He was staring at the Place Saint-Michel. To lean one's back against a thing is equivalent to lying down while standing erect, which attitude is not hated by thinkers.
Laigle de Meaux was pondering without melancholy, over a little misadventure which had befallen him two days previously at the law-school, and which had modified his personal plans for the future, plans which were rather indistinct in any case.
Revery does not prevent a cab from passing by, nor the dreamer from taking note of that cab.
Laigle de Meaux, whose eyes were straying about in a sort of diffuse lounging, perceived, athwart his somnambulism, a two-wheeled vehicle proceeding through the place, at a foot pace and apparently in indecision. For whom was this cabriolet?
Why was it driving at a walk? Laigle took a survey.
In it, beside the coachman, sat a young man, and in front of the young man lay a rather bulky hand-bag. The bag displayed to passers-by the following name inscribed in large black letters on a card which was sewn to the stuff:
MARIUS PONTMERCY.
This name caused Laigle to change his attitude.
He drew himself up and hurled this apostrophe at the young man in the cabriolet:--
"Monsieur Marius Pontmercy!"
The cabriolet thus addressed came to a halt.
The young man, who also seemed deeply buried in thought, raised his eyes:--
"Hey?" said he.
"You are M. Marius Pontmercy?"
"Certainly."
"I was looking for you," resumed Laigle de Meaux.
"How so?" demanded Marius; for it was he:
in fact, he had just quitted his grandfather's, and had before him a face which he now beheld for the first time.
"I do not know you."
"Neither do I know you," responded Laigle.