pavement, and bringing
odours of spring mingled with the scent of _poudre de riz_.

Opposite the Ministry of Marine, a very high phaeton on light wheels,
rather like a great spider, its body represented by the little groom
hanging on to the box and the two persons occupying the front seat, just
missed a collision with the curb as it turned the corner.

The Nabob raised his head and stifled a cry.

Beside a painted woman, with red hair and wearing a tiny hat with wide
strings, who, perched on her leathern cushion, sat leaning stiffly
forward, hands, eyes, her whole factitious person intent on driving the
horse, there sat, pink and made-up also, grown fat with the same vices,
Moessard, the handsome Moessard--the harlot and the journalist; and of
the two, it was not the woman who had sold herself the most. High above
those women reclining in their open carriages, those men opposite them
half buried beneath the flounces of their gowns, all those poses of
fatigue and weariness which the overfed exhibit in public as in contempt
of pleasure and riches, they lorded it insolently, she very proud to be
seen driving with the lover of the Queen, and he without the least shame
in sitting beside a creature who hooked men in the drives of the Bois
with the lash of her whip, removed on her high-perched seat from all
fear of the salutary raids of the police. Perhaps, in order to whet the
appetite of his royal mistress, he chose to parade beneath her windows
in company of Suzanne Bloch, known as Suze the Red.

"Hep! hep, then!"

The horse, a high trotter with slim legs, just such a horse as a
_cocotte_ would care to own, recovered from its swerve and resumed its
proper place with dancing steps, graceful pawings executed on the same
spot without advancing. Jansoulet let fall his portfolio, and as though
he had dropped with it all his gravity, his prestige as a public man,
he made a terrible spring, and dashed to the bit of the animal, which he
held firm with his strong, hairy hands.

A carriage forcibly stopped in the Rue Royale, and in broad
daylight--only this Tartar would have dared such a stroke as that!

"Get down!" said he to Moessard, whose face had turned green and yellow
when he saw him. "Get down immediately!"

"Will you let go my horse, you bloated idiot! Whip up Suzanne; it is the
Nabob."

She tried to gather up the reins, but the animal, held firmly, reared
so sharply that a little more and like a sling the fragile