SIGNED--HONORÉ GRANDISSIME
On the afternoon of the same day, having decided what he would "do," he
started out in search of new quarters. He found nothing then, but next
morning came upon a small, single-story building in the rue
Royale,--corner of Conti,--which he thought would suit his plans. There
were a door and show-window in the rue Royale, two doors in the
intersecting street, and a small apartment in the rear which would
answer for sleeping, eating, and studying purposes, and which connected
with the front apartment by a door in the left-hand corner. This
connection he would partially conceal by a prescription-desk. A counter
would run lengthwise toward the rue Royale, along the wall opposite the
side-doors. Such was the spot that soon became known as
"Frowenfeld's Corner."
The notice "À Louer" directed him to inquire at numero--rue Condé. Here
he was ushered through the wicket of a _porte cochère_ into a broad,
paved corridor, and up a stair into a large, cool room, and into the
presence of a man who seemed, in some respects, the most remarkable
figure he had yet seen in this little city of strange people. A strong,
clear, olive complexion; features that were faultless (unless a
woman-like delicacy, that was yet not effeminate, was a fault); hair _en
queue_, the handsomer for its premature streakings of gray; a tall, well
knit form, attired in cloth, linen and leather of the utmost fineness;
manners Castilian, with a gravity almost oriental,--made him one of
those rare masculine figures which, on the public promenade, men look
back at and ladies inquire about.
Now, who might _this_ be? The rent poster had given no name. Even the
incurious Frowenfeld would fain guess a little. For a man to be just of
this sort, it seemed plain that he must live in an isolated ease upon
the unceasing droppings of coupons, rents, and like receivables. Such
was the immigrant's first conjecture; and, as with slow, scant questions
and answers they made their bargain, every new glance strengthened it;
he was evidently a _rentier_. What, then, was his astonishment when
Monsieur bent down and made himself Frowenfeld's landlord, by writing
what the universal mind esteemed the synonym of enterprise and
activity--the name of Honoré Grandissime. The landlord did not see, or
ignored, his tenant's glance of surprise, and the tenant asked no
questions.
* * * * *
We may add here an incident which seemed, when it took place, as
unimportant as a single fact well could be.
The little sum that Frowenfeld had inherited from his father had been
sadly depleted by the expenses of four funerals; yet he was still able
to pay a month's rent in advance, to supply his shop with a scant stock
of drugs, to purchase a celestial globe and some scientific apparatus,
and to buy a dinner or two of sausages and crackers; but after this
there was no necessity of hiding his purse.
His landlord early contracted a fondness for dropping in upon him, and
conversing with him, as best the few and labored English phrases at his
command would allow. Frowenfeld soon noticed that he never entered the
shop unless its proprietor was alone, never sat down, and always, with
the same perfection of dignity that characterized all his movements,
departed immediately upon the arrival of any third person. One day, when
the landlord was making one of these standing calls,--he always stood'
beside a high glass case, on the side of the shop opposite the
counter,--he noticed in Joseph's hand a sprig of basil, and spoke of it.
"You ligue?"
The tenant did not understand. "You--find--dad--nize?"
Frowenfeld replied that it had been left by the oversight of a customer,
and expressed a liking for its odor.
"I sand you," said the landlord,--a speech whose meaning Frowenfeld was
not sure of until the next morning, when a small, nearly naked black
boy, who could not speak a word of English, brought to the apothecary a
luxuriant bunch of this basil, growing in a rough box.