led to
come home to his meals, ate it mattered not what or when. He went out
at every hour of the day and night, often slept abroad, and even
disappeared for entire weeks at a time. Then too he received the
strangest visitors, odd looking men of suspicious appearance, and
fellows of ill-favoured and sinister aspect.

This irregular way of living had robbed the old fellow of much
consideration. Many believed they saw in him a shameless libertine, who
squandered his income in disreputable places. They would remark to one
another, "Is it not disgraceful, a man of his age?"

He was aware of all this tittle-tattle, and laughed at it. This did not,
however, prevent many of his tenants from seeking his society and paying
court to him. They would invite him to dinner, but he almost invariably
refused.

He seldom visited but one person of the house, but with that one he
was very intimate, so much so indeed, that he was more often in her
apartment, than in his own. She was a widow lady, who for fifteen years
had occupied an apartment on the third floor. Her name was Madame Gerdy,
and she lived with her son Noel, whom she adored.

Noel Gerdy was a man thirty-three years of age, but looking older; tall
and well made, with a noble and intelligent face, large black eyes, and
black hair which curled naturally. An advocate, he passed for having
great talent, and greater industry, and had already gained a certain
amount of notoriety. He was an obstinate worker, cold and meditative,
though devoted to his profession, and affected, with some ostentation,
perhaps, a great rigidity of principle, and austerity of manners.

In Madame Gerdy's apartment, old Tabaret felt himself quite at home. He
considered her as a relation, and looked upon Noel as a son. In spite
of her fifty years, he had often thought of asking the hand of this
charming widow, and was restrained less by the fear of a refusal than
its consequence. To propose and to be rejected would sever the existing
relations, so pleasurable to him. However, he had by his will, which
was deposited with his notary constituted this young advocate his sole
legatee; with the single condition of founding an annual prize of two
thousand francs to be bestowed on the police agent who during the year
had unravelled the most obscure and mysterious crime.

Short as was the distance to his house, old Tabaret was a good quarter
of an hour in reaching it. On leaving M. Daburon his thoughts reverted