ng any lady's. By this visit to
Keyser's he also saved himself the trouble of reading the papers. Gossip
went on between one dressing-room and another, or on the lounges of
the fencing-room, where the visitors sat in fencing dress or flannel
dressing-gowns, or even outside the doctor's door while awaiting the
_douche_. From clubs, drawing-rooms, the Chamber, the Bourse, or
the Palais de Justice came in the news of the day, and there it was
proclaimed freely in loud tones, to the accompaniment of the clashing
of swords and sticks, shouts for the waiter, resounding slaps on bare
backs, creaking of wheel-chairs for rheumatic patients, heavy plunges
re-echoing under the reverberating roof of the swimming-bath, while
above the various sounds of splashing and spurting water rose the voice
of worthy Dr. Keyser, standing on his platform, and the ever-recurring
burden, 'Turn round.'

On this occasion Paul Astier was 'turning round' under the refreshing
shower with great enjoyment; he was getting rid of the dust and fatigue
of his wearisome afternoon, as well as of the lugubrious sonorities of
Astier-Rehu's Academic regret 'His hour sounded upon the bell'... 'the
hand of Loisillon was cold'... 'he had drained the cup of happiness'...
&c, &c. Oh Master! Master! oh, respected papa! It took a good deal
of water, showers, streams, floods of it, to wash off all that grimy
rubbish.

[Illustration: Passed a tall figure bent double 182]

As he went away with the water running off him, he passed a tall
figure bent double, coming up from the swimming bath, which gave him a
shivering nod from under a huge gutta-percha cap covering the head and
half the face. The man's lean pallor and stiff stooping walk made Paul
take him for one of the poor invalids who attend the establishment
regularly, and whose apparition, silent as night-birds in the
fencing-room where they come to be weighed, contrasts so strangely
with the healthy laughter and superabundant vigour of the rest of the
company. But the contemptuous curve of the large nose and the weary
lines round the mouth vaguely recalled some face he knew in society.
In his dressing-room he asked the man who was shampooing him, 'Who was
that, Raymond, who bowed to me just now?'

'Why, that's the Prince d'Athis, sir,' replied Raymond, with a
plebeian's satisfaction in uttering the word 'prince.' 'He has been
taking _douches_ for some time past, and generally comes in the morning.
But he is later