a pipe in the other; he stood there motionless.

"You are fine," said he, "you are magnificent, fatal and accursed--You
remind me of Kean in Othello--

"Have you pray'd to-night, Desdemona?"

Gerfaut gazed at him with frowning brows, but made no reply.

"I will wager that it is the last scene in our third act," replied the
artist, placing his candlestick upon the mantel; "it seems that it is to
be very tragic. Now listen! I also feel the poetical afflatus coming over
me, and, if you like, we will set about devouring paper like two
boa-constrictors. Speaking of serpents, have you a rattle? Ah, yes! Here
is the bell-rope. I was about to say that we would have a bowl of coffee.
Or rather, I will go into the kitchen myself; I am very good friends with
Marianne, the cook; besides, the motto of the house of Bergenheim is
liberte, libertas. Coffee is my muse; in this respect, I resemble
Voltaire--"

"Marillac!" exclaimed Gerfaut, as the artist was about to leave the room.
The artist turned, and meekly retraced his steps.

"You will be so good as to do me the favor of returning to your room,"
said Gerfaut. "You may work or you may sleep, just as you like; between
us, you would do well to sleep. I wish to be alone."

"You say that as if you meditated an attempt upon your illustrious
person. Are you thinking of suicide? Let us see whether you have some
concealed weapon, some poisoned ring. Curse upon it! the poison of the
Borgias! Is the white substance in this china bowl, vulgarly called
sugar, by some terrible chance infamous arsenic disguised under the
appearance of an honest colonial commodity?"

"Be kind enough to spare your jokes," said Octave, as his friend poked
about in all the corners of the room with an affectation of anxiety,
"and, as I can not get rid of you, listen to my opinion: if you think
that I brought you here for you to conduct yourself as you have for the
last two days, you are mistaken."

"What have I done?"

"You left me the whole morning with that tiresome Bergenheim on my hands,
and I verily believe he made me count every stick in his park and every
frog in his pond. Tonight, when that old witch of Endor proposed her
infernal game of whist, to which it seems I am to be condemned daily,
you-excused yourself upon the pretext of ignorance, and yet you play as
good a game as I."

"I can not endure whist at twenty sous a point."

"Do I like it any better?"

"Well, you are a nice fello