pincushion, which was
still bristling with pins. It was as if portions of his heart had been
carried away with these things; and the monotony of the same voices and
the same gestures benumbed him with fatigue, and caused within him a
mournful torpor, a sensation like that of death itself.

There was a rustle of silk close to his ear. Rosanette touched him.

It was through Frederick himself that she had learned about this
auction. When her first feelings of vexation was over, the idea of
deriving profit from it occurred to her mind. She had come to see it in
a white satin vest with pearl buttons, a furbelowed gown, tight-fitting
gloves on her hands, and a look of triumph on her face.

He grew pale with anger. She stared at the woman who was by his side.

Madame Dambreuse had recognised her, and for a minute they examined each
other from head to foot minutely, in order to discover the defect, the
blemish--the one perhaps envying the other's youth, and the other filled
with spite at the extreme good form, the aristocratic simplicity of her
rival.

At last Madame Dambreuse turned her head round with a smile of
inexpressible insolence.

The crier had opened a piano--her piano! While he remained standing
before it he ran the fingers of his right hand over the keys, and put up
the instrument at twelve hundred francs; then he brought down the
figures to one thousand, then to eight hundred, and finally to seven
hundred.

Madame Dambreuse, in a playful tone, laughed at the appearance of some
socket that was out of gear.

The next thing placed before the second-hand dealers was a little chest
with medallions and silver corners and clasps, the same one which he had
seen at the first dinner in the Rue de Choiseul, which had subsequently
been in Rosanette's house, and again transferred back to Madame Arnoux's
residence. Often, during their conversations his eyes wandered towards
it. He was bound to it by the dearest memories, and his soul was melting
with tender emotions about it, when suddenly Madame Dambreuse said:

"Look here! I am going to buy that!"

"But it is not a very rare article," he returned.

She considered it, on the contrary, very pretty, and the appraiser
commended its delicacy.

"A gem of the Renaissance! Eight hundred francs, messieurs! Almost
entirely of silver! With a little whiting it can be made to shine
brilliantly."

And, as she was pushing forward through the crush of people:

"What an odd i