"To be sure!"
"And I may speak to you?"
"Dame! I don't know about that. If I am with my employer, you must be careful. But I'll go out in the entr'acte."
"Then I will make an opportunity to say a few words to you. And you won't come and breakfast with me? An hour passes so quickly!"
"Oh, no! no! Adieu, monsieur! You won't forget—Mademoiselle Rosette, at Madame Ratapond's, No. 48, Rue Meslay."
"No, mademoiselle, there's no danger of my forgetting."
She walked away, and I did the same. I was enchanted with my new acquaintance. Mademoiselle Rosette was altogether charming, and in her eyes, in her answers, I saw at once that she was no fool. Suppose that I had fallen upon a pearl, a treasure! It was impossible to say. The things we find without looking for them are often more valuable than those we take a vast amount of trouble to obtain.
XXXIV
THE UMBRELLAS.—THE POLKA
Love and poetry—these are what make hours seem like minutes. Be an author, a poet, a novelist, or a lover, and for you time will have wings. I thought of Mademoiselle Rosette all day, I dreamed of her all night, and the next morning I set about fulfilling my promise. There is nothing so easy, in Paris, as to obtain theatre tickets; it is not necessary to know authors or managers; it is enough to have money. With money one can have whatever one desires. I was on the way to a ticket broker's, when I found myself face to face with Dumouton, the literary man, who was of the dinner party at Deffieux's.
Poor Dumouton had not changed; he was still the same in physique and in dress. The yellowish-green or faded apple-green coat; the skin-tight trousers of any color you choose. But I noticed that he had two umbrellas under his arm, although there were no signs of rain. He offered me his hand, as if he were overjoyed to meet me, crying: