As it was about nine o'clock in the evening, the flame made by a number of bunches of straw, which the marquis had fired, made the courtyard as light as day. The cry of _fire_! soon arose on all sides; it reached the salon, and the ladies who had taken refuge there from the society of Madame Thomas, rushed out shrieking, and calling their fathers or their husbands. The gentlemen tried to allay their fears, saying: "It's nothing, it won't amount to anything; but we must go as soon as possible. Get your bonnets and shawls; make haste, for ladies should never stay where everything is in confusion. We will go with you." Meanwhile the fire which the marquis had kindled, in order to put the guests to flight, and which the servants did not think of putting out, because they knew that it was a ruse on their master's part,--the fire actually attacked the carriage-house and spread from that to the stable. While the ladies went to get their shawls and the men their hats, and while the servants ran through the rooms shouting _fire_! the danger had become real, and no one discovered it until a large part of the courtyard was already wrapped in flames. Thereupon tumult and confusion held full sway; the ladies fled into the street; one lost her turban, another her cap, and several fainted. Auguste took Athalie in his arms and carried her to a stone bench in the next street. Amid the general upheaval, Mère Thomas decided at last to leave the table; she raised her skirts above her knees and began to run, crying out: "Just look at all them friends of Thomas's! the cowardly skunks are running away instead of forming a line! and they'd leave me here to roast just like a chestnut!" The results of the marquis's little ruse were one wing of the house burned, four horses burned, three firemen injured, ten shawls lost, fifteen hats stolen, six locks of hair scorched, three bracelets lost, and two combs broken; but Monsieur de la Thomassinière made himself whole with twenty thousand francs, and at all events his worthy mother did not exhibit herself to the numerous guests who were invited for the evening. XV THAT WHICH WAS FORESEEN On the morrow of the scene at his house, Monsieur de la Thomassinière and Athalie started for England, where they determined to remain until Paris had forgotten the scandal caused by the stout countrywoman. As for the latter, they had sent her back post haste to her village, expressly forbidding her ever to leave it again, on pain of withdrawal of the allowance of two hundred francs which her generous son deigned to pay her. The absurd false shame of La Thomassinière, who blushed for his mother after he became wealthy, and the petty baseness of Athalie, who had pretended to faint in order to avoid embracing Mère Thomas, made Auguste quite indifferent to their departure; but their house was the only place where he saw Monsieur de Cligneval, and Bertrand said more than once: