"Yes," he said, but lingered a moment over Elliott's shoulder, watching
him pick out the lights in his sketch with a bit of bread. "To-morrow is Sunday," he observed after a moment's silence. "Well?" inquired Elliott. "Have you seen Colette?" "No, I will to-night. She and Rowden and Jacqueline are coming to
Boulant's. I suppose you and, Cécile will be there?" "Well, no," replied Clifford. "Cécile dines at home to-night, and I--I had
an idea of going to Mignon's." Elliott looked at him with disapproval. "You can make all the arrangements for La Roche without me," he continued,
avoiding Elliott's eyes. "What are you up to now?" "Nothing," protested Clifford. "Don't tell me," replied his chum, with scorn; "fellows don't rush off to
Mignon's when the set dine at Boulant's. Who is it now?--but no, I won't
ask that,--what's the use!" Then he lifted up his voice in complaint and
beat upon the table with his pipe. "What's the use of ever trying to keep
track of you? What will Cécile say,--oh, yes, what will she say? It's a
pity you can't be constant two months, yes, by Jove! and the Quarter is
indulgent, but you abuse its good nature and mine too!" Presently he arose, and jamming his hat on his head, marched to the door. "Heaven alone knows why any one puts up with your antics, but they all do
and so do I. If I were Cécile or any of the other pretty fools after whom
you have toddled and will, in all human probabilities, continue to toddle,
I say, if I were Cécile I'd spank you! Now I'm going to Boulant's, and as
usual I shall make excuses for you and arrange the affair, and I don't
care a continental where you are going, but, by the skull of the studio
skeleton! if you don't turn up to-morrow with your sketching-kit under one
arm and Cécile under the other,--if you don't turn up in good shape, I'm
done with you, and the rest can think what they please. Good-night." Clifford said good-night with as pleasant a smile as he could muster, and
then sat down with his eyes on the door. He took out his watch and gave
Elliott ten minutes to vanish, then rang the concierge's call, murmuring,
"Oh dear, oh dear, why the devil do I do it?" "Alfred," he said, as that gimlet-eyed person answered the call, "make
yourself clean and proper, Alfred, and replace your sabots with a pair of
shoes. Then put on your best hat and take this letter to the big white
house in the Rue de Dragon. There is no answer, _mon petit_ Alfred." The concierge departed with a snort in which unwillingness for the errand
and affection for M. Clifford were blended. Then with great care the young
fellow arrayed himself in all the beauties of his and Elliott's wardrobe. He took his time about it, and occasionally interrupted his toilet to play
his banjo or make pleasing diversion for the bull-dogs by gambling about
on all fours. "I've got two hours before me," he thought, and borrowed a
pair of Elliott's silken foot-gear, with which he and the dogs played ball
until he decided to put them on. Then he lighted a cigarette and inspected
his dress-coat. When he had emptied it of four handkerchiefs, a fan, and a
pair of crumpled gloves as long as his arm, he decided it was not suited
to add _éclat_ to his charms and cast about in his mind for a substitute. Elliott was too thin, and, anyway, his coats were now under lock and key. Rowden probably was as badly off as himself. Hastings! Hastings was the
man! But when he threw on a smoking-jacket and sauntered over to Hastings'
house, he was informed that he had been gone over an hour. "Now, where in the name of all that's reasonable could he have gone!" muttered Clifford, looking down the street. The maid didn't know, so he bestowed upon her a fascinating smile and
lounged back to the studio. Hastings was not far away. The Luxembourg is within five minutes' walk of
the rue Notre Dame des Champs, and there he sat under the shadow of a
winged god, and there he had sat for an hour, poking holes in the dust and
watching the steps which lead from the northern terrace to the fountain. The sun hung, a purple globe, above the misty hills of Meudon. Long
streamers of clouds touched with rose swept low on the western sky, and
the dome of the distant Invalides burned like an opal through the haze. Behind the Palace the smoke from a high chimney mounted straight into the
air, purple until it crossed the sun, where it changed to a bar of
smouldering fire. High above the darkening foliage of the chestnuts the
twin towers of St. Sulpice rose, an ever-deepening silhouette. A sleepy blackbird was carolling in some near thicket, and pigeons passed
and repassed with the whisper of soft winds in their wings. The light on
the Palace windows had died away, and the dome of the Pantheon swam aglow
above the northern terrace, a fiery Valhalla in the sky; while below in
grim array, along the terrace ranged, the marble ranks of queens looked
out into the west. From the end of the long walk by the northern façade of the Palace came
the noise of omnibuses and the cries of the street. Hastings looked at the
Palace clock. Six, and as his own watch agreed with it, he fell to poking
holes in the gravel again. A constant stream of people passed between the
Odéon and the fountain. Priests in black, with silver-buckled shoes; line
soldiers, slouchy and rakish; neat girls without hats bearing milliners'
boxes, students with black portfolios and high hats, students with bérets
and big canes, nervous, quick-stepping officers, symphonies in turquoise
and silver; ponderous jangling cavalrymen all over dust, pastry cooks'
boys skipping along with utter disregard for the safety of the basket
balanced on the impish head, and then the lean outcast, the shambling
Paris tramp, slouching with shoulders bent and little eye furtively
scanning the ground for smokers' refuse;--all these moved in a steady
stream across the fountain circle and out into the city by the Odeon,
whose long arcades were now beginning to flicker with gas-jets. The
melancholy bells of St Sulpice struck the hour and the clock-tower of the
Palace lighted up. Then hurried steps sounded across the gravel and
Hastings raised his head. "How late you are," he said, but his voice was hoarse and only his flushed
face told how long had seemed the waiting. She said, "I was kept--indeed, I was so much annoyed--and--and I may only
stay a moment." She sat down beside him, casting a furtive glance over her shoulder at the
god upon his pedestal. "What a nuisance, that intruding cupid still there?" "Wings and arrows too," said Hastings, unheeding her motion to be seated. "Wings," she murmured, "oh, yes--to fly away with when he's tired of his
play. Of course it was a man who conceived the idea of wings, otherwise
Cupid would have been insupportable." "Do you think so?" "_Ma foi_, it's what men think." "And women?" "Oh," she said, with a toss of her small head, "I really forget what we
were speaking of." "We were speaking of love," said Hastings. "_I_ was not," said the girl.