At that period Georges still possessed magnificent diamonds and, among them, two buttons which had been given her by Napoleon and which were each worth nearly twelve thousand francs. She had had them set as earrings and wore them in preference to all others. These buttons were so large that Georges very frequently, on returning home in the evening, after acting, took them off, complaining that they pulled her ears down. One evening, we returned with her and sat down to supper. When supper was over, we ate almonds; Georges ate a great number and, whilst eating, complained of the weight of these earrings, took them out of her ears and laid them on the tablecloth. Five minutes later, the servant came, brush in hand, to brush the crumbs off the table, swept earrings and almond shells together into a basket, and both earrings and shells were thrown clean out of the window into the street. Georges went to bed without remembering her earrings, and slept peacefully; philosophic though she was, she would certainly not have done this if she had known that her servant had thrown twenty-four thousand francs' worth of diamonds out of the window. Next day, Georges the younger came into the room to wake her sister. "Well," she said, "you may well boast of being lucky indeed! Look what I have just found." "What is it?" "One of your earrings." "Where did you pick that up?" "In the street." "In the street?" "Yes, my dear ... in the street, at the door.... You must have lost it when you came back from the theatre." "No, I had them on at supper." "Are you sure of it?" "So sure that, because they tired me, I took them out and laid them by my side. What can I have done with them afterwards? ... Where can I have put them?" "Why, good gracious!" exclaimed Georges the younger. "I remember now: we were eating almonds and the servant swept the table with the brush." "Ah! my poor earrings!" cried Georges, in her turn. "Go downstairs quickly and look, Bébelle!" Bébelle was already at the bottom of the staircase and, five minutes later, she returned with the second earring, which she had found in the gutter. "My darling," she said to her sister, "we are very lucky. Have a mass said, or some great misfortune will overtake us."