The door was at this moment opened quietly, and Van Klopen appeared on the threshold.  He was about forty-four, and too stout for his height.  His red, pimply face had an expression upon it of extreme insolence, and his accent was thoroughly Dutch.  He was dressed in a ruby velvet dressing-gown, with a cravat with lace ends.  A huge cluster-diamond ring blazed on his coarse, red hand.

“Who is the next one?” asked he, rudely.

The lady who had been talking so volubly rose to her feet, but the tailor cut her short, for catching sight of Mascarin, he crossed the room, and greeted him with the utmost cordiality.

“What!” said he; “is it you that I have been keeping waiting?  Pray pardon me.  Pray go into my private room; and this gentleman is with you?  Do me the favor, sir, to come with us.”

He was about to follow his guests, when one of the ladies started forward.

“One word with you, sir, for goodness sake!” cried she.

Van Klopen turned sharply upon her.

“What is the matter?” asked he.

“My bill for three thousand francs falls due to-morrow.”

“Very likely.”

“But I can’t meet it.”

“That is not my affair.”

“I have come to beg you will renew it for two months, or say one month, on whatever terms you like.”

“In two months,” answered the man brutally, “you will be no more able to pay than you are to-day.  If you can’t pay it, it will be noted.”

“Merciful powers! then my husband will learn all.”

“Just so; that will be what I want; for he will then have to pay me.”

The wretched woman grew deadly pale.

“My husband will pay you,” said she; “but I shall be lost.”

“That is not my lookout.  I have partners whose interests I have to consult.”

“Do not say that, sir!  He has paid my debts once, and if he should be angry and take my children from me—­Dear M. Van Klopen, be merciful!”

She wrung her hands, and the tears coursed down her cheeks; but the tailor was perfectly unmoved.

“When a woman has a family of children, one ought to have in a needlewoman by the hour.”

She did not desist from her efforts to soften him, and, seizing his hand, strove to carry it to her lips.

“Ah!  I shall never dare to go home,” wailed she; “never have the courage to tell my husband.”

“If you are afraid of your own husband, go to some one else’s,” said he roughly; and tearing himself from her, he followed Mascarin and Paul.

“Did you hear that?” asked he, as soon as he had closed the door of his room with an angry slam.  “These things occasionally occur, and are not particularly pleasant.”

Paul looked on in disgust.  If he had possessed three thousand francs, he would have given them to this unhappy woman, whose sobs he could still hear in the passage.

“It is most painful,” remarked he.