"It is late," comments M. Marmus. "Take me home, driver."

The driver goes through the quays, the Rue du Bac, falls into a tangle
of wagons, returns by the Rue de Grenelle, the Croix-Rouge, the Rue
Cassette, then he makes a mistake. He tries to find the Rue d'Assas,
in the Rue Honore-Chevalier, in the Rue Madame, in all the impossible
streets and, swearing that if he had known he would not have come so
far for a hundred sous, disembarks the professor in the Rue
Duguay-Trouin.

The cab driver claims an hour, for the police ordinances, that defend
consumers of time in cabs from the stratagems of cab drivers, had not
yet posted the walls of Paris with their protecting articles that
settle in advance all difficulties.

"Very well, my friend," says M. Marmus to the cab driver. "Pay him,"
M. Marmus says to Madame Adolphe. "I do not feel well, my child."

"Monsieur, what did I tell you?" she exclaimed. "You have eaten too
much. While you were away, I said to myself, 'It is Mme. Vernet's
birthday. They will urge him at table and he will come back sick.'
Well, go to bed. I will make camomile tea for you."



VII

DESSERT