of whose piratical kit contrasted with his suavity of manner, sitting with military precision on a straight-backed chair; and Madame Bolivard standing in a far corner of the room; her bare arms crossed above her blue apron, and watching the scene with an air of kindly proprietorship.  They spoke in French, for only one word of English had Hegisippe and his aunt between them, and that being “Howdodogoddam” was the exclusive possession of the former.  Emmy gave utterance now and then to peculiar vocables which she had learned at school, and which Hegisippe declared to be the purest Parisian he had ever heard an Englishwoman use, while Septimus spoke very fair French indeed.  Hegisippe would twirl his little brown mustache—­he was all brown, skin and eyes and close-cropped hair, and even the skull under the hair—­and tell of his military service and of the beautiful sunshine of Algiers and, when his aunt was out of the room, of his Arcadian love affairs.  She served in a wine shop in the Rue des Francs-Bouchers.  When was he going to get married?  At Emmy’s question he laughed, with a wave of his cigarette, and a clank of his bayonet against the leg of the chair.  On a sou a day?  Time enough for that when he had made his fortune.  His mother then would doubtless find him a suitable wife with a dowry.  When his military service was over he was going to be a waiter.  When he volunteered this bit of information Emmy gave a cry of surprise.  This dashing, swaggering desperado of a fellow a waiter!

“I shall never understand this country!” she cried.

“When one has good introductions and knows how to comport oneself, one makes much”—­and he rubbed his thumb and fingers together, according to the national code of pantomime.

And then his hosts would tell him about England and the fogs, wherein he was greatly interested; or Septimus would discourse to him of inventions, the weak spot in which his shrewd intelligence generally managed to strike, and then Septimus would run his fingers through this hair and say, “God bless my soul, I never thought of that,” and Emmy would laugh; or else they talked politics.  Hegisippe, being a Radical, fiche’d himself absolutely of the Pope and the priests.  To be kind to one’s neighbors and act as a good citizen summed up his ethical code.  He was as moral as any devout Catholic.

“What about the girl in the Rue des Francs-Bouchers?” asked Emmy.

“If I were a good Catholic, I would have two, for then I could get absolution,” he cried gaily, and laughed immoderately at his jest.

The days of his visits were marked red in Emmy’s calendar.

“I wish I were a funny beggar, and had lots of conversation like our friend Cruchot, and could make you laugh,” said Septimus one day, when the taedium vitae lay heavy on her.

“If you had a sense of humor you wouldn’t be here,” she replied, with some bitterness.

Septimus rubbed his thin hands together thoughtfully.