"during these unexpected utterances made in a tone of the most secret and important confidence, i looked at richard.richard, in his student days, had acquired a great reputation for practical joking, and he seemed to relish the dish which was being served up to him in his turn.he did not miss a morsel of it, though the seasoning was a little gruesome because of the death of buquet.he nodded his head sadly, while the others spoke, and his features assumed the air of a man who bitterly regretted having taken over the opera, now that he knew that there was a ghost mixed up in the business.
i could think of nothing better than to give him a servile imitation of this attitude of despair.however, in spite of all our efforts, we could not, at the finish, help bursting out laughing in the faces of mm.debienne and poligny, who, seeing us pass straight from the gloomiest state of mind to one of the most insolent merriment, acted as though they thought that we had gone mad.
"the joke became a little tedious; and richard asked half-seriously and half in jest:
"`but, after all, what does this ghost of yours want?'
"m.poligny went to his desk and returned with a copy of the memorandum-book.the memorandum-book begins with the well-known words saying that `the management of the opera shall give to the performance of the national academy of music the splendor that becomes the first lyric stage in france' and ends with clause 98, which says that the privilege can be withdrawn if the manager infringes the conditions stipulated in the memorandum-book.