And the memories it calls up—this pungent, fragrant, spicy perfume: memories of the cup I drank in that old posada outside the gate of Valencia and the girl who served it, and the matador who stood by the window and scowled; memories of my own toy copper coffee-pot, with its tiny blue cup and saucer which Luigi, my gondolier, brings and pours himself; memories of the thimblefuls in shallow china cups hardly bigger than an acorn shell, that Yusef, my dragoman, laid beside my easel in the patio of the Pigeon Mosque in Stamboul, when the priests forbade me to paint.
Yes!—a wonderful aroma this which our pretty, joyous Mignon is scattering broadcast over the court-yard, hastening every man’s toilette that he may get down the earlier where Leà is waiting for him with the big cups, the crescents, the pats of freshly churned butter, and the pitcher of milk boiling-hot from Pierre’s fire.
Another of the pleasures of the open window is being able to hear what goes on in the court-yard. To-day the ever-spontaneous and delightful Louis, as usual, is monopolizing all the talk, with Lemois and Mignon for audience, he having insisted on the open garden for his early cup, which the good Leà has brought, her scuffling sabots marking a track across the well-raked gravel. The conversation is at long range—Louis sitting immediately under my window and Lemois, within reach of the kitchen door at the other side of the court, busying himself with his larder spread out on a table.
“Monsieur Lemois! Oh, Monsieur Lemois!” Louis called; “will you be good enough to pay attention! What about eggs?—can I have a couple of soft-boiled?”
“Why, of course you can have eggs! Leà, tell Pierre to——”
“Yes, I know, but will it endanger the life of the chickens inside? After your sermon last night, and Herbert’s penguin yarn, I don’t intend that any living thing shall suffer because of my appetite—not if I can help it.”
Lemois shrugged his shoulders in laughter, and kept on with his work, painting a still-life picture on his table-top—a string of silver onions for high lights and a brace of pheasants with a background of green turnip-tops for darks. To see Lemois spread his marketing thus deliberately on his canvas of a kitchen table is a lesson in color and composition. You get, too, some idea as to why he was able to reproduce in real paint the “Bayeux” tapestry on the walls of the “Gallerie” and arrange the Marmouset as he has done.
My ear next became aware of a certain silence in the direction of the coffee-roaster which had ceased its rhythm—the coffee is roasted fresh every morning. I glanced out and discovered our Mignon standing erect beside her roaster with flushed cheeks and dancing eyes. Next I caught sight of young Gaston, his bronze, weather-beaten face turned toward the girl, his eyes roaming around the court-yard. In his sunburned hand he clutched a letter. He was evidently inquiring of Mignon as to whom he should give it.
“Who’s it for?” shouted Louis, who, as godfather to Mignon’s romance, had also been watching the little comedy in delight. “All private correspondence read by the cruel parent! I am the cruel parent—bring it over here! What!—not for me? Oh!—for the High-Muck-a-Muck.” The shout now came over his left shoulder. “Here’s a letter for you, High-Muck, from Marc, so this piscatorial Romeo announces. Shall I send it up?”
“No—open and read it,” I shouted back.