"I want an alarum clock—a small one—the cheapest you have!"
Provided with his alarum, Fandor looked at his watch again:
"Confound it all! It's half-past three!" he cried. He signalled to a closed cab:
"To the Palais de Justice! As hard as you can lick!"
Directly Fandor was well inside the vehicle, he drew down the blinds; took off his coat; unbuttoned his waistcoat!...
The great clock of the Palais de Justice had just struck four, and its silvery tones were echoing harmoniously along the corridors when Jérôme Fandor entered the tradesman's gallery. He turned to the right, and gained the little lobby in which the cloak-room is. He quietly entered it. Barristers were coming and going, full of business, throwing off their gowns, inspecting the letters put aside during the sittings of the Courts. Fandor made his way among the groups with the ease of custom. He seemed to be looking for someone, and finished by questioning one of the women employed in the cloak-room:
"Is Madame Marguerite not here?"
"Oh, yes, monsieur, she is down below."
Madame Marguerite was an old friend of Fandor's. She was head of the cloak-room staff, and by her kind offices she had often obtained an interview for our journalist with one or other of the big-wigs of the bar, who generally object strongly to being questioned by journalists. When she appeared, Fandor told her he only wanted a little bit of information from her.