Deloche went away heart-broken, having understood that the young girl accepted the situation and would keep the appointment that evening. When the two young ladies had lunched in a small room adjoining the large dining-room, and in which the women were served much more comfortably, Pauline had to assist Denise downstairs, for the latter's foot was worse. Down below in the afternoon warmth the stock-taking was roaring louder than ever. The moment for the supreme effort had arrived, when before the work, behindhand since the morning, every force was put forth in order to finish that evening. The voices got louder still, one saw nothing but the waving of arms continually emptying the shelves, throwing the goods down, and it was impossible to get along, the tide of the bales and piles of goods on the floor rose as high as the counters. A sea of heads, of brandished fists, of limbs flying about, seemed to extend to the very depths of the departments, like the distant confusion of a riot. It was the last fever of the clearance, the machine nearly ready to burst; whilst along the plate-glass windows, round the closed shop, a few rare pedestrians continued to pass, pale with the stifling boredom of a summer Sunday. On the pavement in the Rue Neuve-Saint-Augustin were planted three tall girls, bareheaded and sluttish-looking, impudently sticking their faces against the windows, trying to see the curious work going on inside. When Denise returned to the ready-made department Madame Aurélie left Marguerite to finish calling out the garments. There was still a lot of checking to be done, for which, desirous of silence, she retired into the pattern-room, taking the young girl with her. “Come with me, we'll do the checking; then you can add up the totals.” But as she wished to leave the door open, in order to look after the young ladies, the noise came in, and they could not hear much better. It was a large, square room, furnished simply with some chairs and three long tables. In one corner were the great machine knives, for cutting up the patterns. Entire pieces were consumed; they sent away every year more than sixty thousand francs' worth of material, cut up in strips. From morning to night, the knives were cutting up silk, wool, and linen, with a scythe-like noise. Then the books had to be got together, gummed or sewn. And there was also between the two windows, a little printing-press for the tickets. “Not so loud, please!” cried Madame Aurélie, now and again, quite unable to hear Denise reading out the articles.