"Yes, monsieur," said Buvat, seizing the opening which was offered to him, with a presence of mind on which he secretly congratulated himself; "is that search forbidden?"
"Why did not monsieur, instead of troubling himself, ring the bell? I have the honor to be appointed monsieur's valet-de-chambre, and I have brought him a night-cap and night-shirt."
And with these words the valet-de-chambre spread out on the bed a night-shirt, embroidered with flowers, a cap of the finest lawn, and a rose-colored ribbon. Buvat, still on his knees, regarded him with the greatest astonishment.
"Now," said the valet-de-chambre, "will monsieur allow me to help him to undress?"
"No, monsieur, no," said Buvat, accompanying the refusal with the sweetest smile he could assume. "No, I am accustomed to undress myself. I thank you, monsieur."
The valet-de-chambre retired, and Buvat remained alone.
As the inspection of the room was completed, and as his increasing hunger rendered sleep more necessary, Buvat began to undress, sighing; placed—in order not to be left in the dark—a candle on the corner of the chimney-piece, and sprang, with a groan, into the softest and warmest bed he had ever slept on.
"The bed is not sleep," is an axiom which Buvat might, from experience, have added to the list of his true proverbs. Either from fear or hunger, Buvat passed a very disturbed night, and it was not till near morning that he fell asleep; even then his slumbers were peopled with the most terrible visions and nightmares. He was just waking from a dream that he had been poisoned by a leg of mutton, when the valet-de-chambre entered, and asked at what time he would like breakfast.
Buvat was not in the habit of breakfasting in bed, so he rose quickly, and dressed in haste; he had just finished, when Messieurs Bourguignon and Comtois entered, bringing the breakfast, as the day before they had brought the dinner.
Then took place a second rehearsal of the scene which we have before related, with the exception that now it was Monsieur Comtois who ate and Monsieur Bourguignon who waited; but when it came to the coffee, and Buvat, who had taken nothing for twenty-four hours, saw his dearly-loved beverage, after having passed from the silver coffee-pot into the porcelain cup, pass into the cavernous mouth of Monsieur Comtois, he could hold out no longer, and declared that his stomach demanded to be amused with something, and that, consequently, he desired that they would leave him the coffee and a roll. This declaration appeared to disturb the devotion of Monsieur Comtois, who was nevertheless obliged to satisfy himself with one cup of the odoriferous liquid, which, together with a roll and the sugar, was placed on a little table, while the two scamps carried off the rest of the feast, laughing in their sleeves.