where he begged Vautrin, the
head of the detective department, to send him Madame de Saint-Esteve.

"We are forbidden, monsieur, to meddle in your affairs; but Madame de
Saint-Esteve is in business, and will attend to your orders," replied
this famous police officer.

On his return home, the unhappy lawyer was told that his mother's reason
was in danger. Doctor Bianchon, Doctor Larabit, and Professor Angard
had met in consultation, and were prepared to apply heroic remedies to
hinder the rush of blood to the head. At the moment when Victorin was
listening to Doctor Bianchon, who was giving him, at some length, his
reasons for hoping that the crisis might be got over, the man-servant
announced that a client, Madame de Saint-Esteve, was waiting to see him.
Victorin left Bianchon in the middle of a sentence and flew downstairs
like a madman.

"Is there any hereditary lunacy in the family?" said Bianchon,
addressing Larabit.

The doctors departed, leaving a hospital attendant, instructed by them,
to watch Madame Hulot.

"A whole life of virtue!----" was the only sentence the sufferer had
spoken since the attack.

Lisbeth never left Adeline's bedside; she sat up all night, and was much
admired by the two younger women.

"Well, my dear Madame de Saint-Esteve," said Victorin, showing the
dreadful old woman into his study and carefully shutting the doors, "how
are we getting on?"

"Ah, ha! my dear friend," said she, looking at Victorin with cold irony.
"So you have thought things over?"

"Have you done anything?"

"Will you pay fifty thousand francs?"

"Yes," replied Victorin, "for we must get on. Do you know that by one
single phrase that woman has endangered my mother's life and reason? So,
I say, get on."

"We have got on!" replied the old woman.

"Well?" cried Victorin, with a gulp.

"Well, you do not cry off the expenses?"

"On the contrary."

"They run up to twenty-three thousand francs already."

Victorin looked helplessly at the woman.

"Well, could we hoodwink you, you, one of the shining lights of the
law?" said she. "For that sum we have secured a maid's conscience and a
picture by Raphael.--It is not dear."

Hulot, still bewildered, sat with wide open eyes.

"Well, then," his visitor went on, "we have purchased the honesty of
Mademoiselle Reine Tousard, a damsel from whom Madame Marneffe has no
secrets--"

"I understand!"

"But if you shy, say so."

"I will play blindfold," he repli