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More miserable than ever, worn and pared and patched up, more and more parched and shriveled by hopelessly long labor he blots out the shiny places on his overcoat with his pen Mielvaque points to Brisbille gagged by the band, he writhes with laughter and shouts in my ear, "He might be trying to sing!"
Notwithstanding, my personal position has established itself and progressively improved. I am getting three hundred and sixty francs a month, and besides, I have a share in the profits of the litigation office about fifty francs a month. It is a year and a half since I was stagnating in the little glass office, to which Monsieur Mielvaque has been promoted, succeeding me.
Brisbille, seeing one of the orators passing near him, throws him a ferocious look, and shouts, "Land-shark!" and other virulent insults. But because of the brass instruments let loose, people only see him open his mouth, and Monsieur Mielvaque dances with delight. Monsieur Mielvaque, declared unfit for service, has been called up again.
They were loaded with parcels in string; new boots hung from their shoulders. I went up to mix with my new companions. Tudor was topped by an artilleryman's cap. Monsieur Mielvaque was bustling about, embarrassed exactly as at the factory by the papers he held in his hand; and he had exchanged his eyeglasses for spectacles, which stood for the beginning of his uniform.
There are many new faces. The factory has tripled quadrupled in importance; quite a town of flimsy buildings has been added to it. "They've built seven others like it in three months!" says Monsieur Mielvaque to me, proudly. The manager is now another young nephew of the Messrs. Gozlan. He was living in Paris and came back on the day of the general mobilization.
"Of course," trumpets Crillon, "that's one of the established thoughts that you find in your head when you fish for 'em. But mark what I says, there's some that dies of envy. I'm not one of them that dies of envy." Monsieur Mielvaque has put his hat back on his petrified head and gone to the door. Monsieur Joseph Bonéas, also, turns his back and goes away.
This feeling of deliverance pervades the most lowly. On the step of the little blood-red restaurant I spy Monsieur Mielvaque, hopping for joy.
Here, too, are Monsieur Pocard, and Crillon, new shaved, his polished skin taut and shiny, and several other people. Prominent among them one marks the wavering head of Monsieur Mielvaque, who, in his timidity and careful respect for custom, took his hat off as he crossed the threshold.