So they went into the dining-room amidst a final noise of hammering in the sale-rooms below.

The meal proved somewhat of a scramble, and was on three occasions disturbed by female attendants, who came to explain difficulties and ask for orders.

Doors were constantly slamming, and the very walls seemed to shake with the unusual bustle which filled the house.

And feverish as they all were in the dining-room, they talked in desultory, haphazard fashion on all sorts of subjects, passing from a ball given at the Ministry of the Interior on the previous night, to the popular mid-Lent festival which would take place on the morrow, and ever reverting to the bazaar, the prices that had been given for the goods which would be on sale, the prices at which they might be sold, and the probable figure of the full receipts, all this being interspersed with strange anecdotes, witticisms and bursts of laughter.
On the General mentioning magistrate Amadieu, Eve declared that she no longer dared to invite him to _dejeuner_, knowing how busy he was at the Palace of Justice.

Still, she certainly hoped that he would come to the bazaar and contribute something.