Arthur Papillon was in evening dress and white cravat, his customary attire every evening, and still had time to show himself in a political salon on the left side, where he met Moichod, the author of that famous Histoire de Napoleon, in which he proves that Napoleon was only a mediocre general, and that all his battles were gained by his lieutenants.  Jocquelet wished to go to the Odeon and hear, for the tenth time, the fifth act of a piece of the common-sense school, in which the hero, after haranguing against money for four acts in badly rhymed verse, ends by marrying the young heiress, to the great satisfaction of the bourgeois.  As to Maurice, before he went to rejoin Mademoiselle Irma at the Rue Monsieur-le-Prince, he walked part of the way with Amedee.

“These comrades of ours are a little stupid, aren’t they?” said he to his friend.

“I must say that they almost disgust me,” replied the young man.  “Their brutal way of speaking of women and love wounded me, and you too, Maurice.  So much the worse!  I will be honest; you, who are so refined and proud, tell me that you did not mean what you said—­that you made a pretence of vice just to please the others.  It is not possible that you are content simply to gratify your appetite and make yourself a slave to your passions.  You ought to have a higher ideal.  Your conscience must reproach you.”

Maurice brusquely interrupted this tirade, laughing in advance at what he was about to say.

“My conscience?  Oh, tender and artless Violette; Oh, modest wood-flower!  Conscience, my poor friend, is like a Suede glove, you can wear it soiled.  Adieu!  We will talk of this another day, when Mademoiselle Irma is not waiting for me.”

Amedee walked on alone, shivering in the mist, weary and sad, to the Rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs.

No! it could not be true.  There must be another love than that known to these brutes.  There were other women besides the light creatures they had spoken of.  His thoughts reverted to the companion of his childhood, to the pretty little Maria, and again he sees her sewing near the family lamp, and talking with him without raising her eyes, while he admires her beautiful, drooping lashes.  He is amazed to think that this delicious child’s presence has never given him the slightest uneasiness; that he has never thought of any other happiness than that of being near her.  Why should not a love like that he has dreamed of some day spring up in her own heart?  Have they not grown up together?  Is he not the only young man that she knows intimately?  What happiness to become her fiancee!  Yes, it was thus that one should love!  Hereafter he would flee from all temptations; he would pass all his evenings with the Gerards; he would keep as near as possible to his dear Maria, content to hear her speak, to see her smile; and he would wait with a heart full of tenderness for the moment when she would consent to become his wife.  Oh! the exquisite union of two chaste beings! the adorable kiss of two innocent mouths!  Did such happiness really exist?