Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1893-10-12


jug before dinner-time and was snap
piSh TO her customers all the rest OF
the day.
What Sata1l-like PRIDE she e4
claimed, thinking Of her favorite patron
and then she muttered remark which
might have found place in the col
umns Of the Pere Duchene.
She cried when she went to bed that
night cried and Sobbed. and sWOre al
oath or two by way of solace, before
she laid her head ON her pillow, think
ing that Castor Mortemar would come
no more to the little table at the end
of the shop. But at the usual time he
walked into her shop, and sat him
self down with an imperturbable Wis
Iage. She served his coffee as carefully
rs ever, but said never a word He
read a newspaper while he breakfast
ed, paid, and vert, without word on
his part
Next morning there was a bunch Of
daffOdils on the little table Il bunch
Of yellow bloom lighting up the shad-
oWy corner. SuZOn had trudged to the
| tiOWer-market before she opened her
shop, to buy these spring flowers for
! the man she loved. Yes, she loved him.
and meant to marry him if she could
! He was Il gentleman, and she canaille
not the gutter throne it yonder on the
| side Of the Seine, in the Bots, in the
Pare Monceau-the gutter made glori-
Gus in silks and satins, driving thor
| Oughbred horses, scattering their lovers
substance in waves of gold? Did not
I'LL that was nOblest in the land lay it
self down and grovel ut the feet Of the
gutter? And her gentleman was poor
and friendless; he lived in a garrett and
toiled for pittance. Surely he would
be willing and glad to marry her, when
he knew that she had saved money,
and had her little investments in the
public funds.
| He smiled at sight Of the first flowers
OF spring, looking UP at the widow
saw that she was smiling too. All her
sullen gloom bad melted 1T sight OF
him. She was 50 glad he had not for
saken the shop. Perhaps it would have
hurt her even more than his desertion
to have known how insignificant Il fig
ure she made in his life, and how little
ne had thought about yesterdays dis
pute.
He asked her the news, and her
whole face beamed at the sound of his
voice She prattled away gally for the
rest of the hour, and considered every
CtEer ustomer an intruder while
Castor sat at his little table.
You ought to put up Il placard in
your window, with .'Relache" upon it,
when Monsieur is here said a grumpy
porter to whom she had served pat
of butter with Scant civility, and whose
keen eyes saw the state of affairs.
This kind of thing went on for more
than a year. Now and again, when
CASTOR was in luck and had made Il
few francs more than his ordinary
earnings from the newspapers, he
rewarded the little widows attentions
by taking her to Il theatre, and giving
her an ice or Il supper in the Passage
J0uffroy before he escorted her home.
He treated her en- grand Seigneur on
these occasions, and these evenings
were to Suzon Michel as nights spent
i'll paradise; hours to dream about for
weeks after they were gone, to long
f0l with a passionate longing. Yet
they brought her no nearer to the man
she loved or to the realisation of her
hopes. Not n word was ever spoken of
love or marriage. When they parted
on the steps of the cremclie, while the
bells of Notre Dame were Ginning one
of the quarters after midnight they
were as far apart as ever. If she was
ever to be Madame Mortemar the offer
OF marriage must come from her own
lips. SuZon thought; and she would
have ShlIlnk from telling the man Of
her choice of those snug little invest
ments, and her willingness to share
her economies with him. Feminine
delicacy would not have hindered such
IN avowal; but there was something in
the man himself which sealed her lips
CASTOR was as cold as ice, as calm
rs marble. He had that amiable I'm
guor Of speech and manner which clever
young men are apt to affect until it be-
comes Il second nnture. He talked
like a man who had lived through every
experience that life could offer to re-
probate youth, who had grown old in
evil before Time had written Il wrinkle
ON his brow.
"Ah, but he has lived, that YOUTH
said the knowing ones of the quarter.
He has sQuandered the paternal for
tune Oh actresses and cOcottes, and
now he has to write for his bread
The fact was that CASTOR Mortemar
had never had napoleon to bestow
upon anybody, for good or evil. He
had worked for his daily bread ever
since he left the school of Albert the
Great, where he had been one of the
] brightest pupils Of the good Domini-
/ cans He had never been rich enough
to be profiigate in a grand way; and
to cheap vice. He was. like Alfred de
| MuSSet, Il dandy born, created with re-
| fined tastes and lofty aspirati lions; but
! poverty had embittered him. He had
fed his mind with the writings of Villon
and Voltaire and Rousseau, Theophile
| Gautier, MuSSet, Baudelaire and
Fiaubert. He was a cynic to the mar
row of his bones. He tried to srrpass
! Noltaire in acrimony, Rousseau in dis
! content, and dashed himself into fury
when he wrote about the great ones
on the earth.