As void of prudery as her husband, she listened impassively, absently, with her thoughts evidently afar, to the boldest of conversational imprudences.
At one of these evening parties, while La Rousseil, recently converted, howled a hymn, Durtal, sitting in a corner having a quiet smoke, had been struck by the physiognomy and bearing of Des Hermies, who stood out sharply from the motley throng of defrocked priests and grubby poets packed into Chantelouve's library and drawing-room.
Among these smirking and carefully composed faces, Des Hermies, evidently a man of forceful individuality, seemed, and probably felt, singularly out of place.

He was tall, slender, somewhat pale.

His eyes, narrowed in a frown, had the cold blue gleam of sapphires.

The nose was short and sharp, the cheeks smooth shaven.

With his flaxen hair and Vandyke he might have been a Norwegian or an Englishman in not very good health.