d be in a very tight place; we must do everything gently.
I believe you have won your picture by Raphael; but they tell me it is
only a Mignard. Never mind, it is much prettier; all the Raphaels are
gone black, I am told, whereas this one is as bright as a Girodet."

"All I want is to crow over Josepha; and it is all the same to me
whether I have a Mignard or a Raphael!--That thief had on such pearls
this evening!--you would sell your soul for them."

Cydalise, Montes, and Madame Nourrisson got into a hackney coach that
was waiting at the door. Madame Nourrisson whispered to the driver the
address of a house in the same block as the Italian Opera House, which
they could have reached in five or six minutes from the Rue
Saint-Georges; but Madame Nourrisson desired the man to drive along
the Rue le Peletier, and to go very slowly, so as to be able to examine
the carriages in waiting.

"Brazilian," said the old woman, "look out for your angel's carriage
and servants."

The Baron pointed out Valerie's carriage as they passed it.

"She has told them to come for her at ten o'clock, and she is gone in
a cab to the house where she visits Count Steinbock. She has dined
there, and will come to the Opera in half an hour.--It is well
contrived!" said Madame Nourrisson. "Thus you see how she has kept you
so long in the dark."

The Brazilian made no reply. He had become the tiger, and had
recovered the imperturbable cool ferocity that had been so striking at
dinner. He was as calm as a bankrupt the day after he has stopped
payment.

At the door of the house stood a hackney coach with two horses, of the
kind known as a _Compagnie Generale_, from the Company that runs them.

"Stay here in the box," said the old woman to Montes. "This is not an
open house like a tavern. I will send for you."

The paradise of Madame Marneffe and Wenceslas was not at all like that
of Crevel--who, finding it useless now, had just sold his to the Comte
Maxime de Trailles. This paradise, the paradise of all comers,
consisted of a room on the fourth floor opening to the landing, in a
house close to the Italian Opera. On each floor of this house there
was a room which had originally served as the kitchen to the
apartments on that floor. But the house having become a sort of inn,
let out for clandestine love affairs at an exorbitant price, the
owner, the real Madame Nourrisson, an old-clothes buyer in the Rue
Nueve Saint-Marc, had wisely appreciated t