“To-morrow, by all means.  At what hour?”

Before replying, Saniel went to his desk and consulted an almanac, which appeared perfectly ridiculous to Balzajette.

“Does he imagine, the young ‘confrere’, that I am going to believe his time so fully occupied that he must make a special arrangement to give me an hour?”

But it was not an arrangement of this kind that Saniel sought.  His almanac gave the rising and the setting of the sun, and it was the exact hour of sunset that he wished:  “26 March, 6h. 20m.”  At this moment it would not be dark enough at Madame Dammauville’s for lamps to be lighted, and yet it would be dark enough to prevent her from seeing him clearly in the uncertain light of evening.

“Will a quarter past six suit you?  I will call for you at six o’clock.”

“Very well.  Only I shall ask you to be very exact; I have a dinner at seven o’clock in the Rue Royale.”

Saniel promised promptness.  The dinner was a favorable circumstance, enabling him to escape from Madame Dammauville’s before the lamps would be lighted.

When Balzajette was gone, he rejoined Phillis in the dining-room.

“A consultation is arranged for to-morrow at six o’clock, at Madame Dammauville’s.”

She threw herself on his breast.

“I knew that you would forgive me.”

CHAPTER XXXII

THE FATAL LIGHT

It was not without emotion that the next day Saniel saw the afternoon slip away, and although he worked to employ his time, he interrupted himself at each instant to look at the clock.

Sometimes he found the time passing quickly, and then all at once it seemed to stand still.

This agitation exasperated him, for calmness had never been more necessary than at this moment.  A danger was before him, and it was only in being master of himself that he could be saved.  He must have the coolness of a surgeon during an operation, the glance of a general in a battle; and the coolness and the glance were not found among the nervous and agitated.

Could he escape from this danger?

This was the question that he asked himself unceasingly, although he knew the uselessness of it.  What good was it to study the chances for or against him?

Either he had succeeded in rendering himself unrecognizable or he had not; but it was done, and now he could do nothing more.  He did the best he could in choosing an hour when the dim evening light put the chances on his side; for the rest he must trust to Fortune.

All day he studied the sky, because for the success of his plan it must be neither too bright nor too dark:  if it were too bright Madame Dammauville could see him clearly; if it were too dark the lamps would be lighted.  He remembered that it was by lamplight she had seen him.  Until evening the weather was uncertain, with a sky sometimes sunny, sometimes cloudy; but at this hour the clouds were driven away by a wind from the north, and the weather became decidedly cold, with the pink and pale clearness of the end of March when it still freezes.