“Ah! Mr. Narcisse,”—she pointed at herself,—“haven’t I been a wife? The husband and wife—they’d aht to jist be each other’s guairdjian angels! Hairt to hairt sur; sperit to sperit. All the rist is nawthing, Mister Narcisse.” She waved her hands. “Min is different from women, sur.” She looked about on the ceiling. Her foot noiselessly patted the floor.
“Yes,” said Narcisse, “and thass the cause that they dwess them dif’ent. To show the dif’ence, you know.”
“Ah! no. It’s not the mortial frame, sur; it’s the sperit. The sperit of man is not the sperit of woman. The sperit of woman is not the sperit of man. Each one needs the other, sur. They needs each other, sur, to purify and strinthen and enlairge each other’s speritu’l life. Ah, sur! Doo not I feel those things, sur?” She touched her heart with one backward-pointed finger, “I doo. It isn’t good for min to be alone—much liss for women. Do not misunderstand me, sur; I speak as a widder, sur—and who always will be—ah! yes, I will—ha! ha! ha!” She hushed her laugh as if this were going too far, tossed her head, and continued smiling.
So they talked on. Narcisse did not stay an hour, but there was little of the hour left when he rose to go. They had passed a pleasant time. The Creole, it is true, tried and failed to take the helm of conversation. Mrs. Riley held it. But she steered well. She was still expatiating on the “strinthenin’” spiritual value of the marriage relation when she, too, stood up.
“And that’s what Mr. and Madam Richlin’s a-doin’ all the time. And they do ut to perfiction, sur—jist to perfiction!”
“I doubt it not, Misses Wiley. Well, Misses Wiley, I bid you au ’evoi’. I dunno if you’ll pummit me, but I am compel to tell you, Misses Wiley, I nevva yeh anybody in my life with such a educated and talented conve’sation like yo’seff. Misses Wiley, at what univussity did you gwaduate?”
“Well, reely, Mister—eh”—she fanned herself with broad sweeps of her purple bordered palm-leaf—“reely, sur, if I don’t furgit the name I—I—I’ll be switched! Ha! ha! ha!”
Narcisse joined in the laugh.
“Thaz the way, sometime,” he said, and then with sudden gravity: “And, by-the-by, Misses Wiley, speakin’ of Mistoo Itchlin,—if you could baw’ me two dollahs an’ a ’alf juz till tomaw mawnin—till I kin sen’ it you fum the office— Because that money I’ve got faw Mistoo Itchlin is in the shape of a check, and anyhow I’m c’owding me a little to pay that whole sum-total to Mistoo Itchlin. I kin sen’ it you firs’ thing my bank open tomaw mawnin.”
Do you think he didn’t get it?