slept in the same bed, in
the dark back shop; they both in turn cut slices from the same loaves
of bread--of which they bought sufficient for a fortnight at a time, so
that it might get very hard, and that they might thus be able to eat but
little of it.

'I say, Chaine,' continued Sandoz, 'your stove is really very exact.'

Chaine, without answering, gave a chuckle of triumph which lighted up
his face like a sunbeam. By a crowning stroke of imbecility, and to
make his misfortunes perfect, his protector's advice had thrown him into
painting, in spite of the real taste that he showed for wood carving.
And he painted like a whitewasher, mixing his colours as a hodman mixes
his mortar, and managing to make the clearest and brightest of them
quite muddy. His triumph consisted, however, in combining exactness
with awkwardness; he displayed all the naive minuteness of the primitive
painters; in fact, his mind, barely raised from the clods, delighted in
petty details. The stove, with its perspective all awry, was tame and
precise, and in colour as dingy as mire.

Claude approached and felt full of compassion at the sight of that
painting, and though he was as a rule so harsh towards bad painters, his
compassion prompted him to say a word of praise.

'Ah! one can't say that you are a trickster; you paint, at any rate, as
you feel. Very good, indeed.'

However, the door of the shop had opened, and a good-looking, fair
fellow, with a big pink nose, and large, blue, short-sighted eyes,
entered shouting:

'I say, why does that herbalist woman next door always stand on her
doorstep? What an ugly mug she's got!'

They all laughed, except Mahoudeau, who seemed very much embarrassed.

'Jory, the King of Blunderers,' declared Sandoz, shaking hands with the
new comer.

'Why? What? Is Mahoudeau interested in her? I didn't know,' resumed
Jory, when he had at length grasped the situation. 'Well, well, what
does it matter? When everything's said, they are all irresistible.'

'As for you,' the sculptor rejoined, 'I can see you have tumbled on your
lady-love's finger-nails again. She has dug a bit out of your cheek!'

They all burst out laughing anew, while Jory, in his turn, reddened. In
fact, his face was scratched: there were even two deep gashes across it.
The son of a magistrate of Plassans, whom he had driven half-crazy by
his dissolute conduct, he had crowned everything by running away with
a music-hall singer under the pr