horrible weather!"

When Charles entered he saluted shortly and took a seat in the corner
beside the fireplace.

Alphonse's eyes had indeed become restless. He looked towards the door
every time any one came in; and when Charles appeared, a spasm passed
over his face and he missed his stroke.

"Monsieur Alphonse is not in the vein to-day," said an onlooker.

Soon after a strange gentleman came in. Charles looked up from his
paper and nodded slightly; the stranger raised his eyebrows a little and
looked at Alphonse.

He dropped his cue on the floor.

"Excuse me, gentlemen, I'm not in the mood for billiards to-day," said
he, "permit me to leave off. Waiter, bring me a bottle of seltzer-water
and a spoon--I must take my dose of Vichy salts."

"You should not take so much Vichy salts, Monsieur Alphonse, but rather
keep to a sensible diet," said the doctor, who sat a little way off
playing chess.

Alphonse laughed, and seated himself at the newspaper table. He
seized the _Journal Amusant_, and began to make merry remarks upon the
illustrations. A little circle quickly gathered round him, and he was
inexhaustible in racy stories and whimsicalities.

While he rattled on under cover of the others' laughter, he poured out
a glass of seltzer-water and took from his pocket a little box on which
was written, in large letters, "Vichy Salts."

He shook the powder out into the glass and stirred it round with a
spoon. There was a little cigar-ash on the floor in front of his chair;
he whipped it off with his pocket-handkerchief, and then stretched out
his hand for the glass.

At that moment he felt a hand on his arm. Charles had risen and hurried
across the room; he now bent down over Alphonse.

Alphonse turned his head towards him so that none but Charles could
see his face. At first he let his eyes travel furtively over his old
friend's figure; then he looked up, and, gazing straight at Charles, he
said, half aloud, "Charlie!"

It was long since Charles had heard that old pet name. He gazed into the
well-known face, and now for the first time saw how it had altered of
late. It seemed to him as though he were reading a tragic story about
himself.

They remained thus for a second or two, and there glided over Alphonse's
features that expression of imploring helplessness which Charles knew
so well from the old school days, when Alphonse came bounding in at the
last moment and wanted his composition written.

"Have yo