"By all means."

"With that we must run along and give you a chance to get to bed, seeing
that you have to be up at dawn."

"Oh, at half-past five for the six o'clock angelus, and then, if I want
to, I can go back to bed, for I don't have to ring again till a quarter
to eight, and then all I have to do is sound a couple of times for the
curate's mass. As you can see, I have a pretty easy thing of it."

"Mmmm!" exclaimed Durtal, "if I had to get up so early!"

"It's all a matter of habit. But before you go won't you have another
little drink? No? Really? Well, good night!"

He lighted his lantern, and in single file, shivering, they descended
the glacial, pitch-dark, winding stair.

CHAPTER VI

Next morning Durtal woke later than usual. Before he opened his eyes
there was a sudden flash of light in his brain, and troops of demon
worshippers, like the societies of which Des Hermies had spoken, went
defiling past him, dancing a saraband. "A swarm of lady acrobats hanging
head downward from trapezes and praying with joined feet!" he said,
yawning. He looked at the window. The panes were flowered with crystal
fleurs de lys and frost ferns. Then he quickly drew his arms back under
the covers and snuggled up luxuriously.

"A fine day to stay at home and work," he said. "I will get up and light
a fire. Come now, a little courage--" and--instead of tossing the covers
aside he drew them up around his chin.

"Ah, I know that you are not pleased to see me taking a morning off," he
said, addressing his cat, which was hunched up on the counterpane at his
feet, gazing at him fixedly, its eyes very black.

This beast, though affectionate and fond of being caressed, was crabbed
and set in its ways. It would tolerate no whims, no departures from the
regular course of things. It understood that there was a fixed hour for
rising and for going to bed, and when it was displeased it allowed a
shade of annoyance to pass into its eyes, the sense of which its master
could not mistake.

If he returned before eleven at night, the cat was waiting for him in
the vestibule, scratching the wood of the door, miaouing, even before
Durtal was in the hall; then it rolled its languorous green-golden eyes
at him, rubbed against his trouser leg, stood up on its hind feet like
a tiny rearing horse and affectionately wagged its head at him as he
approached. If eleven o'clock had passed it did not run along in front
of him, but would onl