"Faisandé!" cried I; "a clerk at the Treasury! Hypocrite, tartuffe, and debauchee! Ah! that's the very man!"
"Do you know him?"
"He was at the dinner at Deffieux's, the night that I made bold to attend Mademoiselle Guillardin's ball. He was very much shocked because we were a little free in our talk; he preached morality to us."
"Oh! that's the man to the life! Let me finish my story:
"When Monsieur Faisandé appeared, I stretched myself out on a stone bench in front of the hovel. I turned my face to the wall, and listened to their talk.
"'I was waiting for you,' my husband said.
"'Why didn't you go in?'
"'I am not so well known here as you are. I was not sure that they'd give me the little secret room.'
"'You must say: "I am Saint-Germain's friend,"—that's the name I go by here,—and they'd have taken you there at once.'
"'It seems that you're a regular habitué?'