l farms,
ten acres of meadowland here, and not a sou besides----"

"Nothing on earth," cried David Sechard, "would induce me to tell a lie,
and less to a question of money than on any other.--Monsieur," he
said, turning to Corentin and Derville, "my father left us, besides the
land----"

Courtois and Cachan signaled in vain to Sechard; he went on:

"Three hundred thousand francs, which raises the whole estate to about
five hundred thousand francs."

"Monsieur Cachan," asked Eve Sechard, "what proportion does the law
allot to a natural child?"

"Madame," said Corentin, "we are not Turks; we only require you to swear
before these gentlemen that you did not inherit more than five
hundred thousand francs from your father-in-law, and we can come to an
understanding."

"First give me your word of honor that you really are a lawyer," said
Cachan to Derville.

"Here is my passport," replied Derville, handing him a paper folded in
four; "and monsieur is not, as you might suppose, an inspector from the
Treasury, so be easy," he added. "We had an important reason for wanting
to know the truth as to the Sechard estate, and we now know it."

Derville took Madame Sechard's hand and led her very courteously to the
further end of the room.

"Madame," said he, in a low voice, "if it were not that the honor
and future prospects of the house of Grandlieu are implicated in this
affair, I would never have lent myself to the stratagem devised by this
gentleman of the red ribbon. But you must forgive him; it was necessary
to detect the falsehood by means of which your brother has stolen a
march on the beliefs of that ancient family. Beware now of allowing it
to be supposed that you have given your brother twelve hundred thousand
francs to repurchase the Rubempre estates----"

"Twelve hundred thousand francs!" cried Madame Sechard, turning pale.
"Where did he get them, wretched boy?"

"Ah! that is the question," replied Derville. "I fear that the source of
his wealth is far from pure."

The tears rose to Eve's eyes, as her neighbors could see.

"We have, perhaps, done you a great service by saving you from abetting
a falsehood of which the results may be positively dangerous," the
lawyer went on.

Derville left Madame Sechard sitting pale and dejected with tears on her
cheeks, and bowed to the company.

"To Mansle!" said Corentin to the little boy who drove the chaise.

There was but one vacant place in the diligence from