The month passed quickly for Hastings, leaving him with only a few strong memories.
One came when he met Mr. Bladen on the Boulevard des Capucines. Bladen was with a very flashy young woman whose loud laugh made Hastings uncomfortable.
Bladen spotted him and immediately pulled him into a café for a bock.
“Come along, Hastings! Have a drink with us.”
Hastings tried to protest, but there was no escaping him.
When he finally got away, he felt as though everyone on the boulevard was staring at him and judging him by the company he had kept.
Later, a disturbing thought about the young woman with Bladen brought a rush of heat to his face.
He returned to the pension looking so miserable that Miss Byng became worried.
“You must get over your homesickness,” she advised him. “You’ll make yourself ill if you keep thinking about home.”
Another memory was much happier.
One Saturday morning, Hastings was feeling particularly lonely. He wandered through the city until he reached the Gare St. Lazare.
It was still too early for breakfast, so he went into the Hôtel Terminus and sat at a table near the window.
As he turned to place his order, a man hurrying through the aisle bumped hard into his head.
Hastings looked up, expecting an apology.
Instead, the man slapped him warmly on the shoulder.
“What the deuce are you doing here, old chap?”
It was Rowden.
“Come on,” Rowden said. “You’re joining us.”
Hastings protested mildly, but Rowden had already seized him and was dragging him into a private dining room.
Clifford was sitting at the table. He jumped up, looking rather red in the face.
“Hastings! What a surprise!”
His welcome was a little awkward, but Rowden was genuinely delighted to see him, and Elliott greeted him with perfect courtesy.
Elliott introduced him to three charming girls.
“Cécile, Colette, Jacqueline—this is Hastings.”
They welcomed him so warmly, and joined Rowden so enthusiastically in insisting that he come with them, that Hastings quickly agreed.
While Elliott explained their plan to visit La Roche, Hastings happily ate his omelet and smiled back at Cécile, Colette, and Jacqueline.
Meanwhile, Clifford leaned toward Rowden and whispered blandly,
“You’re an absolute ass.”
Poor Rowden looked miserable.
Elliott noticed what was happening. He frowned at Clifford and found a chance to reassure Rowden.
“Forget it. We’ll make the best of it. It’s fate, and that settles it.”
Clifford hid a grin.
“It’s Rowden, and that settles it.”
After all, Hastings was not his responsibility.
And so, at 9:15 that morning, the train left the Gare St. Lazare.
A little later, it stopped at the red-roofed station of La Roche, and the cheerful party climbed out carrying sunshades, fishing rods, and one cane, which belonged to the non-fishing Hastings.
They soon established themselves in a grove of sycamores beside the little River Ept.
Clifford, who considered himself the unquestioned authority on all matters of sport, immediately took charge.
“You, Rowden,” he ordered, “share your flies with Elliott and keep an eye on him.”
“Why?”
“Because he’ll probably try to put a float and sinker on a fly rod.”
Elliott looked offended.
“Do you really think this is my first time fishing?”
“I shall be delighted to see your first trout,” Clifford replied.
Elliott laughed despite himself.
Clifford ducked a fishing hook that Elliott threw at him and then began preparing three light rods for Cécile, Colette, and Jacqueline.
With a perfectly serious expression, he attached four small split shot, a tiny hook, and a bright quill float to each line.
Cécile shuddered.
“I shall never touch those worms.”
“Neither will I,” Colette declared.
“Nor I,” Jacqueline agreed.
Hastings smiled.
“I’ll bait the hooks and remove the fish. That can be my contribution.”
But Cécile had become fascinated by the colorful flies in Clifford’s fishing book.
“I think I would rather learn how to fish properly,” she announced.
“Excellent,” said Clifford.
A moment later, Cécile disappeared up the Ept with Clifford following behind.
Elliott looked uncertainly at Colette.
“I prefer gudgeons,” Colette said firmly.
Then she smiled at Jacqueline.
“Perhaps Monsieur Elliott and Monsieur Rowden can leave us alone, don’t you think?”
“Certainly,” Jacqueline replied.
Elliott examined his rod and reel.
Rowden looked over his shoulder.
“You’ve got your reel on upside down.”
Elliott hesitated and glanced at Colette.
“I—I’ve almost decided not to use the flies just now.”
He pointed toward the rod Cécile had left behind.
“There’s the pole—”
“Don’t call it a pole.”
“Rod, then.”
Elliott started after the two girls.
Rowden grabbed him by the arm.
“No, you don’t! What sort of fisherman uses a float and sinker when he has a fly rod in his hand? Come along!”
Down where the quiet Ept flowed between the bushes toward the Seine, a grassy bank shaded the shallow water where gudgeon gathered.
Colette and Jacqueline sat there chatting and laughing as they watched the bright red floats bob across the water.
Hastings lay nearby with his hat pulled over his eyes and his head resting on a bank of moss.
Whenever one of the girls caught a fish, a quick movement of the rod and a half-suppressed scream announced it.
Hastings gallantly removed the hook from each angry little gudgeon.
Sunlight filtered through the leafy trees.
Birds sang in the awakening woods.
Black-and-white magpies hopped nearby, flicking their tails.
Blue-and-white jays with rosy breasts screamed among the branches.
Farther away, a hawk glided low over the fields of ripening wheat, scattering little birds from the hedges.
Across the Seine, a gull settled on the water like a white feather.
The air was clean and still.
Hardly a leaf moved.
From some distant farm came the faint cry of a rooster and the dull barking of a dog.
Every now and then, a steam tug appeared on the river.
Its tall, slanting smokestack poured out smoke as the boat dragged a long line of barges behind it.
The name Guêpe 27 was painted on its side.
At other times, a sailboat drifted silently down the current toward sleepy Rouen.
The air smelled faintly of fresh earth and water.
Orange-tipped butterflies danced over the marsh grass, while soft, velvety butterflies moved slowly through the mossy woods.
Hastings lay quietly beneath the trees.
His thoughts were on Valentine.
At two o’clock, Elliott finally returned.
“I managed to get away from Rowden,” he admitted.
He sat down beside Colette and stretched out comfortably.
Colette looked at him sternly.
“Where are your trout?”
“They’re still alive.”
He closed his eyes.
A moment later, he was asleep.
Rowden returned soon afterward.
He glanced contemptuously at the sleeping Elliott and held up three trout, their sides marked with bright red spots.
Hastings smiled lazily.
“And that,” he said, “is the glorious end toward which the faithful fisherman struggles—the slaughter of tiny fish with a little silk and feather.”
Rowden refused to answer.
Colette caught another gudgeon and woke Elliott.
“I say,” Elliott protested, looking around, “where are the lunch baskets?”
At that moment Clifford and Cécile appeared.
“Lunch!” Cécile demanded.
Her skirts were soaked and her gloves were torn, but she looked happier than anyone.
Clifford pulled a two-pound trout from his creel and stood proudly while everyone applauded.
Elliott stared at the fish.
“Where the deuce did you get that?”
Cécile excitedly described the battle.
Clifford then praised her skill with the fly rod.
“To prove it,” he said, reaching into his creel, “look at this.”
He produced a dead chub.
“It only just missed being a trout.”
Everyone laughed.
They were all extremely happy during lunch, and Hastings was declared “charming.”
He enjoyed himself immensely.
Still, there were moments when he felt that flirting went much further in France than it ever did in Millbrook, Connecticut.
He thought Cécile might be a little less enthusiastic about Clifford.
Perhaps Jacqueline could sit a little farther away from Rowden.
And perhaps Colette could occasionally take her eyes off Elliott’s face.
But Hastings enjoyed the day anyway.
Only when his thoughts returned to Valentine did the happiness disappear.
Then he felt terribly far away from her.
La Roche was at least an hour and a half from Paris.
Yet there was something almost magical about returning to the city.
At eight that evening, the train from La Roche rolled into the Gare St. Lazare.
Hastings felt his heart beat faster.
He was back in Paris.
He was back in Valentine’s city.
“Good night!” the others called as they gathered around him.
“You must come with us next time!”
“I will,” Hastings promised.
He watched them disappear into the darkening streets, two by two.
He remained standing there for a long time.
When he finally looked up again, the great boulevard was glowing with gas lamps, while the electric lights shone above them like enormous moons.