She inched further away.
Carlo Bacon strolled back in and gave Owen a wink. “She’s coming.”
Owen confided to Pierre, “You’ll be staying with me.”
Pierre just stared at him.
With jealousy, Dick said, “I was the one first introduced myself.”
“And why would he want to hole up on a cattle ranch?” Owen asked. “Anyone could tell by just looking that these are cosmopolitan people.”
“So-called urbanites,” said Iona.
Elderly, tottery, but grandly elegant Mrs. Marvyl Christiansen entered the café. She was seventy-five and a widow and a former high school instructor in French language and culture to a majority in the café. She was still teachy, and Owen and Dick alertly jumped up like this was homeroom and a certain protocol was expected. Owen called, “We got company from France, Marvyl!”
She smiled and seated herself in a queenly way before softly gesturing that the men could sit again. And she said in a good accent and a higher voice than normal, “Bonjour, Mademoiselle. Bonjour, Monsieur.”
Natalie nodded. “Bonjour.”
“Comment allez-vous?”
Iona informed the others, “She’s asking them how they are.”
Natalie told Mrs. Christiansen, “Bien.”
Iona translated. “She said she’s just fine.” Iona observed Pierre observing her and failed to blush with embarrassment.
Mrs. Christiansen asked, “Comment vous appelez-vous?”
And Iona said, “She might could be asking them who they are.”
Natalie gave their names and Pierre scowled as if she were committing treachery.
Mrs. Christiansen asked, “Shall I tell them about The Revels?”
“That would be the primary option,” Dick said.
Mrs. Christiansen seemed to pause to construct sentences worthy of the Académie Française, but she was confused as to vocabulary and fell back onto phrases in her high school textbooks. She asked if that was Natalie’s spoon. She said her fat
her had a splendid tailor. She said poodles were good swimmers, and there was a danger of asphyxiation in a room full of shoes.
Natalie smiled pleasantly, but Pierre leaned toward her and whispered, “Ils sont tous fous.” (They’re all crazy.)
Closely watching the two, Dick had a hunch that his former teacher’s language skills had slackened some, and Mrs. Christiansen was lost in the Ardennes forest and seeking a post office on a Sunday when Dick interrupted to say, “I hate to interrupt, ma’am, but she does speak American English.”
Natalie nodded as she touched Mrs. Christiansen’s wrist. “But really, you were doing quite well.”
“Merci,” Mrs. Christiansen said. She gathered her thoughts into English and then instructed both visitors on their local custom, which was that each summer in Seldom there was a three-day festival in honor of its founder, a nineteenth-century trapper from Bordeaux whose name was Bernard LeBoeuf.
Carlo said, “It’s why Nebraska used to be called The Beef State.”
“Oh, foo,” Iona said. “Where’d you get that?”
“Common knowledge,” Carlo said. And then he got defensive and sullen for a while.
Mrs. Christiansen went on to say it was their habit to invite a visiting couple who strayed into town to be king and queen of The Revels.
Iona said of The Revels, “We have lots of parties. And fun stuff at the fairgrounds.”