Page:The fortunes of Fifi (IA fortunesoffifi00seawiala).pdf/146

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  • thing about her trousseau, and Madame Bourcet

hastened to say that she might take Angéline.

In a little while the two were ready to start. In her hand Fifi carried a little purse, containing twenty-one francs, and in her reticule she carried her handkerchief, her smelling-salts and ten crisp thousand-franc notes.

"How shall I ever spend it all!" she thought, with a little dismay; and then, having some curious odds and ends of sense in her pretty head, she concluded: "Oh, it is easy enough. I have often heard Cartouche say that nobody ever yet tried to squander money who did not find a dozen helpers on every hand."

Paris is beautiful on a spring morning, with the sun shining on the splashing fountains and the steel blue river, and the streets full of cheerful-looking people. It was the first, mild, soft day of March, and everybody was trying to make believe it was May. The restaurants had placed their chairs and tables out of doors, and made a brave showing of greenery with watercress and a few little radishes. Itinerant musicians were grinding away industriously, and some humorous cab-drivers had paid five centimes for a sprig of green to stick behind