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Page 8
"It is lost."
"That's the very moment to win it," replied Bixiou.
When they reached Theodore Gaillard's abode, which was now in the rue
de Menars, the valet ushered the three friends into a boudoir and
asked them to wait, as monsieur was in secret conference.
"With whom?" asked Bixiou.
"With a man who is selling him the incarceration of an UNSEIZABLE
debtor," replied a handsome woman who now appeared in a charming
morning toilet.
"In that case, my dear Suzanne," said Bixiou, "I am certain we may go
in."
"Oh! what a beautiful creature!" said Gazonal.
"That is Madame Gaillard," replied Leon de Lora, speaking low into his
cousin's ear. "She is the most humble-minded woman in Paris, for she
had the public and has contented herself with a husband."
"What is your will, messeigneurs?" said the facetious editor, seeing
his two friends and imitating Frederic Lemaitre.
Theodore Gaillard, formerly a wit, had ended by becoming a stupid man
in consequence of remaining constantly in one centre,--a moral
phenomenon frequently to be observed in Paris. His principal method of
conversation consisted in sowing his speeches with sayings taken from
plays then in vogue and pronounced in imitation of well-known actors.
"We have come to blague," said Leon.
"'Again, young men'" (Odry in the Saltimbauques).
"Well, this time, we've got him, sure," said Gaillard's other visitor,
apparently by way of conclusion.
"ARE you sure of it, pere Fromenteau?" asked Gaillard. "This it the
eleventh time you've caught him at night and missed him in the
morning."
"How could I help it? I never saw such a debtor! he's a locomotive;
goes to sleep in Paris and wakes up in the Seine-et-Oise. A safety
lock I call him." Seeing a smile on Gaillard's face he added: "That's
a saying in our business. Pinch a man, means arrest him, lock him up.
The criminal police have another term. Vidoeq said to his man, 'You
are served'; that's funnier, for it means the guillotine."
A nudge from Bixiou made Gazonal all eyes and ears.
"Does monsieur grease my paws?" asked Fromenteau of Gaillard, in a
threatening but cool tone.
"'A question that of fifty centimes'" (Les Saltimbauques), replied the
editor, taking out five francs and offering them to Fromenteau.
"And the rapscallions?" said the man.
"What rapscallions?" asked Gaillard.
"Those I employ," replied Fromenteau calmly.
"Is there a lower depth still?" asked Bixiou.
"Yes, monsieur," said the spy. "Some people give us information
without knowing they do so, and without getting paid for it. I put
fools and ninnies below rapscallions."
"They are often original, and witty, your rapscallions!" said Leon.
"Do you belong to the police?" asked Gazonal, eying with uneasy
curiosity the hard, impassible little man, who was dressed like the
third clerk in a sheriff's office.
"Which police do you mean?" asked Fromenteau.
"There are several?"
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