A look from Madame
Cesar was enough! What secret is there between her and that brigand? The
whole thing is extraordinary."

Popinot sent the cheque at once to the Bank, and went up to speak to
Madame Birotteau; she was not in the counting-room, and had doubtless
gone to her chamber. Anselme and Constance lived like mother-in-law and
son-in-law when people in that relation suit each other; he therefore
rushed up to Madame Cesar's appartement with the natural eagerness of a
lover on the threshold of his happiness. The young man was prodigiously
surprised to find her, as he sprang like a cat into the room, reading
a letter from du Tillet, whose handwriting he recognized at a glance. A
lighted candle, and the black and quivering phantoms of burned letters
lying on the floor made him shudder, for his quick eyes caught the
following words in the letter which Constance held in her hand:--

"I adore you! You know it well, angel of my life, and--"

"What power have you over du Tillet that could force him to agree to
such terms?" he said with a convulsive laugh that came from repressed
suspicion.

"Do not let us speak of that," she said, showing great distress.

"No," said Popinot, bewildered; "let us rather talk of the end of all
your troubles." Anselme turned on his heel towards the window, and
drummed with his fingers on the panes as he gazed into the court.
"Well," he said to himself, "even if she did love du Tillet, is that any
reason why I should not behave like an honorable man?"

"What is the matter, my child?" said the poor woman.

"The total of the net profits of Cephalic Oil mount up to two hundred
and forty-two thousand francs; half of that is one hundred and
twenty-one thousand," said Popinot, brusquely. "If I withdraw from
that amount the forty-eight thousand francs which I paid to Monsieur
Birotteau, there remains seventy-three thousand, which, joined to these
sixty thousand paid for the relinquishment of the lease, gives _you_ one
hundred and thirty-three thousand francs."

Madame Cesar listened with fluctuations of joy which made her tremble so
violently that Popinot could hear the beating of her heart.

"Well, I have always considered Monsieur Birotteau as my partner," he
went on; "we can use this sum to pay his creditors in full. Add
the twenty-eight thousand you have saved and placed in our uncle
Pillerault's hands, and we have one hundred and sixty-one thousand
francs. Our uncle will not refuse hi