Seeing that he, undoubtedly, had to do with a strong hand, la Peyrade thought best to modify his tone; and so, with a more circumspect air, he said:—­

“You will allow me, monsieur, to reserve my acknowledgments until I receive some fuller explanation.”

“Here you are, then,” continued du Portail, “at twenty-eight years of age, without a penny, virtually without a profession; with antecedents that are very—­middling; with associates like Monsieur Dutocq and the courageous Cerizet; owing to Mademoiselle Thuillier ten thousand francs, and to Madame Lambert twenty-five thousand, which you are no doubt extremely desirous to return to her; and finally, this marriage, your last hope, your sheet-anchor, has just become an utter impossibility.  Between ourselves, if I have something reasonable to propose to you, do you not think that you had much better place yourself at my disposal?”

“I have time enough to prove that your opinion is mistaken,” returned la Peyrade; “and I shall not form any resolutions so long as the designs you choose to have upon me are not more fully explained.”

“You were spoken to, at my instigation, about a marriage,” resumed du Portail.  “This marriage, as I think, is closely connected with a past existence from which a certain hereditary or family duty has devolved upon you.  Do you know what that uncle of yours, to whom you applied in 1829, was doing in Paris?  In your family he was thought to be a millionaire; and, dying suddenly, you remember, before you got to him, he did not leave enough for his burial; a pauper’s grave was all that remained to him.”

“Did you know him?” asked la Peyrade.

“He was my oldest and dearest friend,” replied du Portail.

“If that is so,” said la Peyrade, hastily, “a sum of two thousand francs, which I received on my arrival in Paris from some unknown source—­”

“Came from me,” replied du Portail.  “Unfortunately, engaged at the time in a rush of important affairs, which you shall hear of later, I could not immediately follow up the benevolent interest I felt in you for your uncle’s sake; this explains why I left you in the straw of a garret, where you came, like a medlar, to that maturity of ruin which brought you under the hand of a Dutocq and a Cerizet.”

“I am none the less grateful to you, monsieur,” said la Peyrade; “and if I had known you were that generous protector, whom I was never able to discover, I should have been the first to seek occasion to meet you and to thank you.”

“A truce to compliments,” said du Portail; “and, to come at once to the serious side of our present conference, what should you say if I told you that this uncle, whose protection and assistance you came to Paris to obtain, was an agent of that occult power which has always been the theme of feeble ridicule and the object of silly prejudice?”

“I do not seize your meaning,” said la Peyrade, with uneasy curiosity; “may I ask you to be more precise?”