"You do not understand!"—Papa Fregeau was still dancing up and down as he kept step with Jean, who had now started on again toward the Bas Rhône. "Listen! They are Americans of Paris, they say! They arrive in an automobile this afternoon—mademoiselle and her father, the maid and the chauffeur. It is fine, they stop at the Bas Rhône and engage rooms. Excellent! Nothing could be better. There is profit in that. I carry the trunks, the valises, a multitude of effects that are strapped all over the automobile to the rooms, and am on the point of sending for Mother Fregeau at Marie-Louise's. Sapristi—I do not pretend to be a cook! They start out for a walk, the mademoiselle and her father—and the mademoiselle, before they are out of sight from the window, returns to say that they will not stay, that I shall repack everything on that accursed car in readiness for their departure on the return from their walk. Tourment de Satan!—very good, I repack it. And now you bring no fish!"
Jean shrugged his shoulders.
"Well, since they are gone, what does it matter?"
"Gone! Tonnerre!"—Papa Fregeau's face was apoplectic, and his fat cheeks puffed in and out like toy balloons. "Gone! Have I not told you that they are not gone!"
"You have told me nothing"—there was a sudden, quick interest in Jean's voice. "They are gone—and they are not gone! What are you talking about?"
"I do not know what I am talking about!" snapped Papa Fregeau fiercely. "How should I know! It is first this, then that, then this, then that—it is a badauderie! She is crazy, the girl; the father is no better; the maid, Nanette, is a hussy. She slapped my face when I but paid her a pretty compliment; and Jules, the chauffeur, is a pig who lies on his back under the infernal machine and will not lift a finger with the baggage. Wait! Listen! Come here!" He pulled Jean in through the door and across the café to the bar at the far end of the room, where he hastily decanted a glass of cognac and tossed it off. "See! Listen!" he went on excitedly, replenishing his glass. "I repack everything on the machine again, which is out there behind the tavern. I climb the stairs and I descend the stairs three dozen times, there is always one more package. And then fifteen minutes ago mademoiselle returns from her walk alone, and waves her hands—pouf!—just like that—and she says: 'Monsieur Fregeau, we will stay; take the baggage back to the rooms!' C'est insupportable, ça!" Papa Fregeau flung out his arms in abandoned despair. "And now there is no supper for them. Sapristi, I am no cook; but I could cook fish if you, misérable that you are, had brought them—heh! And it is too late now to send for Mother Fregeau."
Jean was paying but slender attention. They had not gone! They were going to stay!
"Get Madame Lachance, next door, to help you," he said absently. Then abruptly: "Mademoiselle returned alone, you say—and what of monsieur, her father?"
Papa Fregeau made a gulp at his second glass.
"He is impossible!" he choked. "With him it is the sunset! Who ever heard of such a thing! He is on the beach to gaze at the sunset! Nom d'un nom, is it extraordinary that the sun should set! But it is not him, it is mademoiselle. I am sure he knows nothing of all this, and concerns himself less. It is mademoiselle's doing. And I have had enough! I will not any longer be made a fool of!" He banged his pudgy fist on the comptoir. "Is it to stand on my head that I am patron of the Bas Rhône! Sacré bleu! I will not support it! I tell you that I will not—" Papa Fregeau's mouth remained wide open.