"More alluring, than Bond Street?"
"More so than any in the world," she affirmed, with the religious fervor which always characterizes her tone when she speaks of Paris.
The very leather of her purse fairly squeaks with ecstasy when she thinks of Paris.
"Heavens!" I murmured, with awe, for whenever she won"t go to Du Maurier"s grave with me, and when I won"t do the crown jewels in the Tower with her, we always compromise amiably on Bond Street, and come home beaming with joy.
"We might go now just to look," I said. "I have the addresses of some very good lodgings."
"We"ll take a cab by the hour," said she, putting her hat on before the mirror, and turning her head on one side to view her completed handiwork.
"Now take off that watch and that belt and that chatelaine if you don"t want these harpies to think we are "rich Americans" (how I have come to hate that phrase over here!), because they will charge accordingly."
She looked at me with genuine admiration.
"Do you know, dear, you are really clever at times?"
I colored with pleasure. It is so seldom that she finds anything practical in me to praise.
"Now mind, we are just going to look," she cautioned, as we rang a bell. "We must not do anything in a hurry."
We came out half an hour afterwards and got into the cab without looking at each other.
"It was very unbusinesslike," said she, severely. "You never do anything right."
"But it was so gloriously impudent of us," I urged. "First, we wanted lodgings. This was a boarding-house. Second, we wanted two bed-rooms and a drawing-room. They had only one drawing-room in the house; could we have that? Yes, we could. So we took their whole first floor, and made them promise to serve our breakfasts in bed, and our other meals in their best drawing-room, and turned a boarding-house into a lodging-house, all inside of half an hour. It was lovely!"
"It was bad business," said she. "We could have got it for less, but you are always in such a hurry. If you like a thing, and anybody says you may have it for fifty, you always say, "I"ll give you seventy-five," You"re so afraid to think a thing over."
"Second thoughts are never as much fun as first thoughts," I urged.
"Second thoughts are always so sensible and reasonable and approved of."
"How do you know?" asked my sister, witheringly. "You never waited for any."
The next day we moved. Everybody said our rooms were charming, and that they were cheap, for I told how much we paid, much to my sister"s disgust. She is _such_ a lady.
"We have cut down our expenses so much," I said, looking around on the drab walls and the dun-colored carpets, "don"t you think we might have a few flowers?"
"I believe you took this place for the balcony, so that you could put daisies around the edge and in the window-boxes!" she cried.
"No, I didn"t. But the houses in London are so pretty with their flowers. Don"t you think we might have a few?"
"Well, go and get them. I"ve got to write the home letter to-day if it is to catch the Southampton boat."
I came home with six huge palms, two June roses, some pink heather, a jar of marguerites, and I had ordered the balcony and window-boxes filled. My sister helped me to place them, but when her back was turned I arranged them over again. I can"t tie a veil on the way she can, but I can arrange flowers to look--well, I won"t boast.
Our landladies were two middle-aged, comfortable sisters. We called them "The Tabbies," meaning no disrespect to cats, either. I thought they took rather too violent an interest in our affairs, but I said nothing until one day after we had been settled nearly a week. I was seated in my own private room trying to write. My sister came in, evidently disturbed by something.
"Do you know," she said, "that our landlady just asked me how much you paid for those strawberries? And when I told her she said that that made them come to fourpence apiece, and that they were very dear. Now, how did she know that they were strawberries, or how many were in each box, I"d like to know?"
"Probably she opened the package," I said.
"Exactly what I think. Now I won"t stand that. And then she asked me not to set things on the mahogany tables. It"s just because we are Americans! She never would dare treat English people that way. She has not sufficient respect for us."
"Then tell her to be more respectful; tell her we are very highly thought of at home."
"She wouldn"t care for that."
"Then tell her we have a few rich relations and quite a number of influential friends."
"Pooh!"
"And if that does not fetch her, there is nothing left to do but to be quite rude to her, and then she will know that we belong to the very highest society. But what do you care what a middle-cla.s.s landlady thinks, just so she lets you alone?"
My sister meditated, and I added:
"If you would just snub her once, in your most ladylike way, it would settle her. As for me, I am satisfied to think we are paying much less, and we are twice as comfortable as we were at the hotel; and we get such good things to eat that our skeletons are filling out, and once more our clothes fit."
"That is so," said she, letting her thoughts wander to the number of hooks in her closet. "We do have more room, and I think our drawing-room with its palms and flowers will look lovely to-morrow."
"Do you think it was wise," she added, "to ask all those men to come at once?"
"Oh yes; let them all come together, then we can weed them out afterwards. You never can have too many men."
"I am glad you have asked in a few women."
"Why?" I demanded. "Are you insinuating that we are not equal to a handful of Englishmen? Recall the Boston tea-party. We will give them the first strawberries of the season, and plenty of tea. Feed them; that"s the main thing," I said, firmly, taking up my pen and looking steadily at her.
"I"ll go," she said, hastily. "Do you have to go to the bank to-day?
You know to-morrow we must pay our weekly bill."
"It won"t be much," I said, cheerfully; "I am sure I have enough."
The next day the bill came. Our landlady sent it up on the breakfast-tray. I opened it, then shrieked for my sister. It covered four pages of note-paper.
"For heaven"s sake! what is the matter?" she cried. "Has anything happened to Billy?"
"Billy! This thing is not an American letter. It is the bill for our cheap lodgings. Look at it! Look at the extras--gas, coals, washing bed--linen, washing table--linen, washing towels, kitchen fires, service, oil for three lamps, afternoon tea, and three shillings for sundries on the fourth page! What can sundries include? She hasn"t skipped anything but pew-rent."
My sister looked at the total, and buried her face in the pillows to smother a groan.
"Ring the bell," I said; "I want the maid."
"What are you going to do?"
"I"m going to find out what "sundries" are."
She gave the bell-cord such a pull that she broke the wire, and it fell down on her head.
"That, too, will go in the bill. Wrap your handkerchief around your hand and give the wire a jerk. Give it a good one. I don"t care if it brings the police."