“Our dear Paul,” the Stranger was saying, “has declined, with his customary modesty, any public recognition of his triumph. He will not refuse three old friends the privilege of offering him their heartiest congratulations. Gentlemen, I drink not only to our dear Paul, but to the French Academy, which in honouring him has honoured France.” The Stranger, rising from his chair, turned his piercing eyes—the only part of him that could be clearly seen—upon the astonished Poet. The two elderly gentlemen opposite, evidently as bewildered as Paul himself, taking their cue from the Stranger, drained their glasses. Still following the Stranger’s lead, leant each across the table and shook him warmly by the hand. “I beg pardon,” said the Poet, “but really I am afraid I must have been asleep. Would it sound rude to you”—he addressed himself to the Stranger: the faces of the elderly gentlemen opposite did not suggest their being of much assistance to him—“if I asked you where I was?” Again there flickered across the Stranger’s face the smile that was felt rather than seen. “You are in a private room of the Café Pretali,” he answered. “We are met this evening to celebrate your recent elevation into the company of the Immortals.” “Oh,” said the Poet, “thank you.” “The Academy,” continued the Stranger, “is always a little late in these affairs. Myself, I could have wished your election had taken place ten years ago, when all France—all France that counts, that is—was talking of you. At fifty-three”—the Stranger touched lightly with his fingers the Poet’s fat hand—“one does not write as when the sap was running up, instead of down.” Slowly, memory of the dingy _café_ in the Rue St. Louis, of the strange happening that took place there that night when he was young, crept back into the Poet’s brain. “Would you mind,” said the Poet, “would it be troubling you too much to tell me something of what has occurred to me?” “Not in the least,” responded the agreeable Stranger. “Your career has been most interesting—for the first few years chiefly to yourself. You married Marguerite. You remember Marguerite?” The Poet remembered her.