment was crowded and she hoped some one would recognize her as the winner of the beauty competition at the Bruxelles Exposition.
At last the train started, and Sylvia settled down to the prospect of crossing the frontier with contraband. She looked at all the people in the carriage, thinking to herself what dangers she would presently encounter. It was almost impossible not to tell them, as they sat there in the stuffy compartment scattering crumbs everywhere with their lunches. Soon a pleasant woman in black engaged Sylvia in conversation by offering her an orange from a string-bag. It was very difficult to eat the orange and keep a tight hold of the album; in the end it fell on the floor, whereupon a fat old gentleman sitting opposite stooped over and picked it up for her. He had grunted so in making the effort that Sylvia felt she must reward him with more than thanks; she decided to divulge her secret and explain to him and the pleasant woman with the string-bag the history of the album. Sylvia was glad when all her other fellow-travelers paid attention to the tale, and she could point out that an album like this cost two francs fifty centimes in Lille, whereas in Bruxelles she had been able to buy it for two francs. Then, because everybody smiled so encouragingly, she unwrapped the album and showed the single picture post-card, discoursing upon the ruse. Everybody congratulated her, and everybody told one another anecdotes about smuggling, until finally a tired and anxious-looking woman informed the company that she was at that very moment smuggling lace to the value of more than two thousand francs. Everybody warned her to be very careful, so strict were the customs officials; but the anxious-looking woman explained that it was wrapped round her and that in any case she must take the risk, so much depended upon her ability to sell this lace at a handsome profit in France.
When the frontier was reached Sylvia alighted with the rest of the travelers to pass through the customs, and with quickening heart she presented herself at the barrier, her album clutched tightly to her side. No, she had nothing to declare, and with a sigh of relief at escape from danger she saw her little valise safely chalked. When she passed through to take her seat in the train again, she saw a man whom she recognized as a traveler from her own compartment that had told several anecdotes about contraband. He was talking earnestly now to one of the officials at the barrier and pointing out the anxious woman, who was still waiting to pass through.
“I tell you she had two thousand francs’ worth of lace wrapped round her. She admitted it in the train.”