Page:Eekhoud - The New Carthage.djvu/156

128 of a wharf rat, upon his head, he asked the price. She looked at him with so amusing and sincere an air of consternation that he could no longer control himself. While she gave him change for a twenty-franc note with the haste of one who would willingly be rid of a suspicious customer, he, on the contrary, took his time, could not finish looking at himself in the mirror, or adjusting his purchase in the most impudent and flippant manner.

Finally he planked himself down comically, his hands on his hips, before the shopkeeper, and looked her up and down fixedly. And when, nettled by his gaze, the good woman changed color, recognizing in his eyes a familiar expression, Laurent abruptly threw his arms about her neck. With a little cry she had already opened her arms to him.

"It is I, Siska, I. Laurent Paridael, your Lorki!"

"Lorki! Monsieur Laurent! It isn't possible!" the good soul exclaimed.

She released him, stepped back to admire him, hugged him again, uttering over and over again:

"What an old rogue! What a child to make a fool of me so seriously!"

However, at Siska's cries of joy, Vincent had run in, no less agreeably surprised than his wife. They took Laurent by the shoulders and pushed him into their little living room.

This retreat resembled a cabin with a vengeance. During the day a window as narrow as a porthole admitted a dull, filtered light as though it were submerged under water. Its industrious occupants solved anew each day the problem of making it hold the greatest possible number of people and objects. There was not an empty inch of space. The walls of the room were