A circle had formed around them, always keeping a distance, however, the ten paces exacted for the salutation of a prince; it was the public there to witness this triumph in which the Nabob was bearing his part as in a dream, intoxicated by those fairy harmonies rather faint in the distance, whose songs that reached him in snatches as over the resonant obstacle of a pool, the perfume of flowers that seem to become full blown in so singular fashion towards the end of Parisian balls, when the late hour that confuses all notions of time and the weariness of the sleepless nights communicate to brains soothed in a more nervous atmosphere, as it were, a dizzy sense of enjoyment.  The robust nature of Jansoulet, civilized savage that he was, was more sensitive than another to these unknown subtleties, and he had need of all his strength to refrain from manifesting by some glad hurrah, by some untimely effusion of gestures and speech, the impulse of physical gaiety which pervaded his whole being, as happens to those great mountain dogs that are thrown into epileptic fits of madness by the inhaling of a drop of some essence.

“The sky is clear, the pavement dry.  If you like, my dear boy, we will send the carriage away and return on foot,” said Jansoulet to his companion as they left Jenkins’s house.

De Gery accepted with eagerness.  He felt that he required to walk, to shake off in the open air the infamies and the lies of that comedy of society which had left his heart cold and oppressed, with all his life-blood driven to his temples where he could hear the swollen veins beating.  He staggered as he walked, like those unfortunate persons who, having been operated upon for cataract, in the terror of sight regained, do not dare put one foot before the other.  But with what a brutal hand the operation had been performed!  So that great artist with the glorious name, that pure and untamed beauty the sight alone of whom had troubled him like an apparition, was only a courtesan.  Mme. Jenkins, that stately woman, of bearing at once so proud and so gentle, had no real title to the name.  That illustrious man of science with the open countenance, and a manner so pleasant in his welcome, had the impudence thus to parade a disgraceful concubinage.  And Paris suspected it, but that did not prevent it from running to their parties.  And, finally, Jansoulet, so kind, so generous, for whom he felt in his heart so much gratitude, he knew him to be fallen into the hands of a gang of brigands, a brigand himself and well worthy of the conspiracy organized to cause him to disgorge his millions.

Was it possible, and how much of it was he to be obliged to believe?