otioning to Rochefide), "she would issue from her
convent, I do believe, to tear him from her."

"Upon my word, Rochefide, if I were you," said Maxime, finding that his
warning did not stop Vignon, "I should give back my wife's fortune,
so that the world couldn't say she attached herself to Calyste from
necessity."

"Maxime is right," remarked Madame Schontz, looking at Arthur, who
colored high. "If I have helped you to gain several thousand francs a
year, you couldn't better employ them. I shall have made the happiness
of husband _and_ wife; what a feather in my cap!"

"I never thought of it," replied the marquis; "but a man should be a
gentleman before he's a husband."

"Let me tell you when is the time to be generous," said Maxime.

"Arthur," said Aurelie, "Maxime is right. Don't you see, old fellow,
that generous actions are like Couture's investments?--you should make
them in the nick of time."

At that moment Couture, followed by Finot, came in; and, soon after, all
the guests were assembled in the beautiful blue and gold salon of the
hotel Schontz, a title which the various artists had given to their
inn after Rochefide purchased it for his Ninon II. When Maxime saw La
Palferine, the last to arrive, enter, he walked up to his lieutenant,
and taking him aside into the recess of a window, gave him notes for
twenty thousand francs.

"Remember, my boy, you needn't economize them," he said, with the
particular grace of a true scamp.

"There's none but you who can double the value of what you seem to
give," replied La Palferine.

"Have you decided?"

"Surely, inasmuch as I take the money," said the count, with a mixture
of haughtiness and jest.

"Well, then, Nathan, who is here to-night, will present you two days
hence at the house of Madame la Marquise de Rochefide."

La Palferine started when he heard the name.

"You are to be madly in love with her, and, not to rouse suspicion,
drink heavily, wines, liqueurs! I'll tell Aurelie to place you beside
Nathan at dinner. One thing more, my boy: you and I must meet every
night, on the boulevard de la Madeleine at one in the morning,--you to
give me an account of progress, I to give you instructions."

"I shall be there, my master," said the young count, bowing.

"Why do you make us dine with that queer fellow dressed like the
head-waiter of a restaurant?" whispered Maxime to Madame Schontz, with a
sign toward Fabien du Ronceret.

"Have you never met the