two or three because there was no suitable room for
Monsieur de La Briere.

"Monsieur le baron," he said to the notary, "makes his secretary quite
his best friend. Ah! I should be well scolded if Monsieur de La Briere
was not as well treated as monsieur le baron himself; and after all, you
know, Monsieur de La Briere is a lawyer in my master's court."

Germain never appeared in public unless punctiliously dressed in
black, with spotless gloves, well-polished boots, and otherwise as well
apparelled as a lawyer. Imagine the effect he produced in Havre, and the
idea people took of the great poet from this sample of him! The valet
of a man of wit and intellect ends by getting a little wit and intellect
himself which has rubbed off from his master. Germain did not overplay
his part; he was simple and good-humored, as Canalis had instructed him
to be. Poor La Briere was in blissful ignorance of the harm Germain
was doing to his prospects, and the depreciation his consent to the
arrangement had brought upon him; it is, however, true that some inkling
of the state of things rose to Modeste's ears from these lower regions.

Canalis had arranged to bring his secretary in his own carriage, and
Ernest's unsuspicious nature did not perceive that he was putting
himself in a false position until too late to remedy it. The delay in
the arrival of the pair which had troubled Charles Mignon was caused by
the painting of the Canalis arms on the panels of the carriage, and by
certain orders given to a tailor; for the poet neglected none of the
innumerable details which might, even the smallest of them, influence a
young girl.

"It is all right," said Latournelle to Mignon on the sixth day. "The
baron's valet has hired Madame Amaury's villa at Sanvic, all furnished,
for seven hundred francs; he has written to his master that he may
start, and that all will be ready on his arrival. So the two gentlemen
will be here Sunday. I have also had a letter from Butscha; here it is;
it's not long: 'My dear master,--I cannot get back till Sunday. Between
now and then I have some very important inquiries to make which concern
the happiness of a person in whom you take an interest.'"

The announcement of this arrival did not rouse Modeste from her gloom;
the sense of her fall and the bewilderment of her mind were still
too great, and she was not nearly as much of a coquette as her father
thought her to be. There is, in truth, a charming and permissi