Page:Eekhoud - The New Carthage.djvu/66

38 as the floors of "The Pelican" or "The Mirror," their favorite dance halls. In the evening, the light of many lamps enlivened this multiplied reflection, and added to the noise of many voices and the grinding of the machines, blinded and deafened Laurent each time that he had come to the door of the room. What troubled him most was the sight of all these pretty girls facing him as they stood at their benches. Very abashed and very clumsy, he passed between the long lines of benches and, stepping gingerly to avoid slipping on the glassy floor, he gained the end of the room where Vincent Tilback sat enthroned in a species of pulpit that he termed his "poop."

There, under the protection of his friend, Laurent soon regained his self-possession. He suffered the inquisition of those many dark and brilliant eyes, responded to the smiles upon those shining faces, and gathered his courage sufficiently to approach the polishers and follow the movement of rosy hands as smooth as the stearine itself.

One day Tilbak asked him if he still cared as much for stories as he used to. "Oh! more than ever," exclaimed Laurent. The sailor took from beneath his coat two volumes that had been tightly pressed to his breast, and gave them to the young schoolboy.

"Accept these books as a remembrance from Siska and Vincent," said the good fellow. They were "The Swiss Family Robinson." "I inherited them from a helmsman who died of yellow fever in the Antilles. I do not know how to read, Master Lorki; when I was nine years old I took care of the cows with Siska, and I was a cabin-boy at twelve."

Laurent did not foresee the consequences of