It may be that I had offended her by my fooling. Or it may be that she had a sisterly desire to shield Mlle. Ange’lique from my mordant art. Or it may be that she was bent on saving M. de Maupassant from a dangerous rivalry. Anyway, she withheld from me the inspiration I had so confidently solicited. I could not think what had led up to that scene on the terrace. I tried hard and soberly. I turned the ‘chose vue’ over and over in my mind, day by day, and the fan-stump over and over in my hand. But the ‘chose a’ figurer’--what, oh what, was that? Nightly I revisited the cafe’, and sat there with an open mind--a mind wide-open to catch the idea that should drop into it like a ripe golden plum. The plum did not ripen. The mind remained wide-open for a week or more, but nothing except that phrase about the sea rustled to and fro in it. A full quarter of a century has gone by. M. Joumand’s death, so far too fat was he all those years ago, may be presumed. A temper so violent as Mlle. Angélique’s must surely have brought its owner to the grave, long since. But here, all unchanged, the stump of her fan is; and once more I turn it over and over in my hand, not learning its secret--no, nor even trying to, now. The chord this relic strikes in me is not one of curiosity as to that old quarrel, but (if you will forgive me) one of tenderness for my first effort to write, and for my first hopes of excellence. ‘HOW SHALL I WORD IT?’ 1910. It would seem that I am one of those travellers for whom the railway bookstall does not cater. Whenever I start on a journey, I find that my choice lies between well-printed books which I have no wish to read, and well-written books which I could not read without permanent injury to my eyesight. The keeper of the bookstall, seeing me gaze vaguely along his shelves, suggests that I should take ‘Fen Country Fanny’ or else ‘The Track of Blood’ and have done with it. Not wishing to hurt his feelings, I refuse these works on the plea that I have read them. Whereon he, divining despite me that I am a superior person, says ‘Here is a nice little handy edition of More’s “Utopia”’ or ‘Carlyle’s “French Revolution”’ and again I make some excuse. What pleasure could I get from trying to cope with a masterpiece printed in diminutive grey-ish type on a semi-transparent little grey-ish page? I relieve the bookstall of nothing but a newspaper or two.