Before him there was a large mirror, in which he saw reflected all the picturesque confusion of the fashionable restaurant. He could see the tables surrounded by women of the highest society and women of the most dubious, in gorgeous toilets and coquettish bonnets, elbowing each other, chatting to their companions, men who knew the women of both classes. The position in which he was placed gave him a view of Yvonne's profile. In front of her was her husband, no longer the dazzling, rattlebrained Chésy of the Jenny, but a nervous, anxious, absent-minded creature, the exact type of the ruined player who amid the most brilliant surroundings is wondering whether or not he will leave the place to blow out his brains.
Between this poor being, visibly ill at ease, and the laughing young wife, who never dreamed of anything so tragic, was seated an individual of ignoble physiognomy, flabby-cheeked, with double chin, piercing, inquisitorial, brutal eyes set in a full-blooded countenance. He had the rosette of the Legion d'Honneur at his buttonhole, and he was paying manifest court to the young wife.
Between Yvonne and Chésy, a second woman was placed. At first Olivier could only see the back of her head. Then he noticed that this woman turned some three or four times to look toward their table at them. There was something so strange in the action of the unknown, the attention she paid to the group in which Hautefeuille and Olivier were was in such total contrast to the reserved expression on her face and to her quiet bearing, that Olivier had for a moment a flash of fresh hope. What if this woman, so pretty, so refined, with an expression that was so gentle and interesting, were Pierre's beloved mistress? As though absent-mindedly, he asked:—
"Who are the Chésys dining with? Who is the man with the decoration?"
"It is Brion, the financier," replied Hautefeuille. "The charming woman in front of him is his wife."
Again Olivier looked in the mirror. This time he surprised Madame Brion with her eyes evidently fixed upon him. His memory, so tenacious of all touching his sojourn in Rome, awoke and reminded him of the time he heard the name last, reminded him in a souvenir that brought back the name as pronounced by an unforgetable voice. He pictured himself again in a garden walk at the Villa Cœlimontana, talking to Ely about his friendship for Pierre and entering into a discussion with her such as they often had.
He declared that friendship, that pure, proud sentiment, that mixture of esteem and affection, of absolute confidence and sympathy, could not exist except between man and man. She averred that she had a friend upon whom she could depend just as he could upon Hautefeuille. And she had then spoken of Louise Brion. It was Ely's friend who was now dining a few feet away. And if she was regarding him with that singular persistence, it was because she knew.—What did she know?—Did she know that he had been Madame de Carlsberg's lover?—Without doubt that was it. Did she know that Pierre was her lover now?
This time the idea became such a violent, such an imperious obsession that Olivier felt he could no longer stand it. Besides, was there not a means close at hand of learning the truth, and that immediately? Had not Corancez told them that he should finish the evening in the Casino? And he must certainly know, seeing that he had passed the winter with Hautefeuille and Madame de Carlsberg.
"I will ask him about it openly, frankly," said Olivier to himself. "Whether he replies or not, I shall be able to read what he knows in his eyes.—He is so stupid!"
Then he felt ashamed of such a proceeding, as though of a frightful indelicacy in regard to his friend.