A Maid and a Million Men: the candid confessions of Leona Canwick, censored indiscreetly by James G. Dunton
John Stuart Mill · en
Another short note came from Aunt Elinor to inform me that she had come
across an old post card from Lisa Mantour, the darling of a maid who was
with us at St. Malo years and years ago. Auntie wrote as soon as she
found it, because she thought I must look up Lisa at once and thus be
able to fall back upon her in case of discovery or trouble of any kind.
It was awfully funny, too, because the post card was sent from this very
city of Le Mans, and I’d be leaving in another day or so. So I made up
my mind to find her, if she was still in the city. I’d have to manage to
get away without Ben, because I didn’t want to risk his overhearing
anything about twins that might stir his imagination. He had enough
foundation for suspicions as it was.
I had my second hair-cut for this rôle. I was a pretty clean-cut young
fella, believe me.
—4—
The next day I discovered to my horror that I did the dizziest thing! I
burned up that letter from Auntie without copying the name of the man
Lisa married. I knew her maiden name but I had one hell of a time trying
to remember that other name just from reading it once in that letter.
So I ditched Ben and went in town to see if I couldn’t see some name
that would recall Lisa’s. I walked all over the downtown section,
looking at window signs and cards, and repeating over and over all the
possibilities that came to my mind. I knew the name started with “L” and
I tried every possible combination of letters beginning with that
letter, but nothing clicked.
It began to rain and I stepped into a corner doorway to escape the
downpour. Two Frenchmen under umbrellas were standing in front of me,
gesticulating so wildly that their hands were all wet, and one of them
kept referring to some name that finally began to sound familiar. I
listened more closely and, sure enough, that was the very name I had
been trying to remember. I grabbed the man’s arm and demanded very
excitedly, “Did you say ‘Lenotier,’ m’sieur?”
“But yes,” admitted the startled man. “Pierre Lenotier, our friend.
Pourquoi?”
“That’s it! Exactly it!” I exclaimed. “And where does one find this
Pierre Lenotier, m’sieur?”
The two natives stared at each other a moment, then stared at me;
finally the one who had not spoken yet stepped from beneath his little
roof long enough to point to the sign over the doorway in which I was
standing. “You do not read, m’sieur?” he asked, with that gentleness
which one affects in humoring a lunatic.
I stepped out and looked at the old sign over the door. It read
LE CHIEN ROUGE
PIERRE LENOTIER, PR.