The truth was that Mathilde had finished by reducing him to the frightened obedience of a little boy.  The once dissolute she-ghoul had become a dictatorial spouse, eager for respect, and consumed with ambition and love of money.  She showed, too, every form of sourish virtue.  It was said that they had been seen taking the Holy Communion together at Notre Dame de Lorette.  They kissed one another before other people, and called each other by endearing nicknames.  Only, of an evening, he had to relate how he had spent his time during the day, and if the employment of a single hour remained suspicious, if he did not bring home all the money he had received, down to the odd coppers, she led him the most abominable life imaginable.

This, of course, Jory left unmentioned.  By way of conclusion he exclaimed:  ’And so we waited for my father’s death, and then I married her.’

Claude, whose mind had so far been wandering, and who had merely nodded without listening, was struck by that last sentence.

‘What! you married her—­married Mathilde?’

That exclamation summed up all the astonishment that the affair caused him, all the recollections that occurred to him of Mahoudeau’s shop.  That Jory, why, he could still hear him talking about Mathilde in an abominable manner; and yet he had married her!  It was really stupid for a fellow to speak badly of a woman, for he never knew if he might not end by marrying her some day or other!

However, Jory was perfectly serene, his memory was dead, he never allowed himself an allusion to the past, never showed the slightest embarrassment when his comrades’ eyes were turned on him.  Besides, Mathilde seemed to be a new-comer.  He introduced her to them as if they knew nothing whatever about her.

Sandoz, who had lent an ear to the conversation, greatly interested by this fine business, called out as soon as Jory and Claude became silent: 

‘Let’s be off, eh?  My legs are getting numbed.’

But at that moment Irma Becot appeared, and stopped in front of the buffet.  With her hair freshly gilded, she had put on her best looks —­all the tricky sheen of a tawny hussy, who seemed to have just stepped out of some old Renaissance frame; and she wore a train of light blue brocaded silk, with a satin skirt covered with Alencon lace, of such richness that quite an escort of gentlemen followed her in admiration.  On perceiving Claude among the others, she hesitated for a moment, seized, as it were, with cowardly shame in front of that ill-clad, ugly, derided devil.  Then, becoming valiant, as it were, it was his hand that she shook the first amid all those well-dressed men, who opened their eyes in amazement.  She laughed with an affectionate air, and spoke to him in a friendly, bantering way.

Fagerolles, however, was already paying for the two chartreuses he had ordered, and at last he went off with Irma, whom Jory also decided to follow.  Claude watched them walk away together, she between the two men, moving on in regal fashion, greatly admired, and repeatedly bowed to by people in the crowd.