I
even recognized on the yellow wall the stamp of a hand in dry mud, made
fifteen years ago by a day boy called Parisot, who had fallen down in
the gutter close by, and thus left his mark on getting up again; and it
had remained there for months, till it had been whitewashed away in the
holidays. Here it was anew, after fifteen years.
The swallows were flying and twittering. A yellow omnibus was drawn up
to the gates of the school; the horses stamped and neighed, and bit each
other, as French horses always did in those days. The driver swore at
them perfunctorily.
A crowd was looking on--le Pere et la Mere Francois, Madame Liard, the
grocer's wife, and other people, whom I remembered at once with delight.
Just in front of us a small boy and girl were looking on, like the rest,
and I recognized the back and the cropped head and thin legs of Mimsey
Seraskier.
A barrel-organ was playing a pretty tune I knew quite well, and had
forgotten.
The school gates opened, and M. Saindou, proud and full of
self-importance (as he always was), and half a dozen boys whose faces
and names were quite familiar to me, in smart white trousers and shining
boots, and silken white bands round their left arms, got into the
omnibus, and were driven away in a glorified manner--as it seemed--to
heaven in a golden chariot.
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