“What object have you?” said the old man, preparing to go down the steps from the cloister of the Chartreux which leads from the great alley of the Luxembourg to the rue d’Enfer.

“Did you never, in your public functions, oblige any one?”

The old man looked at Godefroid with frowning brows; his eyes were full of memories, like a man who turns the leaves of his book of life, seeking for the action to which he owed this gratitude; then he turned away coldly, with a bow, full of doubt.

“Well, for a first investigation I did not frighten him too much,” thought Godefroid.

XIII

FURTHER INVESTIGATIONS

Godefroid now went to the rue d’Enfer, the address given him by Monsieur Alain, and there found Dr. Berton, a cold, grave man, who astonished him much by confirming all the details given by Monsieur Bernard about his daughter’s illness.  From him Godefroid obtained the address of Halpersohn.

This Polish doctor, since so celebrated, then lived in Chaillot, rue Marbeuf, in an isolated house where he occupied the first floor.  General Romanus Zarnowski lived on the second floor, and the servants of the two refugees inhabited the garret of this little house, which had but two stories.  Godefroid did not find Halpersohn, and was told that he had gone into the provinces, sent for by a rich patient; he was almost glad not to meet him, for in his hurry he had forgotten to supply himself with money; and he now went back to the hotel de la Chanterie to get some.

These various trips and the time consumed in dining at a restaurant in the rue de l’Odeon brought Godefroid to the hour when he said he would return and take possession of his lodging on the boulevard du Mont-Parnasse.  Nothing could be more forlorn than the manner in which Madame Vauthier had furnished the two rooms.  It seemed as though the woman let rooms with the express purpose that no one should stay in them.  Evidently the bed, chairs, tables, bureau, secretary, curtains, came from forced sales at auction, articles massed together in lots as having no separate intrinsic value.

Madame Vauthier, with her hands on her hips, stood waiting for thanks; she took Godefroid’s smile for one of surprise.

“There!  I picked out for you the very best we have, my dear Monsieur Godefroid,” she said with a triumphant air.  “See those pretty silk curtains, and the mahogany bedstead which hasn’t got a worm-hole in it!  It formerly belonged to the Prince of Wissembourg.  When he left his house, rue Louis-le-Grand, in 1809, I was the kitchen-girl.  From there, I went to live as cook with the present owner of this house.”

Godefroid stopped the flux of confidences by paying a month’s rent in advance; and he also gave, in advance, the six francs he was to pay Madame Vauthier for the care of his rooms.  At that moment he heard barking, and if he had not been duly warned by Monsieur Bernard, he would certainly have supposed that his neighbor kept a dog.