again the castanados' dainty parlor, more dainty than ever. no one there was in evening dress, though with its privacy "modified as the castanados pleased," it had gathered a company of seven.
chester, not yet come, would make an eighth. madame was in her special chair. and here, besides her husband, were both m. and mme. de l'isle, mme. alexandre and scipion beloiseau. the seventh was m. placide dubroca, perfumer; a man of fifty or so, his black hair and mustache inclined to curl and his eyes spirited yet sympathetic. just entered, he was telling how consumed with regret his wife was, to be kept away--by an old promise to an old friend to go with her to that wonderful movie, "les trois mousquetaires," when chester came in and almost at once a general debate on mlle. chapdelaine's manuscript was in full coruscation.
"in the firs' place," one said--though the best place he could seize was the seventeenth--"firs' place of all--competition! my frien's, we cannot hope to nig-otiate with that north in the old manner which we are proud, a few of us yet, to con-tinue in the rue royale. every publisher----" mme. castanado had a quotation that could not wait: "we got to be 'wise like snake' an' innocent like pigeon'!'"
"precizely! every publisher approach' mus' know he's bidding agains' every other! maybe they are honess men, and if so they'll be rij-oice'!"
a non-listener was trying to squeeze in: "and sec'--and sec'--and secon' thing--if not firs'--is guarantee! they mus' pay so much profit in advance. else it be better to publish without a publisher, and with advertisement' front and back! tiffany, royal baking-powder, ivory soap it float'! ten thousand dolla' the page that ladies' 'ome journal get', and if we get even ten dolla' the page--i know a man what make that way three hundred dolla'!"
"he make that net or gross?" some one asked.
"ah! i think, not counting his time sol-iciting those advertisement', he make it nearly net."
chester made show of breaking in and three speakers at once begged him to proceed: "how much of a book," he asked mme. castanado, "will the manuscript make? how long is it?"
she looked falteringly to her husband: "'tis about a foot long, nine inch' wide. marcel, pazz that to monsieur."
the husband complied. chester counted the lines of one of the pages. madame watched him anxiously.
"tha'z too wide?" she inquired.
"it isn't long enough to make a book. to do that would take--oh--seven times as much."
"ah!" madame's voice grew in sweetness as it rose: "so much the better! so much the more room for those advertisement'!--and picture'!"
"and portrait of mademoiselle!" said mme. alexandre, and mme. de l'isle smiled assent.
yet a disappointed silence followed, presently broken by the perfumer: "all the same, what is the matter to make it a pamphlet?"
beloiseau objected: "no, then you compete aggains' those magazine'. but if you permit one of those magazine' to buy it you get the advantage of all the picture' in the whole magazine."
"ah!" several demurred, "and let that magazine swallow whole all those profit' of all those advertisement'!"
chester spoke: "i have an idea--" but others had ideas and the floor besides.
castanado lifted a hand: "frien'--our counsel."
counsel tried again: "i have a conviction that we should first offer this to a magazine--through--yes, of course, through some influential friend. if one doesn't want it another may----"
chorus: "ho! they will all want it! that was not written laz' night! 'tis fivty year' old; they cannot rif-use that!"
"however," chester persisted, "if they should--if all should--i'd advise----"
"frien's," castanado pleaded, "let us hear."
"i should advise that we gather together as many such old narratives as we can find, especially such as can be related to one another----"
"they need not be ril-ated!" cried dubroca. "we are not ril-ated, and yet see! ril-ated? where you are goin' to find them, ril-ated?"
"royal street!" scipion retorted. "royal street is pave' with old narration'!"
"already," said castanado, "we chanze to have three or four. mademoiselle has that story of her grand'mère, and mr. chezter he has--sir, you'll not care if i tell that?--mr. chezter has the sequal to that, and written by his uncle!"
"yes," chester put in, "but ovide landry finds it was printed years ago."
"proof!" proclaimed mme. alexandre, "proof that 'tis good to print ag-ain! the people that read that before, they are mozely dead."
"at the same time," chester responded, rising and addressing the chair, his hostess, "because that is a sequel to the grand'-mère's story, and because this--this west indian episode--is not a sequel and has no sequel, and particularly because we ought to let mademoiselle be first to judge whether my uncle's memorandum is fit company for her two stories, i propose, i say, that before we read this west indian thing we read my uncle's memorandum, and that we send and beg her to come and hear it with us. it's in my pocket."
patter, patter, patter, went a dozen hands.
"marcel," the hostess cried in french, "go!"
"i will go with you," mme. alexandra proposed, "she will never come without me."
"tis but a step," said mme. de l'isle, "the three of us will go together." they went.
those who waited talked on of their city's true stories. the vastest and most monstrous war in human history was smoking and roaring just across the atlantic, and in it they had racial, national, personal interests; but for the moment they left all that aside. "one troub'," dubroca said, "'tis that all those three stone'--and all i can rim-ember--even that story of m'sieu' smith about the fall of the city--1862--they all got in them somewhere, alas! the nigger. the publique they are not any longer pretty easy to fascinate on that subjec'."
"ho!" beloiseau rejoined, "au contraire, he's an advantage! if only you keep him for the back-ground; biccause in the mind of every-body tha'z where he is, and that way he has the advantage to ril-ate those storie' together and----"
mademoiselle came. her arrival, reception, installation near the hostess and opposite chester are good enough untold. if elsewhere in that wide city a like number ever settled down to listen to an untamed writer's manuscript in as sweet content with one another their story ought to be printed. "well," mme. castanado chanted, "commence." and chester read:
