IV

As he had still some time to spare he went into the shop of a lithographer, who executed visiting cards at a moment’s notice before the eyes of passersby, and had a hundred, bearing his new occupation under his name, printed off while he waited.

Then he went to the office of the paper.

Forestier received him loftily, as one receives a subordinate. “Ah! here you are. Good. I have several things for you to attend to. Just wait ten minutes. I will just finish what I am about.”

And he went on with a letter he was writing.

At the other end of the large table a fat, bald little man, with a very pale, puffy face, and a white and shining head, was writing, with his nose on the paper owing to extreme shortsightedness. Forestier said to him: “I say, Saint-Potin, when are you going to interview those people?”

“At four o’clock.”

“Will you take young Duroy here with you, and let him into the way of doing it?”

“All right.”

Then turning to his friend, Forestier added: “Have you brought the continuation of the Algerian article? The opening this morning was very successful.”

Duroy, taken aback, stammered: “No. I thought I should have time this afternoon. I had heaps of things to do. I was not able.”

The other shrugged his shoulders with a dissatisfied air. “If you are not more exact than that you will spoil your future. Daddy Walter was reckoning on your copy. I will tell him it will be ready tomorrow. If you think you are to be paid for doing nothing you are mistaken.”