“No, I’m taking a rest. It’s good to leave off sometimes.”
She seems about to say something further, but checks herself. Oh, how I do miss that after-dinner pipe! Life suddenly seems hollow and empty. I had always sworn that the best part of a meal was the smoke after; I had always vowed that tobacco added twenty per cent. to my enjoyment of life, and now—
“Little Thing,” I say presently, “let’s go out on the boulevard. I can’t work to-night. It’s Christmas eve.”
She responds happily. It is always a joy to her to go out with me.
“You’d better put on your fur. It’s awfully cold.”
“No, I don’t sink so this hevening, if you don’t mind. I have not cold, not one bit.”
As we emerge from the gloom of the rue Mazarin the river leaps at us in a blaze of glory. Under a sky of rosy cloud it is a triumph of jewelled vivacity. Exultantly it seems to mirror all the radiance of the city, and the better to display its jewels it undulates in infinite unrest. Here the play of light is like the fluttering of a thousand argent-winged moths, there a weaving of silver foliage, traversed by wriggling emerald snakes. Yonder it is a wimpling of purest platinum; afar, a billowing of beaten bronze. Bridge beyond bridge is jewel-hung, and coruscates with shifting fires. The little steamers drag their chains of trembling gold, their trains of rippling ruby; even the black quays seem to be supported on undulant pillars of amber.
Over yonder on the right bank the great Magasins overspill their radiance. They are like huge honey-combs of light, nearly all window, and each window a square of molten gold. The roaring streets flame in fiery dust, and flakes of gold seem to quiver skyward. Oh, how it stirs me, this Paris! It moves me to delight and despair. To think that I can feel so intensely its wonder and beauty yet to be powerless to express it. I can imagine how too much beauty drives to madness; how the Chinese poet was drowned trying to clasp the silver reflexion of the moon.
And so we walk along, I fathoms deep in dream, and the little grey figure by my side trying to keep pace with me. She, too, has that appreciation of beauty and art that seems innate in every Parisienne, yet she cannot understand how I can stare at a scene ten, fifteen, twenty minutes. However, she is very patient, and effaces herself most happily.
Never have I seen the Boul’ Mich’ so gay, and nearly all are carrying parcels. A million messengers of Santa Claus are hastening to fill with delight the eyes of innocence. The Petit Jésus they call him here, these charming Parisian children. Their precious letters to him, placed so carefully in the chimney, are often wept over by mothers in estranging after years. What joy when there comes an answer to their tiny petitions! When there is none: “Ah! it is because you have not been wise, Clairette. The Little Jesus is not pleased with you.” But the Gift-bringer always relents, and the little shoes, brushed by each tot till not a speck of dulness remains, are found in the morning overspilling with glorious things.