the Institute he will have to yield to
evidence."

The driver wrapped his ragged cloak around him. Resignedly, he was
saying to himself, "I have seen many odd folks, but this one--" He
heard the word "Institute."

"The Institute, Monsieur?" he asked.

"Yes, my friend, the Institute," replied Marmus.

"Well he wears the red ribbon," said the driver to himself. "Perhaps
he has something to do with the Institute."

The professor, infinitely more comfortable in his cab than on the
sidewalk, devoted himself entirely to solving the problem that went
against his theory and would not surrender--the rascal! The cab stops
at the Institute; the janitor sees the Academician and bows to him
respectfully. The cab driver, his suspicions dispelled, talks with the
janitor of the Institute while the illustrious professor goes--at
eight in the evening--to the Academie des Sciences.

The cab driver tells the janitor where he found his fare.

"At the Iena bridge," repeats the janitor. "M. Marmus was coming back
from Passy. He had dined, doubtless, with M. Planchette, one of his
friends of the Academy."

"He couldn't tell me his address," says the cab driver.

"He lives in the Rue Duguay-Trouin, Number three," says the janitor.

"What a neighborhood!" exclaims the driver.

"My friend," asks of the janitor the professor who had found the door
shut, "is there no meeting of the Academy to-day?"

"To-day!" exclaims the janitor. "At this hour!"

"What is the time?" asks the man of science.

"About eight o'clock," the janitor replies.

"It is late," comments M. Marmus. "Take me home, driver."

The driver goes through the quays, the Rue du Bac, falls into a tangle
of wagons, returns by the Rue de Grenelle, the Croix-Rouge, the Rue
Cassette, then he makes a mistake. He tries to find the Rue d'Assas,
in the Rue Honore-Chevalier, in the Rue Madame, in all the impossible
streets and, swearing that if he had known he would not have come so
far for a hundred sous, disembarks the professor in the Rue
Duguay-Trouin.

The cab driver claims an hour, for the police ordinances, that defend
consumers of time in cabs from the stratagems of cab drivers, had not
yet posted the walls of Paris with their protecting articles that
settle in advance all difficulties.

"Very well, my friend," says M. Marmus to the cab driver. "Pay him,"
M. Marmus says to Madame Adolphe. "I do not feel well, my child."

"Monsieur, what did I tell you?" she exclaim