Casino de Paris. Plenty of
stylish cocottes here, in whom Tertia
and Lizzie [his sisters] were tremendously interested. Which reminded me of C’s
saying, about the married woman’s way of remarking, ‘Ça dit être une cocotte’ [that must be a whore]. But Tertie and
Lizzie now confess their interest, and insist on going to another music-hall on
Monday night in order to see more cocottes.
Yet when I told them of the idea I had discussed with Frank, of writing a
handbook or practical guide for cocottes,
for the private joy of friends, they were certainly startled. I can always tell
when they are really a little
shocked. -
I was told today that, as I thought, the most distinguished of the music-hall
cocottes went to the Casino de Paris;
and also that they did business comparatively infrequently, but what they did
was very remunerative. This latter statement I regarded with suspicion, as also
the following: that a particular woman, tall, very distinguished, and very well
dressed and well jewelled, who I had often admired in various resorts, had an
absolute minimum of 250 francs. It seems she goes about in a pair-horse
carriage in the evening, by some sort of arrangement with the coachman. I was
told that many cocottes pay their
coachmen either partly or wholly in love. This woman, by the way, sometimes
brings to the Casino her young child, of 7 or 8 years old perhaps, I have seen
them together there, and the effect was certainly effective. -
- from the Journals of Arnold Bennett, 1903
No comments:
Post a Comment