“It seems to me you could say ‘monsieur’ without cracking your throat,” replied the master of the line of coaches of the Valley of the Oise, sharply.

Unless by the sound of the voice, Oscar could never have recognized the individual whose jokes had been so fatal to him.  Georges, almost bald, retained only three or four tufts of hair above his ears; but these were elaborately frizzed out to conceal, as best they could, the nakedness of the skull.  A fleshiness ill-placed, in other words, a pear-shaped stomach, altered the once elegant proportions of the ex-young man.  Now almost ignoble in appearance and bearing, Georges exhibited the traces of disasters in love and a life of debauchery in his blotched skin and bloated, vinous features.  The eyes had lost the brilliancy, the vivacity of youth which chaste or studious habits have the virtue to retain.  Dressed like a man who is careless of his clothes, Georges wore a pair of shabby trousers, with straps intended for varnished boots; but his were of leather, thick-soled, ill-blacked, and of many months’ wear.  A faded waistcoat, a cravat, pretentiously tied, although the material was a worn-out foulard, bespoke the secret distress to which a former dandy sometimes falls a prey.  Moreover, Georges appeared at this hour of the morning in an evening coat, instead of a surtout; a sure diagnostic of actual poverty.  This coat, which had seen long service at balls, had now, like its master, passed from the opulent ease of former times to daily work.  The seams of the black cloth showed whitening lines; the collar was greasy; long usage had frayed the edges of the sleeves into fringes.

And yet, Georges ventured to attract attention by yellow kid gloves, rather dirty, it is true, on the outside of which a signet ring defined a large dark spot.  Round his cravat, which was slipped into a pretentious gold ring, was a chain of silk, representing hair, which, no doubt, held a watch.  His hat, though worn rather jauntily, revealed, more than any of the above symptoms, the poverty of a man who was totally unable to pay sixteen francs to a hat-maker, being forced to live from hand to mouth.  The former admirer of Florentine twirled a cane with a chased gold knob, which was horribly battered.  The blue trousers, the waistcoat of a material called “Scotch stuff,” a sky-blue cravat and a pink-striped cotton shirt, expressed, in the midst of all this ruin, such a latent desire to SHOW-OFF that the contrast was not only a sight to see, but a lesson to be learned.

“And that is Georges!” said Oscar, in his own mind,—­“a man I left in possession of thirty thousand francs a year!”

“Has Monsieur de Pierrotin a place in the coupe?” asked Georges, ironically replying to Pierrotin’s rebuff.

“No; my coupe is taken by a peer of France, the son-in-law of Monsieur Moreau, Monsieur le Baron de Canalis, his wife, and his mother-in-law.  I have nothing left but one place in the interieur.”