That night the professor did not sleep in Westcote, but the next afternoon he appeared at Mrs. Muldoon’s, supported by Monsieur Jules, the well-known Seventh Avenue restaurateur, and Monsieur Renaud, who occupies an important post as garcon in Monsieur Jules’ establishment.

“For the keek,” said the professor, “I care not.  I have been keek before.  The keek by one gentleman, him I resent, him I revenge; the keek by the base, him I scorn!  I let the keek go, Madame Muldoon.  Of the keek I say not at all, but the flea!  Ah, the poor flea!  Excuse the weep, Madame Muldoon!”

The professor wept into his handkerchief, and the two men looked seriously solemn, and patted the professor on the back.

“Ah, my Alphonse, the flea!  The poor leetle flea!” they cried.

“For the flea I have the revenge!” cried the professor, fiercely.  “How you say it?  I will be to have the revenge.  I would to be the revenge having.  The revenge to having will I be.  Him will I have, that revenge business!  For why I bring the educate flea to those States United?  Is it that they should be deathed?  Is it that a Flannery should make them dead with a—­with such a thing like a pop-gun?  Is it for these things I educate, I teach, I culture, I love, I cherish those flea?  Is it for these things I give up wife, and patrie, and immigrate myself out of dear France?  No, my Jules!  No, my Jacques!  No, my madame!  Ah, I am one heart-busted!”

“Ah, now, professor,” said Mrs. Muldoon, soothingly, “don’t bawl annymore.  There is sure no use bawlin’ over spilt milk.  If they be dead, they be dead.  I wouldn’t cry over a million dead fleas.”

“The American flea—­no!” said the professor, haughtily.  “The Irish flea—­no!  The flea au naturel—­no!  But the educate flea of la belle France?  The flea I have love, and teach, and make like a sister, a sweetheart to me?  The flea that have act up in front of the crowned heads of Spain; that have travel on the ocean; that travel on the land?  Ah, Madame Muldoon, it is no common bunch of flea!  Of my busted feelings what will I say?  Nothings!  Of my banged-up heart, what will I say?  Nothings!  But for those dead flea, those poor dead flea, so innocents, so harmless, so much money worth—­for those must Monsieur Flannery compensate.”

As the professor’s meaning dawned on Mrs. Muldoon a look of amazement spread over her face.

“And would be ye makin’ poor Mike Flannery pay good money for thim rascal fleas he kilt, and him with his ankles so bit up they look like the small-pox, to say nothin’ of other folks which is th’ same?” she cried. “‘Tis ashamed ye should be, Mister Professor, bringin’ fleas into America and lettin’ them run loose!  Ye should muzzle thim, Mister Professor, if ye would turn thim out to pasture in the boardin’-house of a poor widdy woman, and no end of trouble, and worry, and every one sayin’, ‘Why did ye let th’ Dago come for, annyhow?’”