"God's blood!" Ballardieu exclaimed, taking a deep breath. "I feel like my old self again!"
More reserved, Agnes smiled.
They had come through the Nesle gate on foot and passed in front of the Hotel de Nevers before arriving at Pont Neuf. It was the shortest route to the Louvre, their destination.
"It is good to be here!" added the delighted old soldier. "Don't you think?"
"Yes."
"And nothing has changed! Look at that buffoon, I remember him!"
He pointed to a tall thin fellow in a moth-eaten cloak, mounted on the back of a poor old nag who was as gaunt as he was, boasting of a miraculous powder which he claimed would preserve your teeth. The fact that he had only one remaining tooth in his own mouth did not seem to weaken his conviction or bother his audience.
"And over there! Tabarin and Mondor, . . ! Come on, let's go hear them."
Tabarin and Mondor were famous si reel entertainers who each had their own stage at the entrance to Place Dauphine. At that moment one of them was singing a bawdy song while the other, armed with an enormous enema bag, was playing at being a quack and offering all comers the chance to have "their arseholes washed all clean and pink!" Their spectators were bursting with laughter.
"Later," said Agnes. "On our way back."
"You've no sense of fun, girl."
"You do remember that I am a baronne?"
"A baronne I knew when she had neither tits nor an arse, who rode on my shoulders, and who I made drink her first glass of eau-de-vie."
"At eight years old! What a handsome feat. ... I remember puking my guts out the whole night after."
"That helps forge character. I was only six when my father did the same for me as I did for you, madame la baronne de Vaudreuil. Have you some objection about the education that my father saw fit to give me?"
"Come on, you old beast. Move along, now. . . . On the way back, I tell you."
"You swear?"
"Yes."
The traffic of carriages, horses, wagons, and handcarts on the roadway was so dense that one could barely advance, while the sidewalks were crammed solid with gawking pedestrians. Charlatans, traders, tumblers, exhibitors of trained dragonnets, teeth pullers ("No pain! And I replace the one I pull!"), and street minstrels all put themselves on show or touted their wares to the crowd in Italian, Spanish, and even Latin or Greek to appear more learned. There were numerous booksellers, offering wrinkled, dogeared, and torn volumes at low prices, among which there were sometimes buried treasures to be found. Each of them had their own stand, hut, tent, or stall. Places were dear and bitterly disputed. Those who had no right to a spot on the bridge put up signboards giving their names, addresses, and specialities. Others—flower sellers, secondhand hatters, and eau-de-vie vendors— hawked their goods loudly as they made their way from one end of the bridge to the other, carrying a tray on their bellies or pushing a cart before them. Anything could be bought or sold on the Pont Neuf. A lot was stolen there, too, for thieves like nothing better than an idle crowd.
Agnes was passing in front of a famous bronze horse—which, standing
on its marble pedestal, would wait almost two centuries before being finally mounted by Henri IV—when she realised she was walking on her own. Retracing her footsteps, she found Ballardieu halted before a Gypsy woman playing a tambourine and dancing lasciviously with a metallic wriggling of her sequined skirt. Agnes dragged the old man away by his sleeve. He followed her backward at first and tripped on the scabbard of his sword, before pricking up an ear at the call: "Hasarda la blanque! With three tries, you can't miss! For one sou, you'll get six! Hasard a la blanque!"
The fellow who was shouting this at the top of his lungs was luring passersby to place bets on the game of blanque, that is to say, the lottery. He was turning a wheel, while the prizes to be won were spread before him: a comb, a mirror, a shoehorn, and other ordinary bric-a-brac which wouldn't be nearly so attractive if anyone looked them over twice. Ballardieu tried his luck, won, and took away a snuffbox with a lid that was only slightly chipped. He was endeavouring to show this prize to the increasingly impatient young baronne when a fanfare of trumpets resounded.
Intrigued and murmuring, the people in the crowd craned their necks uncertainly, seeking the source of the noise.