indeed? In that block of drivel you view the cause of my deepest
misfortunes."

"A thousand apologies!" stammered his companion; "my inference was
hasty. But what you say interests me beyond words. This manuscript, of
seeming innocence, is the cause of misfortunes? May I crave an enormous
favour; may I beg you to regard me as a friend and give me your
confidence?"

"I see no reason why I should refuse it," answered Tricotrin, on whom
the boast of "prosperity" had made a deep impression. "You must know,
then, that this ineptitude, inflicted on me by an eccentric editor for
translation, drove me to madness, and not an hour ago I cast it from my
window in disgust. It is a novel entirely devoid of taste and tact, and
it had the clumsiness to alight on my landlord's head. Being a man of
small nature, he retaliated by demanding his rent."

"Which it was not convenient to pay?" interrupted Petitpas, all the
pages of _La Vie de Boheme_ playing leapfrog through his brain.

"I regret to bore you by so trite a situation. 'Which it was not
convenient to pay'! Indeed, I was not responsible for all of it, for I
occupied the room with a composer named Pitou. Well, you can construct
the next scene without a collaborator; the landlord has a speech, and
the tragedy is entitled 'Tricotrin in Quest of a Home.'"

"What of the composer?" inquired the delighted clerk; "what has become
of monsieur Pitou?"

"Monsieur Pitou was not on in that Act. The part of Pitou will attain