Opposite me a group of young people were making a good deal of noise. Enviously I studied their clothes and that air of easy assurance, the sure sign of a happiness which, perhaps, I should never attain. Truly I was not exactly made for the University, I whom learned expositions, bibliographies and works of reference left sceptical, I whose heart almost beat quicker at the sight of a well-cut waistcoat, a well-tied tie and elegant socks visualized under well-creased trousers! They were a party of four, one a woman, pink and pretty, in her furs. Painted a little, perhaps, though I've never minded that. She was seated next to one of the handsome young men, and facing me. The other two had their backs to me, but in the mirror I could see their faces, slightly flushed by a good dinner, which was then approaching its end. That evening I realized the humiliation of those who go for their coffee to a fashionable restaurant. Said I to myself: "You'd far better have stayed at home, dined anywhere, gone to bed and slept, yes, slept. Sleep is the poor man's haven. You oughtn't to have come here." And yet.... It was gradually beginning to dawn upon me that one of the men with his back to me was studying me closely in the mirror, when he got up and came over to me. "Vignerte!" "Ribeyre!" I had come across this Ribeyre during my advanced rhetoric course. He had already obtained his _licence_, and was, like me, a candidate for Normale, though he displayed that indifference to results which comes from a private income and ambitions in other directions. "What are you up to?" "You can see for yourself," I said, somewhat stung. Then I added quickly: "What about you? Anything new since Henri IV.?" "Don't mention that awful hole, old boy. Talk about instructing youth! I should have made a mess of things if I'd listened to them...." He, too, added: "What about you?" "I couldn't help having to listen to them. I'm still listening to them," I replied bitterly. "But what's your job now? You don't seem to be having a bad time." "I've been extraordinarily lucky, my boy. I was appointed Private Secretary to a Deputy, and six months later he became Minister for Foreign Affairs. I followed him to the Foreign Office. There we are! But come out of your corner and I'll introduce you to the friends of Ministers." Ribeyre did indeed introduce me. "My friend Vignerte--a worker if there ever was one. Got his diploma and Lord knows what else--_Agrégé_, perhaps? No--so much the better for you. Who knows it better than we three, not to mention Clotilde." Clotilde nodded stiffly and gave me an ironical glance. I was on the rack. This panegyric was so suited to my poor, baggy trousers! It was very charming of them all the same, though perhaps this praise of my brains was more a compliment to their own tact and skill in dealing with any situation. After a short time Ribeyre got up.