At this moment Simon Giguet, who had got through his bowing and
scraping to all the influential men of Arcis, and who regarded himself
as sure of his election, joined the circle around Cecile and
Mademoiselle Mollot. The evening was far advanced. Ten o'clock had
struck. After an enormous consumption of cakes, orgeat, punch,
lemonade, and various syrups, those who had come that evening solely
for political reasons and who were not accustomed to Madame Marion's
floors, to them aristocratic, departed,--all the more willingly,
because they were unaccustomed to sitting up so late. The evening then
began to take on its usual air of intimacy. Simon Giguet hoped that he
could now exchange a few words with Cecile, and he looked at her like
a conqueror. The look displeased her.

"My dear fellow," said Antonin to Simon, observing on his friend's
face the glory of success, "you come at a moment when the noses of all
the young men in Arcis are put out of joint."

"Very much so," said Ernestine, whom Cecile had nudged with her elbow.
"We are distracted, Cecile and I, about the great Unknown, and we are
quarrelling for him."

"But," said Cecile, "he is no longer unknown; he is a count."

"Some adventurer!" replied Simon Giguet, with an air of contempt.

"Will you say that, Monsieur Simon," answered Cecile, feeling piqued,
"of a man to whom the Princesse de Cadignan has just sent her
servants, who dined at Gondreville to-day, and is to spend this
evening with the Marquise de Cinq-Cygne?"