“So did I,” Madam Éthorel said. “You would have been amused at the sight of that old fool Madam Hurtrel on the ice, running after young Liauran. She was red in the face and perspiring, while he was carrying on with Mabel Adrahan.” “It amuses you, madam. But if I said I pitied her?” Senneterre said. “Respect love! We know her,” Madam de Bonnivet interrupted with that bitter laugh which I had noticed at the theatre. She was visibly in a nervous state, which I explained to myself when the dinner was served and Jacques had not arrived. I was soon to learn both the false excuse and the real reason of his absence. During the first course the flowers and silver upon the dinner-table directed the conversation to the subject of the taste of the period and mistakes made on the stage. The guests all combined to praise the skill of the late M. Perrin in the putting on of modern comedies. The talk drifted to actual plays, and an allusion being made to _La Duchesse Blue_, one of the guests, Machault, I think it was, said— “Has its run ceased altogether? As I passed along the Boulevard I saw there was a change of bill at the Vaudeville this evening. Do you know the cause of it?” “Because Bressoré has a severe cold and is too unwell to act. I heard that by accident at the Club,” Mosé said, “and the play rests upon his shoulders. He is clever, but he is the only one in the company,” he went on, and this proved that Madam de Bonnivet’s antipathy to Camille Favier had not escaped the dark, observant eyes of the business man. “It appears to be contagious in the theatre,” said Bonnivet. “Molan should have been here, but he excused himself at the last moment. He has a slight attack himself.” As he said this he looked at his wife, who did not even deign to listen to him. She was talking to Miraut, who was near her. Neither her metallic voice nor her hard, clear eyes betrayed the least sign of trouble, but the cruel curves she sometimes had at the corners of her mouth made it more cruel, and a little throbbing of the nostrils, imperceptible but to one of my profession or a jealous man, revealed that the absence of Jacques was the cause of her nervousness. At the same time I felt that Bonnivet was scrutinizing my face with the same look which he gave to his wife, and three things became evident to me: one, and the most terrible was that the husband was suspicious of the relations between Queen Anne and my comrade; the second was that my companion had seized the opportunity of the change of bill to provoke in the coquette an access of spiteful jealousy by passing, or pretending to pass, the evening with Camille Favier; the third was that this simple ruse wounded the vanity of the pretty actress’ rival to the quick. These three instinctive conclusions, two of which at least were fraught with the most serious consequences, were sufficient to render the commonplace dinner passionately interesting to me.