Пользователь - WORLD'S END

"Pour les pauvres." When they asked the price she would say: "All you have," and when they handed her a ten-franc note, she would thank them soulfully, and they would have to forget about the change, because she didn't have any.

Harry Murchison was there, following her everywhere with his eyes. He was a fair mark for the ladies, for he was known as a rich American, and handsome; they lured him to the booths, and he would buy whatever they offered, and then take it to another booth to be sold again by ladies equally charming. They made a game out of the whole thing - it could be nothing but that, of course, because there were persons here who could have built hospitals for all the poor of Paris if they had wanted to. But what they wanted was to dress up and display themselves. They sat at little tables and had Mrs. Emily's uniformed servants bring them tea and little cakes; they sipped and nibbled while they chatted, and paid double prices for what they got, and if there were any tips, these also went pour les pauvres.

IV

A day or two later there was a more exclusive tea party; Mrs. Emily's friends were invited to meet a famous writer. He was no stranger to Lanny Budd, because he had a villa at Antibes, and came there often, and went around wearing little round skullcaps of silk or velvet, always of a bright color and always different - he must have had a hundred of them. He was an old gentleman, tall and thin, with a large head and a long face, like a horse's. His name was Thibault, but he went by his pen name of Anatole France. Everybody talked about his books, but Lanny had got the impression that they were not for the young.

Now he came in a blue velvet coat and a large brown felt hat. He descended slowly from a motorcar, and was escorted to the shade of a great chestnut tree; once he was seated in a.lawn chair, all the ladies and gentlemen brought their chairs where they could sit and look and listen. As soon as he got started, everyone else was silent; they had come to hear him, and he knew it, and they knew it, and he knew that they knew it, and so on. Had he rehearsed in his mind what he was going to say? Very probably; but nobody minded that. He poured out for them a stream of ironic remarks, in an even tone, with a serious mien except for a twinkle in the bright old eyes. Now and then he would put his fingers together in front of him, and move them as if he were telling off the points in his mind.

Most of his talk was too subtle for a youngster. M. France had read everything that was old, and his mind was a storehouse of anecdotes and allusions to history, religion, and art; it was as if you were wandering through a museum so crowded that you hardly had room to move or time to see anything properly. Possibly there was only one person in the company who could understand everything the great man was saying, and that was M. Priedieu, the pale, ascetic librarian, who stood humbly on the outskirts and was not introduced. Lanny thought there was pain in his face, he being a reverent scholar, whereas M. France made mockery of everything he touched.

Somebody started to ask him a question beginning: "What do you think - ?" and he answered quicklyr "I am trying to cure myself of the habit of thinking, which is a great infirmity. May God preserve you from it, as He has preserved His greatest saints, and those whom He loves and destines to eternal felicity!"

Sooner or later the conversation of French ladies and gentlemen was apt to turn to the subject of love. On this also it appeared that the elderly author was skeptical. A saucy young lady asked him something about love in South America, and he made a laughing reply, and the company was vastly amused. Lanny didn't understand it, but afterward he gathered that M. France had once taken a lecture trip to the Argentine, and on the steamer had met a young actress; he had traveled with her, introducing her as his wife. Later, when he returned to France, he did not want her as a wife, but the young lady was disposed to insist, and there resulted a considerable scandal.

Also Lanny heard about a wealthy lady of Paris to whom this story had caused great distress. Madame de Caillavet was her name,

and she was credited with having made the fame and fortune of Anatole France, setting up a salon for the display of his talents and driving this most indolent person to the task of writing books. She and her husband had maintained with France the relationship known as la vie а trois - life in threes, instead of pairs. No one had objected to that, but the Argentine actress had made four, and everyone considered her de trop.

Madame de Caillavet was dead now, so Anatole France no longer had a salon. Perhaps that was why it was possible for an American hostess to lure him to a tea party. After he had taken his departure, they all gossiped about him, saying as many malicious things as he himself had said about Cicero, Cleopatra, St. Cyprian, Joan of Arc, King Louis XV, the Empress Catherine of Russia, and many other personages of history whom he had quoted. However, all agreed that he was an extremely diverting person; they had been so well entertained that for two hours they had forgotten the disturbing news that the Austrian government had delivered to the Serbian government an ultimatum which practically required the abdication of the latter and the taking over of its police functions by Austrian officials.

V

Beauty went motoring with Harry Murchison. She was gone all day, and came back looking flushed and happy, and Lanny went to her room to chat. They would have little snatches like that - she would tell him where she had been, and the nice things that Prince This and Ambassador That had said to her.

But this time she wanted to talk about Harry. He was such an obliging and generous fellow, and his family in Pennsylvania was a very old one; he had an ancestor who had been a member of the First Continental Congress. Harry liked Lanny very much, calling him the best-mannered boy he had ever met; but he thought it was too bad for him not to have a chance to know his own country. "That's what Mr. Hackabury said, too," remarked the boy.

But Beauty didn't want to talk about soap just then; she was interested in plate glass. "Tell me," she persisted, "do you really like him?"

"Why, yes, I think he's all right." Lanny was a bit reserved.

But then came a knockout. "How would you feel if I was to marry him?"

The boy would have had to be a highly trained diplomat to hide the dismay which smote him. The blood mounted to his cheeks, and he stared at his mother until she dropped her eyes. "Oh, Beauty!" he exclaimed. "What about Marcel?"

"Come sit here by me, dear," she said. "It's not easy to explain such things to one so young. Marcel has never expected to marry me. He has no money and he knows that I have none."

"But I don't understand. Would Robbie stop giving you money if you married?"

"No, dear, I don't mean that. But I can't always live on what Robbie gives me."

"But why not, Beauty? Aren't we getting along all right?"

"You don't know about my affairs. I have an awful lot of debts; they drive me to distraction."

"But why can't we go and live quietly at Bienvenu and not spend so much money?"

"I can't shut myself up like that, Lanny - I'm just not made for it. I'd have to give up all my friends, I couldn't travel anywhere, I couldn't entertain. And you wouldn't have any education - you wouldn't see the world as you've been doing - "

"Oh, please don't do it on my account!" the boy broke in. "I'd be perfectly happy to stay home and read books and play the piano."

"You think you would, dear; but that's because you don't know enough about life. People like us have to have money and opportunities - so many things you will find that you want."