lips looked.

"The prince."

"I don't know; I've just come down. Oh, he's certainly due here tonight;
he comes every time!"

Prulliere had drawn near the hearth opposite the console table, where
a coke fire was blazing and two more gas jets were flaring brightly. He
lifted his eyes and looked at the clock and the barometer on his right
hand and on his left. They had gilded sphinxes by way of adornment in
the style of the First Empire. Then he stretched himself out in a huge
armchair with ears, the green velvet of which had been so worn by four
generations of comedians that it looked yellow in places, and there he
stayed, with moveless limbs and vacant eyes, in that weary and resigned
attitude peculiar to actors who are used to long waits before their turn
for going on the stage.

Old Bosc, too, had just made his appearance. He came in dragging one
foot behind the other and coughing. He was wrapped in an old box coat,
part of which had slipped from his shoulder in such a way as to uncover
the gold-laced cloak of King Dagobert. He put his crown on the piano
and for a moment or two stood moodily stamping his feet. His hands
were trembling slightly with the first beginnings of alcoholism, but he
looked a sterling old fellow for all that, and a long white beard lent
that fiery tippler's face of his a truly venerable appearance. Then in
the silence of the room, while the shower of hail was whipping the panes
of the great window that looked out on the courtyard, he shook himself
disgustedly.

"What filthy weather!" he growled.

Simonne and Prulliere did not move. Four or five pictures--a landscape,
a portrait of the actor Vernet--hung yellowing in the hot glare of the
gas, and a bust of Potier, one of the bygone glories of the Varietes,
stood gazing vacant-eyed from its pedestal. But just then there was a
burst of voices outside. It was Fontan, dressed for the second act.
He was a young dandy, and his habiliments, even to his gloves, were
entirely yellow.

"Now say you don't know!" he shouted, gesticulating. "Today's my patron
saint's day!"

"What?" asked Simonne, coming up smilingly, as though attracted by the
huge nose and the vast, comic mouth of the man. "D'you answer to the
name of Achille?"

"Exactly so! And I'm going to get 'em to tell Madame Bron to send up
champagne after the second act."

For some seconds a bell had been ringing in the distance. The long-drawn
sound grew fainter, then louder, and when t