Risler, wrapped in his cloak, was hastening home from the brewery through the deserted streets of the Marais.  He had been celebrating, in company with his two faithful borrowers, Chebe and Delobelle, his first moment of leisure, the end of that almost endless period of seclusion during which he had been superintending the manufacture of his press, with all the searchings, the joys, and the disappointments of the inventor.  It had been long, very long.  At the last moment he had discovered a defect.  The crane did not work well; and he had had to revise his plans and drawings.  At last, on that very day, the new machine had been tried.  Everything had succeeded to his heart’s desire.  The worthy man was triumphant.  It seemed to him that he had paid a debt, by giving the house of Fromont the benefit of a new machine, which would lessen the labor, shorten the hours of the workmen, and at the same time double the profits and the reputation of the factory.  He indulged in beautiful dreams as he plodded along.  His footsteps rang out proudly, emphasized by the resolute and happy trend of his thoughts.

Quickening his pace, he reached the corner of Rue des Vieilles-Haudriettes.  A long line of carriages was standing in front of the factory, and the light of their lanterns in the street, the shadows of the drivers seeking shelter from the snow in the corners and angles that those old buildings have retained despite the straightening of the sidewalks, gave an animated aspect to that deserted, silent quarter.

“Yes, yes! to be sure,” thought the honest fellow, “we have a ball at our house.”  He remembered that Sidonie was giving a grand musical and dancing party, which she had excused him from attending, by the way, knowing that he was very busy.

Shadows passed and repassed behind the fluttering veil of the curtains; the orchestra seemed to follow the movements of those stealthy apparitions with the rising and falling of its muffled notes.  The guests were dancing.  Risler let his eyes rest for a moment on that phantasmagoria of the ball, and fancied that he recognized Sidonie’s shadow in a small room adjoining the salon.

She was standing erect in her magnificent costume, in the attitude of a pretty woman before her mirror.  A shorter shadow behind her, Madame Dobson doubtless, was repairing some accident to the costume, retieing the knot of a ribbon tied about her neck, its long ends floating down to the flounces of the train.  It was all very indistinct, but the woman’s graceful figure was recognizable in those faintly traced outlines, and Risler tarried long admiring her.

The contrast on the first floor was most striking.  There was no light visible, with the exception of a little lamp shining through the lilac hangings of the bedroom.  Risler noticed that circumstance, and as the little girl had been ailing a few days before, he felt anxious about her, remembering Madame Georges’s strange agitation when she passed him so hurriedly in the afternoon; and he retraced his steps as far as Pere Achille’s lodge to inquire.