"Bravo! bravo!" cried the host. "Honor to Zizi! You know three ways already, dear love!" "And I don't propose to stop at that." "These ladies succeed in whatever they choose to undertake," said Roncherolle. Jericourt, with a curl of his lip, muttered: "Madame Saqui could do no better!" "Oh! you always look as if you were sneering!" said Zizi; "but you would be hard put to it to do as much. It's easy to criticise, my dear man!" "This much is certain, that I shall not venture to contend with you." "Because you realize your inferiority." "But I am waiting till you come to the thirty-third way. I fancy that you will do some very extraordinary things then!" "Oh! my boy, we're not such fools. We mean to have some fun, to get a little screwed, but we don't propose to get drunk. We will learn one more way and that will do for to-night; what do you say, my gallant?" "As you command, _belle dame_." "Why, do you know that you're a hard-headed party? Champagne doesn't seem to affect you at all. You drink more than we do, and you don't seem to notice it." "That is the result of my long studies--another advantage of age!" "Look at Alfred; he hasn't drunk half as much as you, I'll bet, and his eyes are in curl-papers already; anyone would think he was going to sleep." "I--oh! I haven't any desire to sleep; I was engaged in thought." "Of what?" "Of the baroness whom he escorted home, no doubt!" said Jericourt, with an ironical glance at the gentleman who aroused his displeasure, and whose emotion at the mention of the baroness's name he had noticed. "Are you going to stuff us some more with your titled lady?" cried Mademoiselle Zizi; "bah! what a tease this Jericourt is!" "That subject bores you, my sweet angel; forgive me, I won't mention that lady again. However, I believe that this Madame de Grangeville is nothing more than a counterfeit baroness." "What makes you think so, monsieur? By what right do you insult that lady?" demanded Roncherolle, in a tone in which there was no trace of jesting, and with a by no means amicable glance at the man of letters. "What! I insult her? Why do you set yourself up as the lady's champion, monsieur, if you don't know her?" "I do know her, monsieur, and I have a right to defend her. The Baronne de Grangeville is more noble than you are eminent in letters; but perhaps that is not saying overmuch for her nobility." "You are attacking me now, monsieur; do you mean to insult me?" "Come, come, messieurs! upon my word! how is this? do you propose to quarrel now?" murmured Alfred, whose mouth had become dry and sticky. "I won't have it; I----"