ntionally.

"Ah!" said Rogron, stupidly, not understanding the notary's sarcasm.

"Then you know nothing about your cousin's position or means?" asked
Monsieur Tiphaine.

"If Monsieur Rogron had known it," said the deputy-judge, "he would
never have left her all this time in an establishment of that kind. I
remember now that a house in Nantes belonging to Monsieur and Madame
Lorrain was sold under an order of the court, and that Mademoiselle
Lorrain's claim was swallowed up. I know this, for I was commissioner at
the time."

The notary spoke of Colonel Lorrain, who, had he lived, would have been
much amazed to know that his daughter was in such an institution. The
Rogrons beat a retreat, saying to each other that the world was very
malicious. Sylvie perceived that the news of her benevolence had missed
its effect,--in fact, she had lost ground in all minds; and she felt
that henceforth she was forbidden to attempt an intimacy with the upper
class of Provins. After this evening the Rogrons no longer concealed
their hatred of that class and all its adherents. The brother told the
sister the scandals that Colonel Gouraud and the lawyer Vinet had put
into his head about the Tiphaines, the Guenees, the Garcelands, the
Julliards, and others:--

"I declare, Sylvie, I don't see why Madame Tiphaine should turn up her
nose at shopkeeping in the rue Saint-Denis; it is more honest than what
she comes from. Madame Roguin, her mother, is cousin to those Guillaumes
of the 'Cat-playing-ball' who gave up the business to Joseph Lebas,
their son-in-law. Her father is that Roguin who failed in 1819, and
ruined the house of Cesar Birotteau. Madame Tiphaine's fortune was
stolen,--for what else are you to call it when a notary's wife who is
very rich lets her husband make a fraudulent bankruptcy? Fine doings!
and she marries her daughter in Provins to get her out of the way,--all
on account of her own relations with du Tillet. And such people set up
to be proud! Well, well, that's the world!"

On the day when Jerome Rogron and his sister began to declaim against
"the clique" they were, without being aware of it, on the road to having
a society of their own; their house was to become a rendezvous for other
interests seeking a centre,--those of the hitherto floating elements of
the liberal party in Provins. And this is how it came about: The launch
of the Rogrons in society had been watched with great curiosity by
Colonel Gouraud and the