"'We ain't for you to-night. There ain't no show! We're engaged! Have Messieurs Bouqueton and Saint-Germain got here?'
"'To be sure!' said a woman at the desk, who had been darting fiery glances at me for some minutes. 'They're waiting for you, and the table's set.'
"'The devil! there's going to be a treat, it seems!' cried one of the men.
"'Yes, yes,' said the girls. 'We're going to earn some shiners. And if you behave yourselves, there'll be something for you. Get out of the way! Let us go to work.'
"And the four women hurried to the other end of the room and disappeared through a little door, which closed behind them. I made haste to escape from that horrible place. I believe that it was high time, for the woman at the desk had pointed me out to some men, who were scrutinizing me closely.
"As soon as I was in the street, I ran at the top of my speed. I thought then, and I still believe that I was not mistaken, that I was chased by some men who came out of the café behind me. But some soldiers came along, and I walked beside them until I reached a more frequented quarter. Then I took a cab and went home.
"I cannot tell you what took place in my heart when I was able to reflect calmly on my plight—that I was the wife of a man of honorable birth and breeding, the bearer of an honorable name, who was at liberty to frequent respectable society in Paris, and who had a wife who was young and pretty, and not a fool,—I flattered myself, perhaps!—and that that man was at that moment in one of those sink-holes of vice which are tolerated in great cities because fugitives from justice can be found there; that he was in the company of public prostitutes of the lowest type, and that he would probably pass the night there.
"I trembled convulsively from head to foot, I had paroxysms of passion, and cried in a sort of frenzy: 'And I am tied to such a creature!'
"To calm myself I thought of that hypocrite Faisandé; he too had a wife; I had happened to meet her twice, and I knew that she was young and pretty and had all the qualities of a good wife and mother; she was virtuous, orderly, economical, not coquettish, and she adored her husband! It seems that there is a fatality about it: the worst scoundrels always obtain such phœnixes. Moreover, Monsieur Faisandé had a daughter; but even that did not deter the wretch! He abandoned himself to his abominable tastes, wholly oblivious of the fact that he was a father.
"I, at all events, had no child; and I thanked God for it at that moment. Recovering my strength of will and my courage, I said to myself that in all probability many wives had passed through such ordeals as mine. Ah! if we knew all the family secrets of our friends! This is not romancing, my friend; I invent nothing; it is history.