“Oh! what a dog of a name! Pongo! But he never talks, the blackamoor; or else he talks to himself, and says things that I don’t understand; I believe that he talks Morocco!” “Come, Hildegarde, it’s almost twelve o’clock; go to bed, that’s the best thing you can do.” “Everybody hasn’t come in.” “Yes they have, everybody except little Georget, who lives up under the roof, with his mother.--By the way, how is the poor woman to-day?” “Not very well; she’s had more fainting fits this afternoon, and I thought she was going _to put out her gas_.” “And her son hasn’t come home, at midnight! that’s what I call a ne’er-do-well, a downright scamp! Hildegarde, heaven didn’t give us any children, and I give thanks for it in my heart; because they aren’t always honey for parents, and often absinthe rules the roost, as I see in the case of Mère Georget!” “Absinthe--absinthe--I don’t hate that! it helps the digestion!” “Oh! bless my soul! you don’t hate any liquid; but I know that absinthe is bad for the health; I’ve heard some of the clerks at the office talking about two talented actors who played at the theatre and who put an end to themselves with absinthe; without counting several others who are in a fair way to do the same thing!” “Bah! that’s all nonsense!” “Come, Hildegarde, go to bed; I will come in a little while; and if little Georget isn’t in at the quarter, I will leave him outside; I can’t waste my oil for anyone who never makes it up to me. Well, you don’t move; are you fastened to your chair to-night?” “Go to bed first, Baudoin; I’ll sit up for the young man, and put the lodge in order.” “You know very well that I am not in the habit of going to bed before you. I see your scheme: you will wait until I am asleep and then go to the cupboard to say a word or two to the bottle!” “Oh! the idea of my going to the cupboard! It’s much more likely to be you, for you like brandy too.” “I like it reasonably, like a man with some self-respect, who doesn’t choose to make a brute of himself.--Hildegarde, go to bed.” “I don’t feel sleepy.” “Hildegarde, we are going to have trouble! Will you go to bed at once?” “You pester me----” “Hildegarde, I shall be compelled to resort to severe means. Why, you certainly are glued to your chair; this isn’t natural, I suspect some trick. Ah! I see! I’ll bet that the bottle isn’t in the cupboard.” And Baudoin rose to go to the cupboard, but as his wife was sitting in front of it and did not move, he pushed her roughly aside, whereupon she reeled, and almost instantly uttered a cry of distress so heartrending that her husband feared that he had hurt her. But it was not Hildegarde who was hurt, it was the bottle under her skirts, which she had involuntarily upset, and which had broken, overflowing the lodge with all the liquor which it contained.