When they entered the cab, the ladies enveloped themselves in ample cloaks, which concealed their costumes, and pulled hoods over their heads, so that their headdresses could not be seen.
“Why do these ladies all disguise themselves in hoods?” Chérubin asked Daréna in an undertone.
“My dear marquis,” the latter replied aloud, “they do it so that their stage costumes may not be seen when they go into the restaurant, for the Carnival hasn’t come yet.--A modest dress is the correct thing in Paris.”
“Bah! I don’t care a fig for your correct thing!” said Mademoiselle Malvina; “for my part I’d just as lief walk about Paris in a Swiss costume. I say, why mightn’t I be a real Swiss?”
“If you wore an oyster woman’s costume, my dear girl, it’s much more probable that no one would think that you were disguised.”
“Well! well! that’s a joke, I suppose! how ugly you are! When you’re out-at-elbows the way you sometimes are, you don’t look any too much like a count yourself!”
Daréna laughed heartily and tapped Malvina on the cheek, saying:
“Come, come, hold your tongue, and above all things behave decently, mesdames; in the country a mild sort of freedom is permissible, but at the Rocher de Cancale, and in the honorable company with which you are to dine, remember, my little shepherdesses, that if you are not discreet I shall be obliged to turn you out of the room.”
“Bless my soul! we know how to behave, monsieur! Do you think we never go into swell society?”
“Why, I often dine with my friend and his brother, who’s one of the biggest butchers in Paris!”
“And I sometimes keep my cousin’s desk; she’s a baker and sells pastry, and only gentlemen with canary-colored gloves come to her little place to eat.”
“Very good, mesdames, very good; we are certain now that you are worthy to go into good society, and that you know how to behave decorously. Oh! if Monsieur d’Hurbain had not come to dine with us! But he has come, for I see him and Monfréville getting out of the tilbury. We have arrived; come, my young marquis, hand out the ladies.”
The carriage stopped and the door was opened; a porcupine’s head appeared, surmounting a body clad in an old nut-colored box-coat, the collar of which was marred by some very extensive spots of grease. It was Monsieur Poterne, who had stepped forward to assist the ladies to alight.