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BACK    TO    PARIS    AND    CELEBRITIES
That is what I admired so much about them.
There was a Spanish hairdresser in the Rue Delam-
bre. I had my hair cut there. There was not a
ladies* place and I had to sit with the French
workmen, who were being shaved. The Spaniard
was a little man with a turned up moustache, who
danced on his toes as he was shaving the workmen.
One day his wife came in with a large bunch of
flowers. The Spaniard was delighted, and the
Frenchman whom he was shaving, said, <e Why do
you buy flowers? I should prefer to buy bifsteak,"
and the Spaniard stood on his toes, waved the razor,
and said, cc Pour nourrir V esprit" and after that I
appreciated the Spaniards even more.
There was a strange old Spanish gipsy called
Fabian. He had been in England with Augustus
John and Horace Cole. He was at one time one of
the finest guitarists in Spain. He had taken to
painting and painted rather bad El Grecos. He
spoke frequently of Le Dessin and I went to his
studio, more to induce him to play the guitar than
to see his pictures. On an easel was an enormous
canvas with a crucifixion on it. It had a red
curtain in front of it and Fabian drew it aside with
great reverence. I finally induced him to take
down his guitar from the wall. He began to tune
it. Guitarists are very difficult people—I can
accompany songs of a rather questionable nature
myself—and I have a good deal of sympathy for
them. Fabian being a Spaniard, and a gipsy at that,
was extremely difficult and tuned and tuned for
nearly an hour. At last he got it tuned and played
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