And whose was the sixteenth? She didn"t tell. It was doubtless the first. Perhaps everybody knew, for no one was surprised. Even Caniveau kept mum.
But Belhomme began to moan again:
"Oh-oh-oh! It"s scratching about in the bottom of my ear! Oh, dear, oh, dear!"
The coach just then stopped at the Cafe Polyto. The priest said:
"If someone were to pour a little water into your ear, it might perhaps drive it out. Do you want to try?"
"Sure! I am willing."
And everybody got out in order to witness the operation. The priest asked for a bowl, a napkin and a gla.s.s of water, then he told the teacher to hold the patient"s head over on one side, and, as soon as the liquid should have entered the ear, to turn his head over suddenly on the other side.
But Caniveau, who was already peering into Belhomme"s ear to see if he couldn"t discover the beast, shouted:
"Gosh! What a mess! You"ll have to clear that out, old man. Your rabbit could never get through that; his feet would stick."
The priest in turn examined the pa.s.sage and saw that it was too narrow and too congested for him to attempt to expel the animal. It was the teacher who cleared out this pa.s.sage by means of a match and a bit of cloth. Then, in the midst of the general excitement, the priest poured into the pa.s.sage half a gla.s.s of water, which trickled over the face through the hair and down the neck of the patient. Then the schoolmaster quickly twisted the head round over the bowl, as though he were trying to unscrew it. A couple of drops dripped into the white bowl. All the pa.s.sengers rushed forward. No insect had come out.
However, Belhomme exclaimed: "I don"t feel anything any more." The priest triumphantly exclaimed: "Certainly it has been drowned." Everybody was happy and got back into the coach.
But hardly had they started when Belhomme began to cry out again. The bug had aroused itself and had become furious. He even declared that it had now entered his head and was eating his brain. He was howling with such contortions that Poirat"s wife, thinking him possessed by the devil, began to cry and to cross herself. Then, the pain abating a little, the sick man began to tell how it was running round in his ear. With his finger he imitated the movements of the body, seeming to see it, to follow it with his eyes: "There is goes up again! Oh-oh-oh-what torture!"
Caniveau was getting impatient. "It"s the water that is making the bug angry. It is probably more accustomed to wine."
Everybody laughed, and he continued: "When we get to the Cafe Bourbeux, give it some brandy, and it won"t bother you any more, I wager."
But Belhomme could contain himself no longer; he began howling as though his soul were being torn from his body. The priest was obliged to hold his head for him. They asked Cesaire Horlaville to stop at the nearest house. It was a farmhouse at the side of the road. Belhomme was carried into it and laid on the kitchen table in order to repeat the operation. Caniveau advised mixing brandy and water in order to benumb and perhaps kill the insect. But the priest preferred vinegar.
They poured the liquid in drop by drop this time, that it might penetrate down to the bottom, and they left it several minutes in the organ that the beast had chosen for its home.
A bowl had once more been brought; Belhomme was turned over bodily by the priest and Caniveau, while the schoolmaster was tapping on the healthy ear in order to empty the other.
Cesaire Horlaville himself, whip in hand, had come in to observe the proceedings.
Suddenly, at the bottom of the bowl appeared a little brown spot, no bigger than a tiny seed. However, it was moving. It was a flea! First there were cries of astonishment and then shouts of laughter. A flea! Well, that was a good joke, a mighty good one! Caniveau was slapping his thigh, Cesaire Horlaville snapped his whip, the priest laughed like a braying donkey, the teacher cackled as though he were sneezing, and the two women were giving little screams of joy, like the clucking of hens.
Belhomme had seated himself on the table and had taken the bowl between his knees; he was observing, with serious attention and a vengeful anger in his eye, the conquered insect which was twisting round in the water. He grunted, "You rotten little beast!" and he spat on it.
The driver, wild with joy, kept repeating: "A flea, a flea, ah! there you are, d.a.m.ned little flea, d.a.m.ned little flea, d.a.m.ned little flea!" Then having calmed down a little, he cried: "Well, back to the coach! We"ve lost enough time."
DISCOVERY
The steamer was crowded with people and the crossing promised to be good. I was going from Havre to Trouville.
The ropes were thrown off, the whistle blew for the last time, the whole boat started to tremble, and the great wheels began to revolve, slowly at first, and then with ever-increasing rapidity.
We were gliding along the pier, black with people. Those on board were waving their handkerchiefs, as though they were leaving for America, and their friends on sh.o.r.e were answering in the same manner.
The big July sun was shining down on the red parasols, the light dresses, the joyous faces and on the ocean, barely stirred by a ripple. When we were out of the harbor, the little vessel swung round the big curve and pointed her nose toward the distant sh.o.r.e which was barely visible through the early morning mist. On our left was the broad estuary of the Seine, her muddy water, which never mingles with that of the ocean, making large yellow streaks clearly outlined against the immense sheet of the pure green sea.
As soon as I am on a boat I feel the need of walking to and fro, like a sailor on watch. Why? I do not know. Therefore I began to thread my way along the deck through the crowd of travellers. Suddenly I heard my name called. I turned around. I beheld one of my old friends, Henri Sidoine, whom I had not seen for ten years.
We shook hands and continued our walk together, talking of one thing or another. Suddenly Sidoine, who had been observing the crowd of pa.s.sengers, cried out angrily:
"It"s disgusting, the boat is full of English people!"
It was indeed full of them. The men were standing about, looking over the ocean with an all-important air, as though to say: "We are the English, the lords of the sea! Here we are!"
The young girls, formless, with shoes which reminded one of the naval constructions of their fatherland, wrapped in multi-colored shawls, were smiling vacantly at the magnificent scenery. Their small heads, planted at the top of their long bodies, wore English hats of the strangest build.
And the old maids, thinner yet, opening their characteristic jaws to the wind, seemed to threaten one with their long, yellow teeth. On pa.s.sing them, one could notice the smell of rubber and of tooth wash.
Sidoine repeated, with growing anger:
"Disgusting! Can we never stop their coming to France?"
I asked, smiling:
"What have you got against them? As far as I am concerned, they don"t worry me."
He snapped out:
"Of course they don"t worry you! But I married one of them."
I stopped and laughed at him.
"Go ahead and tell me about it. Does she make you very unhappy?"
He shrugged his shoulders.
"No, not exactly."
"Then she-is not true to you?"
"Unfortunately, she is. That would be cause for a divorce, and I could get rid of her."
"Then I"m afraid I don"t understand!"
"You don"t understand? I"m not surprised. Well, she simply learned how to speak French-that"s all! Listen.
"I didn"t have the least desire of getting married when I went to spend the summer at Etretat two years ago. There is nothing more dangerous than watering-places. You have no idea how it suits young girls. Paris is the place for women and the country for young girls.
"Donkey rides, surf-bathing, breakfast on the gra.s.s, all these things are traps set for the marriageable man. And, really, there is nothing prettier than a child about eighteen, running through a field or picking flowers along the road.