“Have you dined yet, lad?” asked he, quietly.
“No; I have not had time.”
“Come, then, and partake of mine;” and, without waiting for an answer, he let down the shutter that closed the entrance to his shop, and led me by the arm into a room behind it.
Pierre Dubos, though nearer to sixty than fifty, was only a short time married to a very pretty and young woman who, as he entered the room, was arranging the table for dinner. She received me with much courtesy, scarcely heeding, if she even heard, the explanation her husband gave to account for my presence.
The meal was an excellent one, and passed off with all that easy conviviality that every class of Frenchmen know how to display. Monsieur Dubos seemed somewhat of a character, and rather piqued himself on doing things that others might never have thought of. His marriage appeared to have been one of these; his invitation to myself was another.
“You know, Jeanette,” said he, “we might never have met if it had not been for the ferry being delayed at Honfleur. We made acquaintance on the steps of the pier; and see what has come of it! Now, I have come to know Bernard here by a similar accident. Who knows what may arise out of that?”
Madame smiled benignly in assent to the theory, the happy results of which she seemed to acknowledge.
Coffee came after dinner; and then I began to think how I should take my leave. Ere I could solve the problem to my satisfaction, Dubos said,—
“Shall we all go to the comedy this evening? They play a grand piece, one of Beaumanhui's,—and it will amuse us.”
Madame hailed the proposition with delight; and I really felt sorry as I said,—