who thought I was getting a good thing!—­and paid a hundred thousand down.  I have no receipt; the creditors will think I am an accomplice if I say a word about that hundred thousand francs, and when a man is starting in life he must be careful of his reputation.  There will hardly be thirty per cent saved for the creditors.  At my age, to get such a set-back!  A man fifty-nine years of age to keep a mistress! the old villain!  It is only two weeks since he told me not to marry Cesarine; he said you would soon be without bread,—­the monster!”

Alexandre might have talked on indefinitely, for Birotteau stood still, petrified.  Every phrase was a calamity, like the blows of a bludgeon.  He heard the death-bells tolling in his ears,—­just as his eyes had seen, at the first word, the flames of his fortune.  Alexandre Crottat, who thought the worthy perfumer a strong and able man, was alarmed at his paleness and rigidity.  He was not aware that Roguin had carried off Cesar’s whole property.  The thought of immediate suicide passed through the brain of the victim, deeply religious as he was.  In such a case suicide is only a way to escape a thousand deaths; it seems logical to take it.  Alexandre Crottat gave him his arm, and tried to make him walk on, but it was impossible:  his legs gave way under him as if he were drunk.

“What is the matter?” said Crottat.  “Dear Monsieur Cesar, take courage! it is not the death of a man.  Besides, you will get back your forty thousand francs.  The lender hadn’t the money ready, you never received it,—­that is sufficient to set aside the agreement.”

“My ball—­my cross—­two hundred thousand francs in paper on the market,—­no money in hand!  The Ragons, Pillerault,—­and my wife, who saw true—­”

A rain of confused words, revealing a weight of crushing thoughts and unutterable suffering, poured from his lips, like hail lashing the flowers in the garden of “The Queen of Roses.”

“I wish they would cut off my head,” he said at last; “its weight troubles me, it is good for nothing.”

“Poor Pere Birotteau,” said Alexandre, “are you in danger?”

“Danger!”

“Well, take courage; make an effort.”

“Effort!”

“Du Tillet was your clerk; he has a good head; he will help you.”

“Du Tillet!”

“Come, try to walk.”

“My God!  I cannot go home as I am,” said Birotteau.  “You who are my friend, if there are friends,—­you in whom I took an interest, who have dined at my house,—­take me somewhere in a carriage, for my wife’s sake.  Xandrot, go with me!”

The young notary compassionately put the inert mechanism which bore the name of Cesar into a street coach, not without great difficulty.

“Xandrot,” said the perfumer, in a voice choked with tears,—­for the tears were now falling from his eyes, and loosening the iron band which bound his brow,—­“stop at my shop; go in and speak to Celestin for me.  My friend, tell him it is a matter of life or death, that on no consideration must he or any one talk about Roguin’s flight.  Tell Cesarine to come down to me, and beg her not to say a word to her mother.  We must beware of our best friends, of Pillerault, Ragon, everybody.”