War-time Paris was supposed to be rather a wild place, but so far we hadn’t struck anything very terrible. Perhaps we didn’t know where to look. Anyway, I got quite a kick out of taking Ben around and showing him the historic sights of the city. Nothing exciting about such things as famous “rues” and boulevards, cathedrals, theaters, parks and monuments, and Ben was obviously bored. We even went to see the railroad stations—that’s how hard up we were for something to do.
Ben’s idea of a good time would be to visit all the dives up Montmarte way, the House of Nations and peep-hole palaces that we’d heard so much about. When I got my courage screwed up, I intended to go with him on a tour of those joints. For the time being, though, stuff like that didn’t interest me: my education had gone along pretty fast and I wanted to save something for later. Not that seeing those things would hurt me—Lord knows, just looking at dirty things won’t soil anyone’s soul. I just didn’t see anything very interesting in the sights we’d probably see in those places.
Ben had heard all kinds of stories about some of these places. He told me some things that I just couldn’t believe. Ugh! I didn’t think they really did such things anywhere—and if I went to one of those joints it’d probably be out of curiosity, just to find out for sure whether they did or not. I was tired of hearing about impossible things and not knowing whether to believe or not. However, curiosity wouldn’t kill the kitty.
—5—
One day Ben and I were standing on the comer of two avenues, which Ben said no white man could name, wondering what we could do to kill a couple of hours, when a pretty little drably clad mademoiselle parked herself beside me and remained there until I paid attention to her.
I nudged Ben and said, “Here’s a chance for you, Ben.”
He looked her over and decided that she would suit his taste. “But she picked you out,” he objected. “Go ahead, Leony—she’s a cutie. I’ll mooch along and see you later.”
He started to do this very thing, but I caught his arm before he could take a step. “As you were, Gibraltar!” I commanded. “I don’t want it—you take it.”
Well, he thought it over, gave the little lady another scrutiny, decided to stay. “Well, if you ain’t specially interested, maybe she’d like to push along with a good man.” So we switched places and he addressed himself to the girl. “A-hem ... er ... bon jour, mam’selle.”
Very engaging and cheerful, I thought, very much astonished at the vibrant timbre of Ben’s love-making voice. I decided not to run away yet. This sounded interesting, and I wanted to hear just how one goes about making a trade with one of these wild women of the boulevards.