"What," asked Jim, "ought we to see first in Paris? We are strangers here, you know."
The doctor flung out his short arms. He indulged in an apostrophe to Paris that reminded Stainton of some of the orations he had read as having been delivered in the councils of the First Republic. Boussingault's English was frequently cast in a French mould and sometimes so fused that it was mere alloyage; but he never paused for a word, and he spoke with a fervour that was almost vehemence. There were moments when Jim wondered if the Frenchman suspected him of some slur on Paris and conceived it a duty to defend the city. What Jim must see was, in brief, everything.
Nevertheless, so soon as the apostrophe ended, Boussingault appeared to forget all about it. His sharp eyes travelled over the hotel sitting-room, and his mind occupied itself therewith as devotedly as it had just been giving itself to the Gallic metropolis.
"Ah, you Americans," he sighed; "how you love the luxury!"
"Perhaps we do," said Jim, recalling certain negotiations that he had conducted at the hotel's bureau; "but if the price of these rooms is a criterion, you French make us pay well for it."
Dr. Boussingault's glance journeyed to the partly open doors of the bathroom, displaying a tiled whiteness.
"And without doubt a bath?" he enquired.
"A bath," nodded Stainton.
"And me"—Boussingault shook his bullet-like head—"I well recall when the water-carts stopped at the corners of the streets too narrow for their progress, and one called from the high window that one wished to buy so much and so much, because one bathed oneself or the servant washed the linen to-day."
He talked for a while, again rhapsodically, of the old city, the city of his youth, and, when he chanced to touch upon its restaurants, Stainton asked him if, that evening or the next, he would dine with Muriel and himself.