After dinner Calsabigi took me on one side, and told me that M. du Vernai
had commissioned him to warn me that I could not dispose of tickets on
account.

"Does M. du Vernai take me for a fool or a knave? As I am neither, I
shall complain to M. de Boulogne."

"You will be wrong; he merely wanted to warn you and not offend you."

"You offend me very much yourself, sir, in talking to me in that fashion;
and you may make up your mind that no one shall talk to me thus a second
time."

Calsabigi did all in his power to quiet me down, and at last persuaded me
to go with him to M. du Vernai's. The worthy old gentleman seeing the
rage I was in apologized to me for what he had said, and told me that a
certain Abbe de la Coste had informed him that I did so. At this I was
highly indignant, and I told him what had happened that morning, which
let M. du Vernai know what kind of a man the abbe was. I never saw him
again, either because he got wind of my discovery, or because a happy
chance kept him out of my way; but I heard, three years after, that he
had been condemned to the hulks for selling tickets of a Trevaux lottery
which was non-existent, and in the hulks he died.

Next day Tiretta came in, and said he had only just returned.

"You have been sleeping out, have you, master profligate?"

"Yes, I was so charmed with the she-pope that I kept her company all the
night."