"You know," said he, "that Fate has more or less influence over our
lives, according to the condition of mind in which we happen to be.
In order that you may understand the importance of the adventure I am
about relating to you, it will be necessary for me to picture the state
of mind which I was in at the time it happened; this will he a sort of
philosophical and psychological preamble."

"Thunder!" interrupted Marillac, "if I had known that, I would have
ordered a second bowl."

"You will remember," continued Gerfaut, paying no attention to this
pleasantry, "the rather bad attack of spleen which I had a little over a
year ago?"

"Before your trip to Switzerland?"

"Exactly."

"If I remember right," said the artist, "you were strangely cross and
whimsical at the time. Was it not just after the failure of our drama at
the Porte Saint-Martin?"

"You might also add of our play at the Gymnase."

"I wash my hands of that. You know very well that it only went as far as
the second act, and I did not write one word in the first."

"And hardly one in the second. However, I take the catastrophe upon my
shoulders; that made two perfect failures in that d---d month of August."