“You are right.”

“Don’t rob yourself; and let my dear little aunt here act in the same way in relation to the marriage contract.  Put the remainder of the capital in Madame Thuillier’s name, on the Grand Livre, and she can do what she likes with it.  We shall all live together as one family, and I’ll undertake to make my own fortune, now that I am free from anxiety about the future.”

“That suits me,” said Thuillier; “that’s the talk of an honest man.”

“Let me kiss you on the forehead, my son,” said the old maid; “but, inasmuch as Celeste cannot be allowed to go without a ‘dot,’ we shall give her sixty thousand francs.”

“For her dress,” said la Peyrade.

“We are all three persons of honor,” cried Thuillier.  “It is now settled, isn’t it?  You are to manage the purchase of the house; we are to write together, you and I, my political work; and you’ll bestir yourself to get me the decoration?”

“You will have that as soon as you are made a municipal councillor on the 1st of May.  Only, my good friend, I must beg you, and you, too, dear aunt, to keep the most profound secrecy about me in this affair; and do not listen to the calumnies which all the men I am about to trick will spread about me.  I shall become, you’ll see, a vagabond, a swindler, a dangerous man, a Jesuit, an ambitious fortune-hunter.  Can you hear those accusations against me with composure?”

“Fear nothing,” replied Brigitte.

CHAPTER XI

THE REIGN OF THEODOSE

From that day forth Thuillier became a dear, good friend.  “My dear, good friend,” was the name given to him by Theodose, with voice inflections of varieties of tenderness which astonished Flavie.  But “little aunt,” a name that flattered Brigitte deeply, was only given in family secrecy, and occasionally before Flavie.  The activity of Theodose and Dutocq, Cerizet, Barbet, Metivier, Minard, Phellion, Colleville, and others of the Thuillier circle was extreme.  Great and small, they all put their hands to the work.  Cadenet procured thirty votes in his section.  On the 30th of April Thuillier was proclaimed member of the Council-general of the department of the Seine by an imposing majority; in fact, he only needed sixty more votes to make his election unanimous.  May 1st Thuillier joined the municipal body and went to the Tuileries to congratulate the King on his fete-day, and returned home radiant.  He had gone where Minard went!

Ten days later a yellow poster announced the sale of the house, after due publication; the price named being seventy-five thousand francs; the final purchase to take place about the last of July.  On this point Cerizet and Claparon had an agreement by which Cerizet pledged the sum of fifteen thousand francs (in words only, be it understood) to Claparon in case the latter could deceive the notary and keep him quiet until the time expired during which he might withdraw