, who peered at it suspiciously on every side, breathed upon
it, rubbed it bright again upon his coat-sleeve, and, finally, held the
stones up sideways between his eyes and the light.

"Bah!" said he, sending it on with a contemptuous fillip of the
forefinger and thumb. "Glass and paste, _mon ami_. Not worth five francs
of anybody's money."

Mueller, who had been eyeing him all the time with an odd smile lurking
about the corners of his mouth, emptied his last drop of Chablis, turned
the glass over on the table, bottom upwards, and said very coolly:--

"Well, I'm sorry for that; because I gave seven francs for it myself
this morning, in the Palais Royal."

"You!"

"Seven francs!"

"Bought in the Palais Royal!"

"What does he mean?"

"Mean?" echoed the student, in reply to this chorus of exclamations. "I
mean that I bought it this morning, and gave seven francs for it. It is
not every morning of my life, let me tell you, that I have seven francs
to throw away on my personal appearance."

"But then the ring that the lady took from her finger?"

"And the murder?"

"And the servant in black?"

"And the hundred scudi?"

"One great invention from beginning to end, Messieurs les Chicards, and
being got up expressly for your amusement, I hope you liked it.
_Garcon?_--another _grog au vin_, and sweeter than the last!"

It would be difficult to say whether the Chicards were most disappointed
or delighted at this _denoument_--disappointed at its want of fact, or
delighted with the story-weaving power of Herr Franz Mueller. They
expressed themselves, at all events, with a tumultuous burst of
applause, in the midst of which we rose and left the room. When we once
more came out into the open air, the stars had disappeared and the air
was heavy with the damps of approaching daybreak. Fortunately, we caught
an empty _fiacre_ in the next street and, as we were nearer the Rue du
Faubourg Montmartre than the Chaussee d' Antin, Dalrymple set me
down first.

"Adieu, Damon," he said, laughingly, as we shook hands through the
window. "If we don't meet before, come and dine with me next Sunday at
seven o'clock--and don't dream of dreadful murders, if you can help it!"

I did not dream of dreadful murders. I dreamt, instead, of Madame de
Marignan, and never woke the next morning till eleven o'clock, just two
hours later than the time at which I should have presented myself at
Dr. Cheron's.

* * *