Erick Berry

“ From the tip of the tower that crowned his abbey, wings of gold outspread, sword uplifted, his mailed foot crushed the devil who crawled beneath, and atop one foot perched the golden cock, symbol of eternal vigilance.
Cynthia, gazing skyward murmured, “Lovely!”
“Marvelous!” whispered Nancy looking seaward. The sands of St. Michel, those treacherous sands through which the tide can rip and roar in minutes, seconds almost, shone far below them now, peacefully dry, almost lavender in the sun, creating a false horizon for the fringe of little houses along the shore. ”

“ Mildly clucking, continuing to protest, Miss Mitchall was shoved into her costume, into the shoes with the silver buckles, into the long green cape. Cynthia, against the other’s mild opposition, patted rouge on the pale cheeks, then flung a towel over the cape and shook half a box of white talcum powder on the gray hair.
“But my dear,” beamed Miss Mitchall, “it ... it makes me look so ... so young.”
Indeed it did. The contrast of green cloth against the white hair was dramatic. “Very successful,” purred Cynthia. “You’ll be the belle of the ball. And it’s not immoral to look young you know. ”

“ Cynthia sat enthralled. Almost she had to pinch herself to believe it was real. Glorious in color as an old window of stained glass; silks and velvets, knights in full armor, pages, banners and trumpeters, and at the very end the Palio itself, a great banner drawn in a cart, with the staked flags of the contrada around it.
The procession was over. Cynthia sat back and cracked a few nuts and ate them. Just to return to reality for a while, after so much beauty, was a rest and a relief. ”

“ Banners of silk and banners of velvet, cloth of gold and cloth of silver, all embroidered with the arms of Siena and her ruling houses, and, so far as Cynthia knew, of Mussolini himself, hung from every upper window and balcony, fluttering in the morning breeze with a constant play of color and pageantry along the gay little street. Every doorway held smiling faces above the garments of this holiday mood. Every child carried a brilliant hued balloon or a whistle, or a small flag. ”

“ Along the old walls of Carcassonne, swimming in the golden haze of afternoon light, pigeons circled and cooed. From a not too distant watch tower came the nasal drone of the guide, explaining how, just here, the Black Prince had stormed the city and burned the tower. The air smelt of hot dust, sleepiness, and France, and Cynthia’s busy brush flew from palette to sketch and back again. ”

“ Chick’s suggestion was: lunch at the Danieli, which was the swankiest hotel in Venice, and, he had heard, one of the loveliest of the old Venetian palaces. Then back to the traghetti to see if Luigi had come.
Oh, that again! Cynthia made an impatient gesture. Save us from a man with one idea! But she adored the lunch, loved the gracious old palace with its carved, minstrel gallery, its floor of multicolored tiles, its ceiling carved and painted in deep blue and rose and gold. ”

“ Her traveling coat and hat, her street shoes were with it. Cynthia grabbed the lot and opened the door again. Then came a moment of fright, for the maid, Agnés, stood just outside in the corridor. But she was wreathed in smiles, already primed by Serena for the enlévement, the elopement, and her ancient romantic heart was in the job. She piloted Cynthia along the corridor and down the servant’s stairway, then out through an alley behind the garage, put her finger to her lips as a vow of silence, then blew a kiss into the air as a gesture of her best wishes for the bride and groom. ”

“ The drums tapped out a strange, intriguing little rhythm while the two banner bearers, practising their rite, did a sort of solemn dance with the great five foot square flags. The object seemed to be to keep up a continual stepping, with the banners never for one moment allowed to lag. Under the arms and up again, out and beneath the dancing feet, and the drums always beating faster and faster. Fascinated, Cynthia watched for the culmination which she knew would come. ”

“ Wooden shoes clattered merrily on the cobbles of the quay, and along the distant dunes, purpling with dusk, smoke rose from the smouldering potash fires where, Nancy had said, the thrifty Bretons burned seaweed for fertilizer.
She was pleasantly weary and very hungry. All last night she had been traveling, more than half the width of France from Paris to Brest. Uncle Leslie had sailed from Brest after the Armistice, she remembered, and its steep streets and ancient houses, built on half a dozen different levels, had fascinated her during the hours she had to wait for her trolley to Le Conquet. ”

“ Cynthia hated to admit to herself that she dreaded that first meal alone, doubted her ability to order food, even to find her way home again, once she had set her foot off the hotel doorstep. It was after eight o’clock when she finally tore herself away from the window and summoned courage to go out for dinner. “You can’t starve till morning, idiot!” she told herself severely. “Just walk downstairs, and out the door. There must be lots of places to eat within the next two blocks. Why, France is a nation of cooks!” ”

“ It was a splendid idea, Cynthia admitted, as she followed Nancy into the little stone church. Surely every good Breton inhabitant of Le Conquet was present, the women in wide skirts trimmed with bands of black velvet, with full sleeves, and tight black bodices setting off the lace-trimmed white aprons, the frosty white caps of Breton lace and the wide lace collars. Here at least, all the lovely quaintness of medieval France had not gone down before the stupid uniform of store-bought gingham dresses. ”

“ No houses here, though piles of rubble and a bit of crumbled wall told that the abbey buildings must once have straggled down the face of this cliff. Far above small peasant children climbed and called, or swung bare legs from an outcrop of rock, and still higher a small hunched figure sat all alone on a rock. Cynthia was about to say, “Oh, there’s the little American,” but remembering what Nancy had just called her, held her tongue and busied herself with collecting a bouquet for Mrs. Brewster’s room. ”

“ One of the American tourists had let the group go on without her and had come across to stand behind Cynthia. She was a tall girl, pretty, though pale, with big black eyes and curly dark lashes and a smart American traveling suit of blue and white wash silk. In a low tone she was chatting with the children and with such amazing ease and flourish of idiom that Cynthia, with a pang of envy thought; Canadian ... or Louisiana bred. She’s grown up with the language. Oh darn that model! ”

“ What if she failed to make good on the job that had brought her over, the dozen covers for Little Ones’ Magazine? Suppose she didn’t have the money to stay? Suppose she couldn’t make people understand her French, even though Stasia had been coaching her all week? Oh shut up, Cynthia!
“Miss Mitchall’s the old girl I admire,” she said suddenly. “She’s got more courage! You know she’s returning practically without a job and without money and she’s fifty if she’s a day, though she looks sixty, poor darling. I don’t believe she’s got ten dollars beyond her fare to London.” ”

“ She made a few strokes of her pencil on the blank page of her sketch book, then, noting how still her unconscious model sat, became absorbed in the portrait. Not a good face, but a strong one. The brows were as heavy as her pencil could etch, the graying hair at the temples disappeared beneath the tightly drawn edge of a stocking cap and the long chin dipped into a wide pierrot ruff. The costume was that of a harlequin and had probably been rented from the ship’s barber, who carried a stock of fancy costumes for these parties.
Cynthia, absorbed in her sketch, worked rapidly. ”

“ Cynthia had an idea that he would make a good model for her next magazine cover. She herself was sharing the privilege of the cabbage patch and the shade of the parapet with Mrs. Brewster, both painting busily, when Betsey’s voice sounded slightly above Cynthia’s right ear.
“’S good,” murmured the voice.
121 Cynthia looked up. “Hi!” she said, around the paintbrush in her mouth, but her gaze wandered back to the sunny ochre of the sands and the blue-green of the cabbages. Difficult to depict sunlight against that false horizon; you need blue sky to make a landscape look sunny. ”

“ Third class had been almost a necessity, this Italian trip hadn’t been allowed for in her original budget, but Cynthia had found third class in France so much more fun than second ... and of course even the Italians say that no one but rich, rich Americans and officials who travel on passes ever go by first. This was the coolest carriage too, since the always open windows let in floods of air and sunlight along with the floods of dust, and the hard wooden benches were pleasantly free of the small insect life almost universally inhabiting the upholstery of first and second coaches. ”

“ Cynthia thought the cat’s smug countenance bore a fantastic resemblance to Serena’s Aunt Anna, but she wouldn’t have trusted him alone with a canary.
“How wonderful to be an artist, wonderful to do as you like with your life, no cares, no responsibilities, no ties!” gushed Aunt Anna over their coffee on the terrace.
Cynthia rudely thought “Oh yeah,” and remembered the cover she must send back to the States every month and all the other work she had accomplished in Europe, but said nothing.
“You know I always had a fancy to be an artist. ”

“ Impatiently she said. “If you’d only tell me what it is, Chick, perhaps I could make them understand.” Oh dear, how annoying men could be!
Chick seemed not to hear. The new distraction was a cabbage, wilted, but unquestionably of more recent vintage than either the galosh or the ancient magazine. Its discoverer had waited for a time outside the magic circle, while firing forth a rapid stream of “Ecco ... ecco ... ecco!” ”

“ M. Marge shook his head and Madame, pouring the morning chocolate, murmured something in Basque.
“She says she is sorry to lose our wedding present.”
“Oh dear, I feel terribly responsible,” mourned Cynthia. “If I only hadn’t asked you to bring it out and show me.”
“It is my own fault.” The old man became firmly cheerful. “Mais non, Mademoiselle, I am a careless old man. I should not have left the clock on the verandah. But the Basque are honest peepul. We do not steal and we are too far from the town for gypsies or tramps. ”

“ The next morning Nancy took her to explore76 the little town, not a long tour, for there were not six streets in the whole place. The ancient sturdy houses, facing the sea for half a dozen centuries seemed to grow from the very rock on which they were built. Below the hotel one crossed a bridge, at high water, or walked on a raised path across the sands, at low tide, to a long sandy beach bordered with dunes and tall waving grasses, very white and flat and clean.
Cynthia surveyed the clear stretch of deserted sand, and Nancy’s brief little bathing suit with a longing eye. ”

“ The portfolio made a good rest for my sketch book.”
So there in the tea shop, cool and quiet and growing a bit dim as the sun sank behind the towers and tiles of Siena, Cynthia hauled out her sketches. There were some of the crowd she had made just this afternoon, of the carabinari, heads gravely bent, two by two, always two by two, white gloved hands folded behind their solemn backs.
“You have quite a knack for caricature,” commented Mr. Lewis, and Cynthia said, “You have to, if you are going to do portraits. A really good likeness always holds a little exaggeration.” ”

“ What should she do next? She already had visited Notre Dame, and knew the Cluny and Luxembourg Gardens, for the past two days, as well as the palm of her hand. Besides she still felt strangely faint. She leaned against the heavy stone balustrade and looked down.
Suddenly up through the hallway, wafted from below came the most glorious and enchanting odor. Cynthia closed her eyes. It made her think of home, of a loaded dinner table with big plates of corned-beef hash, with an egg on top, slabs of bread and butter, and a thick slice of apple pie with cheese. Oh dear! ”

“ It seemed to her that the color of the sand had changed, darkened, in the past ten minutes. Idly she noted that the children had gone; already she could see them scampering past the rock at the base, saw them disappear. She looked back of her. Nothing here, no connection with the town. To get home one must go the way they had come. Just beyond where Nancy was still picking flowers was the American girl. Cynthia’s gaze took her in with the rest of the scene. ”

“ Cynthia chose a cake like a little Italian palace, all tiled with lemon peel and crowned with a candied cherry. “And do you know the lovely old monastery at the top of the hill?”
“I should say I do. I made a sketch of that, years ago—before you were born, young lady.” Why did people always lay such emphasis on one’s lack of age? ”