After two
or three preliminary hesitations, he at last, to my great joy,
fairly started on the narrative of his adventure. In the interest
of his subject he soon completely forgot that he was sitting for
his portrait--the very expression that I wanted came over his
face--and my drawing proceeded toward completion, in the right
direction, and to the best purpose. At every fresh touch I felt
more and more certain that I was now getting the better of my
grand difficulty; and I enjoyed the additional gratification of
having my work lightened by the recital of a true story, which
possessed, in my estimation, all the excitement of the most
exciting romance.
This, as I recollect it, is how Mr. Faulkner told me his
adventure:
THE TRAVELER'S STORY
OF
A TERRIBLY STRANGE BED.
Shortly after my education at college was finished, I happened to
be staying at Paris with an English friend. We were both young
men then, and lived, I am afraid, rather a wild life, in the
delightful city of our sojourn. One night we were idling about
the neighborhood of the Palais Royal, doubtful to what amusement
we should next betake ourselves. My friend proposed a visit to
Frascati's; but his suggestion was not to my taste. I knew
Frascati's, as the French saying is, by heart; had lost and won
plenty of five-franc pieces there, merely for amusement's sake,
until it was amusement no longer, and was thoroughly tired, in
fact, of all the ghastly respectabilities of such a social
anomaly as a respectable gambling-house.
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