She feared him, and, as she was timid, she flattered him. "I congratulate you, Chevalier. You were simply astounding. Your exit is a marvel. You can take my word for it. I am not the only one to say so. Fagette thought you were wonderful." "Really?" asked Chevalier. It was one of the happiest moments of his life. A shrieking voice issued from the deserted heights of the third galleries, sounding through the house like the whistle of a locomotive. "One can't hear a word you say, my children; speak louder and pronounce your words distinctly!" The author appeared, infinitely small, in the shadow of the dome. Thereupon the utterance of the players who were collected at the front of the stage, around a naphtha flare, rose more distinctly: "The Emperor will allow the troops to rest for some weeks at Moscow; then with the rapidity of an eagle he will swoop down upon St. Petersburg." "Spades, clubs, trump, two points to me." "There we shall spend the winter, and next spring we shall penetrate into India, crossing Persia, and the British power will be a thing of the past." "Thirty-six in diamonds." "And I the four aces." "By the way, gentlemen, what say you to the Imperial decree concerning the actors of Paris, dated from the Kremlin? There's an end of the squabbles between Mademoiselle Mars and Mademoiselle Leverd." "Do look at Fagette," said Nanteuil. "She is charming in that blue Marie-Louise dress trimmed with chinchilla." Madame Doulce brought out from under her furs a stack of tickets already soiled through having been too frequently offered. "Master," she said, addressing Constantin Marc, "you know that next Sunday I am to give a reading, with appropriate remarks, of the best letters of Madame de Sevigne, for the benefit of the three poor orphans left by Lacour, the actors who died this winter in so deplorable a fashion." "Had he any talent?" asked Constantin Marc. "None whatever," said Nanteuil. "Well, then, in what way is his death deplorable?" "Oh, Master," sighed Madame Doulce, "do not pretend to be unfeeling." "I am not pretending to be unfeeling. But here is something that surprises me: the value which we set upon the lives of those who are not of the slightest interest to us. We seem as though we believe that life is in itself something precious. Yet nature teaches us plainly enough that nothing is more worthless and contemptible. In former days people were less besmeared with sentimentalism. Each of us held his own life to be infinitely precious, but he did not profess any respect whatever for the life of others. We were nearer to nature in those days. We were created to devour one another. But our debilitated, enervated, hypocritical race wallows in a sly cannibalism. While we are gulping one another down we declare that life is sacred, and we no longer dare to confess that life is murder." "That life is murder," echoed Chevalier dreamily, without grasping the meaning of the words.