“Un demi! un!” shouts the garçon.
“Deux pernod nature, deux!” cries another, and presently the “Omnibus” in his black apron hurries to your table, holding between his knuckles, by their necks, half a dozen bottles of different apéritifs, for it is he who fills your glass.
ALONG THE “BOUL’ MICHE”
It is the custom to do most of one’s correspondence in these cafés. The garçon brings you a portfolio containing note-paper, a bottle of violet ink, an impossible pen that spatters, and a sheet of pink blotting-paper that does not absorb. With these and your apéritif, the place is yours as long as you choose to remain. No one will ask you to “move on” or pay the slightest attention to you.
Should you happen to be a cannibal chief from the South Seas, and dine in a green silk high hat and a necklace of your latest captive’s teeth, you would occasion a passing glance perhaps, but you would not be a sensation.
Céleste would say to Henriette:
“Regarde ça, Henriette! est-il drôle, ce sauvage?”
And Henriette would reply quite assuringly: