AN EXCURSION TO VERSAILLES
One evening, as our party sat in the drawing-room of the hotel, after
dinner, some callers' cards were brought to them. The guests proved to
be Bert Chester and his three friends, of whom he had told Patty
before. The four young men were about to start on a motor tour, and
were spending a few days in Paris first.
They were all big stalwart young Englishmen, and when Bert introduced
Paul and Philip Marchbanks and Arthur Oram, Patty thought she had never
seen more pleasant-looking boys.
"We're jolly glad to be allowed to come to see you," said Phil
Marchbanks, addressing Mrs. Farrington, but including them all in his
conversation; "we know almost nobody in Paris, and we're so glad to see
some friendly faces."
"We may as well own up," said his brother Paul, "that we're just a bit
homesick. We're going to have a fine time, of course, after we get
started, but it takes a few days to get used to it."
It amused Patty to think of these great, big boys being homesick, but
she rather liked their frank admission of it, and she began to ask them
questions about their automobile.
The boys had no chauffeur with them, and Arthur Oram drove the car,
with occasional assistance from the others. Of course, the boys were
enthusiastic regarding their car, and young Oram particularly fell into
discussions with Mr. Farrington as to the respective merits of various
makes.
"We've done up Paris pretty well," said Bert Chester; "we've only been
arrested for speeding once; but that's not surprising, for they let you
go about as fast as you like here, and with their marvellously fine
roads, it's more like skating than anything else."
"But you only arrived here when we did," said Elise; "how can you have
done up Paris so soon?"
"Well, you see," said Bert, "we're not going to write a book about it,
so we didn't have to take it all in. We've seen the outside of the
Louvre, and the inside of Napoleon's tomb; we've been to the top of the
Eiffel tower, and the bottom of the Catacombs; so we flatter ourselves
that we've done up the length and breadth and height and depths,--at
least to our own satisfaction."
"It's a great mistake," said Phil Marchbanks, "to overdo this
sightseeing business. A little goes a great way with me, and if I bolt
a whole lot of sights all at once, I find I can't digest them, and I
have a sort of attack of tourist's indigestion, which is a thing I
hate."
"So do I," agreed Patty, "and I think you do quite right not to attempt
too much in a short time. We are taking the winter for it, and Mr.
Farrington is going to arrange it all for us, so that I know we'll
never have too much or too little. How much longer are you staying
here?"
"Only a few days," replied Bert Chester, "and that brings me to our
special errand. We thought perhaps--that is, we hoped that may be you
might, all of you, agree to go with us to-morrow on a sort of a picnic
excursion to Versailles. We thought, do you see, that we could take our
car, and you could take yours, and we'd start in the morning and make a
whole day of it."
"Gorgeous!" exclaimed Patty, clapping her hands; "I do think that would
be delightful, I'd love to go."
"Me too," chimed in Elise; "mother, do say yes, won't you? You know
you're just as anxious to go there as we are, because you spoke of it
only yesterday."
"Yes, indeed," said Mrs. Farrington heartily; "I quite approve of the
plan, and if your father has no objection, we can make a charming
picnic of it."
Mr. Farrington was quite as interested in the project as the others,
and they immediately began to arrange the details of the expedition.
Bert Chester had a road map in his pocket, which showed exactly the
routes they could take, but the decision of these things was left to
Mr. Farrington and Arthur Oram, who put their heads together over the
complicated-looking charts and decided upon their way.
"Do you know," said Paul Marchbanks, "you're the first American girls I
have ever known socially? I've seen tourists in railway stations or
restaurants, but I never talked to any Americans before."
"For goodness' sake!" exclaimed Patty, "have they kept you walled up in
a dungeon tower all your life, or what?"
"Not exactly that; but we English fellows who go to school and then to
college, and meantime live in our country homes, with an occasional run
up to London, have almost no opportunity to meet anybody outside of our
own people. And I haven't jogged about as much as a good many fellows.
This is the first time I've been to Paris."
"Then that explains your homesickness," said Patty, smiling kindly at
the big boy, whose manner was so frank and ingenuous.
"Yes," he said; "I suppose I do miss the family, for they ARE a jolly
lot. Oh, I say, won't you people all come down to our place and see us?
You're going to England, of course, before you return to the States,
aren't you?"
"I don't know," said Elise, smiling; "our plans are uncertain. But if
we accept all the delightful invitations we're continually receiving, I
don't know when we ever shall get back to New York."
The next day proved to be a most perfect one for an excursion of any
sort. They started early, for they wanted to make a long, full day of
it, and return in time for dinner.
The two automobiles were at the door by nine o'clock, and the party was
soon embarked. As Mr. Farrington did not drive his own car, he went in
the other car, sitting in front with Arthur Orara. In the tonneau of
this car were Patty and Bert Chester. So in the other car rode Mrs.
Farrington and Elise and the two Marchbanks. This arrangement seemed
highly satisfactory to all concerned, and the procession of two cars
started off gaily. Away they sped at a rapid speed along the Champs
Elysees, through the Arch and away toward Versailles. The fresh, crisp
morning air, the clear blue sky, and the bright sunlight, added to the
exhilaration of the swift motion, endowed them all with the most
buoyant spirits, and Patty felt sure she had never looked forward to a
merrier, happier day.
She chatted with Bert Chester, and asked him many questions about the
trip on which he was starting.
"I don't know just where we are going," he said. "I leave all that to
Oram. The rest of us don't care, and Oram loves to spend hours hunting
up reasons why we should go to this small village that is picturesque,
or that tiny hamlet that is historic. I'm sure the queer little French
towns will all look alike to me, and I'm not awfully keen about such
things anyhow. I go for the out-door life, and the swift motion, and
the fresh air and all that sort of thing."
"I love that part of it, too," said Patty, "but also I like seeing the
funny little towns with their narrow streets and squealing dogs. I
think I have never been through a French village that wasn't just
spilling over with squealing dogs."
"That's because you always go through them in an automobile. If you
were on a walking tour now, you'd find the dogs all asleep. But the
paramount idea in a French dog's brain is that he was made for the
purpose of waking up and barking at motor cars."
"Well, they're most faithful to what they consider their duty, then,"
said Patty, laughing, for even as she spoke they were whizzing through
a straggling, insignificant little village, and dogs of all sizes and
colours seemed to spring up suddenly from nowhere at all, and act as if
about to devour the car and its occupants.
But notwithstanding the dogs, the villages were exceedingly
picturesque, and Patty loved to drive through them slowly, that she
might see glimpses of the life of the people. And it was almost always
necessary to go slowly, for the streets were so narrow, and the
sidewalks a mere shelf, so that pedestrians often walked in the road.
This made it difficult to drive rapidly, and, moreover, many of the
streets were steep and hilly.
"It never seems to matter," observed Patty, "whether you're going out
of Paris or coming in; it's always uphill, and never down. I think that
after you've climbed a hill, they whisk it around the other way, so
that you're obliged to climb it again on your return."
"Of course they do," agreed Bert; "you can see by the expression of the
people that they're chuckling at us now, and they'll chuckle again when
we pass this way to-night, still climbing."
Neither of the cars in which our party travelled were good
hill-climbers, although they could go fast enough on the level. But
nobody cared, and notwithstanding some delays, the ground was rapidly
covered.
"There's one town I want to go through," said Patty, "but I'm not sure
it's in our route. It's called Noisy-le-Roi. Of course, I know that,
really, Noisy is not pronounced in the English fashion, but I like to
think that it is, and I call it so myself."
"There's no harm in that; I suppose a free-born American citizen has a
right to pronounce French any way she chooses, and I like that way
myself. Noisy-le-Roi sounds like an abode of the Mad Monarch, and you
expect to see the king and all his courtiers and subjects dancing madly
around or playing hilarious games."
"Yes, a sort of general racket, with everybody waving garlands and
carrying wreaths, and flags floating and streamers streaming---"
"Yes, and cannon booming, and salutes being fired, and rockets and
fireworks going off like mad."
"Yes, just that! but now I almost hope we won't pass through it, for
fear it shouldn't quite come up to our notion of it."
"If we do come to it, I'll tell you in time, and you can shut your eyes
and pretend you're asleep while we go through."
But the town in question was not on their route after all, and soon
they came flying in to the town of Versailles. Of course, they made for
the Chateau at once, and alighted from the cars just outside the great
wall.
Patty, being unaccustomed to historic sites, was deeply impressed as
she walked up the old steps and found herself on an immense paved court
that seemed to be fairly flooded with the brightest sunlight she had
ever seen. As a rule, Mr. Farrington did not enjoy the services of a
guide, but for the benefit of the young people in his charge, he
engaged one to describe to them the sights they were to see.
The whole royal courtyard and the great Equestrian Statue of Louis XIV.
seemed very wonderful to Patty, and she could scarcely realise that the
great French monarch himself had often stood where she was now standing.
"I never seemed to think of Louis XIV.," she said, "as a man. He seems
to me always like a set of furniture, or a wall decoration, or at most
a costume."
"Now you've hit it," said Paul; "Louis XIV. was, at most, a costume;
and a right-down handsome costume, too. I wish we fellows could dress
like that nowadays."
"I wish so, too," said Elise; "it's a heap more picturesque than the
clothes men wear at the present day."
"I begin to feel," said Patty, "that I wish I had studied my French
history harder. How many kings lived here after Louis XIV.?"
"Two," replied Mr. Farrington, "and when, Patty, at one o'clock on the
sixth of October, 1789, the line of carriages drove Louis XVI. and his
family away from here to Paris, the Chateau was left vacant and has
never since been occupied."
"In October," said Patty, "and probably just such a blue and gold day
as this! Oh, how they must have felt!"
"I wouldn't weep over it now, Patty," said the matter-of-fact Elise;
"they've been gone so long, and so many people have wept for them, that
I think it wasted emotion."
"I believe it would be," said Patty, smiling, "as far as they're
concerned; but I can't help feeling sorry for them, only I could never
weep before, because I never realised what it was they were leaving."
The party went on into the Chateau, and visited rooms and apartments
one after the other. It was necessary to do this quickly if they were
to do it at all, and, as Mr. Farrington said, a hasty tour of the
palace would give them an idea of it as a whole, and sometime he would
bring the girls again to enjoy the details more at leisure.
Patty was discovering that she was susceptible to what Elise chose to
call wasted emotion, and she found herself again on the verge of tears
when they entered the Chapel. Though she did not know enough of
architecture to survey intelligently the somewhat pompous apartment,
she was delightfully impressed by the rich adornments and the wonderful
sculptures, bronzes and paintings.
Rather rapidly they passed through the various SALONS of the museum,
pausing here and there, as one or another of the party wished to
examine something in particular. The State Rooms and Royal Apartments
were most interesting, but Patty concluded that she liked best of all
the Gallery of Battles. The splendid pictures of war enthralled her,
and she would have been glad had the rest of the party left her to
spend the entire day alone in the great gallery.
But this, of course, they had no wish to do, and with a last lingering
glance at the picture of Napoleon at the battle of Jena, she
reluctantly allowed herself to be led away.
Napoleon was one of Patty's heroes, and she was eagerly interested in
all of the many relics and souvenirs of the great man.
Especially was she interested in his bedroom, and greatly admired the
gorgeous furnishings and quaint, old-fashioned French bedstead.
Having scurried through the palace and museum, Mr. Farrington declared
that he could do no more sightseeing until he had eaten some sustaining
luncheon.
So again they climbed into the automobiles and were whisked away to a
hotel in the town.
Here they were provided with a most satisfying meal, which was partaken
of amid much merry conversation and laughter.