In nomine Patris," said the man, waving his spoon as he would have done with a holy-water sprinkler, "et Filii, et Spiritus sancti"—
"Maître La Hurière!" exclaimed the two young men.
"Messieurs de Coconnas and de la Mole!" cried La Hurière.
"So you are not dead?" asked Coconnas.
"Why! can it be that you are alive?" asked the landlord.
"Nevertheless, I saw you fall," said Coconnas, "I heard the crash of the bullet, which broke something in you, I don't know what. I left you lying in the gutter, with blood streaming out of your nose, out of your mouth, and even out of your eyes."
"All that is as true as the gospel, Monsieur de Coconnas. But the noise you heard was the bullet striking against my sallat, on which fortunately it flattened itself; but the blow was none the less severe, and the proof of it," added La Hurière, lifting his cap and displaying a pate as bald as a man's knee, "is that as you see I have not a spear of hair left."
The two young men burst out laughing when they saw his grotesque appearance.
"Aha! you laugh, do you?" said La Hurière, somewhat reassured, "you do not come, then, with any evil intentions."
"Now tell us, Maître La Hurière, are you entirely cured of your bellicose inclinations?"