Soon a shrill little voice arose in the room which the concierge had entered, and our travellers heard this colloquy:
“What do you want of me, Pierre?”
“Some one has come to buy the house, monsieur.”
“Have you come again to disturb me to no purpose, and to bring me some boorish fellow, as you did just now?”
“Oh! no, monsieur! these folks look like swells!”
“That devilish fellow put me into a terrible temper! I shall be sick, I am sure!”
“I tell you, monsieur, that these folks have a cabriolet.”
“Oh! that’s different! I’ll go and speak to them.”
Madame Germeuil and her children were wondering what they should think of what they had heard, when the door of the adjoining room opened, and a short, thin, yellow, wrinkled man, in dressing gown and nightcap appeared and saluted his visitors with an air which he tried in vain to make amiable.
“We wish to examine this house,” said Edouard; “not that I do not know it very well; but these ladies would be very glad to see it.”