CHAPTER V COFFEE FOR THREE

It was with a critical eye that Petite Jeanne studied her strange companions as they marched away across the park toward the nearest row of shops where a lunch counter might be found. With her native French caution she resolved not to be taken in by strangers.

“They amuse me,” she told herself. “Especially the old man. And yet, I wonder if amuse is just the right word. He tells prodigious lies. I wonder if he really means you to believe them. And yet, who would not love him?

“A cup of coffee on a stool,” she concluded. “Where’s the harm in that? He may tell me other stories.”
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A cup of coffee on a stool was exactly what it turned out to be. The young host made no apologies as he bowed the little French girl to the nearest lunch counter and gave her his hand as she mounted the high seat.

Petite Jeanne ordered sugar wafers, the others ordered doughnuts, and they all had coffee.

Dan Baker told no stories over that coffee. It was Angelo who did the talking until he hit upon the fact that Jeanne had traveled with gypsies. Then his big dark eyes lighted with a strange fire as he demanded:

“Tell me about that. Tell me all about it!”

Petite Jeanne was tempted not to tell. But the coffee was truly fine, and this was to be her lucky day. Why begin it by refusing such a simple request by a friendly young man?

She told her story, told it very well, told of her wanderings across France in a gypsy van. Once more she danced with her bear down country lanes and across village squares. She sang for pennies at fairs and carnivals. She haunted the streets of Paris.

“Beautiful Paris. Marvelous, matchless, beautiful city of my dreams!” Dan Baker murmured, even as she rambled on.
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Jeanne loved him for it. For her, Paris would always remain the most beautiful city in all the world.

As she told her story the dark eyes of the Italian youth, Angelo, were ever upon her. Yet his look was not an offensive one. So impersonal was it that he might have been looking at a marble statue. Yet there was a burning fire in his eyes, the fire of hope, of a new born dream. In that dream he was laying plans, plans for her, Petite Jeanne; a play, his play; a light opera, and what a light opera it would be!

“There!” Jeanne exclaimed as she hopped nimbly off her stool. “I have told you my story. It is a happy little, sad little story, isn’t it? As all true stories must be. There have been for me many moments of happiness. And who in all the world can hope for more than that?”

“You speak the truth, child.” Dan Baker smiled. In that smile there was something so full of meaning, so suggestive of a kindly soul grown mellow with time, that Jeanne wished to stand on tiptoe and kiss that wrinkled face.
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Instead, she patted his hand and murmured: “Thank you so much for such a lovely time and for those wonderful, wonderful stories.”

“But you are not leaving us so soon?” protested the young Italian.

“I must. This is to be my luckee day. Strange, mysterious happenings have come to me. More will come. I have an engagement to meet a new friend. She will take me to a sale. There I shall buy a package at auction. What is in the package? Who knows? Perhaps I shall purchase two, or even three. What will these contain? Who knows? Much, I am sure. For this is my luckee day.”

She sang these last words as she danced out of the lunch room.
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The others followed. “But you will see me again,” pleaded the young Italian. “You are to be in my play, my light opera. I shall write it at once, around you; you only and him, my white-haired friend. It shall be about your beautiful Paree. And oh, how wonderful it shall be! It has all come to me as you told your story. It is wonderful! Marvelous! I have only to write it. And I shall write it with an electric pen that spits fire. You shall see!

“Only grant me this!” In his excitement he waved his hands wildly. Petite Jeanne could have loved him for that; for is it not thus they do in her beloved France? “Grant me this!” he pleaded. “Come to my studio to-night. When your lucky day is over. Then the night shall be more fortunate than the day.

“See!” he exclaimed as he read doubt in her eyes. “It is all right. My white-haired friend will be there. And if you wish—”

“All right,” said the girl impulsively, “I will come. I will bring my friend.”

“Yes, yes,” he agreed eagerly. “Bring your friends. Bring many friends. We shall have a party by the open fire. We shall have tea and biscuits and preserves from my native land.”

“No,” said the little French girl, as a teasing smile played about her lips. “I will bring one friend, only one. And she is big as a policeman, and so strong! Mon Dieu! She is a physical director. She can swim a mile, and skate like a man. And, oh, la, la! You shall see her.”
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At that she went dancing away.

“She was teasing you,” said the old man.

“But she’s a marvel!”

“Yes. She is all that. And you will write a play for us?”

“I will write one.”

“And where shall we open? In Peoria?”

“Peoria? Chicago!”

“But I have never played in a great city. I am a—”

“In this life,” the youth broke in, “it is not what you have been that counts. It is what you are going to be.

“In three months you will see your name beside that other one, Petite Jeanne, and men will fight at the box office for tickets. You shall see!”

The old man said no more. But as they walked away, he squared his bent shoulders and took on for a time quite a military air.