He succeeded at length in obtaining permission to see Florent; but on his return from Bicetre he was obliged to take to his bed.  For nearly three weeks he lay fever-stricken, in a stupefied, comatose state.  Gradelle meantime called down all sorts of maledictions on his republican nephew; and one morning, when he heard of Florent’s departure for Cayenne, he went upstairs, tapped Quenu on the hands, awoke him, and bluntly told him the news, thereby bringing about such a reaction that on the following day the young man was up and about again.  His grief wore itself out, and his soft flabby flesh seemed to absorb his tears.  A month later he laughed again, and then grew vexed and unhappy with himself for having been merry; but his natural light-heartedness soon gained the mastery, and he laughed afresh in unconscious happiness.

He now learned his uncle’s business, from which he derived even more enjoyment than from cookery.  Gradelle told him, however, that he must not neglect his pots and pans, that it was rare to find a pork butcher who was also a good cook, and that he had been lucky in serving in a restaurant before coming to the shop.  Gradelle, moreover, made full use of his nephew’s acquirements, employed him to cook the dinners sent out to certain customers, and placed all the broiling, and the preparation of pork chops garnished with gherkins in his special charge.  As the young man was of real service to him, he grew fond of him after his own fashion, and would nip his plump arms when he was in a good humour.  Gradelle had sold the scanty furniture of the room in the Rue Royer Collard and retained possession of the proceeds—­some forty francs or so—­in order, said he, to prevent the foolish lad, Quenu, from making ducks and drakes of the cash.  After a time, however, he allowed his nephew six francs a month a pocket-money.

Quenu now became quite happy, in spite of the emptiness of his purse and the harshness with which he was occasionally treated.  He liked to have life doled out to him; Florent had treated him too much like an indolent girl.  Moreover, he had made a friend at his uncle’s.  Gradelle, when his wife died, had been obliged to engage a girl to attend to the shop, and had taken care to choose a healthy and attractive one, knowing that a good-looking girl would set off his viands and help to tempt custom.  Amongst his acquaintances was a widow, living in the Rue Cuvier, near the Jardin des Plantes, whose deceased husband had been postmaster at Plassans, the seat of a sub-prefecture in the south of France.  This lady, who lived in a very modest fashion on a small annuity, had brought with her from Plassans a plump, pretty child, whom she treated as her own daughter.  Lisa, as the young one was called, attended upon her with much placidity and serenity of disposition.  Somewhat seriously inclined, she looked quite beautiful when she smiled.  Indeed, her great charm came from the exquisite manner in which she allowed this infrequent smile of hers to escape her.  Her eyes then became most caressing, and her habitual gravity imparted inestimable value to these sudden, seductive flashes.  The old lady had often said that one of Lisa’s smiles would suffice to lure her to perdition.