Every now
and again, one of the birds, recovering its senses
in the hurly-burly, would make a curving swoop downward
past the rows of windows below, and triumphantly catch
in its beak something that had been thrown into the air.
Thorpe, leaning over his railing, saw that a lady on
a balcony one floor below, and some yards to the left,
was feeding the birds. She laughed aloud as she did so,
and said something over her shoulder to a companion who was
not visible.
"Well, that's pretty cool," he remarked to his niece,
who had come to stand beside him. "She's got the same
sign down there that we've got. I can see it from here.
Or perhaps she can't read French."
"Or perhaps she isn't frightened of the hotel people,"
suggested the girl. She added, after a little, "I think
I'll feed them myself in the morning. I certainly shall
if the sun comes out--as a sort of Thanksgiving festival,
you know."
Her uncle seemed not to hear her. He had been struck by
the exceptional grace of the gestures with which the pieces
of bread were flung forth. The hands and wrists of this
lady were very white and shapely. The movements which she
made with them, all unaware of observation as she was,
and viewed as he viewed them from above, were singularly
beautiful in their unconstraint. It was in its way
like watching some remarkable fine dancing, he thought.
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