A Summer’s Day
Once I wrote a story of a woman’s day in Paris, a Perfect Day. It had to do with the buying of all the lovely trappings that are the entrappings of the animal which Mr. Shaw believes woman endlessly pursues. One of the animals was in the story, and there was food and moonlight, music and adventure.
I never sold that marvelous tale. For years it has peeked out at me from a certain pigeon hole in my desk with the anguish of a prisoner in the Black Hole of Calcutta, and with as little hope for its liberation into the glad air of a free press. Yet it is with me now in Paris. In that last distracted moment of packing, when all sense of what is needed has left one, it was thrust into a glove case like contraband cigarettes. There may have been some idea of remolding it with a few deceiving touches—make a soldier of the hero probably—but with the “love interest” firmly remaining. There was only one Perfect Day to a woman, I thought.
That was some weeks ago. I am now writing on the back of that romance for lack of paper, writing of another day, wondering as I work if the present day’s adventures will have any quality that might hold the reader’s eye. I dare not ask for the reader’s heart when love does not stalk through the pages.
Paris is now an entrenched camp but one is not awakened by bugles, and the beat of drums is unheard as the troops march through the city. It was the regular “blump-blump” of military boots past my window which possibly aroused me into activity, although the companies crossing from station to cantonment no longer turn the head of the small boy as he rolls his hoop along the Champs Élysées. This troubles me, and I always go to the curb to watch them when I am in the street.
There was an instant’s hesitation before I pulled up the refractory Venetian blind—the right rope so eager to rise, the left so indifferent to its improvement—an instant’s dread. I was afraid “they” would be hopping about even this early in the morning, hopping, hopping—the jerking gait of the mutilated—the little broken waves of a sea of “horizon blue.” But they must have been just getting their faces washed at the Salon, where once we went to see pictures and now find compositions more dire than the newest schools of painting.
On the other side the stretch of chestnuts, the taxicabs, returned to their original mission, were already weaving about in their effort to exterminate each other. Battling at the Marne had been but a slight deviation in their mode of procedure, yet when a cab recently ran down and killed a bewildered soldier impeded by a crutch strange to him, Paris raised its voice in a new cry of rage. Beyond the Champs Élysées, far beyond, rose the Eiffel tower. Capable, immune so far from the attacks of the enemy, its very outlines seem to have taken on a great importance. Once the giant toy of a people who frolicked, it now serves in its swift mission as the emblem of a race more gigantic than we had conceived.
It is not a relieving thought to such of us as still can play, that spirit, whether in the bosom of the boulevardier or his country cousin playing bowls in the cool of the evening, is the same that projects itself brilliantly across the battlefield; that the flash of a woman’s eye as she invites a conquest is the flame upon the alter when sacrifice is needed; that the very gaiety which makes one laugh is a force to endure the deepest pits that have been dug for mankind. Even as I continually struggle with a lump in my throat which I often think should remain with me forever, I dare claim that of all the necessitous qualities in life the spirit of play must be the last to leave a race. Its translation to the gravities of living needs no bellows for the coaxing of the fire. It is ever burning upon the hearth of the happy heart.
The gilded statuary of the bridge of Alexander III, like flaming beacons in the sun’s rays, waved us out and on to the Invalides to see the weekly awarding of medals. It is presumably the gay event of the week as the band plays, and there is some color in the throngs who surge along the colonnades to look into the court of honor. A portion of the great space is now accommodating huge shattered cannon and air craft of the enemy, their massiveness suggesting, as the little glittering medals are pinned upon the soldiers’ breasts, that it is not so easy to be a hero and go a-capturing.
By the judicious wavings of famous autographs we were permitted the upper balcony to sketch the heroic ones within the hollow square formed by soldiers and marines. Directly beneath us stood the band with the brassard of the red cross on their arms, for they are still the stretcher bearers at the front. In the center of the square was a little group of men, seventy perhaps but the space was vast. Some were standing, some seated with stiff stumps of legs sticking out queerly. Here and there a nurse stood by a blind man, and there were white oblong gaps in the line which designated the beds of the paralyzed.
I had set my teeth and said that I must stand it when across the courtyard like a liquid stream of some spilled black portion came the mothers and the wives, who were to wear the ribbon their soldiers had earned in exchange for their lives. Or should there be little sons or daughters they received this wondrous emblem of their fathers’ sacrifice. We could see the concerted white lift of handkerchiefs to the eyes of the black line of women as the general bestowed the honors. But the little children were tranquil.
With the beginning of the distribution the band, for which I had longed that it might give a glow to the war, swung into a blare of triumph. It was the first note of music we had heard in France. And as we all expressed our emotion with abandonment throughout the enlivening strains of “The Washington Post,” I appreciated the infinite wisdom of marching drumless through the streets—of the divine lack of the bugles’ song. For music, no matter its theme, makes happy only those who are already happy. To those who suffer it urges an unloosening of their grief—and grief must not go abroad in France.
There was an end to the drama. The guard of honor marched through the porte, banners flying. It was a happy ending, I suppose, though one might not think so by the triumphal chariots that entered the court to bear away the heroes—chariots with that red emblem emblazoned upon a white disc which would have mystified an early Caesar. But my thoughts were not entirely with the chief actors in the play, rather with the squad of soldiers who had surrounded them, the supers who would have enjoyed medals, too, and upon whom opportunity had not smiled; whose epic of brave deeds may never be read, and who, by chance, may go legless yet ribbonless up the Champs Élysées.
“They” were hopping up the Avenue when we crossed it again, yet we all went on about our daily tasks as one passes the blind man on the corner of Sixth Avenue and Thirty-third Street. He may receive a penny, a twang of the heart strings, but he must be passed to go into the shop. My list was in my purse bearing but a faint resemblance to the demands of other years. I thought as I took it out what confusion of mind would have been my portion had I found it in my purse three summers ago, in what state of madness could any one prepare for a day in Paris such a program as: “Gloves, Hospital 232, furs, workshop for blind, shell combs, see my baby at Orphelinat, hair nets, cigarettes to my soldier, try on gowns, funeral of Am. airman,” and on and on through each day’s great accomplishment to the long quiet night.
Yet to buy freely and even frivolously in France need harass nothing more soulful than a letter of credit, and it was with less of guilt than of fear that I entered the courtyard of my furrier. I turned the button ever so gently with the same dread in my heart that I had suffered in going back to all of my shop keepers of previous summers. Would he still be there? Two years is a long time, and he was a young man. But he was there, wounded in the chest but at work in the expectation of being recalled. He did not want to go back, but of course if he was needed—
And I must lay stress on the magnificence of this hope that he might not have to return to the trenches. I have found many who do not want to go back. Fierce partisans of French courage deny this, reading in my contention a lack of bravery, but to me it is valor of a glorious color. For they do return without resentment, and, what is more difficult in this day of monumental deeds and minute bickerings, without criticism.
Like most of the men who came out of the trenches he had very little to say about them. It amused him to hear that my new fur coat purchased in America is of so fleeting a dye that I must dart into the subway whenever the sun shines. He was laughing quietly as he wished me a cloudy winter upon my descending the broad stone steps into the empty, echoing courtyard. The unexpected appreciation of my doubtful humor set me musing over the possibility of a duty new to Americans. It is the French who have stood for gaiety. We have warmed ourselves in their quick wit. Perhaps it is time for us to do our little clownish best to set them laughing.
Having made the resolve I failed meanly to put it into execution. I knew I was going to fail as the motor stopped before the great house in the rue Daru—the lordly house of exquisitely tinted walls although the colors are not seen by those who dwell within. There is a paved COUR beyond the high wall with great steps leading up to the hotel. At the right are the stables, where delicate fabrics are woven—the workmen with heads erect; where are special looms for those who, by the sad demands of this war, are denied hands as well as their two eyes. At the left is another building and here the men play in a gymnasium, even fence with confidence. In an anteroom is a curious lay figure that the most sensitive of the students may learn massage—it is the blind in Japan who give their understanding fingers to this work—and in the rooms above is a printing press, silent for lack of funds, but ready to give a paper of his own to the sightless. Only, at “The Light House” they will not accept that a single one of their guests is without vision. “Ah GUARDIENNE,” cried one of the students to the American woman who has established our Light House methods over there, “you do not see the unevenness of this fabric for your eyes are in your way.”
I was standing in the room where the plan of the house is set upon a table. It is the soldier’s first lesson that he may know the turns and steps, and run about without the pitiful outstretching of arms. There were other callers upon the GUARDIENNE. A blind graduate who had learned to live (which means to work) had returned with his little old father, and both were telling her that he had enough orders for his sweaters from the “Trois Quartiers” to keep him occupied for two years. The family felt that he was established—so there was nothing more to fear. And then because we were all happy over it the old man and the woman and myself began to cry noiselessly. Only the blind boy remained smiling through the choking silence.
I went to the window and glared down into the gardens where other soldiers were studying at little tables with a professor for each, and I asked myself why, in this great exigency, I was not being funny and paying my debt to France. But there was nothing to be funny about. The thing that dried my tears was the recollection of the blind asylum of my youth, where the “inmates” never learned to walk without groping, where we were shown hideous bead furniture, too small for dolls, which was the result of their eager but misspent lives.
There was a gown to be ordered before noon and as I drove back through the Faubourg St. Honoré I found myself looking fondly, thirstily into the shop windows, lifting my free eyes to the charming vagaries of old buildings, and again I made a vow although it had nothing to do with humor. On my dressing table rests a cushion of brocade and I shall carry it about as one who may yield to temptation carries a pledge, for the card which is attached chants out to me whenever my eyes rest upon it: “Soldat Pierre. Aveugle de la guerre. Blessé à Verdun.” And as long as Soldier Pierre. Blind from the war. Wounded at Verdun can go on weaving his fabrics I pray that I may carry whatever burden may be mine with the unrebellious spirit.
Ah well! The robe took its place in the curriculum of my new Parisian day. It was to be a replica in color of that worn by the head of the house—her one of mourning was so bravely smart—for the business must go on and only the black badge of glory in fashionable form show itself in the gay salon. “Yes, we must go on,” she said, “though every wife may give her mate. It is of an enormity to realize before one dies that he can be done without—that there are enough little ones to keep France alive and we women in the meantime can care for the country. Our men may die glad in that thought, but I think there must be a little of grief, too. It is sad not to be needed. Yes, Madame, blue for you where mine is black, and in place of the crêpe something very brilliant. It is only Americans that we can make gay now, and it keeps the women in the sewing room of good cheer to work in colors. Too dear you think? Ah, no, Madame, observe the model!”
Conscious that she had taken the basest advantage of my sympathy, and glad that she had done so I went to déjeuner with a feeling that I had deserved it which I might not otherwise have enjoyed. We were lunching at the restaurant on the Seine which felt for a short time the upheaval of war. Among the first called to the front had been the proprietor, and the august deputies whose custom it was to take their midday meal at this famous eating place had suffered from an unevenness of the cuisine. He is back at his establishment now, an ammunition maker on the night shift and the excellent and watchful patron at noon.
Our guests came promptly, for France still eats, although, if I can say anything so anomalous, does not stop to do so. The war talk continues albeit one carries it more lightly through a meal. A French officer arrived in the only automobile of his garage which the government had not commandeered. We looked down upon it stealthily that we might not give offense to his chauffeur, for the car is a Panhard in the last of its teens—which holds no terrors to a woman but is a gloomy age for a motor. An American architect from our Clearing House bowed over my hand a little more Gallic in these days than the Gaul himself. He has a right to the manners of the country. He had come over at the beginning of the war for a month and is determined to stick it out if he never builds another railway station. “To see the troops march through the Arc de Triomphe!” is the cry of the Americans, but the French do not express themselves so dramatically.
There is drama enough, though, even in the filing of papers at every American relief society. That and the new sensation of work serves to hold the dilettante of our country to his long task. “This is the president’s office,” you will be told in a hushed voice outside some stately door. Then one discovers in Mr. President a playmate of Mayfair or Monte Carlo or Taormina who may never previously have used a desk except as a support for the signing of checks.
Our friend had been engaged that morning upon the re-ticketing of the Lafayette Kits which had come back from the front because there was no longer a Gaspard to receive them. I put this down that any young girl of our country who does not hear from “her soldier” may understand the silence. And sometimes the poilu is a little confused, writing a charming letter of thanks to “Monsieur Lafayette” himself.
A man takes coffee at déjeuner but finishes his cigar en route to work. We were at the edge of Paris before the Illustrator had thrown his away. We were not in the car of ancient lineage but in that relic of other days a real automobile without the great white letters of the army upon its sides and bonnet. Yet we were going into the heart of the Army. We would not be among the derelicts of battle that afternoon but with men sound of mind and body, and the thought was grateful that there would be nothing to anguish over. We were to visit two cantonments, rough barracks, in one of which the men gathered after their “permission” for a re-equipment; while at the second one were those soldiers who had become separated from their regiments, and who were sent there until the companies—if they existed—could be found, and the “isolated” again dispatched to the front.
I had anticipated a very relieving afternoon. The sun shone, the long road led to open country, and many circling aeroplanes over an aviation field nearby gave the air of a fête. Only the uniforms of the English and American women who are attached to each of these many cantonments suggested any necessitous combating of the grim reaper.
Yet they are not nurses of the body but of the spirit. From modest little vine covered sheds erected in each ugly open space they disperse good cheer augmented by coffee and cigarettes (and such small comforts as we Americans send them) after the regulation army rations are served by the commissary. They hear the men’s stores, comfort the unhappy ones, chaff the gloomy ones, and when they have a moment’s breathing space write letters to such of those as have asked for a correspondent.
One of these women—an American—was intent upon this occupation at the first canteen we visited. She admitted that she was tired but she must answer her letters. She was rather grave about it, “I write to sixty-eight,” she said, “and I’ll tell you why. At least I will tell you a little of it and you can read the rest. I was on night duty. There is always one of us here. The men have just come from visiting their homes and some of them are blue and cannot sleep. Rude to us? Oh, never! I had written letters almost all night and it was time to make the morning coffee, yet there was still one to do. I was tempted to put it aside. I didn’t remember the man, but he had sent me a word of thanks. Well, somehow I did answer it between the moment of filling the cauldron and getting ready for the day. Here is his reply—it came this morning—”
Translating crudely from the letter I read aloud to our little circle: “Dear Madame, you have saved my life. I have no friends and no people left for I am from the invaded districts, so on one writes me. To-day I was on duty as the officer came into our trench with the mail. He called my name. He gave me permission to leave the listening post to receive your valued letter. While at his side a shell tore up entirely my post. I think you, Madame, that I am spared to fight for France—”
I regarded her with longing. She had been the controller of a destiny. I suppose we are all that when we bend our best efforts, but seldom are we so definitely apprised of the reward of untiring duty.
A petty officer passed by the shack with a paper in his hands. There were no sounding trumpets, but the men recognized the paper and rose from the ground where they had been lounging to hear him read the list of those who were to return immediately to the front. As the names were called each one summoned turned without comment or exclamation or expletive, picked up his kit dumped in a corner, slung on the heavy equipment, saw that the huge loaf of bread was secure—the extra shoes—refilled his canteen and moved over to the barred gate. Occasionally one shook hands with a comrade and all saluted the women of the little flower-bedecked hut. An order was given and the gate was opened. They filed out into the dusty road on their march to the railway station. The gate was closed. A little hill rose higher than the ground of the barracks and we could see them once again—stout little men in patched uniforms—bending unresistingly under their burdens, the heavy steel helmets gleaming but faintly in the sun. Another detachment entered the barracks.
It was coffee time now. The soldiers were lingering politely about with their tin cups in hand—not too expectantly, so as to assure the ladies that if by any chance there was no coffee they would not be disappointed. The gentlewoman in attendance had recently come from a canteen near the front where soup is made and often eight thousand bowls of it served in a day. The skin of her arms and hands is, I fear, permanently unlovely from the steam of the great kettles—or perhaps I should say permanently lovely now that one knows the cause of the branding. I offered to pour in her place and she assented.
The men came up to the little bar. I began to pour. I had thought I was about to do them a service. I knew with the first cup that it was they who were doing me one. All the unrest and misery of my idle if observing days in France was leaving me. I was pushing back the recollection with the sweetness of physical effort. I was at work. There is no living in France—or anywhere now—unless one is at work. I served and served and urged fresh cups upon them. They thought I was generous—I could not tell them that I had not known a happy instant till this coffee pouring time. I had not recognized that it was toiling with the hands that would bring a surcease to the beating of queries at my bewildered brain. There are no answers to this war. One can only labor for it and so, strangely, forget it.
Late that afternoon I had a cup of tea in a ground floor room of a big Parisian hotel which has been freely assigned to an American woman for the least known of all our relief work. I had come that I might argue with her into giving up her long task for a brief rest. My contention was to have been that she could stop at any time as her work is never recognized. I found her doing up a parcel of excellent garments for a man and three women. They were to be assigned to the family of a respected painter of the Latin Quarter. They will never know who is the middleman, and it has chanced that she has dined in company with her day’s donation.
As I observed her tired tranquility I felt my argument growing pointless. Whether it was coffee or the unacknowledged dispenser of clothing to the uncrying needy it was service, and though my arm muscles ached I could understand that it is the idle boy in Paris which does not rest at night.
And so I come tot he last sheet of the romance which is serving so humbly my war-time needs. There is space for the dinner and the closing in of the gentle night thanks to the repeated, fervid declarations of the lovers on the other side of the paper. We had been with the men that afternoon. We were among the officers that evening. We dined at one of the great restaurants which has timorously reopened its doors to find eager families ready to feast honored sons. At one table sat three generations, the father of the boy concealing his pride with a Gallic interest in the menu, but the grandfather futilely stabbed the snails as his gleaming old eyes kept at attention upon the be-medalled lad. Pretty women, too, were there, subdued in costuming but with that amiable acceptance of their position which is not to be found among the more eager “lost ones” of other countries. And I enjoyed some relief in their evidence once more, and some inward and scarcely to-be-expressed solace in the thought that those soldiers who henceforth must go disfigured through a fastidious world can every buy companionship.
There was a theater attached to the restaurant. Through the glass doors we could see an iridescence of scant costumes, but the audience was light, and we ourselves preferred, as a more satisfactory ending to our day, to walk quietly toward the Arc de Triomphe which is waiting, waiting for fresh glories. On the other side of this last sheet of paper my lovers had so walked together. But upon looking over their passionate adventures I have discovered, at last, why the romance has never found a market. On one side and then on the other I have read and reread the two experiences. Yes, I find the LOVE-story curiously lacking in love.
[signed] Louise Closser Hale