“And what is to be the upshot of it all?” inquired Ned, ignoring the protest.
“According to M. de St Denys, a universe of gentlemen.”
“He is, at the same time, the soul of honour,” said Lambertine.
“Well,” said Mr Murk, “I think I will go to bed.”
He appealed to the cook, who still fussed among her pans, with a look of puzzled inquiry. She answered sourly—
“You can take your pick. There are plenty to choose from.”
It was then he discovered, to his profound astonishment, that the confessional-boxes were sleeping-places, to the use of one of which he was unblushingly invited in the very face of his company.
“Well,” thought he, “I am travelling for experience;” and he took his knapsack, chose that cupboard nearest the window and farthest from the table, and, withdrawing himself behind the curtains, undressed, folded and laid his clothes aside, and philosophically composed himself to slumber on a little bed that smelt of onions.
Conditions were not favourable to rest. The heat was suffocating; the atmosphere unspeakable. In the distance the voices of his late companions droned like hornets in a bottle—sometimes swelled, it seemed, into a thick passion of tearfulness. Without brooded an apoplectic silence, broken only by a spasmodic rumbling sound that might have signified dogs or cattle, or, indeed, nothing more than the earth turning in its sleep, or the rolling heavenwards of the wheel of the moon. Now and then some winged creature would boom past the window, its vibrant note dying like the voice of a far-off multitude; now and again the seething rush of a bat would seem to stir up the very grounds of stagnation. Suddenly a heart-wrung voice spoke up outside his curtain—
“Monsieur! I am not to be laughed at. Bear that in mind!”