He did not mention all that was needed, but nearly so, and a great deal too much for the people who stood by.  As a proof of this, the wife of the broker put grandly a five-franc piece on the mantlepiece, and quietly slipped out.  Some of the others followed her example; but they left nothing.  When Papa Ravinet had finished his little speech, there was nobody left but the two ladies who lived on the first floor, and the concierge and his wife.  The two ladies, moreover, looked at each other in great embarrassment, as if they did not know what their curiosity might cost them.  Had the shrewd man foreseen this noble abandonment of the poor girl?  One would have fancied so; for he smiled bitterly, and said,—­

“Excellent hearts—­pshaw!”

Then, shrugging his shoulders, he added,—­

“Luckily, I deal in all possible things.  Wait a minute.  I’ll run down stairs, and I’ll be back in a moment with all that is needed.  After that, we shall see what can be done.”

The face of the concierge’s wife was a picture.  Never in her life had she been so much astonished.

“They have changed Papa Ravinet, or I am mad.”

The fact is, that the man was not exactly considered a benevolent and generous mortal.  They told stories of him that would have made Harpagon envious, and touched the heart of a constable.

Nevertheless, he re-appeared soon after, almost succumbing under the weight of two excellent mattresses; and, when he came back a second time, he brought much more than he had mentioned.

Miss Henrietta was breathing more freely, but her face was still painfully rigid.  Life had come back before the mind had recovered; and it was evident that she was utterly unconscious of her situation, and of what was going on around her.  This troubled the two ladies not a little, although they felt very much relieved, and disposed to do everything, now that they were no longer expected to open their purses.

“Well, that is always the way,” said Papa Ravinet boldly.  “However, the doctor will bleed her, if there is any necessity.”

And, turning to Master Chevassat, he added,—­

“But we are in the way of these ladies; suppose we go down and take something?  We can come back when the child is comfortably put to bed.”

The good man lived, to tell the truth, in the same rooms in which the thousand and one things he was continually buying were piled up in vast heaps.  There was no fixed place for his bed even.  He slept where he could, or, rather, wherever an accidental sale had cleared a space for the time,—­one night in a costly bed of the days of Louis XIV., and the next night on a lounge that he would have sold for a few francs.  Just now he occupied a little closet not more than three-quarters full; and here he asked the concierge to enter.

He poured some brandy into two small wineglasses, put a teakettle on the fire, and sank into an arm-chair; then he said,—­