The promenaders had been singularly noisy, I thought. Now they were
mounting to the room making a truly tremendous racket. No sooner were the
doors opened than in rushed half a dozen frenzied friends, who began
telling me all at once about a terrific thing which my friend the _noir_
had just done. It seems that The Trick Raincoat had pulled at Jean's
handkerchief (Lulu's gift in other days) which Jean wore always
conspicuously in his outside breast pocket; that Jean had taken the
Raincoat's head in his two hands, held it steady, abased his own head,
and rammed the helpless T.R. as a bull would do--the impact of Jean's
head upon the other's nose causing that well-known feature to occupy a
new position in the neighbourhood of the right ear. B. corroborated this
description, adding the Raincoat's nose was broken and that everyone was
down on Jean for fighting in an unsportsmanlike way. I found Jean still
very angry, and moreover very hurt because everyone was now shunning him.
I told him that I personally was glad of what he'd done; but nothing
would cheer him up. The T.R. now entered, very terrible to see, having
been patched up by Monsieur Richard with copious plasters. His nose was
not broken, he said thickly, but only bent.
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