stirs the ooze below, and causes hidden, rotting things to rise once more
to the surface. And Pierre had to bring his elbows into play and force a
passage athwart the throng, betwixt the shivering cowardice of some, the
insolent audacity of others, and the smirchings which sullied the greater
number, given the contagion which inevitably prevailed. However, he
carried away a fresh hope, and it seemed to him that if he should save a
life, make but one man happy that day, it would be like a first
instalment of redemption, a sign that a little forgiveness would be
extended to the many follies and errors of that egotistical and
all-devouring political world.

On reaching the vestibule a final incident detained him for a moment
longer. Some commotion prevailed there following upon a quarrel between a
man and an usher, the latter of whom had prevented the former from
entering on finding that the admission ticket which he tendered was an
old one, with its original date scratched out. The man, very rough at the
outset, had then refrained from insisting, as if indeed sudden timidity
had come upon him. And in this ill-dressed fellow Pierre was astonished
to recognise Salvat, the journeyman engineer, whom he had seen going off
in search of work that same morning. This time it was certainly he, tall,
thin and ravaged, with dreamy yet flaming eyes, which set his pale
starveling's face aglow. He no longer carried his tool-bag; his ragged
jacket was buttoned up and distended on the left side by something that
he carried in a pocket, doubtless some hunk of bread. And on being
repulsed by the ushers, he walked away, taking the Concorde bridge,
slowly, as if chancewise, like a man who knows not whither he is going.



IV