"Pshaw! for my part I would rather remain all my life on a salary of twenty-four hundred francs than wear myself to a skeleton the way he is doing."
Pitolet turned on his heels and said in a bantering tone: "But that does not prevent you, my dear fellow, from being here on this twentieth of December before ten o'clock."
The other shrugged his shoulders with an air of indifference. "Hang it all! I do not want everybody to walk over my head, either! Since you come here to see the sun rise, I am going to do it, too, however much I may deplore your officiousness. From doing that to calling the chief 'dear master,' as Lesable does, and staying until half past six and then carrying work home with you is a long way. Besides, I am in society and I have other demands upon my time."
M. Cachelin had ceased his registering and begun to dream, his eyes fixed on vacancy. At last he asked: "Do you believe that he will get an increase again this year?"
Pitolet cried: "I will bet you ten to one he gets it. He is not wearing himself out for nothing."
And so they talked of the eternal question of promotion which for a month had excited the whole hive of clerks from the ground floor to the roof.
They calculated chances, computed figures, compared their various claims to promotion, and waxed indignant over former injustices. These discussions lasted from morning until evening, and the next day were begun all over again, with the same reasons, the same arguments, the same words.
A new clerk entered, a little, pale, sick-looking man, M. Boissel, who lived as in a romance of Alexandre Dumas, père. Everything with him was an extraordinary adventure, and he recounted every morning to his friend Pitolet his strange encounters of the previous evening, imaginary scenes enacted in his house, strange cries uttered in the street which caused him to open his window at half past three in the morning. Every day he had separated combatants, stopped runaway horses, rescued women from danger; and although of a deplorably weak constitution he talked unceasingly, in a slow and satisfied tone, of exploits accomplished by his strong arm.
As soon as he understood that they were talking of Lesable he declared: "Some day I will give that little pup his deserts; and if he ever walks over my head. I'll give him something that will prevent him from trying again."
Maze, continuing to smoke, sneered: "You would do well, then, to begin at once, for I hear on good authority that you are to be set aside this year for Lesable."