d out his hands and looked at the clock
on the wall.

"Presently," he said.

"Oh," I said, "you'll speak it presently. That's splendid. But why not
speak it right away?"

The tailor again looked at the clock with a despairing shrug.

"At twelve o'clock," he said.

"Come now," I said, "be fair about this. I don't want to wait an hour
and a half for you to begin to talk. Let's get at it right now."

But he was obdurate. He merely shook his head and repeated:

"Speak English at twelve o'clock."

Judging that he must be under a vow of abstinence during the morning, I
tried another idea.

"Allemand?" I asked, "German, Deutsch, eh! speak that?"

Again the French tailor shook his head, this time with great decision.

"Not till four o'clock," he said.

This was evidently final. He might be lax enough to talk English at
noon, but he refused point-blank to talk German till he had his full
strength.

I was just wondering whether there wasn't some common sense in this
after all, when the solution of it struck me.

"Ah!" I said, speaking in French, "tres bong! there is somebody who
comes at twelve, quelqu'un qui vient a midi, who can talk English."

[Illustration: The tailor shrugged his shoulders.]

"Precisement," said the tailor, wreathed in smiles and waving his tape
coquettishly about his neck.

"You flirt!" I said, "but let's get to business. I want a suit, un soot,
un complete, complet, comprenez-vous, veston, gilet, une pair de
panteloon--everything--do you get it?"

The tailor was now all animation.

"Ah, certainement," he said, "monsieur desires a fantasy, une fantaisie,
is it not?"

A fantasy! Good heavens!

The man had evidently got the idea from my naming so many things that I
wanted a suit for a fancy dress carnival.

"Fantasy nothing!" I said--"pas de fantaisie! un soot anglais"--here an
idea struck me and I tapped myself on the chest--"like this," I said,
"comme ceci."

"Bon," said the tailor, now perfectly satisfied, "une fantaisie comme
porte monsieur."

Here I got mad.

"Blast you," I said, "this is not a fantaisie. Do you take me for a
dragon-fly, or what? Now come, let's get this fantaisie business
cleared up. This is what I want"--and here I put my hand on a roll of
very quiet grey cloth on the counter.

"Tres bien," said the tailor, "une fantaisie."

I stared at him.

"Is _that_ a fantaisie?"

"Certainement, monsieur."

"Now," I said, "let's go into it further," and I t