



Produced by David Widger






PUTOIS

By Anatole France

Translated by William Patten.

Copyright, 1907, by P. F. Collier & Son.

Dedicated to Georges Brandes




I

This garden of our childhood, said Monsieur Bergeret, this garden that
one could pace off in twenty steps, was for us a whole world, full of
smiles and surprises.

"Lucien, do you recall Putois?" asked Zoe, smiling as usual, the lips
pressed, bending over her work.

"Do I recall Putois! Of all the faces I saw as a child that of Putois
remains the clearest in my remembrance. All the features of his face and
his character are fixed in my mind. He had a pointed cranium..."

"A low forehead," added Mademoiselle Zoe.

And the brother and sister recited alternately, in a monotonous voice,
with an odd gravity, the points in a sort of description:

"A low forehead."

"Squinting eyes."

"A shifty glance."

"Crow's-feet at the temples."

"The cheek-bones sharp, red and shining."

"His ears had no rims to them."

"The features w