oke he lighted his clay pipe, the bowl of which represented
Abd-el-Kader's face, very much colored, save the eyes and turban, which
were of white enamel.

The engraver's wife, a dumpy little woman with merry eyes, soon joined
her husband, pushing before her two little girls; one, the smaller of the
two, was two years younger than Amedee; the other was ten years old, and
already had a wise little air. She was the pianist who practised one hour
a day Marcailhou's Indiana Waltz.

The children chattered through the trellis that divided the balcony in
two parts. Louise, the elder of the girls, knew how to read, and told the
two little ones very beautiful stories: Joseph sold by his brethren;
Robinson Crusoe discovering the footprints of human beings.

Amedee, who now has gray hair upon his temples, can still remember the
chills that ran down his back at the moment when the wolf, hidden under
coverings and the grandmother's cap, said, with a gnashing of teeth, to
little Red Riding Hood: "All the better to eat you with, my child."

It was almost dark then upon the terrace. It was all delightfully
terrible!

During this time the two families, in their respective parts of the
balcony, were talking familiarly together. The Violettes were quiet
people, and preferred rather to listen to their neighbors than to talk
themselves, making brief replies for politeness' sake--"Ah!" "Is it
possible?" "You are right."

The Gerards liked to talk. Madame Gerard, who was a good housekeeper,
discussed questions of domestic economy; telling, for example, how she
had been out that day, and had seen, upon the Rue du Bac, some merino: "A
very good bargain, I assure you, Madame, and very wide!" Or perhaps the
engraver, who was a simple politician, after the fashion of 1848, would
declare that we must accept the Republic, "Oh, not the red-hot, you know,
but the true, the real one!" Or he would wish that Cavaignac had been
elected President at the September balloting; although he himself was
then engraving--one must live, after all--a portrait of Prince Louis
Napoleon, destined for the electoral platform. M. and Madame Violette let
them talk; perhaps even they did not always pay attention to the
conversation. When it was dark they held each other's hands and gazed at
the stars.

These lovely, cool, autumnal evenings, upon the balcony, under the starry
heavens, are the most distant of all Amedee's memories. Then there was a
break in his memory,