"Excuse me, M. Dardouillet," said Denoisel. "I've come about an affair that----" "Moonlight--remember that--if ever you have a garden--there's nothing like moonlight for seeing what you have done--exactly as it is. By daylight you can't see the embankments----" "M. Dardouillet, I want to appeal to a man who has worn a soldier's uniform. You are a friend of the Mauperins. I have come to ask you if you will act for Henri as----" "A duel?" And Dardouillet fastened up the black coat he wore, winter and summer alike, with all that was left of the button. "Good heavens! Yes, a service of that kind is a duty." "I shall take you back with me, then," said Denoisel, putting his arm through Dardouillet's. "You can sleep at my place. It must be settled quickly. It will be all over to-morrow, or the day after at the latest." "Good!" said Dardouillet, looking regretfully at a line of stakes that had been commenced, the shadows of which the moon threw on the ground. XXXVIII On leaving Henri Mauperin's, M. de Villacourt had suddenly recollected that he had no friends, no one at all whom he could ask to serve as seconds. This had not occurred to him before. He remembered two or three names which had been mixed up in his father's family history, and he went along the streets trying to find the houses where he had been taken when he had come to Paris in his boyhood. He rang at several doors, but either the people were no longer living there or they were not at home to him. At night he returned to his lodging-house. He had never before felt so absolutely alone in the world. When he was taking the key of his bed-room, the landlady asked him if he would not have a glass of beer and, opening a door in a passage, showed him into a cafe which took up the ground-floor of the house. Some swords were hanging from the hat-pegs, with cocked hats over them. At the far end, through the tobacco smoke, he could see men dressed in military uniform moving about round a billiard-table. A sickly looking boy with a white apron on was running to and fro, scared and bewildered, giving the _Army Monitor_ and the other papers a bath, each time that he put a glass or cup on the table. Near the counter, a drum-major was playing at backgammon with the landlord of the cafe in his shirt-sleeves. On every side voices could be heard calling out and answering each other, with the rolling accent peculiar to soldiers. "To-morrow I'm on duty at the theatre." "I take my week." "Gaberiau is beadle at Saint-Sulpice." "He was proposed and was to be examined." "Who's on service at the Bourdon ball?" "What an idea! to blow his brains out when he hadn't a single punishment down on his book!" It was very evident that they were the Paris Guards from the barracks, just near, waiting until nine o'clock for the roll-call. "Waiter, a bowl of punch and three glasses," said M. de Villacourt, taking his place at a table where two of the Guards were seated.