Max
had picked up in the purlieus of Issoudun an old lancer of the Imperial
Guard, a Pole named Kouski, now very poor, who asked nothing better than
to quarter himself in Monsieur Rouget's house as the captain's servant.
Max was Kouski's idol, especially after the duel with the three
royalists. So, from 1817, the household of the old bachelor was made up
of five persons, three of whom were masters, and the expenses advanced
to about eight thousand francs a year.

CHAPTER X

At the time when Madame Bridau returned to Issoudun to save--as Maitre
Desroches expressed it--an inheritance that was seriously threatened,
Jean-Jacques Rouget had reached by degrees a condition that was
semi-vegetative. In the first place, after Max's instalment, Flore put
the table on an episcopal footing. Rouget, thrown in the way of good
living, ate more and still more, enticed by the Vedie's excellent
dishes. He grew no fatter, however, in spite of this abundant and
luxurious nourishment. From day to day he weakened like a worn-out
man,--fatigued, perhaps, with the effort of digestion,--and his eyes had
dark circles around them. Still, when his friends and neighbors met him
in his walks and questioned him about his health, he always answered
that he was never better in his life. As he had always been thought
extremely deficient in mind, people did not notice the constant lowering
of his faculties. His love for Flore was the one thing that kept
him alive; in fact, he existed only for her, and his weakness in her
presence was unbounded; he obeyed the creature's mere look, and watched
her movements as a dog watches every gesture of his master. In short, as
Madame Hochon remarked, at fifty-seven years of age he seemed older than
Monsieur Hochon, an octogenarian.

Every one will suppose, and with reason, that Max's _appartement_ was
worthy of so charming a fellow. In fact, in the course of six years our
captain had by degrees perfected the comfort of his abode and adorned
every detail of it, as much for his own pleasure as for Flore's. But it
was, after all, only the comfort and luxury of Issoudun,--colored tiles,
rather elegant wallpapers, mahogany furniture, mirrors in gilt frames,
muslin curtains with red borders, a bed with a canopy, and draperies
arranged as the provincial upholsterers arrange them for a rich bride;
which in the eyes of Issoudun seemed the height of luxury, but are so
common in vulgar fashion-plates that even the petty