. . . I shall
finally have to live alone." Then he met his mother--embraces and tears.
Afterwards he saw his Aunt Elena in the hotel parlors, most enthusiastic
over the country and the summer colony.
She could talk at great length with many of them about the decadence of
France. They were all expecting to receive the news from one moment to
another, that the Kaiser had entered the Capital. Ponderous men who had
never done anything in all their lives, were criticizing the defects
and indolence of the Republic. Young men whose aristocracy aroused Dona
Elena's enthusiasm, broke forth into apostrophes against the corruption
of Paris, corruption that they had studied thoroughly, from sunset to
sunrise, in the virtuous schools of Montmartre. They all adored Germany
where they had never been, or which they knew only through the reels
of the moving picture films. They criticized events as though they were
witnessing a bull fight. "The Germans have the snap! You can't fool with
them! They are fine brutes!" And they appeared to admire this inhumanity
as the most admirable characteristic. "Why will they not say that in
their own home on the other side of the frontier?" Chichi would
protest. "Why do they come into their neighbor's country to ridicule
his troubles? . . . Possibly they consider it a sign of their wonderful
good-breeding!"
But Julio had not gone to Biarritz to live with his family.
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