“It is I who am to blame for everything!” cried Chambourdin; “I forced him to disclose his disaster. Strictly, I ought to lend him some trousers, but as I believe he has another pair, I prefer that he should wear his own.--Go, hapless victim of a slippery sidewalk, but don’t be long! something tells me that the soup is not far away.” Little Astianax disappeared, and Monsieur Glumeau would have been glad to do as much, but his guests surrounded him and talked to him; he was hemmed in on all sides. “Everybody must have come, is it not so, my dear friend?” said Chambourdin, offering him snuff in one of those snuff-boxes known as _rat-tails_. “No, indeed, and it’s very lucky--otherwise there would be thirteen of us,” replied Glumeau, writhing about as inoffensively as possible. “Thirteen! I had just as soon sit thirteen at table. Truffles, champagne, chambertin and thirteen at table every day--I’ll subscribe for that if I don’t have to pay in advance.” “Or if you don’t have to pay afterward, perhaps?” said Monsieur Dufournelle. “Oh! what a spiteful thing to say, big Dufournelle! How fat the fellow is growing! If he keeps on he won’t be able to go into any house; partitions of decent dimensions no longer conceal him--he will have to have some made expressly for him.” “Hold your tongue, advocate without causes!” “I an advocate? Oh! I have abandoned the profession; I wasn’t loquacious enough, and then I was too good a fellow. I settled disputes on the instant. I induced the parties to dine together and I dined with them; we all got tipsy; after dinner they embraced and that was the end of their litigation. My confrères begged me to give up practice--I was ruining the profession.” “Whom else do you expect, Monsieur Glumeau?” inquired Monsieur Camuzard. “A lady--a charming lady--not very young, but very good-looking still.” “And her name?” “The Baronne de Grangeville.” “A baroness! the deuce! a real baroness?” “I never knew a sham one.” “I was joking.--Is she married?” “No, she’s a widow.” “Oho! a widow, eh? And rich?” “I believe that she is very rich.--But I beg pardon--I have to say a word to my daughter.” “I can’t conceive what your mother is doing!” said Glumeau in his daughter’s ear. “I can’t remain in this plight. Something must have happened to the instrument. Go and see, Eolinde, and urge your mother to make haste.” Mademoiselle Eolinde was sorely vexed to be obliged to leave the company; she went out of the room with a sulky expression, and without acknowledging the fifth bow that young Kingerie addressed to her. “Something out of the natural course is going on here,” said Madame Dufournelle to her husband; “Madame Glumeau goes out and does not return; the son’s trousers are all torn, and he disappears; the daughter has left the salon in a pet; Monsieur Glumeau stands first on one leg, then on the other; he frowns and doesn’t pay any attention to the conversation. There certainly is something wrong!”