All this he took in at a comprehensive glance that consumed no more time than it had taken him to say good-morning.  To that good-morning Pantaloon replied in a bellow: 

“What the devil are you doing up there?”

“Precisely the same thing that you are doing down there,” was the answer.  “I am trespassing.”

“Eh?” said Pantaloon, and looked at his companions, some of the assurance beaten out of his big red face.  Although the thing was one that they did habitually, to hear it called by its proper name was disconcerting.

“Whose land is this?” he asked, with diminishing assurance.

Andre-Louis answered, whilst drawing on his stockings.  “I believe it to be the property of the Marquis de La Tour d’Azyr.”

“That’s a high-sounding name.  Is the gentleman severe?”

“The gentleman,” said Andre-Louis, “is the devil; or rather, I should prefer to say upon reflection, that the devil is a gentleman by comparison.

“And yet,” interposed the villainous-looking fellow who played Scaramouche, “by your own confessing you don’t hesitate, yourself, to trespass upon his property.”

“Ah, but then, you see, I am a lawyer.  And lawyers are notoriously unable to observe the law, just as actors are notoriously unable to act.  Moreover, sir, Nature imposes her limits upon us, and Nature conquers respect for law as she conquers all else.  Nature conquered me last night when I had got as far as this.  And so I slept here without regard for the very high and puissant Marquis de La Tour d’Azyr.  At the same time, M. Scaramouche, you’ll observe that I did not flaunt my trespass quite as openly as you and your companions.”

Having donned his boots, Andre-Louis came nimbly to the ground in his shirt-sleeves, his riding-coat over his arm.  As he stood there to don it, the little cunning eyes of the heavy father conned him in detail.  Observing that his clothes, if plain, were of a good fashion, that his shirt was of fine cambric, and that he expressed himself like a man of culture, such as he claimed to be, M. Pantaloon was disposed to be civil.

“I am very grateful to you for the warning, sir... " he was beginning.

“Act upon it, my friend.  The gardes-champetres of M. d’Azyr have orders to fire on trespassers.  Imitate me, and decamp.”

They followed him upon the instant through that gap in the hedge to the encampment on the common.  There Andre-Louis took his leave of them.  But as he was turning away he perceived a young man of the company performing his morning toilet at a bucket placed upon one of the wooden steps at the tail of the house on wheels.  A moment he hesitated, then he turned frankly to M. Pantaloon, who was still at his elbow.

“If it were not unconscionable to encroach so far upon your hospitality, monsieur,” said he, “I would beg leave to imitate that very excellent young gentleman before I leave you.”