st be little notaries and notaresses.
He is a heavy, pedantic creature, and that's the truth; but on his own
ground, he is not the man to flinch before any power in creation.... No
woman ever got money out of him; he is a fossil pater-familias, his
wife worships him, and does not deceive him, although she is a notary's
wife.--What more do you want? as a notary he has not his match in Paris.
He is in the patriarchal style; not queer and amusing, as Cardot used
to be with Malaga; but he will never decamp like little What's-his-name
that lived with Antonia. So I will send round my man to-morrow morning
at eight o'clock.... You may sleep in peace. And I hope, in the first
place, that you will get better, and make charming music for us again;
and yet, after all, you see, life is very dreary--managers chisel
you, and kings mizzle and ministers fizzle and rich fold
economizzle.--Artists have nothing left _here_" (tapping her
breast)--"it is a time to die in. Good-bye, old boy."

"Heloise, of all things, I ask you to keep my counsel."

"It is not a theatre affair," she said; "it is sacred for an artist."

"Who is your gentleman, child?"

"M. Baudoyer, the mayor of your arrondissement, a man as stupid as the
late Crevel; Crevel once financed Gaudissart, you know, and a few days
ago he died and left me nothing, not so much as a pot of pomatum. That
made me say just now that this age of ours is something sickening."

"What did he die of?"

"Of his wife. If he had stayed with me, he would be living now.
Good-bye, dear old boy, I am talking of going off, because I can see
that you will be walking about the boulevards in a week or two, hunting
up pretty little curiosities again. You are not ill; I never saw your
eyes look so bright." And she went, fully convinced that her protege
Garangeot would conduct the orchestra for good.

Every door stood ajar as she went downstairs. Every lodger, on tip-toe,
watched the lady of the ballet pass on her way out. It was quite an
event in the house.

Fraisier, like the bulldog that sets his teeth and never lets go, was on
the spot. He stood beside La Cibot when Mlle. Brisetout passed under
the gateway and asked for the door to be opened. Knowing that a will
had been made, he had come to see how the land lay, for Maitre Trognon,
notary, had refused to say a syllable--Fraisier's questions were
as fruitless as Mme. Cibot's. Naturally the ballet-girl's visit _in
extremis_ was not lost upon Fra