e
bristles, a menacing pointed chin, a toothless mouth, eyes bright as the
eyes of his dogs in the yard, and a nose like an obelisk--there he stood
in his gallery smiling at the beauty called into being by genius. A Jew
surrounded by his millions will always be one of the finest spectacles
which humanity can give. Robert Medal, our great actor, cannot rise to
this height of poetry, sublime though he is.

Paris of all the cities of the world holds most of such men as Magus,
strange beings with a strange religion in their heart of hearts.
The London "eccentric" always finds that worship, like life, brings
weariness and satiety in the end; the Parisian monomaniac lives
cheerfully in concubinage with his crotchet to the last.

Often shall you meet in Paris some Pons, some Elie Magus, dressed badly
enough, with his face turned from the rising sun (like the countenance
of the perpetual secretary of the Academie), apparently heeding nothing,
conscious of nothing, paying no attention to shop-windows nor to fair
passers-by, walking at random, so to speak, with nothing in his pockets,
and to all appearance an equally empty head. Do you ask to what Parisian
tribe this manner of man belongs? He is a collector, a millionaire, one
of the most impassioned souls upon earth; he and his like are capable of
treading the miry ways that lead to the police-court if so they may gain
possession of a cup, a picture, or some such rare unpublished piece as
Elie Magus once picked up one memorable day in Germany.

This was the expert to whom Remonencq with much mystery conducted La
Cibot. Remonencq always asked advice of Elie Magus when he met him
in the streets; and more than once Magus had lent him money through
Abramko, knowing Remonencq's honesty. The Chaussee des Minimes is close
to the Rue de Normandie, and the two fellow-conspirators reached the
house in ten minutes.

"You will see the richest dealer in curiosities, the greatest
connoisseur in Paris," Remonencq had said. And Mme. Cibot, therefore,
was struck dumb with amazement to be confronted with a little old man in
a great-coat too shabby for Cibot to mend, standing watching a painter
at work upon an old picture in the chilly room on the vast ground floor.
The old man's eyes, full of cold feline malignance, were turned upon
her, and La Cibot shivered.

"What do you want, Remonencq?" asked this person.

"It is a question of valuing some pictures; there is nobody but you in
Paris wh