Free Martha in Paris by Margery Sharp

the absence of Mrs. Taylor—including the first. Had such an escapade been repeated—(not at all dans le genre de la maison )—Madame Leclerc the concierge might indeed have felt herself bound to lay information—but what could be more respectable than the succeeding hour, of Martha’s departures, at ten o’clock? “One swallow does not make a summer!” thought Madame Leclerc tolerantly. Also Eric had had the sense to give her a whacking great tip.
    Angèle saw Martha onto the boat-train; without incident Martha completed the journey; and arriving back at Richmond told her Aunt Dolores, and her Uncle Harry, and her patron Mr. Joyce, all she thought necessary to tell them, of her first term in Paris.
    2
    It wasn’t much.
    â€œI’m still in Life,” grumbled Martha. “If Mr. Joyce says so, that’s where you ought to be,” affirmed Harry Gibson loyally. Dolores’ enquiries as to Paris fashions—the waist up or down, hats large or small?—met an absolute blank. “I don’t believe you even keep your eyes open!” cried Dolores disappointedly; for she had been awaiting Martha’s return to buy a chic winter outfit. Another disappointment was when she asked if Martha hadn’t met any nice young men.
    â€œNo,” said Martha flatly.
    â€œI don’t mean students,” said Dolores. (It was in fact a great relief to her to find that Martha hadn’t attended a single orgy.) “But there must be some nice English people, in Paris?”
    Martha, sinking the Taylors and their circle without trace, replied that if there were, she hadn’t met them.
    â€œAnyway, I’m not supposed to speak anything but French,” added Martha virtuously.
    Her presumed ability to parlez-vous (the phrase, inevitably, Harry Gibson’s) was in fact very useful. It afforded precisely the cut-and-come-again sort of joke needed, to tide such a disparate household over the Christmas festival. Harry Gibson, in addition to his “Gay Paree,” could say things like “ Bon soir, Mam’zelle ,” and “ Ooh-la-la! ”—to which Martha could respond with a reasonably apposite “ Allez-vous-en. ” It wasn’t the language of Racine, but it sufficed. Martha’s triumph, however, was to succeed in teaching him the whole rhyme about la peinture à l’huile , which even more usefully replaced their old, rather out-worn question-and-answer joke about Martha and Mary. “ La peinture à l’huile — ? ” Martha would begin. “ Est bien difficile ,” agreed Harry Gibson. “ Mais c’est beaucoup meilleure — ? ” encouraged Martha. “ Que la peinture au beurre! ” finished Harry triumphantly. If it was an odd exchange to echo through a flat above a furrier’s shop in Richmond, philistine Harry (the meaning re-explained to him) enjoyed it very much; and Mr. Joyce laughed his head off.
    Mr. Joyce’s examination of Martha, unlike her aunt’s, was strictly professional. Actually Mr. Joyce had his own source of information, from the horse’s mouth, and Martha could hardly have dissatisfied him. Only let your young savage continue , scrawled that large, big-knuckled, freckled hand, and one day, old friend, we may see marvels! Only let her continue!
    â€œAre you prepared to continue?” asked Mr. Joyce of Martha. “In Paris?”
    â€œYes,” said Martha unhesitatingly.
    â€œWhy?” asked Mr. Joyce.
    Martha pondered.—Between them, after the Gibson Christmas dinner, a couple of candles flickered out above the remains of Dolores’ plum-pudding. Dolores was washing up, with Harry to help—not Martha. Martha and Mr. Joyce consulted together as artist and patron should, unencumbered by domesticity.
    â€œArt,” said Martha at last—pronouncing the word with far more difficulty than she’d have pronounced the name