Page:Malot - Nobodys Boy, Crewe-Jones, 1916.djvu/175

 Forty francs in this village! in the cold, and with such poor resources at our command!

While I stayed at home with Pretty-Heart, Vitalis found a hall in the public market, for an out-of-door performance was out of the question. He wrote the announcements and stuck them up all over the village. With a few planks of wood he arranged a stage, and bravely spent his last fifty sous to buy some candles, which he cut in half so as to double the lights.

From the window of our room I saw him come and go, tramping back and forth in the snow. I wondered anxiously what program he could make. I was soon enlightened on this subject, for along came the town crier of the village, wearing a scarlet cap, and stopped before the inn. After a magnificent roll of his drum he read out our program.

Vitalis had made the most extravagant promises! There was to be present a world-renowned artist—that was Capi—and a young singer who was a marvel; the marvel was myself. But the most interesting part of the farce was that there was no fixed price for the entertainment. We relied upon the generosity of the audience, and the public need not pay until after it had seen, heard, and applauded.

That seemed to me extraordinarily bold. Who was going to applaud us? Capi certainly deserved to be celebrated, but I ... I was not at all convinced that I was a marvel.

Although Pretty-Heart was very ill at this moment,