Who has not seen him, happy and smiling, his eye bright, and his lip ruddy, notwithstanding his fifty years, walking on the sunny side of the Boulevard, with his royal blue jacket and his eternal white vest?  He is passionately fond of everything that tends to make life pleasant and easy; dines at Bignon’s, or the Cafe Anglais; plays baccarat at the club with extraordinary luck; has the most comfortable apartment and the most elegant coupe in all Paris.  With all this, he is pleased to declare that he is the happiest of men, and is certainly one of the most popular; for he cannot walk three blocks on the Boulevard without lifting his hat at least fifty times, and shaking hands twice as often.

And when any one asks, “What does he do?” the invariable answer is, “Why he operates.”

To explain what sort of operations, would not be, perhaps, very easy.  In the world of rogues, there are some rogues more formidable and more skillful than the rest, who always manage to escape the hand of the law.  They are not such fools as to operate in person,—­not they!  They content themselves with watching their friends and comrades.  If a good haul is made, at once they appear and claim their share.  And, as they always threaten to inform, there is no help for it but to let them pocket the clearest of the profit.

Well, in a more elevated sphere, in the world of speculation, it is precisely that lucrative and honorable industry which M. d’Escajoul carries on.  Thoroughly master of his ground, possessing a superior scent and an imperturbable patience, always awake, and continually on the watch, he never operates unless he is sure to win.

And the day when the manager of some company has violated his charter or stretched the law a little too far, he may be sure to see M. d’Escajoul appear, and ask for some little—­advantages, and proffer, in exchange, the most thorough discretion, and even his kind offices.

Two or three of his friends have heard him say,

“Who would dare to blame me?  It’s very moral, what I am doing.”

Such is the man who came in, smiling, just as Maxence and Marius de Tregars had sat down at the table.  M. de Tregars rose to receive him.

“You will breakfast with us?” he said.

“Thank you,” answered M. d’Escajoul.  “I breakfasted precisely at eleven, as usual.  Punctuality is a politeness which a man owes to his stomach.  But I will accept with pleasure a drop of that old Cognac which you offered me the other evening.”

He took a seat; and the valet brought him a glass, which he set on the edge of the table.  Then,

“I have just seen our man,” he said.

Maxence understood that he was referring to M. de Thaller.

“Well?” inquired M. de Tregars.

“Impossible to get any thing out of him.  I turned him over and over, every way.  Nothing!”

“Indeed!”

“It’s so; and you know if I understand the business.  But what can you say to a man who answers you all the time, ’The matter is in the hands of the law; experts have been named; I have nothing to fear from the most minute investigations’?”