Page:The Yellow Book - 03.djvu/89

 When I am King

By Henry Harland

wandered into a tangle of slummy streets, and began to think it time to inquire my way back to the hotel; then, turning a corner, I came out upon the quays. At one hand there was the open night, with the dim forms of many ships, and stars hanging in a web of masts and cordage; at the other, the garish illumination of a row of public-houses: Au Bonheur du Matelot, Café de la Marine, Brasserie des Quatre Vents, and so forth; rowdy-looking shops enough, designed for the entertainment of the forecastle. But they seemed to promise something in the nature of local colour; and I entered the Brasserie des Quatre Vents.

It proved to be a brasserie-à-femmes; you were waited upon by ladies, lavishly rouged and in regardless toilets, who would sit with you and chat, and partake of refreshments at your expense. The front part of the room was filled up with tables, where half a hundred customers, talking at the top of their voices, raised a horrid din—sailors, soldiers, a few who might be clerks or tradesmen, and an occasional workman in his blouse. Beyond, there was a cleared space, reserved for dancing, occupied by a dozen