ald-coloured Hungarian cheese, with fruit
and pastry. As wine, some old Bordeaux claret in decanters, chambertin
with the roast, and sparkling moselle at dessert, in lieu of champagne,
which was voted commonplace.

At seven o'clock Sandoz and Henriette were waiting for their guests, he
simply wearing a jacket, and she looking very elegant in a plain dress
of black satin. People dined at their house in frock-coats, without
any fuss. The drawing-room, the arrangements of which they were now
completing, was becoming crowded with old furniture, old tapestry,
nick-nacks of all countries and all times--a rising and now overflowing
stream of things which had taken source at Batignolles with an old pot
of Rouen ware, which Henriette had given her husband on one of his fete
days. They ran about to the curiosity shops together; a joyful passion
for buying possessed them. Sandoz satisfied the longings of his youth,
the romanticist ambitions which the first books he had read had
given birth to. Thus this writer, so fiercely modern, lived amid the
worm-eaten middle ages which he had dreamt of when he was a lad of
fifteen. As an excuse, he laughingly declared that handsome modern
furniture cost too much, whilst with old things, even common ones, you
immediately obtained something with effect and colour. There was nothing
of the collector about him, he was entirely concerned as to decoration
and broad effects; and to tell the truth, the drawing-room, lighted by
two lamps of old Delft ware, had quite a soft warm tint with the dull
gold of the dalmaticas used for upholstering the seats, the yellowish
incrustations of the Italian cabinets and Dutch show-cases, the faded
hues of the Oriental door-hangings, the hundred little notes of the
ivory, crockery and enamel work, pale with age, which showed against the
dull red hangings of the room.

Claude and Christine were the first to arrive. The latter had put on
her only silk dress--an old, worn-out garment which she preserved with
especial care for such occasions. Henriette at once took hold of
both her hands and drew her to a sofa. She was very fond of her, and
questioned her, seeing her so strange, touchingly pale, and with anxious
eyes. What was the matter? Did she feel poorly? No, no, she answered
that she was very gay and very pleased to come; but while she spoke, she
kept on glancing at Claude, as if to study him, and then looked away. He
seemed excited, evincing a feverishness in his