“Those cigars will lead to a catastrophe, if I don’t use prudence and dissemble,” said I to myself.

I do not know how it was, but my sweetheart found herself seated on the left of the host.  I did not like that, but what could I say?  And then, the said host, with his twenty-five summers, his moustache curled up at the ends, and his self-assurance, seemed to me the most ideal, the most astounding of young devils, and I felt for him a shade of respect.

“Well,” he said, with captivating volubility, “you are feeling yourself at home, are you not?  You know any guest who feels uncomfortable in his coat may take it off . . . and the ladies, too.  Ha! ha! ha!  That’s the way to make one’s self happy, is it not, my little dears?” And before he had finished laughing he printed a kiss right and left on the necks of his two neighbors, one of whom, as I have already said, was my beloved.

The ill-bred dog!  I felt my hair rise on end and my face glow like red-hot iron.  For the rest, everybody burst out laughing, and from that moment the supper went on with increased animation.

“My young friends,” was the remark of that infernal examining magistrate, “let us attack the cold meat, the sausages, the turkey, the salad; let us at the cakes, the cheese, the oysters, and the grapes; let us attack the whole show.  Waiter, draw the corks and we will eat up everything at once, eh, my cherubs?  No ceremony, no false delicacy.  This is fine fun; it is Oriental, it is splendid.  In the centre of Africa everybody acts in this manner.  We must introduce poetry into our pleasures.  Pass me some cheese with my turkey.  Ha! ha! ha!  I feel queer, I am wild, I am crazy, am I not, pets?” And he bestowed two more kisses, as before.  If I had not been already drunk, upon my honor, I should have made a scene.

I was stupid.  Around me they were laughing, shouting, singing, and rattling their plates.  A racket of popping corks and breaking glasses buzzed in my ears, but it seemed to me that a cloud had risen between me and the outer world; a veil separated me from the other guests, and, in spite of the evidence of my senses, I thought I was dreaming.  I could distinguish, however, though in a confused manner, the animated glances and heightened color of the guests, and, above all, a disorder quite new to me in the toilettes of the ladies.  Even my sweetheart appeared to have changed.  Suddenly—­it was as a flash of lightning—­my beloved, my angel, my ideal, she whom that very morning I was ready to marry, leaned toward the examining magistrate and—­I still feel the cold shudder—­devoured three truffles which were on his plate.

I experienced keen anguish; it seemed to me as if my heart were breaking just then.

Here my recollections cease.  What then took place I do not know.  All I remember is that some one took me home in a cab.  I kept asking:  “Where is she?  Where?  Oh, where?”

I was told that she had left two hours before.  The next morning I experienced a keen sense of despair when the truffles of the examining magistrate came back to mind.  For a moment I had a vague idea of entering upon holy orders, but time—­you know what it is—­calmed my troubled breast.  But what the devil was her name?  It ended in “ine.”  Indeed, no, I believe it ended in “a.”