g-ting!"

"Sold again!"

"Monsieur Desroches, you are going to the play without paying," said
Hure to the fourth clerk, giving him a slap on the shoulder that might
have killed a rhinoceros.

There was a storm of cat-calls, cries, and exclamations, which all the
onomatopeia of the language would fail to represent.

"Which theatre shall we go to?"

"To the opera," cried the head clerk.

"In the first place," said Godeschal, "I never mentioned which theatre.
I might, if I chose, take you to see Madame Saqui."

"Madame Saqui is not the play."

"What is a play?" replied Godeschal. "First, we must define the point
of fact. What did I bet, gentlemen? A play. What is a play? A spectacle.
What is a spectacle? Something to be seen--"

"But on that principle you would pay your bet by taking us to see the
water run under the Pont Neuf!" cried Simonnin, interrupting him.

"To be seen for money," Godeschal added.

"But a great many things are to be seen for money that are not plays.
The definition is defective," said Desroches.

"But do listen to me!"

"You are talking nonsense, my dear boy," said Boucard.

"Is Curtius' a play?" said Godeschal.

"No," said the head clerk, "it is a collection of figures--but it is a
spectacle."

"I bet you a hundred francs to a sou," Godeschal resumed, "that Curtius'
Waxworks forms such a show as might be called a play or theatre. It
contains a thing to be seen at various prices, according to the place
you choose to occupy."

"And so on, and so forth!" said Simonnin.

"You mind I don't box your ears!" said Godeschal.

The clerk shrugged their shoulders.

"Besides, it is not proved that that old ape was not making game of us,"
he said, dropping his argument, which was drowned in the laughter of the
other clerks. "On my honor, Colonel Chabert is really and truly dead.
His wife is married again to Comte Ferraud, Councillor of State. Madame
Ferraud is one of our clients."

"Come, the case is remanded till to-morrow," said Boucard. "To work,
gentlemen. The deuce is in it; we get nothing done here. Finish copying
that appeal; it must be handed in before the sitting of the Fourth
Chamber, judgment is to be given to-day. Come, on you go!"

"If he really were Colonel Chabert, would not that impudent rascal
Simonnin have felt the leather of his boot in the right place when he
pretended to be deaf?" said Desroches, regarding this remark as more
conclusive than Godeschal's.

"Since