"Tell me, then, where you hid them, monsieur."
"Look under my bed.—Entrust your business to me, monsieur, and rest assured that I will look after it with all the zeal that I always display in behalf of my clients, who, I venture to say, have never had occasion thus far to do anything but congratulate themselves on having placed their interests in my hands."
"Ouiche! that's all very fine talk! but I believe what I see.—They told me that Monsieur Chamoureau was a widower, but that he still cried for his wife."
"That's the truth, monsieur, the exact truth.—O Eléonore! why are you not here to defend your husband!"
"They ain't under the bed, I just looked there."
"Look in my somno.—Yes, monsieur, I mourn for my wife! If she were alive, she'd have found my slippers before this!"
"When a man mourns for his dead wife, he don't go masquerading round the streets in broad daylight! No, no! I don't trust you!"
At that moment they heard loud talking on the stairs. The door, which was not locked, was thrown open with violence, and the professor of bookkeeping rushed into the room, shouting at the top of his voice:
"What have I learned? Great God! He has worn a disguise, attended public balls, and carried disregard of propriety so far as to appear in broad daylight and in his own neighborhood, dressed in a costume to which it is impossible to give a name.—Yes! it is not a falsehood, a fable, a false rumor; here he is, still in that absurd costume! and he, a man who keeps a business office, abandons himself to such libertinage—and without his shoes!—What a shocking disguise!"
"Ah! good-morning, Monsieur Beaubichon, I am at your service in one moment.—Come, Madame Monin, will you give me my slippers or not?"