time that a customer got up to go. He would have liked to take him by
the arm, hold him back and beg him to stay a little longer, so much did
he dread the time when the waiter would come up to him and say angrily:
"Come, Monsieur, it is closing time!"

[Footnote 1: Glass of Bavarian beer]

For every evening he stopped last. He saw them carry in the tables, turn
out the gas jets one by one, except his and that at the counter. He
looked unhappily at the cashier counting the money and locking it up in
the drawer, and then he went, being usually pushed out by the waiters,
who murmured: "Another one who has too much! One might think he had no
place to sleep in."

As soon as he was alone in the dark street, he began to think of George
again, and to rack his brains in trying to discover whether or not he
was this child's father.

He thus became in the habit of going to the beer houses, where the
continual elbowing of the drinkers brings you in contact with a familiar
and silent public, where the heavy clouds of tobacco smoke lulls
disquietude, while the heavy beer dulls the mind and calms the heart. He
almost lived there. He was scarcely up, before he went there to find
people to occupy his looks and his thoughts, and soon, as he felt too
idle to move, he took his meals there. About twelve o'clock he used to
rap on the marble table, and the waiter quickly brought a plate, a
glass, a table napkin, and his lunch when he had ordered it. When he had
done, he slowly drank his cup of black coffee, with his eyes fixed on
the decanter of brandy, which would soon procure him an hour or two of
forgetfulness. First of all he dipped his lips into the cognac, as if to