Lucien looked up at the ceiling and vainly tried to think of something else to say. As his eyes wandered over the gray painted joists and the spaces of plaster between, he saw, not without qualms, that the little chandelier with the old-fashioned cut-glass pendants had been stripped of its gauze covering and filled with wax candles. All the covers had been removed from the furniture, and the faded flowered silk damask had come to light. These preparations meant something extraordinary. The poet looked at his boots, and misgivings about his costume arose in his mind. Grown stupid with dismay, he turned and fixed his eyes on a Japanese jar standing on a begarlanded console table of the time of Louis Quinze; then, recollecting that he must conciliate Mme. de Bargeton’s husband, he tried to find out if the good gentleman had a hobby of any sort in which he might be humored. “You seldom leave the city, monsieur?” he began, returning to M. de Bargeton. “Very seldom.” Silence again. M. de Bargeton watched Lucien’s slightest movements like a suspicious cat; the young man’s presence disturbed him. Each was afraid of the other. “Can he feel suspicious of my attentions?” thought Lucien; “he seems to be anything but friendly.” Lucien was not a little embarrassed by the uneasy glances that the other gave him as he went to and fro, when luckily for him, the old man-servant (who wore livery for the occasion) announced “M. du Châtelet.” The Baron came in, very much at ease, greeted his friend Bargeton, and favored Lucien with the little nod then in vogue, which the poet in his mind called purse-proud impertinence.