ems to have accompanied her, she spread about reports
which are very damaging to my worthy colleague in the Chamber. She said,
for instance, that it was not true that the Marquis de Sallenauve was
his father; that it was not even true that the Marquis de Sallenauve was
still living; and moreover that the spurious Sallenauve was a man of no
heart, who had repudiated his real parents,--adding that she could, by
the help of the able man who accompanied her, compel him to disgorge the
Sallenauve property and 'clear out' of the place."

"I have no objection to that," said Rastignac; "but this woman must, of
course, have papers to prove her allegations?"

"That is the weak point of the matter," replied Vinet. "But let me go
on with my story. The government has at Arcis a most intelligent and
devoted functionary in the commissary of police. Circulating among the
groups, as he usually does on market days, he heard these statements
of the peasant-woman, and reported them at once, not to the mayor, who
might not have heeded them, but to Madame Beauvisage."

"_Ah ca_!" said Rastignac, addressing Maxime; "was the candidate you
gave us such a dolt as that?"

"Just the man you needed," replied Maxime,--"silly to the last degree,
and capable of being wound round anybody's finger. I'll go any lengths
to repair that loss."

"Madame Beauvisage," continued Vinet, "wished to speak with the woman
herself, and she ordered Groslier--that's the commissary of police--to
fetch her with a threatening air to the mayor's office, so as to give
her an idea that the authorities disapproved of her conduct."

"Did Madame Beauvisage concoct that plan?" asked Rastignac.

"Yes," replied Maxime, "she is a very clever woman."

"Questioned closely by the mayoress," continued Vinet, "who took care to
have the mayor present, the peasant-woman was far from categorical. Her
grounds for asserting that the new deputy could not be the son of the
marquis, and the assurance with which she stated that the latter had
long been dead were not, as it appears, very clearly established; vague
rumors and the deductions drawn by the village practitioner seem to be
all there was to them."

"Then," said Rastignac, "what does all this lead to?"

"Absolutely nothing from a legal point of view," replied the
attorney-general; "for supposing the woman were able to establish the
fact that this recognition of the said Dorlange was a mere pretence, she
has no status on which