that
circumstance was known, seemed to hear the name flung into his ear
in the midst of his despair by an inward voice, and he foresaw a
possibility of wrenching from the hands of Claparon the weapon with
which Cerizet had threatened him. He must, however, in the first
instance, gain an entrance to Desroches, and get some light on the
actual situation of his enemies. Godeschal, by reason of the intimacy
still existing between the former clerk and his old master, could be his
go-between. When the attorneys of Paris have ties like those which bound
Godeschal and Desroches together, they live in true fraternity, and the
result is a facility in arranging any matters which are, as one may say,
arrangeable. They obtain from one another, on the ground of reciprocity,
all possible concessions by the application of the proverb, "Pass me the
rhubarb, and I'll pass you the senna," which is put in practice in
all professions, between ministers, soldiers, judges, business men;
wherever, in short, enmity has not raised barriers too strong and high
between the parties.

"I gain a pretty good fee out of this compromise," is a reason that
needs no expression in words: it is visible in the gesture, the tone,
the glance; and as attorneys and solicitors meet constantly on this
ground, the matter, whatever it is, is arranged. The counterpoise
of this fraternal system is found in what we may call professional
conscience. The public must believe the physician who says, giving
medical testimony, "This body contains arsenic"; nothing is supposed to
exceed the integrity of the legislator, the independence of the cabinet
minister. In like manner, the attorney of Paris says to his brother
lawyer, good-humoredly, "You can't obtain that; my client is furious,"
and the other answers, "Very good; I must do without it."

Now, la Peyrade, a shrewd man, had worn his legal gown about the Palais
long enough to know how these judicial morals might be made to serve his
purpose.

"Sit in the carriage," he said to Thuillier, when they reached the rue
Vivienne, where Godeschal was now master of the practice he had formerly
served as clerk. "You needn't show yourself until he undertakes the
affair."

It was eleven o'clock at night; la Peyrade was not mistaken in supposing
that he should find a newly fledged master of a practice in his office
at that hour.

"To what do I owe this visit, monsieur?" said Godeschal, coming forward
to meet the barrister.

F