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“To the confusion of the debtor?” asked Malaga, lending an attentive ear to this discourse.

“No, the confusion of rights of debtor and creditor, and pay yourself through your own hands. So Claparon’s innocence in merely issuing writs of attachment eased the Count’s mind. As he came back from the Varietes with Antonia, he was so much the more taken with the idea of selling the reading-room to pay off the last two thousand francs of the purchase-money, because he did not care to have his name made public as a partner in such a concern. So he adopted Antonia’s plan. Antonia wished to reach the higher ranks of her calling, with splendid rooms, a maid, and a carriage; in short, she wanted to rival our charming hostess, for instance–“

“She was not woman enough for that,” cried the famous beauty of the Circus; “still, she ruined young d’Esgrignon very neatly.”

“Ten days afterwards, little Croizeau, perched on his dignity, said almost exactly the same thing, for the fair Antonia’s benefit,” continued Desroches.

” ‘Child,’ said he, ‘your reading-room is a hole of a place. You will lose your complexion; the gas will ruin your eyesight. You ought to come out of it; and, look here, let us take advantage of an opportunity. I have found a young lady for you that asks no better than to buy your reading-room. She is a ruined woman with nothing before her but a plunge into the river; but she had four thousand francs in cash, and the best thing to do is to turn them to account, so as to feed and educate a couple of children.’

” ‘Very well. It is kind of you, Daddy Croizeau,’ said Antonia.

” ‘Oh, I shall be much kinder before I have done. Just imagine it, poor M. Denisart has been worried into the jaundice! Yes, it has gone to the liver, as it usually does with susceptible old men. It is a pity he feels things so. I told him so myself; I said, “Be passionate, there is no harm in that, but as for taking things to heart–draw the line at that! It is the way to kill yourself.”–Really, I would not have expected him to take on so about it; a man that has sense enough and experience enough to keep away as he does while he digests his dinner–‘

” ‘But what is the matter?’ inquired Mlle. Chocardelle.

” ‘That little baggage with whom I dined has cleared out and left him! . . . Yes. Gave him the slip without any warning but a letter, in which the spelling was all to seek.’

” ‘There, Daddy Croizeau, you see what comes of boring a woman–‘

” ‘It is indeed a lesson, my pretty lady,’ said the guileful Croizeau. ‘Meanwhile, I have never seen a man in such a state. Our friend Denisart cannot tell his left hand from his right; he will not go back to look at the “scene of his happiness,” as he calls it. He has so thoroughly lost his wits, that he proposes that I should buy all Hortense’s furniture (Hortense was her name) for four thousand francs.’

” ‘A pretty name,’ said Antonia.

” Yes. Napoleon’s stepdaughter was called Hortense. I built carriages for her, as you know.’

” ‘Very well, I will see,’ said cunning Antonia; ‘begin by sending this young woman to me.’

“Antonia hurried off to see the furniture, and came back fascinated. She brought Maxime under the spell of antiquarian enthusiasm. That very evening the Count agreed to the sale of the reading-room. The establishment, you see, nominally belonged to Mlle. Chocardelle. Maxime burst out laughing at the idea of little Croizeau’s finding him a buyer. The firm of Maxime and Chocardelle was losing two thousand francs, it is true, but what was the loss compared with four glorious thousand-franc notes in hand? ‘Four thousand francs of live coin!– there are moments in one’s life when one would sign bills for eight thousand to get them,’ as the Count said to me.