inside the doors you would be greeted by exactly what you had expected to see -- -a large dingy room needing a fresh coat of its cafe-au-lait paint , in which half a dozen men sat at cheap desks and typed or wrote amidst the usual accouterments of a busy organization -- -in and out baskets , telephones , in this case the old-fashioned standard ones that are typical of such an office in this part of paris , and dark green metal filing cabinets in which drawers stand open .