I was beginning to think I was the only one spared, when I thought I heard a great stirring inside a cupboard against which the head of my bed had been put. I looked at the lock. It was keyless. However, I felt no doubt that some sort of animal was shut up in that cupboard. Only, what sort of an animal was it? I was not kept long in suspense: as one o'clock struck a cock crowed at the head of my bed, and renewed his crowing every hour till day came. I did not deny Christ, like St. Peter, but I confess I took His name in vain. We fell asleep by seven o'clock,--de Leuven in spite of his itching powder, Hippolyte Leroy in spite of his frogs, and I in spite of my cock,--when Manceau entered our rooms and woke us by telling us that as he had heard in roundabout ways we had spent a bad night, he had come to offer us his professional services: Manceau denounced his own handiwork! We had slept so badly, through that horrible night, that, with terrible imprecations, we had consigned our persecutor, whoever he might be, to the infernal regions. Manceau, as I have said, denounced himself: expiation must follow the crime; our sworn oath must be fulfilled. At a sign, de Leuven shut the door: I fell upon Manceau, Hippolyte gagged him; we stripped him naked, we wrapped him in a sheet off Adolphe's bed, we tied him up like a sausage, we took him down a disused staircase and we deposited him in the most unfrequented part of the park, in the very middle of the little river, at a place where he could stand, but where, entangled as he was, he ran great risk of losing his foothold at the first step he took. We then quietly returned to our beds, and resumed our interrupted sleep. We went down to the morning meal at ten o'clock. Our arrival was eagerly expected. Everybody burst out laughing when we came within view. The young ladies each played a part: some pretended to scratch, others imitated in a low voice the croaking of frogs, and others simulated the crowing of a cock. We were quite imperturbable: we merely asked carelessly where Manceau was. Nobody had seen him. We sat down to table. The fowl was tough, Cécile remarked; one would have said it was an old cock which had crowed all the night. Augustine asked where the frogs were that she had seen, she said, in the kitchen the night before. Had they been moved?... Were the frogs lost?... The frogs must be found again. Louise asked Adolphe if he was not attacked by a contagious affection; for since he had offered her his arm to lead her into the dining-room, her skin had felt fearfully irritable. "If Manceau were here," I said to Louise, "you could ask him for a prescription to allay it." "But, joking apart, where is Manceau?" asked Madame Collard.