addeus. "When he knew we were here
together, he said to me: 'Bring him, he is a charming fellow who plies
a great fork; and bring that dear man Ivan Petrovitch, and all your
friends.'"

"Oh, I only dined at his house," grumbled Athanase, "because there was a
favor he was going to do me."

"He does services for everybody, that man," observed Ivan Petrovitch.

"Of course, of course; he ought to," retorted Athanase. "What is a chief
of Secret Service for if not to do things for everybody? For everybody,
my dear friends, and a little for himself besides. A chief of Secret
Service has to be in with everybody, with everybody and his father,
as La Fontaine says (if you know that author), if he wants to hold his
place. You know what I mean."

Athanase laughed loudly, glad of the chance to show how French he could
be in his allusions, and looked at Rouletabille to see if he had been
able to catch the tone of the conversation; but Rouletabille was too
much occupied in watching a profile wrapped in a mantilla of black lace,
in the Spanish fashion, to repay Athanase's performance with a knowing
smile.

"You certainly have naive notions. You think a chief of Secret Police
should be an ogre," replied the advocate as he nodded here and there to
his friends.

"Why, certainly not. He needs to be a sheep in a place like that, a
thorough sheep. Gounsovski is soft as a sheep. The time I dined with him
he had mutton streaked with fat. He is just like that. I am sure he is
mainly layers of fat. When you shake hands you feel as though you
had grabbed a piece of fat. My word! And when he eats he wags his jaw
fattishly. His head is like that, too; bald, you know, with a cranium
like fresh lard. He speaks softly and looks at you like a kid looking to
its mother for a juicy meal."

"But--why--it is Natacha!" murmured the lips of the young man.

"Certainly it is Natacha, Natacha herself," exclaimed Ivan Petrovitch,
who had used his glasses the better to see whom the young French
journalist was looking at. "Ah, the dear child! she has wanted to see
Annouchka for a long time."

"What, Natacha! So it is. So it is. Natacha! Natacha!" said the others.
"And with Boris Mourazoff's parents."

"But Boris is not there," sniggered Thaddeus Tehitchnikoff.

"Oh, he can't be far away. If he was there we would see Michael
Korsakoff too. They keep close on each other's heels."

"How has she happened to leave the general? She said she couldn't bear