could force me to accept."

"Precisely; therefore it is to your own good sense and intelligence that
I now address myself; but we have to come face to face with people
in order to speak to them, you know. Now, then, let us look into your
present situation, and don't get angry if, like a surgeon who wants to
cure his patient, I lay my hand mercilessly on wounds which have long
tormented and harassed you. The first point to state is that the Celeste
Colleville affair is at an end for you."

"Why so?" demanded la Peyrade.

"Because I have just seen Thuillier and terrified him with the history
of the misfortunes he has incurred, and those he will incur if he
persists in the idea of giving you his goddaughter in marriage. He knows
now that it was I who paralyzed Madame du Bruel's kind offices in the
matter of the cross; that I had his pamphlet seized; that I sent that
Hungarian woman into his house to handle you all, as she did; and that
my hand is opening fire in the ministerial journals, which will only
increase from bad to worse,--not to speak of other machinations which
will be directed against his candidacy. Therefore you see, my good
friend, that not only have you no longer the credit in Thuillier's eyes
of being his great helper to that election, but that you actually block
the way to his ambition. That is enough to prove to you that the side by
which you have imposed yourself on that family--who have never sincerely
liked or desired you--is now completely battered down and dismantled."

"But to have done all that which you claim with such pretension, who are
you?" demanded la Peyrade.

"I shall not say that you are very inquisitive, for I intend to answer
your question later; but for the present let us continue, if you please,
the autopsy of your existence, dead to-day, but which I propose to
resuscitate gloriously. You are twenty-eight years old, and you have
begun a career in which I shall not allow you to make another step. A
few days hence the Council of the order of barristers will assemble and
will censure, more or less severely, your conduct in the matter of
the property you placed with such candor in Thuillier's hands. Do not
deceive yourself; censure from that quarter (and I mention only your
least danger) is as fatal to a barrister as being actually disbarred."

"And it is to your kind offices, no doubt," said la Peyrade, "that I
shall owe that precious result?"

"Yes, I may boast of it," replied du