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But our troop is often more numerous: to begin with, we chaperon Oyouki who is confided to our care by her parents; then we have two cousins of my wife's pretty little creatures; and lastly friends guests of sometimes only ten or twelve years old, little girls of the neighborhood to whom our mousmés wish to show some politeness.
We pass through the midst of their mirth and their laughter without understanding the wherefore, so totally do they differ from our own. Chrysantheme with Yves, Oyouki with me, Fraise and Zinnia, our cousins, walking before us under our watchful eyes, move slowly through the crowd, holding hands lest we should lose one another.
The whole town will be there; all our married friends have already started, the whole set, X , Y , Z , Touki-San, Campanule, and Jonquille, with 'the friend of amazing height. And these two, poor Chrysantheme and poor Oyouki, would have been obliged to stay at home with heavy hearts, had we not arrived, because Madame Prune had been seized with faintness and hysterics after her dinner."
We also go down to the town, Yves, Chrysantheme, Oyouki and I in order to conduct my mother-in-law, sisters-in-law, and my youthful aunt, Madame Nenufar, to their house.
And these two, poor Chrysantheme and poor Oyouki, would have been obliged to stay at home with heavy hearts, had we not arrived, because Madame Prune had been seized with faintness and hysterics after her dinner. Quickly the mousmes must deck themselves out.
At first it was only to Chrysantheme's guitar that I listened with pleasure now I am beginning to like her singing also. She has nothing of the theatrical, or the deep, assumed voice of the virtuoso; on the contrary, her notes, always very high, are soft, thin, and plaintive. She often teaches Oyouki some romance, slow and dreamy, which she has composed, or which comes back to her mind.
There are groups of women of every age, decked out in their smartest clothes, crowds of mousmés with aigrettes of flowers in their hair, or little silver top-knots like Oyouki, pretty little physiognomies, little narrow eyes peeping between slit lids like those of a new-born kitten, fat pale little cheeks, round, puffed-out, half-opened lips.
M. Sucre and Madame Prune, my landlord and his wife, two perfectly unique personages recently escaped from the panel of some screen, live below us on the ground floor; and very old they seem to have this daughter of fifteen, Oyouki, who is Chrysantheme's inseparable friend.
But our troop is often more numerous: to begin with, we chaperon Oyouki, who is confided to our care by her parents; then we have two cousins of my wife's pretty little creatures; and lastly friends guests of sometimes only ten or twelve years old, little girls of the neighborhood to whom our mousmes wish to show some politeness.
Although Oyouki has a heavy heart, she can not prevent herself from indulging in a few bursts of childish laughter while she works. Madame Prune, bathed in tears, no longer restrains her feelings; poor old lady, I really very much regret . . . . Chrysantheme is absent-minded and silent. But what a fearful amount of luggage!