Without waiting for a reply, she removed one of the covers of the heater.  It was that of the compartment reserved for the chitterlings, sausages, and black-puddings.  However, the chafing-dish was quite cold, and there was nothing left but one stray forgotten sausage.

“Look under the other cover, Mademoiselle Saget,” said Lisa.  “I believe there’s a cutlet there.”

“No, it doesn’t tempt me,” muttered the little old woman, poking her nose under the other cover, however, all the same.  “I felt rather a fancy for one, but I’m afraid a cutlet would be rather too heavy in the evening.  I’d rather have something, too, that I need not warm.”

While speaking she had turned towards Florent and looked at him; then she looked at Gavard, who was beating a tattoo with his finger-tips on the marble table.  She smiled at them, as though inviting them to continue their conversation.

“Wouldn’t a little piece of salt pork suit you?” asked Lisa.

“A piece of salt pork?  Yes, that might do.”

Thereupon she took up the fork with plated handle, which was lying at the edge of the dish, and began to turn all the pieces of pork about, prodding them, lightly tapping the bones to judge of their thickness, and minutely scrutinising the shreds of pinky meat.  And as she turned them over she repeated, “No, no; it doesn’t tempt me.”

“Well, then, have a sheep’s tongue, or a bit of brawn, or a slice of larded veal,” suggested Lisa patiently.

Mademoiselle Saget, however, shook her head.  She remained there for a few minutes longer, pulling dissatisfied faces over the different dishes; then, seeing that the others were determined to remain silent, and that she would not be able to learn anything, she took herself off.

“No; I rather felt a fancy for a cutlet rolled in bread-crumbs,” she said as she left the shop, “but the one you have left is too fat.  I must come another time.”

Lisa bent forward to watch her through the sausage-skins hanging in the shop-front, and saw her cross the road and enter the fruit market.

“The old she-goat!” growled Gavard.

Then, as they were now alone again, he began to tell them of the situation he had found for Florent.  A friend of his, he said, Monsieur Verlaque, one of the fish market inspectors, was so ill that he was obliged to take a rest; and that very morning the poor man had told him that he should be very glad to find a substitute who would keep his berth open for him in case he should recover.

“Verlaque, you know, won’t last another six months,” added Gavard, “and Florent will keep the place.  It’s a splendid idea, isn’t it?  And it will be such a take-in for the police!  The berth is under the Prefecture, you know.  What glorious fun to see Florent getting paid by the police, eh?”

He burst into a hearty laugh; the idea struck him as so extremely comical.

“I won’t take the place,” Florent bluntly replied.  “I’ve sworn I’ll never accept anything from the Empire, and I would rather die of starvation than serve under the Prefecture.  It is quite out of the question, Gavard, quite so!”