Page 98 - down-and-out-in-paris-and-london

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heard queer tales in the hotel. There were tales of dope
I fiends, of old debauchees who frequented hotels in search
of pretty page boys, of thefts and blackmail. Mario told me
of a hotel in which he had been, where a chambermaid stole
a priceless diamond ring from an American lady. For days
the staff were searched as they left work, and two detectives
searched the hotel from top to bottom, but the ring was nev-
er found. The chambermaid had a lover in the bakery, and
he had baked the ring into a roll, where it lay unsuspected
until the search was over.
Once Valenti, at a slack time, told me a story about him-
self.
‘You know, MON P’TIT, this hotel life is all very well,
but it’s the devil when you’re out of work. I expect you know
what it is to go without eating, eh? FORCEMENT, oth-
erwise you wouldn’t be scrubbing dishes. Well, I’m not a
poor devil of a PLONGEUR; I’m a waiter, and I went five
days without eating, once. Five days without even a crust of
bread—Jesus Christ!
‘I tell you, those five days were the devil. The only good
thing was, I had my rent paid in advance. I was living in a
dirty, cheap little hotel in the Rue Sainte Eloise up in the
Latin quarter. It was called the Hotel Suzanne May, after
some famous prostitute of the time of the Empire. I was