“Declining all thoughts of the wager and the wine, I left the party in a maze of stupor, and sped as hastily as I could to the _Guinguette_, or Tea-Garden, where, it will be remembered, Ravalette and myself had entered to converse with the proprietor regarding his novel and costly experiment in the way of feasting poor people _a la les richeuse_. “Entering this place, I put the same question to the proprietor that I had to the gardener and the man of Michel le Compte; but instead of surprise at his answer, I was absolutely dumb-founded, for the man insisted that I entered the shop _quite alone_, but that I had conversed with him in two separate and perfectly distinct voices, _au ventriloque_--which he had regarded as very singular, but concluded that I was a student of ventriloquism, and took every opportunity to test my proficiency, and had now come back to ascertain what success attended the experiment. “I was too much horrified to speak; but, simply nodding my adieux, took my departure in a mood much easier to be imagined than described. “Not yet content, I made inquiries as to whether any one had seen two horsemen of a peculiar description pass through any of the streets of Belleville. “Nobody had seen any such, or indeed any horsemen whatever. I was thunderstruck. “‘I’ll track them!’ I cried, as a last resource; ‘for the place where we walked, where the horse and groom stood waiting, and where the old man mounted, was a soft, yielding, grassless turf. This will decide whether I have been dealing with the living or the dead, and that too in this broad daylight.’ “I ran thither. Not a trace of a horse’s hoofs; not a single vestige of Ravalette’s footprints save one, and that one the fac-simile of the description formerly given. My own foot-marks were plain enough, but only the one other was to be found! Here the mystery grew thicker and thicker, nor could I see the first glimmer of a way to clear it up. “Slowly and despondently, I retraced my steps toward Paris, taking care to inquire as I went, whether any person had seen two men on horseback go toward Charronne, Villette, Menilmontant, or through the Barrières. I might just as well not have asked. “But the chapter of devilry was not yet concluded, for what subsequently took place actually threw all that had gone before it entirely in the shade. These things I will now relate, first premising my narrative.