ome little work-girl. But where can he get the money
from? I could bet that he begs of his former mistresses--Mademoiselle
Jenny Cadine or Josepha."

The Baroness trembled more severely than ever; every nerve quivered;
she wiped away the tears that rose to her eyes and looked mournfully
up to heaven.

"I cannot think that a Grand Commander of the Legion of Honor will
have fallen so low," said she.

"For his pleasure what would he not do?" said Lisbeth. "He robbed the
State, he will rob private persons, commit murder--who knows?"

"Oh, Lisbeth!" cried the Baroness, "keep such thoughts to yourself."

At this moment Louise came up to the family group, now increased by
the arrival of the two Hulot children and little Wenceslas to see if
their grandmother's pockets did not contain some sweetmeats.

"What is it, Louise?" asked one and another.

"A man who wants to see Mademoiselle Fischer."

"Who is the man?" asked Lisbeth.

"He is in rags, mademoiselle, and covered with flue like a
mattress-picker; his nose is red, and he smells of brandy.--He is
one of those men who work half of the week at most."

This uninviting picture had the effect of making Lisbeth hurry into
the courtyard of the house in the Rue Louis-le-Grand, where she found
a man smoking a pipe colored in a style that showed him an artist in
tobacco.

"Why have you come here, Pere Chardin?" she asked. "It is understood
that you go, on the first Saturday in every month, to the gate of the
Hotel Marneffe, Rue Barbet-de-Jouy. I have just come back after
waiting there for five hours, and you did not come."

"I did go there, good and charitable lady!" replied the
mattress-picker. "But there was a game at pool going on at the Cafe
des Savants, Rue du Cerf-Volant, and every man has his fancy. Now, mine
is billiards. If it wasn't for billiards, I might be eating off silver
plate. For, I tell you this," and he fumbled for a scrap of paper in
his ragged trousers pocket, "it is billiards that leads on to a dram
and plum-brandy.--It is ruinous, like all fine things, in the things
it leads to. I know your orders, but the old 'un is in such a quandary
that I came on to forbidden grounds.--If the hair was all hair, we
might sleep sound on it; but it is mixed. God is not for all, as the
saying goes. He has His favorites--well, He has the right. Now, here
is the writing of your estimable relative and my very good friend--his
political opinion."

Chardin attempted