related it one day without noticing that we were present."
"And ever afterwards, Zoé, you could never see Monsieur Malorey without wanting to laugh."
"You laughed also."
"No, Zoé, I did not laugh at that. That which amuses other men does not make me laugh, that which amuses me does not make other men laugh. I have often noticed it. I see the ludicrous where no one else perceives it. I am gay and I am sad in the wrong places, and it has often made me look like a fool."
Monsieur Bergeret climbed a ladder in order to hang a view of Mount Vesuvius by night, during an eruption; the picture was a water-colour which he had inherited from a paternal ancestor.
"But I have not told you, sister, what I said to Monsieur Malorey."
"Lucien, while you are on the ladder, please put up the curtain-rods," said Zoé.
"I will," said her brother. "We were then living in a little house in a suburb ot Saint-Omer."
"The curtain-rings are in the nail-box."
"I have them.... A little house with a garden."
"A very pretty garden," said Zoé. "It was