Page:The Bohemians of the Latin Quarter.djvu/272

“Here is enough to buy a needle and thread with. Mend your gown, that will instruct and amuse you at the same time, utile dulci.”

Nevertheless, in a council kept very secret, Marcel and Schaunard agreed with Rodolphe that each of them should endeavor to satisfy the justifiable coquetry of their mistresses.

“These poor girls,” said Rodolphe, “a trifle suffices to adorn them, but then they must have this trifle. Latterly fine arts and literature have been flourishing; we are earning almost as much as street porters.”

“It is true that I ought not to complain,” broke in Marcel. “The fine arts are in a most healthy condition, one might believe oneself under the sway of Leo the Tenth.”

“In point of fact,” said Rodolphe, “ Musette tells me that for the last week you have started off every morning and do not get home till about eight in the evening. Have you really got something to do?”

“My dear fellow, a superb job that Medicis got me. I am painting at the Ave Maria barracks. Eight grenadiers have ordered their portraits at six francs a head taken all round, likenesses guaranteed for a year, like a watch. I hope to get the whole regiment. I had the idea, on my own part, of decking out Musette when Medicis pays me, for it is with him I do business and not with my models.”

“As to me,” observed Schaunard, carelessly, “although it may not look like it, I have two hundred francs lying idle.”

“The deuce, let us stir them up,” said Rodolphe.

“In two or three days I count on drawing them,” replied Schaunard. “I do not conceal from you that on doing so I intend to give a free rein to some of my passions. There is, above all, at the second-hand clothes-shop close by a