Page:The Bohemians of the Latin Quarter.djvu/152

“True; I should never have thought of that.”

They heard a neighboring clock strike six.

“Let us have dinner at once,” said Rodolphe. “I mean to begin from to-night. Talking of dinner, it occurs to me that we lose much valuable time every day in cooking ours; now time is money, so we must economize it. From this day we will dine out.”

“Yes,” said Marcel, “there is a capital restaurant twenty steps off. It’s rather dear, but not far to go, so we shall gain in time what we lose in money.”

“We will go there to-day,” said Rodolphe, “but to-morrow or next day we will adopt a still more economical plan. Instead of going to the restaurant, we will hire a cook.”

“No, no,” put in Marcel, “we will hire a servant to be cook and everything. Just see the immense advantages which will result from it. First of all, our rooms will be always in order; he will clean our boots, go on errands, wash my brushes; I will even try and give him a taste for the fine arts, and make him grind colors. In this way we shall gave at least six hours a day.”

Five minutes after, the two friends were installed in one of the little rooms of the restaurant, and continuing their schemes of economy.

“We must get an intelligent lad,” said Rodolphe; “if he has a sprinkling of spelling, I will teach him to write articles, and make an editor of him.”

“That will be a resource for his old age,” said Marcel, adding up the bill. “Well, this s dear, rather! Fifteen francs! We used both to dine for a franc and a half.”

“Yes,” replied Rodolphe, “but then we dined so badly that we were obliged to sup at night. So, on the whole, it is an economy.”

“You always have the best of the argument,” muttered the convinced artist. “Shall we work to-night?”