“That is fair,” said Monsieur Bernard, who seemed rather pleased to find himself the object of a competition by which he might profit.  “Do you know what my work is?”

“No; I only know it is a good enterprise from a business point of view.”

“It is only half-past nine, my daughter has breakfasted, and Cartier will not bring the flowers for an hour or more; we have time to talk, Monsieur—­Monsieur who?”

“Godefroid.”

“Monsieur Godefroid, the work in question was projected by me in 1825, at the time when the ministry, being alarmed by the persistent destruction of landed estates, proposed that law of primogeniture which was, you will remember, defeated.  I had remarked certain imperfections in our codes and in the fundamental institutions of France.  Our codes have often been the subject of important works, but those works were all from the point of view of jurisprudence.  No one had even ventured to consider the work of the Revolution, or (if you prefer it) of Napoleon, as a whole; no one had studied the spirit of those laws, and judged them in their application.  That is the main purpose of my work; it is entitled, provisionally, ’The Spirit of the New Laws;’ it includes organic laws as well as codes, all codes; for we have many more than five codes.  Consequently, my work is in several volumes; six in all, the last being a volume of citations, notes, and references.  It will take me now about three months to finish it.  The proprietor of this house, a former publisher, of whom I made a few inquiries, perceived, scented I may say, the chance of a speculation.  I, in the first instance, thought only of doing a service to my country, and not of my own profit.  Well, this Barbet has circumvented me.  You will ask me how it was possible for a publisher to get the better of a magistrate, a man who knows the laws.  Well, it was in this way:  You know my history; Barbet is an usurer; he has the keen glance and the shrewd action of that breed of men.  His money was always at my heels to help me over my worst needs.  Strange to say, on the days I was most defenceless against despair he happened to appear.”

“No, no, my dear Monsieur Bernard,” said Godefroid, “he had a spy in Madame Vauthier; she told him when you needed money.  But the terms, the conditions?  Tell them to me briefly.”

“He has lent me from time to time fifteen hundred francs, for which I have signed three notes of a thousand francs each, and those notes are secured by a sort of mortgage on the copyright of my book, so that I cannot sell my book unless I pay off those notes, and the notes are now protested,—­he has taken the matter into court and obtained a judgment against me.  Such are the complications of poverty!  At the lowest valuation, the first edition of my great work, a work representing ten years’ toil and thirty-six years’ experience, is fully worth ten thousand francs.  Well, ten days ago Morand proposed to give me three thousand francs and my notes