after her interests with the most honorable intentions. Do you believe
that the proud Duchesse de Chaulieu would cast a favorable eye on the
happiness of Madame de Canalis if her waiting-woman, who is in love with
Monsieur Germain, not liking that charming valet's absence in Havre,
were to say to her mistress while brushing her hair--"

"Who do you know about all this?" said La Briere, interrupting Butscha.

"In the first place, I am clerk to a notary," answered Butscha. "But
haven't you seen my hump? It is full of resources, monsieur. I have made
myself cousin to Mademoiselle Philoxene Jacmin, born at Honfleur, where
my mother was born, a Jacmin,--there are eight branches of the Jacmins
at Honfleur. So my cousin Philoxene, enticed by the bait of a highly
improbable fortune, has told me a good many things."

"The duchess is vindictive?" said La Briere.

"Vindictive as a queen, Philoxene says; she has never yet forgiven the
duke for being nothing more than her husband," replied Butscha. "She
hates as she loves. I know all about her character, her tastes, her
toilette, her religion, and her manners; for Philoxene stripped her for
me, soul and corset. I went to the opera expressly to see her, and I
didn't grudge the ten francs it cost me--I don't mean the play. If my
imaginary cousin had not told me the duchess had seen her fifty summers,
I should have thought I was over-generous in giving her thirty; she has
never known a winter, that duchess!"

"Yes," said La Briere, "she is a cameo--preserved because it is stone.
Canalis would be in a bad way if the duchess were to find out what he
is doing here; and I hope, monsieur, that you will go no further in this
business of spying, which is unworthy of an honest man."

"Monsieur," said Butscha, proudly; "for me Modeste is my country. I do
not spy; I foresee, I take precautions. The duchess will come here if
it is desirable, or she will stay tranquilly where she is, according to
what I judge best."

"You?"

"I."

"And how, pray?"

"Ha, that's it!" said the little hunchback, plucking a blade of grass.
"See here! this herb believes that men build palaces for it to grow in;
it wedges its way between the closest blocks of marble, and brings
them down, just as the masses forced into the edifice of feudality have
brought it to the ground. The power of the feeble life that can creep
everywhere is greater than that of the mighty behind their cannons. I
am one of three who hav