U.S.A_ - John Dos Passos [358]
"Be back in a minute, teacher." The face disappeared. She was dizzy but Pierre caught her and held her tight; he smelt of perfume but stil she liked having him hold her tight. He suggested they go somewhere else, "Mademoisel e Sistair," he whispered, "al ow us to show you the mystères de Paree . . . afterwards we can come back to your plus orsairs. They wil probably become intoxicate . . . plus orsairs invariably intoxicate." They laughed. He had grey eyes and light hair, he said he was a Norman. She said
-414-he was the nicest Frenchman she'd ever met. She had a hard time getting her coat from the checkroom because she didn't have any check, but she went in and picked it out while Pierre talked French to the checkgirl. They got into a long low grey car; Daughter had never seen such speeding. Pierre was a fine driver though; he had a game of running ful speed towards a gendarme and swerving just enough at the right moment. She said supposing he hit one; he shrugged his shoulders and said, "It does not mattair . . . they are . . . ow do you cal it? . . . bloody cows." They went to Maxims, where it was too quiet for them, then to a little tough dancehal way across Paris. Daughter could see that Pierre was wel known everywhere and an Ace. The other aviators met girls in different places and dropped away. Before she realized it she and Pierre were alone in the long grey car. "Primo," he was explaining, "we wil go to Les Hal es to eat soupe à l'oignon . . . and then I shal take you a little tour en avion.""Oh, please do. I've never been up in a plane
. . . I'd like to go up and loop the loop . . . promise you'l loop the loop.""Entendu," he said. They sat a little sleepily in a smal empty eatingplace and ate onion soup and drank some more champagne. He was stil very kind and considerate but he seemed to have exhausted his English. She thought vaguely about going back to the hotel and catching the boattrain, but al she seemed to be able to say was, "Loop the loop, promise me you'l loop the loop." His eyes had gotten a little glazy,
"With Mademoisel e Sistair," he said, "I do not make love . . . I make loop the loop." It was a long drive out to the aviation field. A little greyness of dawn was creeping over everything. Pierre couldn't drive straight any more, so that she had to grab the wheel once or twice to steady him. When they drew up with a jerk at the field she could see the row of hangars and three planes standing out in deepest blue and beyond,
-415-rows of poplartrees against the silver rim of the plain. Overhead the sky sagged heavily like a wet tent. Daughter got out of the car shivering. Pierre was staggering a little.
"Perhaps you wil go instead to bed . . . to bed it is very good," he said yawning. She put her arm around him,
"You promised you'd take me up and loop the loop."
"Al right," he said angrily and walked towards one of the planes. He fumbled with the engine a while and she could hear him swearing in French. Then he went into the hangar to wake up a mechanic. Daughter stood there
shivering in the growing silvery light. She wouldn't think of anything. She wanted to go up in a plane. Her head ached but she didn't feel nauseated. When the mechanic came back with Pierre she could make out that he was arguing with him trying to make him give up the flight. She got very sore: " Pierre, you've got to take me up," she yel ed at the two men sleepily arguing in French. "Aw-right, Mademoisel e Sistair." They wrapped a heavy army-coat around her and strapped her very careful y in the observer's seat. Pierre climbed into the pilot seat. It was a Bleriot monoplane, he said. The mechanic spun the