Then softening a little, he said, with a smile:
“I won’t come any more, my friend. I’ll send my boots around to-morrow by my boy.”
But the longest red-letter day has its ending, and time and tide beckon one with the brutality of an impatient jailer.
On my studio table is a well-stuffed envelope containing the documents relative to my impending exile—a stamped card of my identification, bearing the number of my cell, a plan of the slave-ship, and six red tags for my baggage.
The three pretty daughters of old Père Valois know of my approaching departure, and say cheering things to me as I pass the concierge’s window.
Père Valois stands at the gate and stops me with: “Is it true, monsieur, you are going Saturday?”
“Yes,” I answer; “unfortunately, it is quite true.”
The old man sighs and replies: “I once had to leave Paris myself”; looking at me as if he were speaking to an old resident. “My regiment was ordered to the colonies. It was hard, monsieur, but I did my duty.”
The morning of my sailing has arrived. The patron of the tobacco-shop, and madame his good wife, and the wine merchant, and the baker along the little street with its cobblestone-bed, have all wished me “bon voyage,” accompanied with many handshakings. It is getting late and Père Valois has gone to hunt for a cab—a “galerie,” as it is called, with a place for trunks on top. Twenty minutes go by, but no “galerie” is in sight. The three daughters of Père Valois run in different directions to find one, while I throw the remaining odds and ends in the studio into my valise. At last there is a sound of grating wheels below on the gravel court. The “galerie” has arrived—with the smallest of the three daughters inside, all out of breath from her run and terribly excited. There are the trunks and the valises and the bicycle in its crate to get down. Two soldiers, who have been calling on two of the daughters, come up to the studio and kindly offer their assistance. There is no time to lose, and in single file the procession starts down the atelier stairs, headed by Père Valois, who has just returned from his fruitless search considerably winded, and the three girls, the two red-trousered soldiers and myself tugging away at the rest of the baggage.
It is not often one departs with the assistance of three pretty femmes de ménage, a jolly old concierge, and a portion of the army of the French Republic. With many suggestions from my good friends and an assuring wave of the hand from the aged cocher, my luggage is roped and chained to the top of the rickety, little old cab, which sways and squeaks with the sudden weight, while the poor, small horse, upon whom has been devolved the task of making the 11.35 train, Gare St. Lazare, changes his position wearily from one leg to the other. He is evidently thinking out the distance, and has decided upon his gait.