“The police?” interrupted the baker, “the seals?  What do I care for that?  It’s my money I want:  do you hear?  Justice is going to take a hand in it, is it?  Arrest your father, try him?  What good will that do me?  He will be condemned to two or three years’ imprisonment.  Will that give me a cent?  He will serve out his time quietly; and, when he gets out of prison, he’ll get hold of the pile that he’s got hidden somewhere; and while I starve, he’ll spend my money under my very nose.  No, no!  Things won’t suit me that way.  It’s at once that I want to be paid.”

And throwing himself upon a chair his head back, and his legs stretched forward—­

“And what’s more,” he declared, “I am not going out of here until I am paid.”

It was not without the greatest efforts that Maxence managed to keep his temper.

“Your insults are useless, sir,” he commenced.

The man jumped up from his seat.

“Insults!” he cried in a voice that could have been heard all through the house.  “Do you call it an insult when a man claims his own?  If you think you can make me hush, you are mistaken in your man, M. Favoral, Jun.  I am not rich myself:  my father has not stolen to leave me an income.  It is not in gambling at the bourse that I made these ten thousand francs.  It is by the sweat of my body, by working hard night and day for years, by depriving myself of a glass of wine when I was thirsty.  And I am to lose them?  By the holy name of heaven, we’ll have to see about that!  If everybody was like me, there would not be so many scoundrels going about, their pockets filled with other people’s money, and from the top of their carriage laughing at the poor fools they have ruined.  Come, my ten thousand francs, canaille, or I take my pay on your back.”

Maxence, enraged, was about to throw himself upon the man, and a disgusting struggle was about to begin, when Mlle. Gilberte stepped between them.

“Your threats are as cowardly as your insults, Monsieur Bertan,” she uttered in a quivering voice.  “You have known us long enough to be aware that we know nothing of our father’s business, and that we have nothing ourselves.  All we can do is to give up to our creditors our very last crumb.  Thus it shall be done.  And now, sir, please retire.”

There was so much dignity in her sorrow, and so imposing was her attitude, that the baker stood abashed.

“Ah! if that’s the way,” he stammered awkwardly; “and since you meddle with it, mademoiselle—­” And he retreated precipitately, growling at the same time threats and excuses, and slamming the doors after him hard enough to break the partitions.

“What a disgrace!” murmured Mme. Favoral.  Crushed by this last scene, she was choking; and her children had to carry her to the open window.  She recovered almost at once; but thus, through the darkness, bleak and cold, she had like a vision of her husband; and, throwing herself back,