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“What’s this for, Baeader? Have you not had enough to eat?”

Baeader’s face wore its blandest smile. “On ze contraire, I have made for myself a most excellent repast; but if monsieur will consider–ze dinner is a prix fixe, and monsieur can eat it all, or it shall remain for ze proprietaire. Zis, if monsieur will for one moment attend, will be stupid extraordinaire. I have made ze investigation, and discover zat ze post depart from Cancale in one hour. How simple zen to affeex ze stamps,–only five sous,–and in ze morning, even before Mme. Baeader is out of ze bed, it is in Paris–a souvenir from Cancale. How charmante ze surprise!”

I discovered afterward that since he had joined us Baeader’s own domestic larder had been almost daily enriched with crumbs like these from Dives’s table.

The fete, despite Baeader’s assurances, lacked one necessary feature. There was no music. The band was away with the boats, the triangle probably cooking, the French horn and clarinet hauling seines.

But Baeader, not to be outdone by any contretemps, started off to find an old blind fellow who played an accordeon, collecting five francs of me in advance for his pay, under the plea that it was quite horrible that the young people could not dance. “While one is young, monsieur, music is ze life of ze heart.”

He brought the old man back, and with a certain care and tenderness set him down on a stone bench, the sightless eyes of the poor peasant turning up to the stars as he swayed the primitive instrument back and forth. The young girls clung to Baeader’s arm, and blessed him for his goodness. I forgave him his duplicity, his delight in their happiness was so genuine. Perhaps it was even better than a fete.

When, later in the evening, we arrived at Mme. Flamand’s, we found her in the doorway, her brown face smiling, her white cap and apron in full relief under the glare of an old-fashioned ship’s light, which hung from a rafter of the porch. Baeader inscribed my name in a much-thumbed, ink–stained register, which looked like a neglected ship’s log, and then added his own. This, by the by, Baeader never neglected. Neither did he neglect a certain little ceremony always connected with it.

After it was all over and “Moritz Baeader Courrier et Interprete” was duly inscribed,–and in justice it must be confessed it was always clearly written with a flourish at the end that lent it additional dignity,–Baeader would pause for a moment, carefully balance the pen, trying it first on his thumb-nail, and then place two little dots of ink over the first a, saying, with a certain wave of his hand, as he did so, “For ze honor of my families, monsieur.” This peculiarity gained for him from the governor the sobriquet of “old fly-specks.”

The inn of Mme. Flamand, although less pretentious than many others that had sheltered us, was clean and comfortable, the lower deck and companionway were freshly sanded,–the whole house had a decidedly nautical air about it,–and the captain’s state-room on the upper deck, a second-floor room, was large and well-lighted, although the ceiling might have been a trifle too low for the governor, and the bed a few inches too short.

I ascended to the upper deck, preceded by the hostess carrying the ship’s lantern, now that the last guest had been housed for the night. Baeader followed with a brass candlestick and a tallow dip about the size of a lead pencil. With the swinging open of the bedroom door, I made a mental inventory of all the conveniences: bed, two pillows, plenty of windows, washstand, towels. Then the all-important question recurred to me, Where had they hidden the portable tub?

I opened the door of the locker, looked behind a sea-chest, then out of one window, expecting to see the green-painted luxury hanging by a hook or drying on a convenient roof. In some surprise I said:–