as my grandson, tivoli ryoku, approaches his second birthday he is well into the stage of life dominated by joy and curiosity where the transition to sleep is but an annoying intrusion upon exploration and discovery. as a catalyst to the transition his parents, alexi and mckayla, have been reading aloud to him at bedtime. they have just completed the series of sir arthur conan doyle's tales of sherlock holmes, the fictional detective.

i thought it would be nice to continue that tradition when tivoli comes to visit and stay with nana and opa so i perused the bookcase for something appropriate. i was hoping to find something with verse and a soothing or engaging cadence, a la the doctor suess series that we read to our children, when i stumbled upon an old book belonging to my son, kaj, from his high school days, "collected poems of robert service", and recalled that i'd always enjoyed his verse.

we began with some of the classic poems from "the spell of the yukon and other verses" such as the spell of the yukon, the shooting of dan mcgrew, and the cremation of sam mcgee, and tivoli seemed to enjoy them although they are a bit cold and dark both in content as well as physical environment of the settings. we moved on to the ballad of the northern lights, the ballad of the black fox skin, the man from eldorado, and the ballad of gum-boot ben from "ballads of a cheechako", then athabaska dick, while the bannock bakes, and good-bye, little cabin from "rhymes of a rolling stone", and on to the paris-inspired "ballads of a bohemian" and my favorite verse to date, julot the apache (although i'm looking forward in anticipation to the absinthe drinkers).

                                      julot the apache

you've heard of julot the apache, and gigolette his mome....

montmartre was their hunting-ground, but belville was their home.

a little chap just like a boy, with smudgy black mustache, -

yet there was nothing juvenile in julot the apache

from head to heel as tough as steel, as nimble as a cat,

with every trick of twist and kick, a master of savate.

and gigolette was tall an fair, as stupid as a cow,

with three combs in the greasy hair she banged upon her brow.

you'd see her on the place pigalle on any afternoon,

a primitive and strapping wench as brazen as the moon.

and yet there is a tale that's told of clichy after dark,

and two gendarmes who swung their arms with julot for a mark.

and oh, but they'd have got him too; they banged and blazed away,

when like a flash a woman leapt between them and their prey.

she took the medicine meant for him; she came down with a crash ...

"quick now, and make your get-away, o julot the apache!"

but no! he turned, ran swiftly back, his arms around her met;

they nabbed him sobbing like a kid, and kissing gigolette.

now i'm a reckless painter chap who loves a jamboree,

and one night in cyrano's bar i got upon a spree;

and there were trollops all about, and crooks of every kind,

but though the place was reeling round i didn't seem to mind.

till down i sank, and all was blank when in the bleary dawn

i woke up in my studio to find - my money gone;

three hundred francs i'd scraped and squeezed to pay my quarter's rent.

"someone has pinched my wad," i wailed; "it never has been spent."

and as i racked by brains to seek how i could raise some more,

before my cruel landlord kicked me cowering from the door:

a knock ... "come in," i gruffly groaned; i did not raise my head,

then lo! i heard a husky voice, a swift and silky tread:

"you got so blind, last night, mon vieux, i collared all your cash -

three hundred francs.... there! nom de dieu," said julot the apache.

and that was how i came to know julot and gigolette,

and we would talk and drink a bock, and smoke a cigarette.

and i would meditate upon the artistry of crime,

and he would tell of cracking cribs and cops and doing time;

or else when he was flush of funds he'd carelessly explain

he'd biffed some bloated bourgeois on the border of the seine.

so gentle and polite he was, just like a man of peace,

and not a desperado and the terror of police.

now one day in a bistro that's behind the place vendome

i came on julot the apache, and gigolette his mome.

and as they looked so very grave, says i to them, says i,

"come on and have a little glass, it's good to rinse the eye.

you both look mighty serious; you've something on the heart."

"ah, yes," said julot the apache, "we've something to impart.

when such things come to folks like us, it isn't very gay ...

it's gigolette - she tells me that a gosse is on the way."

then gigolette, she looked at me with eyes like stones of gall:

"if we were honest folks," said she, "i wouldn't mind at all.

but then ... you know the life we lead; well, anyway i mean

(that is, providing it's a girl) to call her angeline."

"cheer up," said i; "it's all in life. there's gold within the dross.

come on, we'll drink another verre to angeline the gosse."

and so the weary winter passed, and then one april morn

the worthy julot came at last to say the babe was born.

"i'd like to chuck it in the seine," he sourly snarled, "and yet

i guess i'll have to let it live, because of gigolette."

i only laughed, for sure i saw his spite was all a bluff,

and he was prouder than a prince behind his manner gruff.

yet every day he'd blast the brat with curses deep and grim,

and swear to me that gigolette no longer thought of him.

and then one night he dropped his mask; his eyes were sick with dread,

and when i offered him a smoke he groaned and shook his head:

"i'm all upset; it's angeline ... she's covered with a rash ...

she'll maybe die, my little gosse," cried julot the apache.

but angeline, i joy to say, came through the test all right,

though julot, so they tell me, watched beside her day and night.

and when i saw him next, says he: "come up and dine with me.

we'll buy a beefsteak on the way, a bottle and some brie."

and so i had a merry night within his humble home,

and laughed with angeline the gosse and gigolette the mome.

and every time that julot used a word the least obscene,

how gigolette would frown at him and point to angeline:

oh, such a little innocent, with hair of silken floss,

i do not wonder they were proud of angeline the gosse.

and when her arms were round his neck, then julot says to me:

"i must work harder now, mon vieux, since i've to work for three."

he worked so very hard indeed, the police dropped in one day,

and for a year behind the bars they put him safe away.

so dark and silent now, their home; they'd gone - i wondered where,

till in a laundry near i saw a child with shining hair;

and o'er the tub a strapping wench, her arms in soapy foam;

lo! it was angeline the gosse, and gigolette the mome.

and so i kept an eye on them and saw that all went right,

until at last came julot home, half crazy with delight.

and when he'd kissed them both, says he: "i've had my fill this time.

i'm on the honest now, i am; i'm all fed up with crime.

you mark my words, the page i turn is going to be clean,

i swear it on the head of her, my little angeline."

and so, to finish up my tale, this morning as i strolled

along the boulevard i heard a voice i knew of old.

i saw a rosy little man with walrus-like mustache ...

i stopped, i stared.... by all the gods! 'twas julot the apache.

"i'm in the garden way," he said, "and doing mighty well;

i've half an acre under glass, and heaps of truck to sell.

come out and see. oh come, my friend, on sunday, wet or shine ...

say! it's the first communion of that little girl of mine."