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“Sing, my Muse, the lay of the prodigal host! Who enters here leaveth behind not hope. Course follows course; entrée, relevé, ragoût, Ambrosial sauces, pungent, after luscious soup. The landlord spurs his guests to fresh attack, With fricassee, réchauffé and omelets; A toothsome feast that Apicius would fain have served, While wine, divine, new zeal in all begets. Who is this host, my Muse, pray say? Who but that prodigal, Tortier! |
“There, my dear,” concluded Straws, “those feet are pretty wobbly to walk, but flattery moves on lame 299 legs faster than truth will travel on two good ones. Besides, I haven’t time to polish them properly, or the mess in the frying-pan will spoil. Better spoil the poem than the contents of the flesh pots! Now if––dear me, Celestina, if you haven’t let the coffee pot boil over!”
“Oh, Monsieur,” cried the child, almost weeping again. “I forgot to watch it! I just couldn’t while you were writing poetry.”
“The excuse more than condones the offense,” continued the other. “But as I was about to say, you take this poem to Monsieur Tortier, make your prettiest bow and courtesy––let me see you make a courtesy.”
The girl bowed as dainty as a little duchess.
“That should melt a heart of stone in itself,” commented Straws. “But Tortier’s is flint! After that charming bow, you will give him my compliments; Mr. Straws’ compliments, remember; and, would he be kind enough just to glance over this poem which Mr. Straws, with much mental effort, has prepared, and which, if it be acceptable to Monsieur Tortier, will appear in Mr. Straws’ famous and much-talked-of column in the paper?”
“Oh, Monsieur, I can’t remember all that!” said the girl.
“Do it your own way then. Besides, it will be better than mine.”
With the poem hugged to her breast, the child fairly flew out of the room, leaving Straws a prey to 300 conflicting emotions. He experienced in those moments of suspense all the doubts and fears of the nestling bard or the tadpole litterateur, awaiting the pleasure and sentence of the august editor or the puissant publisher. Tortier had been suddenly exalted to the judge’s lofty pedestal. Would he forthwith be an imperial autocrat; turn tyrant or Thersites; or become critic, one of “those graminivorous animals which gain subsistence by gorging upon buds and leaves of the young shrubs of the forest, robbing them of their verdure and retarding their progress to maturity”?
Straws’ anxiety was trouble’s labor lost. Celestina appeared, the glad messenger of success, and now, as she came dancing into the room, bore in her arms the fruits of victory which she laid before the poet with sparkling eyes and laughing lips.