h an inclosed balcony, the three
windows of which,--a large one in the center and two smaller ones at
the side,--sent a flood of light in over the great writing table which
filled nearly the entire balcony. Inside the room, near the balcony,
stood a divan covered with a bearskin rug. Upon this divan I spent
many of my hours in Paris, occupied in the smoking of my friend's
excellent cigars, and the sampling of his superlatively good whisky.
At the same time I could lie staring up at the tops of the trees in
the Luxembourg Gardens, while Lucien worked at his desk. For, unlike
most writers, he could work best when he was not alone.

"If I remained away several days, he would invariably ring my bell
early some morning, and drag me out of bed with the remark: 'The
whisky is ready. I can't write if you are not there.'

"During the particular days of which I shall tell you, he was engaged
in the writing of a fantastic novelette, 'The Force of the Wind,' a
work which interested him greatly, and which he would interrupt
unwillingly at intervals to furnish copy for the well-known newspaper
that numbered him among the members of its staff. His books were
printed by the same house that did the printing for the paper.

"Often, as I lay in my favorite position on the divan, the bell would
ring and we would be honored by a visit from the printer's boy
Adolphe, a little fellow in a blue blouse, the true type of Paris
gamin. Adolphe rejoiced in a broken nose, a pair of crafty eyes, and
had his fists always full of manuscripts which he treated with a
carelessness that would have driven a literary novice to despair. The
long rolls of yellow paper would hang out of his trousers pockets as
if ready to fall apart at his next movement. And the disrespectful
manner in which he crammed my friend Lucien's scarcely dried essay
into the breast of his blouse would have certainly called forth
remarks from a journalist of more self-conceit.

"But his eyes were so full of sly cunning, and there was such an
atmosphere of Paris about the stocky little fourteen-year-old chap,
that we would often keep him longer with us, and treat him to a glass
of anisette to hear his opinion of the writers whose work he handled.
He was an amusing cross between a tricky little Paris gamin and a real
child, and he hit off the characteristics of the various writers with
as keen a touch of actuality as he could put into his stories of how
many centimes he had won that m