Leah Hirsig Diary Entry

Tuesday, 23 September 1924

On Tues. last (Sept. 23) 2.30 or so, I bade Dorothy [Dorothy Olsen] and Beast goodbye. Mc. Bride took me up to the American Consulate where we were kept waiting till after 4. I started menstruating between 3 and 4, nothing on, of course. His highness, the lawyer in question, appeared and after a hasty conference with the Vice Consul or his clerk or whoever the fair-haired youth is, we went down stairs to get a taxi to 207.^[1] It was pouring with rain. The lawyer person who seemed very capable went out into the rain and got us a Taxi. We drove to 207. On the way, the lawyer kept looking at me in a very queer way and saying I must have been very ill. I replied that I was very ill. He got out and something impelled me to get out too. I think it was because Mc. Bride was quivering in her boots. I had scarcely got to the door when I fell. They got a chair for me and even allowed me to enter the sanctum sanctorum. Fancy that, Hedda! Mc. Bride let me lean on her and the lawyer talked to the proprietress out in the other room. She finally came and said she must consult her husband. She did so and he said—N O. The lawyer said that settles it. I got up to go out and fell. The dear lawyer beat it. He wasn't as strong as he looked important. I got up and fell again asking Mc. Bride to get a Dr.

By this time the woman prop ( I call her that for short) had regained her old and natural attitude. I lay on the floor shivering. Not a soul stirred anything but their tongues. They jeered at me—sick indeed! No, doped! They said I must go out. I tried to go and fell again. More jeers—a crowd and then the police. Mc. Bride started to open my bag to get my passport. I rose and shouted to her to leave it alone and fell again.

"You see she's not sick", said the woman. "She must get out." Jeers and sneers and remarks about drugs.

Finally the police removed me to the street. They walked me a bit and seeing that I was utterly unable to stand or walk called a taxi for which Mc. Bride paid.

Police—I mean Commissario's office next. They jeered and said "piqueurs"—I said no and fell. They wanted to send me to the French hospital. I shouted no. Finally a young man came in and said I'd better see a doctor and asked me if I had sufficient money. That touch of humanity bucked me up and I was able to walk to Dr. Chaussegro's place. He saw me and though he was very kind he was not nearly kind enough. He gave me a prescription and we walked off. At the pharmacy's Mc. Bride asked them to give me something to buck me up. They did. Then we went to the Dingo hoping to see Lambert.

Mc. Bride and I had dinner at the Dingo—then she took me back to the Maine [Hotel] where I received some mail and asked if they had a room. They said No. My heart sank. But Mme. came out and said yes 44 was still vacant. Mc. Bride was all in so I got upstairs O.K. and the girl gave me a hot water bottle and I slept a good night's sleep.

1—[Refers to 207 Boulevard Raspail, Paris, an apartment that had been leased to Dorothy Olsen.]

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