“Come, come! another glass before you start. I am very sorry I can’t go back to Rome with you; but I’m kept here by all sorts of business—besides, it’s better we shouldn’t be seen together. Good-bye! Let me embrace you, my dear Fleurissoire. May God keep you! I thank Him for having permitted me to know you.”
He accompanied Fleurissoire to the door, and as he was leaving:
“Ah! sir,” he said, “what do you think of the Cardinal? Is it not distressing to see the state to which persecution has reduced such a noble intelligence?”
Then, as he went back to the bogus Cardinal:
“You fathead! That was a bright idea of yours, wasn’t it, to get your cheque endorsed by a silly ass who hasn’t even got a passport, and whom I shall have to shadow?”
But Bardolotti, heavy with sleep, let his head roll upon the table, murmuring:
“We must keep the old ’uns busy.”
Protos went indoors to take off his wig and his peasant’s costume; he appeared a little later, looking thirty years younger and dressed like a bank clerk or a shop assistant of inferior grade. He had very little time to catch the train he knew Fleurissoire was going to take, and he went off without taking leave of the slumbering Bardolotti.
VII
Fleurissoire got back to Rome and the Via dei Vecchierelli that same evening. He was extremely tired and persuaded Carola to allow him to sleep.