They certainly are not; but why she should have alluded to them at that moment, no one but herself knew. There was a mystery about some of Mrs. Trescott's moods which made her society interesting: no one could ever tell what she would say next.
After breakfast we sat awhile in the garden, where there were palm, lemon, and orange trees, high woody bushes of heliotrope, grotesque growth of cactus, and the great gray-blue swords of the century-plant. Before us stretched the sea. Even if we had not known it, we should have felt sure that its waters laved tropical shores somewhere, and that it was the reflection of those far skies which we caught here.
Miss Graves now joined us, with an acquaintance she had discovered, a Mrs. Clary, who had "spent several winters at Mentone," and who adored "every stone of it." This phrase, which no doubt sounded well coming from Mrs. Clary, who was an impulsive person, with fine dark eyes and expressive mobile face, assumed a comical aspect when repeated by the sober voice of Miss Graves. Mrs. Clary, laughing, hastened to explain; and Miss Graves, noticing Mrs. Trescott on a bench in the shade, where she and her laces had floated down, said, warningly, "I should advise you to rise; I have just learned that the shade of Mentone is of the most deadly nature, and to be avoided like a scorpion."
Mrs. Trescott and her laces floated up. "Is it damp?" she asked, alarmed.
"No," replied Miss Graves, "it is not damp. It does not know how to be damp at Mentone. But the shade is deadly, all the same. Now in Florida it was otherwise." And she went into the house to get a white umbrella.
"Matilda's temperament is really Alpine," said Mrs. Clary, smiling. "I have always felt that she would be cold even in heaven."
"In that case," said Baker, "she might try – " But he had the grace to stop.
"What is it about the shade?" I asked.
"Only this," said Mrs. Clary: "as the warmth is due to the heat of the sun, and not to the air, which is cool, there is more difference between the sunshine and shade here than we are accustomed to elsewhere. But surely it is a small thing to remember. The treasure of Mentone is its sunshine: in it, safety; out of it, danger."
"Like Mr. Micawber's income," said Margaret, smiling. "Amount, twenty shillings; you spend nineteen shillings and sixpence – riches; twenty shillings and sixpence – bankruptcy."
A little later we went down to the "old town," as the closely built village of the Middle Ages, clinging to the side hill, and hardly changed in the long lapse of centuries, is called. The "old town" lies between the East Bay and the West Bay, as the body of a bird lies between the two long, slender wings.
"The West Bay has its Promenade du Midi, and the East Bay has its sea-wall," said Mrs. Clary. "I like a sea-wall."
"This one does not approach that at St. Augustine," said Miss Graves.
"Here is one of the fountains or wells," said Mrs. Clary. "You will soon see that going for water and gossiping at the well are two occupations of the women everywhere in this region. It comes, I suppose, from the scarcity of water, which is brought in pipes from long distances to these wells, to which the women must go for all the water needed by their households. Notice the classic shapes of the jugs and jars they bear on their heads. Those green ones might be majolica."
We now turned up a paved ascent, and passing under a broad stone archway, entered the "old town," through whose narrow, lane-like streets no vehicle could be driven, through some of them hardly a donkey. The principal avenue, the Rue Longue, but a few feet in width, was smoothly paved and clean; but walking there was like being at the bottom of a well, so far above and so narrow was the little ribbon of blue sky at the top. Unbroken stone walls rose on each side, directly upon the street, five and six stories in height, shutting out the sunshine; and these tall gray walls were often joined above our heads also by arches, "like uncelebrated bridges of sighs," Janet said. These closely built continuous blocks were the homes of the native population, "old Mentone," unspoiled by progress and strangers. The low doorways showed stone steps ascending somewhere in the darkness, showed low-ceilinged rooms, whose only light was from the door, where were mothers and babies, men mending shoes, women sewing and occupied with household tasks, as calmly as though daylight was not the natural atmosphere of mankind, but rather their own dusky gloom. Outside the doors little black-eyed children sat on the pavement, eating the dark sour bread of the country, and here and there old women in circular white hats like large dinner plates were spinning thread with distaff and spindle. Above were some bits of color: pots of flowers on high window-sills, bright-hued rags hung out to dry, or a dark-eyed girl, with red kerchief tied over her black braids, looking down.
"It is all like a scene from an opera," said Janet.
"Oh no," said Mrs. Clary; "say rather that it is like a scene from the Middle Ages."
"That is what I mean," said Janet. "The scenes in the operas are generally from the Middle Ages."
"The chorus always," said Baker.
"It is a pity you cannot see the old mansion of the Princes," said Mrs. Clary. "But I see the street is blockaded just now by the artist."
"By the artist?" said Janet.
"Yes; this one, a Frenchman, is rather broad-shouldered, and when he is at work he blockades the street. However, the mansion is not especially interesting; it was built by one of the later Princes with the stones of the ruined castle above, and has, I believe, only a vaulted hallway and one or two marble pillars. It is now a lodging-house. I saw dancing-dogs going up the stairway yesterday."
From the Rue Longue we had turned into a labyrinth of crooked, staircase-like lanes, winding here and there from side to side, but constantly ascending, the whole net-work, owing to the number of arches thrown across above, seeming to be half underground, but in reality a honey-combed erection clinging to the steep hill-side.
"Dancing-dogs!" said Janet, pausing in the darkest of these turnings. "Let us go back and see them."
But we all exclaimed against this; Mrs. Trescott's little old feet were wearied with curling over the round stones, and Margaret was tired. Inness and Baker offered to make dancing-dogs of themselves for the remainder of the morning, and dogs, too, of a very superior quality, if she would only go on.
The Professor, who, in his "winnowing progress," as Mrs. Trescott called it, had fallen behind, now joined us, followed by Miss Graves.
"I have just witnessed a remarkably interesting little ceremony," he began, "quite mediæval – a herald, with his trumpet, making an announcement through the streets. I could not comprehend all he said, but no doubt it was something of importance to the community."
"It was," said Miss Graves's monotonous voice. "He was telling them that excellent sausage-meat was now to be obtained at a certain shop for a price much lower than before."
"Ah," said the Professor. Then, rallying, he added, "But the ceremony was the same."
"Certainly," I said, with my usual unappreciated benevolence.
"I wonder what induced these people to build their houses upon such a crag as this, when they had the whole sunny coast to choose from?" said Janet.
The Professor, charmed with this idle little speech (which he took for a thirst for knowledge), hastened by several of us as we walked in single file, in order to be nearer to the questioner.
"You may not be aware, Miss Trescott," he began (she was still in advance, but he hoped to make up the distance), "that this whole shore, called the Riviera – "
"Let us begin fairly," I said. "What is the Riviera?"
"It is heaven," said Mrs. Clary.
"It is the coast of the Gulf of Genoa," said the Professor, "extending both eastward and westward from the city of that name. On the west it extends geographically to Nice; but Cannes and Antibes are generally included. This shore-line, then, has been subject from a very early date to attacks from the pirates of the Mediterranean, who swept down upon the coast and carried off as slaves all who came in their way. To escape the horrors of this slavery