of her pocket and held it
up to the light, and it was, as Barty said, merely an empty envelope
and a red seal. She then held it out to her husband and exclaimed:

"Le cachet de Monsieur Josselin, que je lui avais demande...!"

So bloodshed was perhaps avoided, and Monsieur Jean took care not to
jostle Josselin any more. Indeed, they became great friends.

For next day Barty strolled into the Salle d'Armes, Rue des
Dunes--and there he found Monsieur Jean fencing with young de
Cleves, the dragoon. Both were good fencers, but Barty was the
finest fencer I ever met in my life, and always kept it up; and
remembering his adventure of the previous day, it amused him to
affect a careless nonchalance about such trivial things--"des
enfantillages!"

"_You_ take a turn with Jean, Josselin!" said the dragoon.

"Oh! I'm out of practice--and I've only got one eye...."

"Je vous en prie, monsieur de la garde!" said the viscount.

"Cette fois, alors, nous allons tirer _ensemble_!" says Barty, and
languidly dons the mask with an affected air, and makes a fuss about
the glove not suiting him; and then, in spite of his defective
sight, which seems to make no difference, he lightly and gracefully
gives M. Jean such a dressing as that gentleman had never got in his
life--not even from his maitre d'armes: and afterwards to young de
Cleves the same. Well I knew his way of doing this kind of thing!

So Barty and M. and Madame Jean became quite intimate--and with his
usual indiscretion Barty told them how he fluked that bull's-eye,
and they were charmed!

"Vous etes impayable, savez-vous, mon cher!" says M. Jean--"vous
avez tous les talents, et un million dans le gosier par-dessus le
marche! Si jamais je puis vous etre de service, savez-vous, comptez
sur moi pour la vie ..." said the impulsive viscount when they bade
each other good-bye at the end.

[Illustration: "'A VOUS, MONSIEUR DE LA GARDE!'"]

"Et plus jamais d'enveloppes vides, quand vous m'ecrirez!" says
madame.

* * * * *

So frivolous time wore on, and Barty found it pleasant to frivol in
such pleasant company--very pleasant indeed! But when alone in his
garret, with his seton-dressing and dry-cuppings, it was not so gay.
He had to confess to himself that his eye was getting slowly worse
instead of better; darkening day by day; and a little more retina
had been taken in by the strange disease--"la peau de chagrin," as
he nicknamed this