Concierge

“ The concierge, generally a woman, takes charge of your room, orders your breakfast if you require one, and keeps the key of your apartment when you are absent. It is a charming mode of living. You can dine or lunch when you will, and are master of your time and your apartment. I employed a neat, light carriage and one horse, with a driver who knew a smattering of several languages, and found him trusty and faithful—all this at a cost that would disgust the ordinary hotel proprietor in the United States, and especially the hack driver of any of our cities. ”

“ There are two ways of managing your concierge if you haven’t any money. One is—to take the high hand, make her your enemy, bluster, refuse to discuss anything; the other is—to keep in with her, butter her up to the two knots of the black rag tying up her jaws, pretend to confide in her, and rely on her to arrange with the gas man and to put off the landlord. ”

“ Without his approval and cooperation, your money, your position, your brains will not help you in making living conditions easy. The concierge stands between you and servants, tradespeople, visitors. You are at his mercy. ”

“ Everything is still and sealed in front, but to the right, from the concierge’s 328 lodge back to a solid, practical, dark stone building in the rear of the main hall, is a throng of idle people, chatting in clusters, sunning themselves on the benches, walking up and down. ”

“ The concierge next door, I was persuaded, knew more of his inmates than he cared to say. I still, as I have said, glanced my eye, each morning, along the upper angles of the court, and sidled now and then by the gate of the neighboring hotel; but the window wore its usual look—there was the veil, and the placard, and the disjointed, rattling sash; and in the neighboring court was, sometimes, the tall gentleman picking his way carefully over the stones, and sometimes the stumpy figure of a waiting woman. ”

“ A steamer trunk and a couple of bags were being trundled in by the porter, while the concierge was helping a short, stocky man to the ground. He hurried into the hotel, signed the police slips, and asked for his room. He seemed to be afraid of the dark. He was gone when Carmichael went into the office.
"Your Excellency," said the concierge, rubbing his hands and smiling after the manner of concierges born in Switzerland, "a compatriot of yours arrived this evening." ”

“ It was a bad season; the guests did not understand the ways of the hotel; the servants did not understand the guests; she was told she ought to have a concierge. But what was the good of a concierge?
"I have no idea," said Miss Raby, feeling that no concierge would ever restore the fortunes of the Biscione.
"They say he would meet the diligence and entrap the new arrivals. What pleasure should I have from guests I entrapped?"
"The other hotels do it," said Miss Raby, sadly.
"Exactly. Every day a man comes down from the Alpes." ”

“ A few minutes later the concierge saw him leave the hall. He was attired in a very handsome and costly fur coat, with a cap to match; and though the weather was bitterly cold and the ground covered with snow, he wore patent-leather shoes. The concierge, who was much surprised at the fact of his master leaving the house in the midst of the [63] revels, asked him if he wanted a carriage. To this question the Count answered curtly, and, according to the porter, angrily, ‘No.’ The night wore itself out. The dancers danced themselves into limpness and prostration, and began to depart. ”

“ It is up to the belated visitor or lodger to close the wicket after him, and he is bound by law to give his name, together with the number of the apartment to which he is going, in to the concierge as he goes past the lodge. ”

“ I loitered about the outer court of the hotel, under pretence of waiting for the abbé, in hope of seeing something which would throw light upon the mysterious occupant of the chamber. But the comers and goers were all of the most unobtrusive and ordinary cast. I ventured to question the concierge concerning his lodgers. They were all bons gens. ”

“ It is for the most part a large private house, without, though not always without, the parade of concierge and other distinctive marks of an hotel. As a rule, to which there are exceptions, it is more homely, there is less style in the method of conducting, less appearance about the rooms, and smaller attention paid to service and sanitary arrangements. On the other hand, the company is smaller, and as the people come to remain for periods of time, they fraternize better, and there is a good deal more of the home feeling in a pension than ever finds its way into any hotel. ”

“ Otherwise letters which are delivered at the lodge may not be brought up as soon as they should be, and other little annoyances will frequently occur. It is customary to give 50 to 100 francs to the concierge on New Year’s day, according to the rent paid, to secure civility and good service through the year. The concierge is the servant of the proprietor and not of the tenant. Every quarter the rent is paid to the concierge, and must be paid in cash. The cheque system as we have it in England is but little used in France. ”

“ Then, descending by the lift, he sought the assistant concierge, and from him discovered that the pair were in consultation in room Number 164.
“Yes, I believe there is a door between that and the next room, m’sieur,” the man replied.
“Good. Then get me the key for an hour or so, and I will make it all right with you.”
The profession of concierge is synonymous of bribery. No concierge in Europe lives upon his stipend. ”

“ The concierge, before she became a concierge, had owned a drink-selling concession at the Paris race-courses. Her life-work lay in the pelouse, but she kept an eye on the people of the pesage, and she took great pride in telling me which of my guests were well brought up, which were of good family, who were sportsmen, a French word pronounced with the accent on the men. The only trouble was that people who did not fall into any of those three categories were very liable to be told there was no one home, chez Barnes. ”

“ Several times I had seen him going in or coming out of the court that opened two doors above the abbé's. He was unlike most inhabitants of the neighborhood in both dress and air.
I ventured to step up to the brisk little concierge in the court one day, and ask who was the tall gentleman with the tarnished lace who had just entered? [Pg 167]
"It is un Monsieur Very," said the concierge.
"And poor Monsieur Very lives alone?" said I.
"How should I know, monsieur?"
"He always walks alone," said I.
"It is true," said the concierge. ”

“ I am not surprised that there is a good view; is that what you call getting me a lodging near the ground?"
"There ain't any to be had, master; but the stairs are as easy as can be; you can go up without moving your legs; and then there is a concierge who is willing to do the housework for all the tenants, at a very moderate price, and even to make the coffee."
"There are many advantages, and no mistake; where is this jewel of an apartment situated?" ”

“ In Paris, when the Palais de la Cité ceased about 1360 to be a royal residence and became the seat of the courts of justice, the Conciergerie was turned into a prison. In modern usage a “concierge” is a hall-porter or janitor. ”

“ It was to this house that he now directed his steps, impelled by the desire to see the rooms in which the beautiful young actress had lived—if it were possible to see them. In this dead season, when so many of the residents of Paris were absent, there was just the chance that some good-natured concierge—and the concierge is always amenable to the gentle inducement of a five-franc piece—might consent to admit a respectable-looking stranger to a view of the third floor of No. ”

“ La Conciergerie was perhaps one of the greatest show-places of the city for the morbidly inclined, and permission à visiter was at that time granted avec toutes facilités, being something more than is allowed to-day. ”

“ An officer handed her about, and the concierge went before, knocking on the ground with his stick. (The concierge is generally a very tall man dressed in plum colour; he goes before the priests, [Pg 78] funerals, etc.) The lady held in her hand a little box of crimson velvet and gold which she presented to everybody, and curtsied; a servant followed with a crimson bag, into which she emptied the money when the box was full. The French churches are just like some show. We were told that a French gentleman had stayed at the English chapel one Sunday during the sacrament ”

“ Suppose you are four in number, and have been a week in the house; you pay the concierge from five to eight francs, the chambermaid four to six, the waiter who has brought the coffee in the morning, and otherwise looked after you, five to eight, and the porter who has handled luggage and blacked your boots, five to six francs. These figures are for a fair amount of service, and are liberal enough for most cases. Every traveler must judge for himself whether he has made an undue demand upon the servants, and gauge his gratuities accordingly. ”

“ They are at the far corners of the courtyard; both are pitch dark and reek of stuffiness and evil smells. The apartments which they serve, especially those on the lower floors, are dependent for light and air on what modicum of these gifts of heaven comes down the shaft into the quadrangle.
After dark, of course, porte-cochère and wicket are both closed, and if a belated lodger of visitor desires to enter the house, he must ring the bell and the concierge in his lodge will pull a communicating cord that will unlatch the wicket. ”

“ Declining the proffered carriage, we walk down a wide avenue into the hotel grounds, see rows of neat cottages stretching away on either hand, with families and groups lounging on the piazzas, telling stories, singing, and mayhap love-making in the moonlight—enter the hotel, dine sumptuously—washing down our broiled chicken, trout and quail with the rich, fruity red wine of Calistoga; and finally, well pleased with the world, ourselves, and mankind in general, retire to our cottage, disrobe, draw the drapery of our couch around us, and lie down to pleasant dreams. ”

“ Every visitor entering the hotel was obliged to pass through the lounge, and for newcomers the passage was an ordeal; they were made to feel that they had so much to learn, so much to get accustomed to; like passengers who join a ship at a port of call, they felt that the business lay before them of creating a niche for themselves in a hostile and haughty society. ”

“ Is he not really a stay-at-home who has ventured out merely to stretch his legs? Ask the keeper of a commercial hotel in a country town who his customers are. He will tell you that they are commercial travellers and coffee-room visitors. The two classes are distinct in the mind of mine host. One suggests work, the other play. The commercial man is bound to travel whether he likes it or not, the visitor is a fitful amateur amusing himself by a change from the monotony of home. ”

“ The visitor, evincing some nervousness, rises quickly to his feet, follows the servant up the hall, and is ushered into a parlor of regal dimensions, on the right. His eye falls upon one solitary occupant, who rises from a lounge of oriental richness, and advances towards him with an air of familiarity their conditions seem not to warrant. Having greeted the visitor, and bid him be seated (he takes his seat, shyly, beside the door) , the lady resumes her seat in a magnificent chair. ”

“ There is the boarding-house, advertised as "Directly facing the sea;" and when you have engaged your rooms, and arrive with all your luggage, you find the establishment is at the far end of a side street; and "Directly facing the sea" is interpreted by the fact that by hanging half-way out of the sitting-room widow, and screwing your head round violently to the left, you can see the place where that watery monarch ought to be.
"A boarding-house is so much nicer than an hotel, because you get to know the people so much easier," I heard a girl remark once. ”

“ Fortune had approved our resolution not to go, except in the greatest extremity, to any sort of boarding-house, or any sort of hotel, private, residential, temperant or inebriant, varying to the type of sea-side caravansary which is common to the whole world, but to cling to an ideal of lodgings such as we had cherished ever since our former sojourn in England, and such as you can realize nowhere else in the world. ”

“ Dependent upon outside travelers for news, the latest remedies for ailments, and mail, the inhabitants of the frontier opened the doors of their cabins and their hearts to visitors. Taken into a home, the weary traveler often found himself treated to the best in food and comfort which the limitations of the frontier permitted. Generally sharing the one-room cabin, like any member of the family, he soon learned that he was a welcome guest rather than a stranger in their midst. The loneliness of the frontier stimulated the hospitality of the frontiersman. ”

“ The little hotel of the town was a bright and sunny place, like the jovial face of the clean little woman who kept it, and who trotted about talking always—talking to the customers in the taproom, and to the maids in the kitchen, and to the passers-by when she could hail them from the windows; talking, as good-natured women with large mouths and small noses always do, in season and out. ”

“ I hastened to reply, “if you will so accept it.”
“Then I would ask,” continued my interrogator, “must a man be a certain length of time at an hotel before he is entitled to the privileges of a guest?”
“Oh, dear, no! Merely purchasing temporary refreshment at an inn makes the purchaser a guest and renders the innkeeper liable for the safety of the goods he may have with him, [121] if he is a traveler.”
“But who is a traveler?”
“One who is absent from his home, whether on pleasure or business. [122] A townsman or neighbor, who is actually traveling, may be a guest. ”