I owe this little trick to my friend Claparon, who left me to bear the whole weight of the trouble about his stock-company, in which we were tricked by Conture, and I hope you may never be in that man’s skin!” he added, infernal hatred flashing from his worn and withered eyes.  “Now, I’ve said my say, gentlemen,” he continued, sending out his voice through his nasal holes, and taking a dramatic attitude; for once, at a moment of extreme penury, he had gone upon the stage.

As he finished making his proposition some one rang at the outer door, and la Peyrade rose to go and open it.  As soon as his back was turned, Cerizet said, hastily, to Dutocq:—­

“Are you sure of him?  I see a sort of air about him—­And I’m a good judge of treachery.”

“He is so completely in our power,” said Dutocq, “that I don’t trouble myself to watch; but, between ourselves, I didn’t think him as strong as he proves to be.  The fact is, we thought we were putting a barb between the legs of a man who didn’t know how to ride, and the rogue is an old jockey!”

“Let him take care,” growled Cerizet.  “I can blow him down like a house of cards any day.  As for you, papa Dutocq, you are able to see him at work all the time; watch him carefully.  Besides, I’ll feel his pulse by getting Claparon to propose to him to get rid of us; that will help us to judge him.”

“Pretty good, that!” said Dutocq.  “You are daring, anyhow.”

“I’ve got my hand in, that’s all,” replied Cerizet.

These words were exchanged in a low voice during the time that it took Theodose to go to the outer door and return.  Cerizet was looking at the books when the lawyer re-entered the room.

“It is Thuillier,” said Theodose.  “I thought he’d come; he is in the salon.  He mustn’t see Cerizet’s frock-coat; those frogs would frighten him.”

“Pooh! you receive the poor in your office, don’t you?  That’s in your role.  Do you want any money?” added Cerizet, pulling a hundred francs out of his trousers’ pocket.  “There it is; it won’t look amiss.”

And he laid the pile on the chimney-piece.

“And now,” said Dutocq, “we had better get out through the bedroom.”

“Well, good-bye,” said Theodose, opening a hidden door which communicated from the study to the bedroom.  “Come in, Monsieur Thuillier,” he called out to the beau of the Empire.

When he saw him safely in the study he went to let out his two associates through the bedroom and kitchen into the courtyard.

“In six months,” said Cerizet, “you’ll have married Celeste and got your foot into the stirrup.  You are lucky, you are, not to have sat, like me, in the prisoners’ dock.  I’ve been there twice:  once in 1825, for ‘subversive articles’ which I never wrote, and the second time for receiving the profits of a joint-stock company which had slipped through my fingers!  Come, let’s warm this thing up!  Sac-a-papier!  Dutocq and I are sorely in need of that twenty-five thousand francs.  Good courage, old fellow!” he added, holding out his hand to Theodose, and making the grasp a test of faithfulness.