CHAPTER III
FROM MISS VIOLET RAY, IN PARIS, TO MISS AGNES RICH, IN NEW YORK.
September 21st.
We had hardly got here when father received a telegram saying he
would have to come right back to New York. It was for something
about his business--I don't know exactly what; you know I never
understand those things, never want to. We had just got settled at
the hotel, in some charming rooms, and mother and I, as you may
imagine, were greatly annoyed. Father is extremely fussy, as you
know, and his first idea, as soon as he found he should have to go
back, was that we should go back with him. He declared he would
never leave us in Paris alone, and that we must return and come out
again. I don't know what he thought would happen to us; I suppose he
thought we should be too extravagant. It's father's theory that we
are always running up bills, whereas a little observation would show
him that we wear the same old RAGS FOR MONTHS. But father has no
observation; he has nothing but theories. Mother and I, however,
have, fortunately, a great deal of PRACTICE, and we succeeded in
making him understand that we wouldn't budge from Paris, and that we
would rather be chopped into small pieces than cross that dreadful
ocean again. So, at last, he decided to go back alone, and to leave
us here for three months. But, to show you how fussy he is, he
refused to let us stay at the hotel, and insisted that we should go
into a FAMILY. I don't know what put such an idea into his head,
unless it was some advertisement that he saw in one of the American
papers that are published here.
There are families here who receive American and English people to
live with them, under the pretence of teaching them French. You may
imagine what people they are--I mean the families themselves. But
the Americans who choose this peculiar manner of seeing Paris must be
actually just as bad. Mother and I were horrified, and declared that
main force should not remove us from the hotel. But father has a way
of arriving at his ends which is more efficient than violence. He
worries and fusses; he "nags," as we used to say at school; and, when
mother and I are quite worn out, his triumph is assured. Mother is
usually worn out more easily than I, and she ends by siding with
father; so that, at last, when they combine their forces against poor
little me, I have to succumb. You should have heard the way father
went on about this "family" plan; he talked to every one he saw about
it; he used to go round to the banker's and talk to the people there-
-the people in the post-office; he used to try and exchange ideas
about it with the waiters at the hotel. He said it would be more
safe, more respectable, more economical; that I should perfect my
French; that mother would learn how a French household is conducted;
that he should feel more easy, and five hundred reasons more. They
were none of them good, but that made no difference. It's all
humbug, his talking about economy, when every one knows that business
in America has completely recovered, that the prostration is all
over, and that immense fortunes are being made. We have been
economising for the last five years, and I supposed we came abroad to
reap the benefits of it.
As for my French, it is quite as perfect as I want it to be. (I
assure you I am often surprised at my own fluency, and, when I get a
little more practice in the genders and the idioms, I shall do very
well in this respect.) To make a long story short, however, father
carried his point, as usual; mother basely deserted me at the last
moment, and, after holding out alone for three days, I told them to
do with me what they pleased! Father lost three steamers in
succession by remaining in Paris to argue with me. You know he is
like the schoolmaster in Goldsmith's "Deserted Village"--"e'en though
vanquished, he would argue still." He and mother went to look at some
seventeen families (they had got the addresses somewhere), while I
retired to my sofa, and would have nothing to do with it. At last
they made arrangements, and I was transported to the establishment
from which I now write you. I write you from the bosom of a Parisian
menage--from the depths of a second-rate boarding-house.
Father only left Paris after he had seen us what he calls comfortably
settled here, and had informed Madame de Maisonrouge (the mistress of
the establishment--the head of the "family") that he wished my French
pronunciation especially attended to. The pronunciation, as it
happens, is just what I am most at home in; if he had said my genders
or my idioms there would have been some sense. But poor father has
no tact, and this defect is especially marked since he has been in
Europe. He will be absent, however, for three months, and mother and
I shall breathe more freely; the situation will be less intense. I
must confess that we breathe more freely than I expected, in this
place, where we have been for about a week. I was sure, before we
came, that it would prove to be an establishment of the LOWEST
DESCRIPTION; but I must say that, in this respect, I am agreeably
disappointed. The French are so clever that they know even how to
manage a place of this kind. Of course it is very disagreeable to
live with strangers, but as, after all, if I were not staying with
Madame de Maisonrouge I should not be living in the Faubourg St.
Germain, I don't know that from the point of view of exclusiveness it
is any great loss to be here.
Our rooms are very prettily arranged, and the table is remarkably
good. Mamma thinks the whole thing--the place and the people, the
manners and customs--very amusing; but mamma is very easily amused.
As for me, you know, all that I ask is to be let alone, and not to
have people's society forced upon me. I have never wanted for
society of my own choosing, and, so long as I retain possession of my
faculties, I don't suppose I ever shall. As I said, however, the
place is very well managed, and I succeed in doing as I please,
which, you know, is my most cherished pursuit. Madame de Maisonrouge
has a great deal of tact--much more than poor father. She is what
they call here a belle femme, which means that she is a tall, ugly
woman, with style. She dresses very well, and has a great deal of
talk; but, though she is a very good imitation of a lady, I never see
her behind the dinner-table, in the evening, smiling and bowing, as
the people come in, and looking all the while at the dishes and the
servants, without thinking of a dame de comptoir blooming in a corner
of a shop or a restaurant. I am sure that, in spite of her fine
name, she was once a dame de comptoir. I am also sure that, in spite
of her smiles and the pretty things she says to every one, she hates
us all, and would like to murder us. She is a hard, clever
Frenchwoman, who would like to amuse herself and enjoy her Paris, and
she must be bored to death at passing all her time in the midst of
stupid English people who mumble broken French at her. Some day she
will poison the soup or the vin rouge; but I hope that will not be
until after mother and I shall have left her. She has two daughters,
who, except that one is decidedly pretty, are meagre imitations of
herself.
The "family," for the rest, consists altogether of our beloved
compatriots, and of still more beloved Englanders. There is an
Englishman here, with his sister, and they seem to be rather nice
people. He is remarkably handsome, but excessively affected and
patronising, especially to us Americans; and I hope to have a chance
of biting his head off before long. The sister is very pretty, and,
apparently, very nice; but, in costume, she is Britannia incarnate.
There is a very pleasant little Frenchman--when they are nice they
are charming--and a German doctor, a big blonde man, who looks like a
great white bull; and two Americans, besides mother and me. One of
them is a young man from Boston,--an aesthetic young man, who talks
about its being "a real Corot day," etc., and a young woman--a girl,
a female, I don't know what to call her--from Vermont, or Minnesota,
or some such place. This young woman is the most extraordinary
specimen of artless Yankeeism that I ever encountered; she is really
too horrible. I have been three times to Clementine about your
underskirt, etc.
