Absent-mindedly I dipped the
edge of the piece of sugar into the liquid, before dropping it,
and watched the brown moisture rise through the white crystals.
Then I remembered. It was an invariable practice of Carlotta's.
She would keep the lump in the coffee to saturation-point between
her fingers, and then hastily put it into her mouth, so that it
should not crumble to pieces on the way. If it did, there would
be much laughter and wiping of skirts; and there would be a
search through my dinner-jacket pockets for a handkerchief to dry
the pink tips of her fingers. She called the dripping lump a
canard, like the French children. It was such a trivial thing;
but it brought back with a rush all the thousand dainty, foolish,
captivating intimacies that made up the maddening charm of
Carlotta.
Yes, I am aware that there is no language spoken under heaven
that can fitly express the doting folly of a man who can be
driven mad by a piece of sugar soaked in coffee. There is a
ghastly French phrase not to be found in Lamartine,
Chateaubriand, or any of the polite sentimentalists _avoir les
sangs tournes de quelqu'un_.
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