our ends."

"Of course,--better that than nothing."

"Well, then, here's what I advise. Don't let your peasant-woman lodge
her complaint before the criminal court, but make her place in the
hands of the president of the Chamber of deputies a simple request for
permission to proceed. Probably the permission will not be granted, and
the affair will have to stop at that stage; but the matter being once
made known will circulate through the Chambers, the newspapers will get
hold of it and make a stir, and the ministry, _sub rosa_, can envenom
the vague accusation through its friends."

"_Parbleu_! my dear fellow," cried Maxime, delighted to find a way
open to his hatred, "you've a strong head,--stronger than that of these
so-called statesmen. But this request for permission addressed to the
president of the Chamber, who is to draw it up?"

"Oh! not I," said Desroches, who did not wish to mix himself up any
farther in this low intrigue. "It isn't legal assistance that you
want; this is simply firing your first gun, and I don't undertake that
business. But you can find plenty of briefless barristers always ready
to put their finger in the political pie. Massol, for instance, can draw
it up admirably. But you must not tell him that the idea came from me."

"Oh! as for that," said Maxime, "I'll take it all on my own shoulders.
Perhaps in this form Rastignac may come round to the project."

"Yes, but take care you don't make an enemy of Vinet, who will think you
very impertinent to have an idea which ought, naturally, to have come
into the head of so great a parliamentary tactician as himself."

"Well, before long," said Maxime, rising, "I hope to bring the Vinets
and Rastignacs, and others like them, to heel. Where do you dine this
evening?" he added.

"In a cave," replied Desroches, "with a band."

"Where's that?"

"I suppose, in the course of your erotic existence, you have had
recourse to the good offices of a certain Madame de Saint-Esteve?"

"No," replied Maxime, "I have always done my own business in that line."

"True," said Desroches, "you conquer in the upper ranks, where, as a
general thing, they don't use go-betweens. But, at any rate, you have
heard of Madame de Saint-Esteve?"

"Of course; her establishment is in the rue Neuve-Saint-Marc, and it was
she who got that pot of money out of Nucingen for La Torpille. Isn't she
some relation to the chief of detective police, who bears the same name,
and used