"Excuse me, my dear love, for leaving the whist table," rejoined Monsieur Plays, alarmed by his wife's agitated manner; "but I assure you that I am beginning to understand; one of the players said to another: 'We have the _odd_!' from which I conclude that the _odd_ is like Pope Joan or the double six; so, you see, I understand whist." "Oh! monsieur, what do I care about whist! it's something much more important that I have to talk to you about." "You look as if you were very warm--would you like an ice?" "Hush! and listen to me: Albert is not dead!" "What do you mean? that young man who was killed in a duel for you?" "Yes, Albert Vermoncey, for whose death I blamed myself, whose sad fate I lamented. He is alive; he is in Paris." "Then he wasn't killed dead?" "Mon Dieu! don't I tell you that he wasn't killed at all?" "So much the better! for he was a very pleasant fellow; and now you won't suffer with remorse any more, or shed any more tears over his premature end." "What do you say? So much the better! Why, you don't seem to understand that I have been tricked, made a fool of, in the most indecent way! as to Albert's not being dead--I am not sorry for that, although he behaved very dishonorably to me! But why should that man come and tell me that he had run his sword through him and killed him? Why bring me a cigar which he said he had found on the body? And I had the kindness to weep and lament and go into retirement for two months--seeing nobody but you, and almost bored to death! and to carry in my bosom that cigar, which was said to have been found on the dying Albert!" "Ah! you had a cigar about you! so that's the reason that you smelt like a--trooper, and that someone said to me this evening: 'Your wife is a _lionne_.'" "You see, monsieur, I have been played with in the most abominable way! But this is not to be the end of it! I trust, monsieur, that you will not allow people to amuse themselves at your wife's expense, and, consequently, at your own; for to show disrespect to a wife is to show disrespect to her husband, and I have been shamefully insulted." "But, my dear love, what do you expect me to do about it?" "What do I expect you to do! what a question! I expect you to challenge the insolent villain who lied to me!" "What! you want to have that poor Albert killed again? You have only just learned that he's alive, and----" "No, monsieur; I am not talking about Albert now; but of that little man who dared to come and tell me that he had killed him in a duel. Do you know Tobie Pigeonnier?" "Tobie Pigeon----" "You must have seen him here two or three times." "Oh! yes, a little short fat man; I remember him very well. He's a very good-looking fellow."