But people of M. de Bargeton’s stamp, who live perforce in silence because their capacity is limited and their outlook circumscribed, often behave at great crises with a ready-made solemnity.  If they say little, it naturally follows that they say little that is foolish; their extreme lack of confidence leads them to think a good deal over the remarks that they are obliged to make; and, like Balaam’s ass, they speak marvelously to the point if a miracle loosens their tongues.  So M. de Bargeton bore himself like a man of uncommon sense and spirit, and justified the opinion of those who held that he was a philosopher of the school of Pythagoras.

He reached Stanislas’ house at nine o’clock, bowed silently to Amelie before a whole room full of people, and greeted others in turn with that simple smile of his, which under the present circumstances seemed profoundly ironical.  There followed a great silence, like the pause before a storm.  Chatelet had made his way back again, and now looked in a very significant fashion from M. de Bargeton to Stanislas, whom the injured gentleman accosted politely.

Chatelet knew what a visit meant at this time of night, when old M. de Bargeton was invariably in his bed.  It was evidently Nais who had set the feeble arm in motion.  Chatelet was on such a footing in that house that he had some right to interfere in family concerns.  He rose to his feet and took M. de Bargeton aside, saying, “Do you wish to speak to Stanislas?”

“Yes,” said the old gentleman, well pleased to find a go-between who perhaps might say his say for him.

“Very well; go into Amelie’s bedroom,” said the controller of excise, likewise well pleased at the prospect of a duel which possibly might make Mme. de Bargeton a widow, while it put a bar between her and Lucien, the cause of the quarrel.  Then Chatelet went to M. de Chandour.

“Stanislas,” he said, “here comes Bargeton to call you to account, no doubt, for the things you have been saying about Nais.  Go into your wife’s room, and behave, both of you, like gentlemen.  Keep the thing quiet, and make a great show of politeness, behave with phlegmatic British dignity, in short.”

In another minute Stanislas and Chatelet went to Bargeton.

“Sir,” said the injured husband, “do you say that you discovered Mme. de Bargeton and M. de Rubempre in an equivocal position?”

“M.  Chardon,” corrected Stanislas, with ironical stress; he did not take Bargeton seriously.

“So be it,” answered the other.  “If you do not withdraw your assertions at once before the company now in your house, I must ask you to look for a second.  My father-in-law, M. de Negrepelisse, will wait upon you at four o’clock to-morrow morning.  Both of us may as well make our final arrangements, for the only way out of the affair is the one that I have indicated.  I choose pistols, as the insulted party.”

This was the speech that M. de Bargeton had ruminated on the way; it was the longest that he had ever made in life.  He brought it out without excitement or vehemence, in the simplest way in the world.  Stanislas turned pale.  “After all, what did I see?” said he to himself.