breach between Claude and his old friends had gradually widened.
With time the latters' visits had become brief and far between, for they
felt uncomfortable when they found themselves face to face with that
disturbing style of painting; and they were more and more upset by the
unhinging of a mind which had been the admiration of their youth. Now
all had fled; none excepting Sandoz ever came. Gagniere had even left
Paris, to settle down in one of the two houses he owned at Melun, where
he lived frugally upon the proceeds of the other one, after suddenly
marrying, to every one's surprise, an old maid, his music mistress, who
played Wagner to him of an evening. As for Mahoudeau, he alleged work
as an excuse for not coming, and indeed he was beginning to earn some
money, thanks to a bronze manufacturer, who employed him to touch up
his models. Matters were different with Jory, whom no one saw, since
Mathilde despotically kept him sequestrated. She had conquered him,
and he had fallen into a kind of domesticity comparable to that of a
faithful dog, yielding up the keys of his cashbox, and only carrying
enough money about him to buy a cigar at a time. It was even said that
Mathilde, like the devotee she had once been, had thrown him into the
arms of the Church, in order to consolidate her conquest, and that she
was constantly talking to him about death, of which he was horribly
afraid. Fagerolles alone affected a lively, cordial feeling towards
his old friend Claude whenever he happened to meet him. He then always
promised to go and see him, but never did so. He was so busy since his
great success, in such request, advertised, celebrated, on the road to
every imaginable honour and form of fortune! And Claude regretted
nobody save Dubuche, to whom he still felt attached, from a feeling
of affection for the old reminiscences of boyhood, notwithstanding the
disagreements which difference of disposition had provoked later on. But
Dubuche, it appeared, was not very happy either. No doubt he was gorged
with millions, but he led a wretched life, constantly at logger-heads
with his father-in-law (who complained of having been deceived with
regard to his capabilities as an architect), and obliged to pass
his life amidst the medicine bottles of his ailing wife and his two
children, who, having been prematurely born, had to be reared virtually
in cotton wool.

Of all the old friends, therefore, there only remained Sandoz, who still
foun