"Here is a splendid article by Rochefort. That fellow is marvelous."

He read the article in a loud voice, laying so much stress on its most
striking passages that he did not notice the entrance of his friend.

M. de Meroul had a paper in each hand: "Le Gaulois" for himself and "Le
Clarion" for his wife.

The ardent prose of the master-writer who overthrew the empire,
violently declaimed, recited in the accent of the south, rang through
the peaceful drawing-room, shook the old curtains with their rigid
folds, seemed to splash the walls, the large upholstered chairs, the
solemn furniture fixed in the same position for the past century, with a
hail of words, rebounding, impudent, ironical, and crushing.

The husband and the wife, the one standing, the other seated, listened
in a state of stupor, so scandalized that they no longer even ventured
to make a gesture. Mouradour flung out the concluding passage in the
article as one sets off a stream of fireworks; then in an emphatic tone
he remarked:

"That's a stinger, eh?"

But suddenly he perceived the two prints belonging to his friend, and he
seemed himself for a moment overcome with astonishment. Then he came
across to his host with great strides, demanding in an angry tone:

"What do you want to do with these papers?"