But while drinking and laughing and talking, these gentlemen forgot the time; and suddenly little Astianax exclaimed:
"Mon Dieu! here are people coming already!"
It was midsummer, when the days were longest; and so, although it was nearly eight o'clock, the gardens were not yet dark, and they could see outside the gate a large number of persons who had come to see the performance. The ladies were in full dress, because they knew that after the play there would be dancing; the men too had taken pains with their costumes; for while saying to themselves: "In the country there is no ceremony;" they were quite as anxious to please there as in the city.
"The devil! the devil!" said Chambourdin, ogling the ladies who arrived. "Why, some of them are passably good-looking. Who is that brunette, with high color and her hair dressed _à la Fontange_? She has a saucy little air which attracts me immensely. Is she a product of the neighborhood?"
"Yes, she belongs here, or at all events she has property here."
"She has one who is three times her age."
"Then, it's about the same as if she hadn't any!"
"She is very gay, very fond of laughing; she rides and fences and dances admirably."
"Sapristi! why on earth didn't you give her a part in the play, Monsieur Glumeau? I should have been delighted to fence with her, to try the _four blows_ with her."
Monsieur Glumeau was no longer there; he had gone to receive his guests; but little Astianax, made exceedingly loquacious by the champagne, replied:
"My mother and sister aren't very fond of Madame Boutillon--that is the pretty brunette's name; they say that her manner with men is too free."
"Oh! of course! that's just like the women; when one of them happens to be a little more lively, a little less prudish, and doesn't pick her expressions, but says frankly what she thinks, why she is voted bad form at once! she is too free! I snap my fingers at it; I like them that way myself, and I will look after the little Boutillon!"
"Good-evening, Miaulard; are you still hoarse?"
"The deuce you say! you seem hardly able to speak to-day."
"Yes, but the last time I couldn't speak at all."
"Ah! here is the baroness, messieurs, the famous Baroness de--de--what's her name?"