He
perceived it, indeed--mentally--in the attitude of a small street-boy
playing upon his nose with that vulgar gesture which is supposed to
represent the elation of successful fraud. There was a large blank wall
before his window, painted a dirty yellow and much discolored by the
weather; a broad patch of summer sunlight rested upon it and brought
out the full vulgarity of its complexion. Bernard stared a while at
this blank wall, which struck him in some degree as a symbol of his
own present moral prospect. Then suddenly he turned away, with the
declaration that, whatever truth there might be in symbolism, he, at any
rate, had not come to Europe to spend the precious remnant of his youth
in a malodorous Norman sea-port. The weather was very hot, and neither
the hotel nor the town at large appeared to form an attractive sejour
for persons of an irritable nostril. To go to Paris, however, was hardly
more attractive than to remain at Havre, for Bernard had a lively vision
of the heated bitumen and the glaring frontages of the French capital.
But if a Norman town was close and dull, the Norman country was
notoriously fresh and entertaining, and the next morning Bernard got
into a caleche, with his luggage, and bade its proprietor drive him
along the coast.
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