"A village! Very like, indeed! Why, there is always such an infernal din in the house."
"Still, it is impossible to find a quieter house. Above the lady, there is the leader of the band at the Café des Aveugles, and a gentleman traveller; over that, another traveller; over that—"
"I am not alluding to those persons; they are very quiet, and appear very respectable. My niece has no fault to find with them; but in the fourth, there is a stout lame man, whom Madame de Saint-Ildefonse met yesterday tipsy on the stairs; he was shrieking like a savage, and she nearly had a fit, she was so much alarmed. If you think that, with such lodgers, your house resembles a village—"
"Sir, I assure you I only wait the opportunity to turn this stout lame man out-of-doors; he has paid his last fortnight in advance, otherwise I should already have turned him out."
"You should not have taken in such a lodger."
"But, except him, I hope madame has nothing to complain of. There is a twopenny postman, who is the cream of honest fellows, and overhead, beside the chamber of the stout lame man, a lady and daughter, who do not move any more than dormice."
"I repeat, Madame de Saint-Ildefonse only complains of this stout lame man, who is the nightmare of the house; and I warn you that, if you keep such a fellow in your house, you will find all your respectable lodgers leave you."
"I will send him away, you may be assured. I have no wish to keep him."
"You will only do what's right, for else your house will be forsaken."
"Which will not answer my purpose at all; so, sir, consider the stout lame man as gone, for he has only four more days to stay here."