The explanation of this manoeuvre was
that they had determined to spend the summer "in some bracing place"; but
in Paris they dropped into a small furnished apartment--a fourth floor in
a third-rate avenue, where there was a smell on the staircase and the
portier was hateful--and passed the next four months in blank indigence.
The better part of this baffled sojourn was for the preceptor and his
pupil, who, visiting the Invalides and Notre Dame, the Conciergerie and
all the museums, took a hundred remunerative rambles. They learned to
know their Paris, which was useful, for they came back another year for a
longer stay, the general character of which in Pemberton's memory to-day
mixes pitiably and confusedly with that of the first. He sees Morgan's
shabby knickerbockers--the everlasting pair that didn't match his blouse
and that as he grew longer could only grow faded. He remembers the
particular holes in his three or four pair of coloured stockings.
Morgan was dear to his mother, but he never was better dressed than was
absolutely necessary--partly, no doubt, by his own fault, for he was as
indifferent to his appearance as a German philosopher.
Pages:
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36