The title refers to a French game of forfeits in the course of which a little boy, apparently vanished, is the object of a search through Parisian streets before he's found where the reader knew he was asleep behind the bedroom door. The brief encounters with concierge, streetsweeper, fisherman and gendarme are pleasantly pictured, as is some terminal sightseeing (Bois de Boulogue, Luxembourg, etc.), but the story is just an excuse for getting around.