On that particular Thursday the evening seemed a long one, on account of the persistent irritation of the men. The ladies had begun to chat before the smouldering fire; and when the servant, after clearing the table, reopened the door of the dining-room, they were left alone, the men repairing to the adjoining apartment to smoke and sip some beer. Sandoz and Claude, who were not smokers, soon returned, however, and sat down, side by side, on a sofa near the doorway. The former, who was glad to see his old friend excited and talkative, recalled the memories of Plassans apropos of a bit of news he had learnt the previous day. Pouillaud, the old jester of their dormitory, who had become so grave a lawyer, was now in trouble over some adventure with a woman. Ah! that brute of a Pouillaud! But Claude did not answer, for, having heard his name mentioned in the dining-room, he listened attentively, trying to understand. Jory, Mahoudeau, and Gagnière, unsatiated and eager for another bite, had started on the massacre again. Their voices, at first mere whispers, gradually grew louder, till at last they began to shout. ‘Oh! the man, I abandon the man to you,’ said Jory, who was speaking of Fagerolles. ‘He isn’t worth much. And he out-generalled you, it’s true. Ah! how he did get the better of you fellows, by breaking off from you and carving success for himself on your backs! You were certainly not at all cute.’ Mahoudeau, waxing furious, replied: ‘Of course! It sufficed for us to be with Claude, to be turned away everywhere.’ ‘It was Claude who did for us!’ so Gagnière squarely asserted. And thus they went on, relinquishing Fagerolles, whom they reproached for toadying the newspapers, for allying himself with their enemies and wheedling sexagenarian baronesses, to fall upon Claude, who now became the great culprit. Well, after all, the other was only a hussy, one of the many found in the artistic fraternity, fellows who accost the public at street corners, leave their comrades in the lurch, and victimise them so as to get the bourgeois into their studios. But Claude, that abortive great artist, that impotent fellow who couldn’t set a figure on its legs in spite of all his pride, hadn’t he utterly compromised them, hadn’t he let them in altogether? Ah! yes, success might have been won by breaking off. If they had been able to begin over again, they wouldn’t have been idiots enough to cling obstinately to impossible principles! And they accused Claude of having paralysed them, of having traded on them--yes, traded on them, but in so clumsy and dull-witted a manner that he himself had not derived any benefit by it. ‘Why, as for me,’ resumed Mahoudeau, ‘didn’t he make me quite idiotic at one moment? When I think of it, I sound myself, and remain wondering why I ever joined his band. Am I at all like him? Was there ever any one thing in common between us, eh? Ah! it’s exasperating to find the truth out so late in the day!’