wild outburst of laughter. One
suspicious gentleman asked:

"How came you to be here?"

He explained, telling about his project of going to the opera, his
departure from Vernon, his arrival in Paris, and the way in which he had
spent the evening.

They sat around him to listen to him; they greeted him with words of
applause, and called him Scheherazade.

Romantin did not return. Other guests arrived. M. Saval was presented
to them so that he might begin his story over again. He declined; they
forced him to relate it. They seated and tied him on one of three chairs
between two women who kept constantly filling his glass. He drank; he
laughed; he talked; he sang, too. He tried to waltz with his chair, and
fell on the ground.

From that moment, he forgot everything. It seemed to him, however, that
they undressed him, put him to bed, and that he was nauseated.

When he awoke, it was broad daylight, and he lay stretched with his feet
against a cupboard, in a strange bed.

An old woman with a broom in her hand was glaring angrily at him. At
last, she said:

"Clear out, you blackguard! Clear out! What right has anyone to get
drunk like this?"

He sat up in bed, feeling very ill at ease. He asked:

"Where am I?"

"Where are you, you dirty scamp? You are drunk. Take your rotten carcass
out of here as quick as you can--and lose no time about it!"

He wanted to get up. He found that he was in no condition to do so. His
clothes had disappeared. He blurted out:

"Madame, I----Then he remembered. What was he to do? He asked:

"Did Monsieur Romantin come back?"

The doorkeeper shouted:

"Will you take your dirty carcass out of this, so that he at any rate
may not catch you here?"

M. Saval said, in a state of confusion:

"I haven't got my clothes; they have been taken away from me."

He had to wait, to explain his situation, give notice to his friends,
and borrow some money to buy clothes. He did not leave Paris till
evening. And when people talk about music to him in his beautiful
drawing-room in Vernon, he declares with an air of authority that
painting is a very inferior art.

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Original Short Stories of Maupassant,
Volume 5, by Guy de Maupassant

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MAUPASSANT SHORT STORIES ***

***** This file should be named 3081.txt or 3081.zip *****
This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
http://www