The Rudder Grangers Abroad and Other Stories Part 7

I never had the heart to throw cold water on Euphemia's n.o.ble emotions, and so I did not tell her that the notice merely requested travellers to remove from their trunks the _anciennes etiquettes_, or old railway labels.

We were not rich tourists, and we all took lodgings in a small hotel to which we had been recommended. It was in the Latin Quarter, near the river, and opposite the vast palace of the Louvre, into whose labyrinth of picture-galleries Euphemia and I were eager to plunge.

But first we all went to the office of the American Consul, and consulted him in regard to the proper measures to be taken for searching for the little Corinne in Paris. After that, for some days, Jonas and Pomona spent all their time, and Euphemia and I part of ours, in looking for the child. Euphemia's Parisian exhilaration continued to increase, but there were some things that disappointed her.

"I thought," said she, "that people in France took their morning coffee in bed, but they do not bring it up to us."

"But, my dear," said I, "I am sure you said before we came here that you considered taking coffee in bed as an abominable habit, and that nothing could ever make you like it."

"I know," said she, "that I have always thought it a lazy custom, and not a bit nice, and I think so yet. But still, when we are in a strange country, I expect to live as other people do."

It was quite evident that Euphemia had been looking forward for some time to the novel experience of taking her coffee in bed. But the gray-haired old gentleman who acted as our chambermaid never hinted that he supposed we wanted anything of the kind.

Nothing, however, excited Euphemia's indignation so much as the practice of giving a _pourboire_ to cabmen and others. "It is simply feeding the flames of intemperance," she said. When she had occasion to take a cab by herself, she never conformed to this reprehensible custom. When she paid the driver, she would add something to the regular fare, but as she gave it to him she would say in her most distinct French: "_Pour manger. Comprenezvous_?" The _cocher_ would generally nod his head, and thank her very kindly, which he had good reason to do, for she never forgot that it took more money to buy food than drink.

In spite of the attractions of the city, our sojourn in Paris was not satisfactory. Apart from the family trouble which oppressed us, it rained nearly all the time. We were told that in order to see Paris at its best we should come in the spring. In the month of May it was charming. Then everybody would be out-of-doors, and we would see a whole city enjoying life. As we wished to enjoy life without waiting for the spring, we determined to move southward, and visit during the winter those parts of Europe which then lay under blue skies and a warm sun. It was impossible, at present, for Pomona and Jonas to enjoy life anywhere, and they would remain in Paris, and then, if they did not find their child in a reasonable time, they would join us. Neither of them understood French, but this did not trouble them in the slightest.

Early in their Paris wanderings they had met with a boy who had once lived in New York, and they had taken him into pay as an interpreter.

He charged them a franc and a half a day, and I am sure they got their money's worth.

Soon after we had made up our minds to move toward the south, I came home from a visit to the bankers, and joyfully told Euphemia that I had met Baxter.

"Baxter?" said she, inquiringly; "who is he?"

"I used to go to school with him," I said; "and to think that I should meet him here!"

"I never heard you mention him before," she remarked.

"No," I answered; "it must be fifteen or sixteen years since I have seen him, and really it is a great pleasure to meet him here. He is a capital fellow. He was very glad to see me."

"I should think," said Euphemia, "if you like each other so much that you would have exchanged visits in America, or, at least, have corresponded."

"Oh, it is a very different thing at home," I said; "but here it is delightful to meet an old school friend like Baxter. He is coming to see us this evening."

That evening Baxter came. He was delighted to meet Euphemia, and inquired with much solicitude about our plans and movements. He had never heard of my marriage, and, for years, had not known whether I was dead or alive. Now he took the keenest interest in me and mine. We were a little sorry to find that this was not Baxter's first visit to Europe. He had been here several times; and, as he expressed it, "had knocked about a good deal over the Continent." He was dreadfully familiar with everything, and talked about some places we were longing to see in a way that considerably dampened our enthusiasm. In fact, there was about him an air of superiority which, though tempered by much kindliness, was not altogether agreeable. He highly approved our idea of leaving Paris. "The city is nothing now," he said. "You ought to see it in May." We said we had heard that, and then spoke of Italy.

"You mustn't go there in the winter," he said. "You don't see the country at its best. May is the time for Italy. Then it is neither too hot nor too cold, and you will find out what an Italian sky is." We said that we hoped to be in England in the spring, and he agreed that we were right there. "England is never so lovely as in May."

"Well!" exclaimed Euphemia; "it seems to me, from all I hear, that we ought to take about twelve years to see Europe. We should leave the United States every April, spend May in some one place, and go back in June. And this we ought to do each year until we have seen all the places in May. This might do very well for any one who had plenty of money, and who liked the ocean, but I don't think we could stand it. As for me," she continued, "I would like to spend these months, so cold and disagreeable here, in the sunny lands of Southern France. I want to see the vineyards and the olive groves, and the dark-eyed maidens singing in the fields. I long for the soft skies of Provence, and to hear the musical dialect in which Frederic Mistral wrote his 'Mireio.'"

"That sounds very well," said Baxter, "but in all those southern countries you must be prepared in winter for the rigors of the climate.

The sun is pretty warm sometimes at this season, but as soon as you get out of it you will freeze to death if you are not careful. The only way to keep warm is to be in the sun, out of the wind, and that won't work on rainy days, and winter is the rainy season, you know. In the houses it is as cold as ice, and the fires don't amount to anything. You might as well light a bundle of wooden tooth-picks and put it in the fire-place. If you could sleep all the time you might be comfortable, for they give you a feather-bed to cover yourself with. Outside you may do well enough if you keep up a steady walking, but indoors you will have hard work to keep warm. You must wear chest-protectors. They sell them down there--great big ones, made of rabbit-skins; and a nice thing for a man to have to wear in the house is a pair of cloth bags lined with fur. They would keep his feet and legs warm when he isn't walking. It is well, too, to have a pair of smaller fur bags for your hands when you are in the house. You can have a little hole in the end of one of them through which you can stick a pen-holder, and then you can write letters. An india-rubber bag, filled with hot water, to lower down your back, is a great comfort. You haven't any idea how cold your spine gets in those warm countries. And, if I were you, I'd avoid a place where you see them carting coal stoves around. Those are the worst spots. And you need not expect to get one of the stoves, not while they can sell you wood at two sticks for a franc. You had better go to some place where they are not accustomed to having tourists. In the regular resorts they are afraid to make any show of keeping warm, for fear people will think they are in the habit of having cold weather. And in Italy you've got to be precious careful, or you'll be taken sick. And another thing. I suppose you brought a great deal of baggage with you. You, for instance," said our friend, turning to me, "packed up, I suppose, a heavy overcoat for cold weather, and a lighter one, and a good winter suit, and a good summer one, besides another for spring and fall, and an old suit to lie about in in the orange groves, and a dress suit, besides such convenient articles as old boots for tramping in, pocket-lanterns, and so forth."

Strange to say, I had all these, besides many other things of a similar kind, and I could not help admitting it.

"Well," said Baxter, "you'd better get rid of the most of that as soon as you can, for if you travel with that sort of heavy weight in the Mediterranean countries, you might as well write home and get your house mortgaged. All along the lines of travel, in the south of Europe, you find the hotels piled up with American baggage left there by travellers, who'll never send for it. It reminds one of the rows of ox skeletons that used to mark out the roads to California. But I guess you'll be able to stick it out. Good bye. Let me hear from you."

When Baxter left us, we could not but feel a little down-hearted, and Euphemia turned to her guide-book to see if his remarks were corroborated there.

"Well, there is one comfort," she exclaimed at last; "this book says that in Naples epidemics are not so deadly as they are in some other places, and if the traveller observes about a page of directions, which are given here, and consults a physician the moment he feels himself out of order, it is quite possible to ward off attacks of fever. That is encouraging, and I think we might as well go on."

"Yes," said I, "and here, in this newspaper, a hotel in Venice advertises that its situation enables it to avoid the odors of the Grand Ca.n.a.l; and an undertaker in Nice advertises that he will forward the corpses of tourists to all parts of Europe and America. I think there is a chance of our getting back, either dead or alive, and so I also say, let us go on."

But before we left Paris, we determined to go to the Grand Opera, which we had not yet visited, and Euphemia proposed that we should take Pomona with us. The poor girl was looking wretched and woe-begone, and needed to have her mind diverted from her trouble. Jonas, at the best of times, could not be persuaded to any amus.e.m.e.nt of this sort, but Pomona agreed to go. We had no idea of dressing for the boxes, and we took good front seats in the upper circle, where we could see the whole interior of the splendid house. As soon as the performance commenced, the old dramatic fire began to burn in Pomona. Her eyes sparkled as they had not done for many a day, and she really looked like her own bright self. The opera was "Le Prophete," and, as none of us had ever seen anything produced on so magnificent a scale, we were greatly interested, especially in the act which opens with that wonderful winter scene in the forest, with hundreds of people scattered about under the great trees, with horses and sleighs and the frozen river in the background where the skaters came gliding on. The grouping was picturesque and artistic; the scale of the scene was immense; there was a vast concourse of people on the stage; the dances were beautiful; the merry skaters graceful; the music was inspiring.

Suddenly, above the voices of the chorus, above the drums and ba.s.s strings of the orchestra, above the highest notes of the sopranos, above the great chandelier itself, came two notes distinct and plain, and the words to which they were set, were:--

"Ma-ma!"

Like a shot Pomona was on her feet. With arms outspread and her whole figure dilating until she seemed twice as large as usual, I thought she was about to spring over the balcony into the house below. I clutched her, and Euphemia and I, both upon our feet, followed her gaze and saw upon the stage a little girl in gay array, and upturned face. It was the lost Corinne.

Without a word, Pomona made a sudden turn, sprang up the steps behind her, and out upon the lobby, Euphemia and I close behind her. Around and down the steps we swept, from lobby to lobby, amazing the cloak-keepers and attendants, but stopping for nothing; down the grand staircase like an avalanche, almost into the arms of the astonished military sentinels, who, startled from their soldier-like propriety, sprang, muskets in hand, toward us. It was only then that I was able to speak to Pomona, and breathlessly ask her where she was going.

"To the stage-door!" she cried, making a motion to hurl to the ground the soldier before her. But there was no need to go to any stage-door.

In a moment there rushed along the corridor a lady, dressed apparently in all the colors of the rainbow, and bearing in her arms a child.

There was a quick swoop, and in another moment Pomona had the child.

But clinging to its garments, the lady cried, in excellent English, but with some foreign tinge:--

"Where is my child you stole?"

"Stole your grandmother!" briefly e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Pomona. And then, in grand forgetfulness of everything but her great joy, she folded her arms around her child, and standing like a statue of motherly content, she seemed, in our eyes, to rise to the regions of the caryatides and the ceiling frescos. Not another word she spoke, and amid the confusion of questions and exclamations, and the wild demands of the lady, Euphemia and I contrived to make her understand the true state of the case, and that her child was probably at our lodgings. Then there were great exclamations and quick commands; and, directly, four of us were in a carriage whirling to our hotel. All the way, Pomona sat silent with her child clasped tightly, while Euphemia and I kept up an earnest but unsatisfactory conversation with the lady; for, as to this strange affair, we could tell each other but little. We learned from the lady, who was an a.s.sistant soprano at the Grand Opera, how Corinne came to her in Paris, and how she had always kept her with her, even dressing her up, and taking her on the stage in that great act where as many men, women, and children as possible were brought upon the scene. When she heard the cry of Corinne, she knew the child had seen its mother, and then, whether the opera went on or not, it mattered not to her.

When the carriage stopped, the three women sprang out at once, and how they all got through the door, I cannot tell. There was such a tremendous ring at the gate of the court that the old _concierge_, who opened it by pulling a wire in his little den somewhere in the rear, must have been dreadfully startled in his sleep. We rushed through the court and up the stairs past our apartments to Pomona's room; and there in the open doorway stood Jonas, his coat off, his sandy hair in wild confusion, his face radiant, and in his hands Little Kensington in her nightgown.

"I knew by the row on the stairs you'd brought her home," he exclaimed, as Little Kensington was s.n.a.t.c.hed from him and Corinne was put into his arms.

We left Jonas and Pomona to their wild delight, and I accompanied the equally happy lady to the opera house, where I took occasion to reclaim the wraps which we had left behind in our sudden flight.

When the police of Paris were told to give up their search for an absconding nurse accompanied by a child, and to look for one without such enc.u.mbrance, they found her. From this woman was obtained much of the story I have told, and a good deal more was drawn out, little by little, from Corinne, who took especial pleasure in telling, in brief sentences, how she had ousted the lazy baby from the carriage, and how she had scratched her own legs in getting in.

"What I'm proud of," said Pomona, "is that she did it all herself. It wasn't none of your common stealin's an' findin's; an' it aint everywhere you'll see a child that kin git itself lost back of Prince Albert's monnyment, an' git itself found at the operer in Paris, an'

attend to both ends of the case itself. An', after all, them two high notes of hern was more good than Perkins's Indelible Dab."

DERELICT.

A TALE OF THE WAYWARD SEA.

I.

On the 25th of May, 1887, I sat alone upon the deck of the _Sparhawk_, a three-masted schooner, built, according to a description in the cabin, at Sackport, Me. I was not only alone on the deck, but I was alone on the s.h.i.+p. The _Sparhawk_ was a "derelict"; that is, if a vessel with a man on board of her can be said to be totally abandoned.

I had now been on board the schooner for eight days. How long before that she had been drifting about at the mercy of the winds and currents I did not then know, but I discovered afterward that during a cyclone early in April she had been abandoned by her entire crew, and had since been reported five times to the hydrographic office of the Navy Department in Was.h.i.+ngton, and her positions and probable courses duly marked on the pilot chart.

She had now become one of that little fleet abandoned at sea for one cause or another, and floating about this way and that, as the wild winds blew or the ocean currents ran. Voyaging without purpose, as if manned by the spirits of ignorant landsmen, sometimes backward and forward over comparatively small ocean s.p.a.ces, and sometimes drifting for many months and over thousands of miles, these derelicts form, at night and in fog, one of the dangers most to be feared by those who sail upon the sea.