And they both plunged into an interminable game.

The table had not been cleared.  The smell of lunch and the cigarette smoke filled the room with an ambient, steamy vapor.  The two ladies had again set to work dipping lumps of sugar in brandy and sucking the same.  For twenty minutes at least they played and sucked simultaneously when, the electric bell having rung a third time, Zoe bustled into the room and roughly disturbed them, just as if they had been her own friends.

“Look here, that’s another ring.  You can’t stay where you are.  If many folks call I must have the whole flat.  Now off you go, off you go!”

Mme Maloir was for finishing the game, but Zoe looked as if she was going to pounce down on the cards, and so she decided to carry them off without in any way altering their positions, while Mme Lerat undertook the removal of the brandy bottle, the glasses and the sugar.  Then they both scudded to the kitchen, where they installed themselves at the table in an empty space between the dishcloths, which were spread out to dry, and the bowl still full of dishwater.

“We said it was three hundred and forty.  It’s your turn.”

“I play hearts.”

When Zoe returned she found them once again absorbed.  After a silence, as Mme Lerat was shuffling, Mme Maloir asked who it was.

“Oh, nobody to speak of,” replied the servant carelessly; “a slip of a lad!  I wanted to send him away again, but he’s such a pretty boy with never a hair on his chin and blue eyes and a girl’s face!  So I told him to wait after all.  He’s got an enormous bouquet in his hand, which he never once consented to put down.  One would like to catch him one—­a brat like that who ought to be at school still!”

Mme Lerat went to fetch a water bottle to mix herself some brandy and water, the lumps of sugar having rendered her thirsty.  Zoe muttered something to the effect that she really didn’t mind if she drank something too.  Her mouth, she averred, was as bitter as gall.

“So you put him—?” continued Mme Maloir.

“Oh yes, I put him in the closet at the end of the room, the little unfurnished one.  There’s only one of my lady’s trunks there and a table.  It’s there I stow the lubbers.”

And she was putting plenty of sugar in her grog when the electric bell made her jump.  Oh, drat it all!  Wouldn’t they let her have a drink in peace?  If they were to have a peal of bells things promised well.  Nevertheless, she ran off to open the door.  Returning presently, she saw Mme Maloir questioning her with a glance.

“It’s nothing,” she said, “only a bouquet.”

All three refreshed themselves, nodding to each other in token of salutation.  Then while Zoe was at length busy clearing the table, bringing the plates out one by one and putting them in the sink, two other rings followed close upon one another.  But they weren’t serious, for while keeping the kitchen informed of what was going on she twice repeated her disdainful expression: