make your acquaintance.”
Duroy stepped forward, seeking to impart to his face a look of expressive cordiality, and grasped his host’s hand with exaggerated energy. Then, having sat down, he could find nothing to say.
Monsieur de Marelle placed a log upon the fire, and inquired: “Have you been long engaged in journalism?”
“Only a few months.”
“Ah! you have got on quickly?”
“Yes, fairly so,” and he began to chat at random, without thinking very much about what he was saying, talking of all the trifles customary among men who do not know one another. He was growing seasoned now, and thought the situation a very amusing one. He looked at Monsieur de Marelle’s serious and respectable face, with a temptation to laugh, as he thought: “I have cuckolded you, old fellow, I have cuckolded you.” A vicious, inward satisfaction stole over him—the satisfaction of a thief who has been successful, and is not even suspected—a delicious, roguish joy. He suddenly longed to be the friend of this man, to win his confidence, to get him to relate the secrets of his life.