The Arm-Chair at the Inn

by Francis Hopkinson Smith

It is market day at Dives. This means that it is Saturday. On Friday the market is at Cabourg, on Wednesday at Buezval, and on the other days at the several small towns within a radius of twenty miles.

It means, too, that the street fronting the Inn is blocked up with a line of carts, little and big, their shafts in the gutter, the horses eating from troughs tied to the hind axle; that another line stretches its length along the narrow street on the kitchen side of the Inn which leads to the quaint Norman church, squeezing itself through a yet narrower street into a small open square, where it comes bump up against a huge hulk of a building, choked up on these market days with piles of vegetables, crates of chickens, boxes of apples, unruly pigs alive and squealing; patient, tired, little calves; geese, ducks—all squawking; chrysanthemums in pots spread out on the sidewalk; old brass, old iron; everything that goes to supply the needs of the white-capped women and wide-hatted men who crowd every square foot of standing room.

Market day means, too, that Pierre is unusually busy; and so is Lemois, and so are Leà and our little Mignon. Long before any one of us were out of bed this morning, the court-yard was crowded with big red-faced Norman farmers and their fat wives, all talking at once over their coffee, each with half a glass of Calvados (Norman apple-jack) dumped into their cups. At noon, the market over, they were back again for their midday breakfast, and Pierre, who had been working since daylight without a mouthful to eat, then placed on a big table in one of the open kiosks a huge earthen crock, sizzling-hot, filled with tripe, bits of pork, and chicken—the whole seasoned with onions and giving out a most seductive and inviting smell when its earthenware cover was lifted. There were great loaves of brown bread, too, which Lemois himself cut and served to the guests, besides cold pork in slices and cabbage chopped into shreds. When each plate was full, and the knives and forks had begun to rattle, he went indoors for his most precious heirloom—the square cut-glass decanter with its stopper made of silver buttons cut from a peasant’s jacket and soldered together—and after brimming each glass, seated himself and took his meal with the others, bowing them out when breakfast was over—hat in hand—as if they were ambassadors of a foreign court—gentleman and peasant, as he is—while they, full to their eyelids, stumbled up into their several carts, their women climbing in after.

And a great day it was for an out-door meal or for anything else one’s soul longed for—and they have these days in Normandy in October, when the fire is out in the Marmouset, the air a caress, and a hunger for the vanished summer comes over you. So soothing was the touch of the autumn air, and so lovely the tones of the autumn sky, that Louis hauled out a sketch-box from beneath a pile of canvases, and tucking one of them under his arm, disappeared through the big gate in the direction of the old church. Brierley took down his gun, and, calling Peter, strolled out of the court-yard promising to be back at luncheon, while Herbert, who had risen at dawn and walked to Houlgate to bid The Engineer good-by, dragged out an easy-chair from the “Gallerie,” backed it up against the statue of the Great Louis, and under pretence of resting his legs, buried himself in a book, the warm sunshine full on the page.

I, being left to my own devices, waited until the last cart with its well-fed load of Norman farmers had turned the corner of the Inn and quiet reigned again; and remembering that I was host, sought out our landlord and put the question squarely as to what objections, if any, he, the lord of the manor, had to our lunching out of doors too, and at the same table on which Pierre had placed the big crock and its attendant trimmings.

“Of course, my dear Monsieur High-Muck, you shall all lunch in the court, but the menu shall be better adapted to your more gentle appetites than the one prepared for our departed guests. I am at this moment paying the penalty for my share of the indigestible mess—but then I could not hurt their feelings by refusing—and so I have a queer feeling here”—and he ironed his waistcoat with the flat of his hand, his eyes upraised as if in pain. “But let me think—what shall it be to-day? I have a fish which Mignon, who has just gone to the market, will bring back, because I could not go myself nor spare Leà. Those big-eating people came so early and stayed so late. After the fish we will have Poulet Vallèe D’auge, with stewed celery, and at last a Pêche Flambée—and it will be the last time, for the late peaches are about over. And now about the wine—will you pick it out or shall I? Ah!—I remember—only yesterday I found a few bottles of Moncontour Vouvray at the bottom of a shelf in my old wine-cellar. It will bring fresh courage to your hearts. When it does not do that, and you have only dull despair or thick headaches, it should be poured out on the ground”—having delivered which homily, the old man, with his eye on Coco asleep on his perch, sauntered slowly up the court in the direction of the wine-cellar, from which he emerged a few minutes later bearing two dust-encrusted bottles topped with yellow wax—a distinguishing mark which he himself had placed there some twenty years before and had forgotten.

So while Herbert read on, only looking up now and then from his book, Leà and I set the table, stripping it of its rough, heavy dishes, swabbing it off with a clean, water-soaked towel—I did the swabbing and Leà held the basin—bringing from the Marmouset our linen and china, then dragging up the big wooden chairs, which were rain-proof and never housed.

We missed Mignon, of course. Buying a fish, and the market but half a dozen blocks away, should not require a whole hour for its completion, especially since she had been told to hurry—more especially still, since Pierre’s pot was on the boil awaiting its arrival, Louis and Brierley having returned hungry as bears. Indeed I had already started in to ask Lemois the plump question as to what detained our Bunch of Roses, when Leà’s thin, sharp, fingers clutched my coat-sleeve, her eyes on Lemois. What she meant I dared not ask, but there was no doubt in my mind that it had to do with the love affair in which every man of us was mixed up as coconspirator—a conclusion which was instantly confirmed when I looked into her shrivelled face and caught the joyous, lantern flare behind her eyes.

Waiting until we were out of hearing, Lemois having gone to the kitchen, she answered with a shake of her old head:

“Mignon loiters because Gaston is well again.”