Read Online A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway - Free Book Online
Authors: Ernest Hemingway
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and it was one of the best cafes in Paris. It was warm inside in the winter, and in the spring and fall it was very fine outside with the tables under the shade of the trees on the side where the statue of Marshal Ney was, and the square, regular tables under the big awnings along the boulevard. Two of the waiters were our good friends. People from the Dome and the Rotonde never came to the Lilas.
There was no one there they knew, and no one would have stared at them if they came. In those days many people went to the cafes at the corner of the Boulevard Montparnasse and the Boulevard Raspail to be seen publicly and in a way such places anticipated the columnists as the daily substitutes for immortality.
The Closerie des Lilas had once been a cafe where poets met more or less regularly and the last principal poet had been Paul Fort whom I had never read. But the only poet I ever saw there was Blaise Cendrars, with his broken boxer's face and his pinned-up empty sleeve, rolling a cigarette with his one good hand. He was a good companion until he drank too much and, at that time, when he was lying, he was more interesting than many men telling a story truly. But he was the only poet who came to the Lilas then and I only saw him there once. Most of the clients were elderly bearded men in well-worn clothes who came with their wives or their mistresses and wore or did not wear thin red Legion of Honour ribbons in their lapels. We thought of them all hopefully as scientists or savants and they sat almost as long over an aperitif as the men in shabbier clothes who sat with their wives or mistresses over a cafe creme and wore the purple ribbon of the Palms of the Academy, which had nothing to do with the French Academy, and meant, we thought, that they were professors or instructors.
These people made it a comfortable cafe since they were all interested in each other and in their drinks or coffees, or infusions, and in the papers and periodicals which were fastened to rods, and no one was on exhibition.
There were other people too who lived in the quarter and came to the Lilas, and some of them wore Croix de Guerre ribbons in their lapels and others also had the yellow and green of the Medaille Militaire, and I watched how well they were overcoming the handicap of the loss of limbs, and saw the quality of their artificial eyes and the degree of skill with which their faces had been reconstructed. There was always an almost iridescent shiny cast about the considerably reconstructed face, rather like that of a well-packed ski run, and we respected these clients more than we did the savants or the professors, although the latter might well have done their military service too without experiencing mutilation.
In those days we did not trust anyone who had not been in the war, but we did not completely trust anyone, and there was a strong feeling that Cendrars might well be a little less flashy about his vanished arm. I was glad he had been in the Lilas early in the afternoon before the regular clients had arrived.
On this evening I was sitting at a table outside of the Lilas watching the light change on the trees and the buildings and the passage of the great slow horses of the outer boulevards. The door of the cafe opened behind me and to my right, and a man came out and walked to my table.
'Oh here you are,' he said.
It was Ford Madox Ford, as he called himself then, and he was breathing heavily through a heavy, stained moustache and holding himself as upright as an ambulatory, well-clothed, up-ended hogshead.
'May I sit with you?' he asked, sitting down, and his eyes which were a washed-out blue under colourless lids and eyebrows looked out at the boulevard.
'I spent good years of my life that those beasts should be slaughtered humanely,' he said.
'You told me,' I said.
'I don't think so.'
'I'm quite sure.'
'Very odd. I've never told anyone in my life.'
'Will you have a drink?'
The waiter stood there and Ford told him
There was no one there they knew, and no one would have stared at them if they came. In those days many people went to the cafes at the corner of the Boulevard Montparnasse and the Boulevard Raspail to be seen publicly and in a way such places anticipated the columnists as the daily substitutes for immortality.
The Closerie des Lilas had once been a cafe where poets met more or less regularly and the last principal poet had been Paul Fort whom I had never read. But the only poet I ever saw there was Blaise Cendrars, with his broken boxer's face and his pinned-up empty sleeve, rolling a cigarette with his one good hand. He was a good companion until he drank too much and, at that time, when he was lying, he was more interesting than many men telling a story truly. But he was the only poet who came to the Lilas then and I only saw him there once. Most of the clients were elderly bearded men in well-worn clothes who came with their wives or their mistresses and wore or did not wear thin red Legion of Honour ribbons in their lapels. We thought of them all hopefully as scientists or savants and they sat almost as long over an aperitif as the men in shabbier clothes who sat with their wives or mistresses over a cafe creme and wore the purple ribbon of the Palms of the Academy, which had nothing to do with the French Academy, and meant, we thought, that they were professors or instructors.
These people made it a comfortable cafe since they were all interested in each other and in their drinks or coffees, or infusions, and in the papers and periodicals which were fastened to rods, and no one was on exhibition.
There were other people too who lived in the quarter and came to the Lilas, and some of them wore Croix de Guerre ribbons in their lapels and others also had the yellow and green of the Medaille Militaire, and I watched how well they were overcoming the handicap of the loss of limbs, and saw the quality of their artificial eyes and the degree of skill with which their faces had been reconstructed. There was always an almost iridescent shiny cast about the considerably reconstructed face, rather like that of a well-packed ski run, and we respected these clients more than we did the savants or the professors, although the latter might well have done their military service too without experiencing mutilation.
In those days we did not trust anyone who had not been in the war, but we did not completely trust anyone, and there was a strong feeling that Cendrars might well be a little less flashy about his vanished arm. I was glad he had been in the Lilas early in the afternoon before the regular clients had arrived.
On this evening I was sitting at a table outside of the Lilas watching the light change on the trees and the buildings and the passage of the great slow horses of the outer boulevards. The door of the cafe opened behind me and to my right, and a man came out and walked to my table.
'Oh here you are,' he said.
It was Ford Madox Ford, as he called himself then, and he was breathing heavily through a heavy, stained moustache and holding himself as upright as an ambulatory, well-clothed, up-ended hogshead.
'May I sit with you?' he asked, sitting down, and his eyes which were a washed-out blue under colourless lids and eyebrows looked out at the boulevard.
'I spent good years of my life that those beasts should be slaughtered humanely,' he said.
'You told me,' I said.
'I don't think so.'
'I'm quite sure.'
'Very odd. I've never told anyone in my life.'
'Will you have a drink?'
The waiter stood there and Ford told him
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