“What do you want with him?” he said.  “Just leave him in peace; you can plainly see that he is in trouble.”

“The gentleman has just lost his friend, and proposes, no doubt, to do honor to his memory, being, as he is, the sole heir.  The gentleman, no doubt, will not haggle over it, he will buy a piece of ground outright for a grave.  And as M. Pons was such a lover of the arts, it would be a great pity not to put Music, Painting, and Sculpture on his tomb —­three handsome full-length figures, weeping—­”

Remonencq waved the speaker away, in Auvergnat fashion, but the man replied with another gesture, which being interpreted means “Don’t spoil sport”; a piece of commercial free-masonry, as it were, which the dealer understood.

“I represent the firm of Sonet and Company, monumental stone-masons; Sir Walter Scott would have dubbed me Young Mortality,” continued this person.  “If you, sir, should decide to intrust your orders to us, we would spare you the trouble of the journey to purchase the ground necessary for the interment of a friend lost to the arts—­”

At this Remonencq nodded assent, and jogged Schmucke’s elbow.

“Every day we receive orders from families to arrange all formalities,” continued he of the black coat, thus encouraged by Remonencq.  “In the first moment of bereavement, the heir-at-law finds it very difficult to attend to such matters, and we are accustomed to perform these little services for our clients.  Our charges, sir, are on a fixed scale, so much per foot, freestone or marble.  Family vaults a specialty.—­We undertake everything at the most moderate prices.  Our firm executed the magnificent monument erected to the fair Esther Gobseck and Lucien de Rubempre, one of the finest ornaments of Pere-Lachaise.  We only employ the best workmen, and I must warn you, sir, against small contractors—­who turn out nothing but trash,” he added, seeing that another person in a black suit was coming up to say a word for another firm of marble-workers.

It is often said that “death is the end of a journey,” but the aptness of the simile is realized most fully in Paris.  Any arrival, especially of a person of condition, upon the “dark brink,” is hailed in much the same way as the traveler recently landed is hailed by hotel touts and pestered with their recommendations.  With the exception of a few philosophically-minded persons, or here and there a family secure of handing down a name to posterity, nobody thinks beforehand of the practical aspects of death.  Death always comes before he is expected; and, from a sentiment easy to understand, the heirs usually act as if the event were impossible.  For which reason, almost every one that loses father or mother, wife or child, is immediately beset by scouts that profit by the confusion caused by grief to snare others.  In former days, agents for monuments used to live round about the famous cemetery of Pere-Lachaise,