"Easy to find an excuse for this visit, though it will seem strange to Chantelouve, whom I have neglected for months," said Durtal on his way toward the rue Bagneux.

"Supposing he is home this evening--and he probably isn't, because surely Hyacinthe will have seen to that--I can tell him that I have learned of his illness through Des Hermies and that I have come to see how he is getting along." He paused on the stoop of the building in which Chantelouve lived.

At each side and over the door were these antique lamps with reflectors, surmounted by a sort of casque of sheet iron painted green.

There was an old iron balustrade, very wide, and the steps, with wooden sides, were paved with red tile.

About this house there was a sepulchral and also clerical odour, yet there was also something homelike--though a little too imposing--about it such as is not to be found in the cardboard houses they build nowadays.