omnibus, and retained, even in her provocations and accidental contacts,
the appearance of incurable respectability, pursue Ligny with her lanky
legs, and beset him with the glances of a poverty-stricken Pasiphae. She
had also surprised the oldest actress of the theatre, their excellent
mother Ravaud, in a corridor, baring, at Ligny's approach, all that was
left to her, her magnificent arms, which had been famous for forty
years.

Fagette, with disgust, and the tip of a gloved finger, called Nanteuil's
attention to the scene through which Durville, old Maury and
Marie-Claire were struggling.

"Just look at those people. They look as if they were playing at the
bottom of thirty fathoms of water."

"It's because the top lights are not lit."

"Not a bit of it. This theatre always looks as if it were at the bottom
of the sea. And to think that I, too, in a moment, have to enter that
aquarium. Nanteuil, you must not stop longer than one season in this
theatre. One is drowned in it. But look at them, look at them!"

Durville was becoming almost ventriloqual in order to seem more solemn
and more virile:

"Peace, the abolition of the combined martial and civil law, and of
conscription, higher pay for the troops; in the absence of funds, a few
drafts on the bank, a few commissions suitably distributed, these are
infallible means."