urned pale," said the count, "but he didn't say a word."

"Oh! his name is Thaddeus, is it?"

"Yes; Thaddeus folded the paper and gave it back to me, and then he
said: 'I thought, Adam, that we were one for life or death, and that we
should never part. Do you want to be rid of me?' 'Oh!' I said, 'if you
take it that way, Thaddeus, don't let us say another word about it. If
I ruin myself you shall be ruined too.' 'You haven't fortune enough to
live as a Laginski should,' he said, 'and you need a friend who will
take care of your affairs, and be a father and a brother and a trusty
confidant.' My dear child, as Paz said that he had in his look and
voice, calm as they were, a maternal emotion, and also the gratitude
of an Arab, the fidelity of a dog, the friendship of a savage,--not
displayed, but ever ready. Faith! I seized him, as we Poles do, with
a hand on each shoulder, and I kissed him on the lips. 'For life and
death, then! all that I have is yours--do what you will with it.' It was
he who found me this house and bought it for next to nothing. He sold my
Funds high and bought in low, and we have paid for this barrack with
the profits. He knows horses, and he manages to buy and sell at such
advantage that my stable really costs very little; and yet I have the
finest horses and the most elegant equipages in all Paris. Our servants,
brave Polish soldiers chosen by him, would go through fire and water
for us. I seem, as you say, to be ruining myself; and yet Paz keeps the
house with such method and economy that he has even repaired some of my
foolish losses at play,--the thoughtless folly of a young man. My dear,
Thaddeus is as shrewd as two Genoese, as eager for gain as a Polish Jew,
and provident as a good housekeeper. I never could force him to live as
I did when I was a bachelor. Sometimes I had to use a sort of friendly
coercion to make him go to the theatre with me when I was alone, or to
the jovial little dinners I used to give at a tavern. He doesn't like
social life."

"What does he like, then?" asked Clementine.

"Poland; he loves Poland and pines for it. His only spendings are
sums he gives, more in my name than in his own, to some of our poor
brother-exiles."

"Well, I shall love him, the fine fellow!" said the countess, "he looks
to me as simple-hearted as he is grand."

"All these pretty things you have about you," continued Adam, who
praised his friend in the noblest sincerity, "he picked up; he boug