"Say then!" exclaimed Amedee--"what king of madness is that? To make
orations for only one auditor!"

He brushed away my suggestion that the auditor might be a stenographer
to whom the professor was dictating chapters for a new book. The
relation between the two men, he contended, was more like that between
teacher and pupil. "But a pupil with gray hair!" he finished, raising
his fat hands to heaven. "For that other monsieur has hair as gray as
mine."

"That other monsieur" was farther described as a thin man, handsome, but
with a "singular air," nor could my colleague more satisfactorily define
this air, though he made a racking struggle to do so.

"In what does the peculiarity of his manner lie?" I asked.

"But it is not so much that his manner is peculiar, monsieur; it is an
air about him that is singular. Truly!"

"But how is it singular?"

"Monsieur, it is very, very singular."

"You do not understand," I insisted. "What kind of singularity has the
air of 'that other monsieur'?"

"It has," replied Amedee, with a powerful effort, "a very singular
singularity."

This was as near as he could come, and, fearful of injuring him, I