He returned to his apartment at eleven o'clock, but had the patience to wait until midnight, so that he might not meet anyone in the hall. Then he took a candle, and ran quickly up the two flights. He had learned from Lépinette which was Georgette's door: it was the last on the right; there was no possibility of a mistake. The viscount soon found the door, and saw that the key was in the lock. "She thinks of everything!" he said to himself; "there is no need of knocking, and I don't have to wait on the landing; it's well done of her." He softly opened the door and entered the room, where it was absolutely dark. "So she has gone to bed already!" thought the viscount, walking toward the bed, which was at the back of the room. He put forward his light: no one; the bed was empty and had not been slept in. Utterly at sea, the young man looked in all directions; at last, he discovered on a table near the fireplace all the dry goods he had sent to Georgette a second time; nothing was missing, not even the bonnet; but the little white petticoat was laid on a piece of material, and on the petticoat was a letter addressed to Monsieur le Vicomte Edward de Sommerston. Our lover seized the letter and hurriedly ran his eye over it. "MONSIEUR LE VICOMTE: "I have gone away; do not look for me. I carry with me your pocketbook and its contents; I need only that, so I leave you all the rest. I leave you, in addition, my little white petticoat, which seemed to please you immensely; but some day I shall ask you to return it to me; for I expect to see you again, in order to explain my conduct; then, perhaps, you will consider that it was perfectly natural, rather than blamable." The viscount stood for some time, lost in amazement, gazing alternately at the letter and the petticoat; but suddenly he burst into a laugh, saying to himself: "Gad! she's a most amusing little hussy! And it has been a racy adventure. I will regale my friends with it when I give them that dinner, the day after to-morrow." XXIII THE GENTLEMEN WITH THE THREE PETTICOATS Toward the close of the month of September following, one fine day, about two o'clock in the afternoon, a gentleman was walking back and forth along the path in front of the monkey house at the Jardin des Plantes. This gentleman was no other than our old acquaintance Monsieur Dupont, of whom we lost sight some time ago. We left him in the private dining-room, where he had dined with Georgette, who quitted him abruptly because he thought that he could easily triumph over a girl who had consented to dine with him alone at a restaurant; so that his _bonne fortune_ was limited to the possession of a little striped petticoat which had been left in his hands.