s will not trouble me again. I
shall want no more credit. I have some money of my own. Did ever any one
see a man like Gilliatt. I was struck down to the ground, I was a dead
man. He comes and sets me up again as firm as ever. And all the while I
was never thinking about him. He had gone clean out of my mind; but I
recollect everything now. Poor lad! Ah! by the way, you know you are to
marry Deruchette."

Gilliatt leaned with his back against the wall, like one who staggers,
and said in a tone very low, but distinct:

"No."

Mess Lethierry started.

"How, no!"

Gilliatt replied:

"I do not love her."

Mess Lethierry went to the window, opened and reclosed it, took the
three bank-notes, folded them, placed the iron box on top, scratched his
head, seized Clubin's belt, flung it violently against the wall, and
exclaimed:

"You must be mad."

He thrust his fists into his pockets, and exclaimed:

"You don't love Deruchette? What! was it at me, then, that you used to
play the bagpipe?"

Gilliatt, still supporting himself by the wall, turned pale, as a man
near his end. As he became pale, Lethierry became redder.

"There's an idiot for you! He doesn't love Deruchette. Very good; make
up your mind to love her, for she shall never marry any but you. A
devilish pretty story that; and you think that I believe you. If there
is anything really the matter with you, send for a doctor; but don't
talk nonsense. You can't have had time to quarrel, or get out of temper
with her. It is true that lovers are great fools sometimes. Come now,
what are your reasons? If you have any, say. People don't make geese of
themselves without reasons. But, I have wool in my ears; perhaps I
didn't understand. Repeat to me what you said."

Gilliatt replied:

"I said, No!"

"You said, No. He holds to it, the lunatic! You must be crazy. You said,
No. Here's a stupidity beyond anything ever heard of. Why, people have
had their heads shaved for much less than that. What! you don't like
Deruchette? Oh, then, it was out of affection for the old man that you
did all these things? It was for the sake of papa that you went to the
Douvres, that you endured cold and heat, and was half dead with hunger
and thirst, and ate the limpets off the rocks, and had the fog, the
rain, and the wind for your bedroom, and brought me back my machine,
just as you might bring a pretty woman her little canary that had
escaped from its cage. And the tempest that w