The concert came to an end at last; Dubourg suggested a game, and the tables were soon arranged. Backgammon is not often played in a salon, but Dubourg said that they played nothing else at the Polish court; whereupon Monsieur Chambertin instantly produced a board, and declared that within a week he would have four in his salon. Dubourg and Frossard took their places, and Chambertin watched them play, although he did not understand the game at all.
Dubourg was in luck; he urged his adversary to increase the stakes, and tried to taunt him into doing so. He had won some twenty louis, when there was a tremendous report in the garden.
Cries of: "It's the fireworks!" arose on all sides, and everybody hurried into the garden.
"To the devil with the fireworks!" exclaimed Dubourg; "the dice are just beginning to fall well for me!"
But he tried in vain to detain the ironmaster, who was determined to see the fireworks; so Dubourg concluded to do as everybody else did.
He left the salon. The fireworks were at the end of the garden, and Dubourg fell in with Madame Chambertin, who was coming to see what monsieur le baron was doing, and, it may be, to seek an opportunity for a tête-à-tête. Dubourg offered her his arm; he was in excellent spirits, and, as he recalled the conversation under the table and the stifled sighs, he reflected that he was to pass several days in the house, and that he ought to show himself worthy of the welcome he had received. These considerations led him to take a path which did not lead to the place where the other guests were.
"Where are you taking me, pray?" madame asked, now and then. But Dubourg replied:
"I don't know at all, but let us go on."
They soon came to a small summer-house, which was not lighted and had but one window, a little farther from the ground than an ordinary ground-floor window. Dubourg opened the door, pushed Madame Chambertin in, and entered behind her, taking care to close the door.
Meanwhile, Monsieur Chambertin, who had provided the fireworks expressly for his friend the baron, was looking for him in the glare of a Bengal-light; as he did not see him, he ran hither and thither, crying: