A file of waiting carriages lined the kerbstone the whole length of Place Vendome. Beneath the arch and within the portal, groups of fashionable persons elbowed each other on entering or leaving, and exchanged friendly polite greetings; the women quizzing the new hats, little hoods of plush or large _Rembranesque_ hats in which the delicate Parisian faces were lost as under the roof of a cabriolet. The liveried lackeys perfunctorily glanced at the cards of admission that the holders hardly took the trouble to present. One was seated at a table mechanically handing out catalogues. Through the open door of the Club's Theatre could be seen gold frames suspended from the walls, terra cottas and marbles on their pedestals, and around the pictures and sculptures a dense crowd, masses of black hats inclined toward the paintings, side by side with pretty feminine heads crowned with Gainsborough hats adorned with plumes. It was impossible to see at close quarters the pieces offered for the sale that was for that day the engrossing topic of conversation of _All Paris_. "A veritable salon in miniature!" said Guy aloud to an art critic who was taking notes. "But to examine it comfortably one should be quite alone. For an hour past I have been trying to get a look at the Meissonier, but have not been able to do so. It is stifling here. I will return another time." He quickly grasped the hand that held the pencil, and which was extended to him, and tried to make a passage through the crowd to the exit. Pushed and pushing, he smiled and apologized for his inability to disengage his arms that were held by the crowd as if in a vise, in order to salute the friends he recognized. At length he reached, giving vent to a grunt of satisfaction, the hall where visitors were sitting on divans, chatting, either less eager to view the pictures or satisfied in their desires. There, Guy instinctively looked at a mirror and examined the knot of his cravat. He did not notice that a gentleman with a closely buttoned frock-coat, on seeing him, quietly rose from the divan on which he had been sitting, and approached him, mechanically pulling the skirts of his coat meanwhile, so as to smooth the creases. He simply touched Monsieur de Lissac's shoulder with the tip of his finger. Guy turned round, expecting to recognize a friend. "You are surely Monsieur de Lissac?" said the man in the frock-coat, with the refined manners of a gentleman. "Yes!" said Lissac, somewhat astonished at the coldness of his manner. "Be good enough to accompany me, monsieur, I am a Commissioner of the Judiciary Delegations!" Lissac thought he misunderstood him. "I confess that I don't quite understand you," he began, with a rather significant smile. "I am a Commissioner of Police," the other replied, "and I am ordered to arrest you."