“Old monster!” cried Florentine, “haven’t you a key that lets you in at all hours?  My ball lasted till five in the morning, and you have the cruelty to come and wake me up at eleven!”

“Half-past eleven, Titine,” observed Cardot, humbly.  “I came out early to order a dinner fit for an archbishop at Chevet’s.  Just see how the carpets are stained!  What sort of people did you have here?”

“You needn’t complain, for Fanny Beaupre told me you were coming to dinner with Camusot, and to please you I’ve invited Tullia, du Bruel, Mariette, the Duc de Maufrigneuse, Florine, and Nathan.  So you’ll have the four loveliest creatures ever seen behind the foot-lights; we’ll dance you a ‘pas de Zephire.’”

“It is enough to kill you to lead such a life!” cried old Cardot; “and look at the broken glasses!  What pillage!  The antechamber actually makes me shudder—­”

At this instant the wrathful old gentleman stopped short as if magnetized, like a bird which a snake is charming.  He saw the outline of a form in a black coat through the door of the boudoir.

“Ah, Mademoiselle Cabirolle!” he said at last.

“Well, what?” she asked.

The eyes of the danseuse followed those of the little old man; and when she recognized the presence of the clerk she went off into such fits of laughter that not only was the old gentleman nonplussed, but Oscar was compelled to appear; for Florentine took him by the arm, still pealing with laughter at the conscience-stricken faces of the uncle and nephew.

“You here, nephew?”

“Nephew! so he’s your nephew?” cried Florentine, with another burst of laughter.  “You never told me about him.  Why didn’t Mariette carry you off?” she said to Oscar, who stood there petrified.  “What can he do now, poor boy?”

“Whatever he pleases!” said Cardot, sharply, marching to the door as if to go away.

“One moment, papa Cardot.  You will be so good as to get your nephew out of a scrape into which I led him; for he played the money of his master and lost it, and I lend him a thousand francs to win it back, and he lost that too.”

“Miserable boy! you lost fifteen hundred francs at play at your age?”

“Oh, uncle, uncle!” cried poor Oscar, plunged by these words into all the horrors of his position, and falling on his knees before his uncle, with clasped hands, “It is twelve o’clock!  I am lost, dishonored!  Monsieur Desroches will have no pity!  He gave me the money for an important affair, in which his pride was concerned.  I was to get a paper at the Palais in the case of Vandernesse versus Vandernesse!  What will become of me?  Oh, save me for the sake of my father and aunt!  Come with me to Monsieur Desroches, and explain it to him; make some excuse,—­anything!”

These sentences were jerked out through sobs and tears that might have moved the sphinx of Luxor.

“Old skinflint!” said the danseuse, who was crying, “will you let your own nephew be dishonored,—­the son of the man to whom you owe your fortune?—­for his name is Oscar Husson.  Save him, or Titine will deny you forever!”