d mortification of Monsieur Ramin
were extreme. He could not understand how Bonelle, whom he had thought
ruined, had scraped up so large a sum; his lease was out, and he
now felt himself at the mercy of the man he had so much injured. But
either Monsieur Bonelle was free from vindictive feelings, or those
feelings did not blind him to the expediency of keeping a good tenant:
for though he raised the rent until Monsieur Ramin groaned inwardly,
he did not refuse to renew the lease. They had met at that period, but
never since.

"Well, Catharine," observed Monsieur Ramin to his old servant on the
following morning, "How is that good Monsieur Bonelle getting on?"

"I dare say you feel very uneasy about him," she replied with a sneer.

Monsieur Ramin looked up and frowned.

"Catharine," said he, dryly, "you will have the goodness, in the first
place, not to make impertinent remarks: in the second place, you will
oblige me by going up stairs to inquire after the health of Monsieur
Bonelle, and say that I sent you."

Catharine grumbled, and obeyed. Her master was in the shop, when she
returned in a few minutes, and delivered with evident satisfaction the
following gracious message:

"Monsieur Bonelle desires his compliments to you, and declines to
state how he is; he will also thank you to attend to your own shop,
and not to trouble yourself about his health."

"How does he look?" asked Monsieur Ramin, with perfect composure.

"I caught a glimpse of him, and he appears to me to be rapidly
preparing for the good offices of the undertaker."

Monsieur Ramin smiled, rubbed his hands, and joked merrily with a
dark-eyed _grisette_, who was cheapening some ribbon for her cap. That
girl made an excellent bargain that day.

Toward dusk the mercer left the shop to the care of his attendant, and
softly stole up to the fourth story. In answer to his gentle ring, a
little old woman opened the door, and giving him a rapid look, said
briefly:

"Monsieur is inexorable: he won't see any doctor whatever."

She was going to shut the door in his face, when Ramin quickly
interposed, under his breath, with "I am not a doctor."

She looked at him from head to foot.

"Are you a lawyer?"

"Nothing of the sort, my good lady."

"Well then, are you a priest?"

"I may almost say, quite the reverse."

"Indeed, you must go away, Master sees no one."

Once more she would have shut the door, but Ramin prevented her.

"My good lady,"