Chaudoreille won the first game, then a second and a third, because, thanks to the marks he had made on the back of each card, he knew them as well by their backs as by their faces. "It's singular," said Marcel, "that I never win anything; you always have the best cards." "What would you have? It's chance, luck; but it will probably turn." The luck did not turn and Marcel's crowns passed into Chaudoreille's pocket. The chevalier was scarlet, trembling, and the veins on his forehead were swollen by the ardor of his play, when the bell at the garden gate rang violently. "Oh, the deuce! there's somebody," said Marcel. "I am lost!" cried Chaudoreille jumping on his chair, "it is somebody come to arrest me." He immediately rose and ran around the room, went through the first door he saw and disappeared, without listening to Marcel, who called to him,-- "It's monseigneur; it's M. de Villebelle; keep still and I'll let you out without his seeing you." But Chaudoreille had disappeared and the bell continued to ring. Marcel was obliged to open the gate without knowing what had become of his guest. CHAPTER IV THE LITTLE SUPPER "And pray why did you make us wait so long, clown?" said the marquis angrily to Marcel, as he entered the garden with three men, two of whom were enveloped in their cloaks, while the third had no hat and nothing to cover his velvet doublet, which was stained in many places with mud; this, however, did not prevent its owner from bursting into shouts of laughter as he looked at himself, as though he still enjoyed some frolic in which he had participated. "Follow me, my friends," said the marquis. "Oh, I know the way to your little nest of the Faubourg," said one, "it's not the first time I've come here." "Nor me." "That's all very well; as for me, messieurs, I make my first appearance here today and in a brilliant costume I hope. Ha! Ha! What the devil! if anybody should happen to divine that I ought to be present this evening at the petit coucher, 'twould be deuced awkward for me!" "Come, Marcel, show us a light," said the marquis, pushing the valet before him, while the latter, anxious and uneasy, was constantly glancing around him. "You've been sleeping already, rascal, for you look stupefied." "Yes, monseigneur, that's true, I have been asleep." "He lives the life of a canon here. He does nothing but eat and sleep." While speaking they had reached the house. Happily for Marcel the marquis never went into the lower room, where the card table was still standing. They went up into the apartment on the first floor. Marcel lighted many candles, while the marquis' friends threw themselves into armchairs, and Villebelle took off his mantle, saying,--