"Monsieur," he said, "I have already intimated to you that your hands annoy me there; have the goodness to put them in your pockets if you have no other place for them, but please be so good as to take them off my seat!" Signol withdrew them a second time. But, at the end of another two minutes, the young officer felt, not merely his irritating neighbour's hands but also his head upon his shoulder. This time he lost all patience, jumped up and turned round. "Monsieur! monsieur!" he exclaimed, "if you are doing it on purpose to pick a quarrel with me, tell me so outright." "Very well, then; it is done on purpose," Signol replied, rising too. "Why?" "On purpose to insult you, and if I have not done sufficient to that end already, take that!" And the angry madman gave Marulaz a blow across the face. Thoroughly astounded at this incomprehensible conduct, the young officer mechanically drew his sword half out of its sheath. "Look!" shouted Signol, "he is going to murder me!" Marulaz pushed his sword back again into its scabbard and replied-- "No, monsieur; I will not assassinate you, but I will kill you!" And, to avenge the insult he had thus gratuitously received, Marulaz, who was very strong, lifted Signol as though he had been a child right across from the one row to his own, and then placed him under his feet. The incident caused a great commotion in the theatre, especially as even those close by did not know what it was all about: they had heard an altercation, seen the blow, and heard the words "He is going to murder me!" They had seen the flash of the drawn sword and its speedy return to its sheath; finally, they saw one man standing over another with his foot upon him. Not knowing precisely which was in the right or wrong of the quarrel, they took the part of the weaker, surrounded Marulaz, and pulled him off Signol, who, staggering and half suffocated, made for the corridor and street, and thence to the theatre café. Marulaz followed him there, and it became then a question of reparation, no longer one that could be settled by an immediate fight. They exchanged cards and fixed a meeting for the next day but one, in the bois de Vincennes. The next day was to be spent by each combatant in choosing his seconds, and by the seconds in arranging the conditions of the duel. At two o'clock the following day, the four seconds met, conferred together and agreed upon swords as the weapons to be employed. Lieutenant Marulaz chose as one of his seconds the friend whom he had replaced on duty; this friend had duelling swords, and Marulaz examined them, pronounced them suitable and told him to bring them on the occasion. "Agreed," said his friend; "but I warn you one of the two is an unlucky weapon: it has already served a similar purpose three or four times, and the combatants who used it were either killed or hurt." "Plague take it!" Marulaz replied laughingly; "don't tell me which it is, then, and if I draw it I would rather not know."