h the affair was presented to him it might surely be
considered provincial. Threatened with the loss of his position at the
bar, he was thus acquiring, as we said before, a new position and that
of a "detached fort"; compelled, as he might be, to defend himself, he
could from that vantage-ground take the offensive and oblige his enemies
to reckon with him.

On the Thuillier side, the newspaper would undoubtedly make him a
personage of considerable importance; he would have more power on the
election; and by involving their capital in an enterprise which,
without him, they would feel a gulf and a snare, he bound them to him
by self-interests so firmly that there was nothing to fear from their
caprice or ingratitude.

This horizon, rapidly taken in during Etienne Lousteau's visit, had
fairly dazzled the Provencal, and we have seen the peremptory manner
in which Thuillier was forced into accepting with some enthusiasm the
discovery of this philosopher's-stone.

The cost of the purchase was ridiculously insignificant. A bank-note for
five hundred francs, for which Etienne Lousteau never clearly accounted
to the share-holders, put Thuillier in possession of the name, property,
furniture, and good-will of the newspaper, which he and la Peyrade at
once busied themselves in reorganizing.

CHAPTER X. IN WHICH CERIZET PRACTISES THE HEALING ART AND

THE ART OF POISONING ON THE SAME DAY

While this regeneration was going on, Cerizet went one morning to see du
Portail, with whom la Peyrade was now more than ever determined to hold
no communication.

"Well," said the little old man to the poor man's banker, "what effect
did the news we gave to the president of the bar produce on our man? Did
the affair get wind at the Palais?"

"Phew!" said Cerizet, whose intercourse, no doubt pretty frequent, with
du Portail had put him on a footing of some familiarity with the old
man, "there's no question of that now. The eel has wriggled out of our
hands; neither softness nor violence has any effect upon that devil of
a man. He has quarrelled with the bar, and is in better odor than
ever with Thuillier. 'Necessity,' says Figaro, 'obliterates distance.'
Thuillier needs him to push his candidacy in the quartier Saint-Jacques,
so they kissed and made up."

"And no doubt," said du Portail, without much appearance of feeling,
"the marriage is fixed for an early day?"

"Yes," replied Cerizet, "but there's another piece of work on hand