“Mimi” stretches her full length, extending and retracting her claws, rolls on her back, turns her big yellow eyes to Céleste and mews. The next moment she is picked up and carried back into the house like a stray child.
At noon the streets seem deserted, except for the sound of occasional laughter and the rattle of dishes coming from the smaller restaurants as one passes. At this hour these places are full of workmen in white and blue blouses, and young girls from the neighboring factories. They are all laughing and talking together. A big fellow in a blue gingham blouse attempts to kiss the little milliner opposite him at table; she evades him, and, screaming with laughter,
picks up her skirts and darts out of the restaurant and down the street, the big fellow close on her dainty heels. A second later he has overtaken her, and picking her up bodily in his strong arms carries her back to her seat, where he places her in her chair, the little milliner by this time quite out of breath with laughter and quite happy. This little episode affords plenty of amusement to the rest of the crowd; they wildly applaud the good-humored captor, who orders another litre of red wine for those present, and every one is merry.
The Parisian takes his hour for déjeuner, no matter what awaits him. It is the hour when lovers meet, too. Edmond, working in the atelier for the reproduction of Louis XVI furniture, meets Louise coming from her work on babies’ caps in the rue des Saints-Pères at precisely twelve-ten on the corner of the rue Vaugirard and the Boulevard Montparnasse. Louise comes without her hat, her hair in an adorable coiffure, as neatly arranged as a Geisha’s, her skirt held tightly to her hips, disclosing her small feet in low slippers. There is a golden rule, I believe, in the French catechism which says: “It is better, child, that thy hair be neatly dressed than that thou shouldst have a whole frock.” And so Louise is content. The two breakfast on a ragoût and a bottle of wine while they talk of going on Sunday to St. Cloud for the day—and so they must be economical this week. Yes, they will surely go to St. Cloud and spend all day in the woods. It is the second Sunday in the month, and the fountains will be playing. They will take their déjeuner with them. Louise will, of course, see to this, and Edmond will bring cigarettes enough for two, and the wine. Then, when the stars are out, they will take one of the “bateaux mouches” back to Paris.
Dear Paris—the Paris of youth, of love, and of romance!
The pulse of the Quarter begins really to beat at 6 P.M. At this hour the streets are alive with throngs of workmen—after their day’s work, seeking their favorite cafés to enjoy their apéritifs with their comrades—and women hurrying back from their work, many to their homes and children, buying the dinner en route.
Henriette, who sews all day at one of the fashionable dressmakers’ in the rue de la Paix, trips along over the Pont Neuf to her small room in the Quarter to put on her best dress and white kid slippers, for it is Bullier night and she is going to the ball with two friends of her cousin.
In the twilight, and from my studio window the swallows, like black cinders against the yellow sky, dart and swoop above the forest of chimney-pots and tiled and gabled roofs.