how it is."

"Do you mind losing a couple of thousand francs, Lucien?" asked
Lousteau.

"Yes!" Lucien answered vehemently. He was dismayed by this first rebuff.

"You are making a mistake," said Etienne.

"You won't find any one that will take their paper," said Barbet. "Your
book is their last stake, sir. The printer will not trust them; they are
obliged to leave the copies in pawn with him. If they make a hit now, it
will only stave off bankruptcy for another six months, sooner or later
they will have to go. They are cleverer at tippling than at bookselling.
In my own case, their bills mean business; and that being so, I can
afford to give more than a professional discounter who simply looks at
the signatures. It is a bill-discounter's business to know whether
the three names on a bill are each good for thirty per cent in case of
bankruptcy. And here at the outset you only offer two signatures, and
neither of them worth ten per cent."

The two journalists exchanged glances in surprise. Here was a little
scrub of a bookseller putting the essence of the art and mystery of
bill-discounting in these few words.

"That will do, Barbet," said Lousteau. "Can you tell us of a bill-broker
that will look at us?"

"There is Daddy Chaboisseau, on the Quai Saint-Michel, you know. He
tided Fendant over his last monthly settlement. If you won't listen to
my offer, you might go and see what he says to you; but you would only
come back to me, and then I shall offer you two thousand francs instead
of three."

Etienne and Lucien betook themselves to the Quai Saint-Michel, and
found Chaboisseau in a little house with a passage entry. Chaboisseau,
a bill-discounter, whose dealings were principally with the book trade,
lived in a second-floor lodging furnished in the most eccentric manner.
A brevet-rank banker and millionaire to boot, he had a taste for the
classical style. The cornice was in the classical style; the bedstead,
in the purest classical taste, dated from the time of the Empire, when
such things were in fashion; the purple hangings fell over the wall
like the classic draperies in the background of one of David's pictures.
Chairs and tables, lamps and sconces, and every least detail had
evidently been sought with patient care in furniture warehouses. There
was the elegance of antiquity about the classic revival as well as its
fragile and somewhat arid grace. The man himself, like his manner of
life, was in grotesque co