"What remains to be done, my dear D'Argenton, I will soon tell you."
But Jack did not hear the end of Monsieur Rivals's phrase, D'Argenton with a shove having thrust him out.
The noise of the discussion reached him in his room, like the various parts in a great orchestra. He distinguished and recognized all the voices, but they melted one into the other, united by their resonance, and made a discordant uproar through which some bits of phrases were alone intelligible.
"It is an infamous lie."
"Messieurs! Messieurs!"
"Life is not a romance."
"Sacred blouse, beûh! beûh!"
At last old Rivals's voice could be heard thundering as he crossed the threshold:—
"May I be hanged if ever I put my foot in your house again!"
Then the door was violently slammed, and a great silence fell on the dining-room, broken only by the clatter of knives and forks.