rday Madame has had the whole house cleaned up, which she
left--"

"Whom do you mean by Madame?" asked old Hochon.

"That's what they call the Rabouilleuse over there," answered Gritte.
"She left the salon and all Monsieur Rouget's part of the house in a
pitiable state; but since yesterday the rooms have been made to look
like what they were before Monsieur Maxence went to live there. You can
see your face on the floors. La Vedie told me that Kouski went off on
horseback at five o'clock this morning, and came back at nine, bringing
provisions. It is going to be a grand dinner!--a dinner fit for the
archbishop of Bourges! There's a fine bustle in the kitchen, and
they are as busy as bees. The old man says, 'I want to do honor to my
nephew,' and he pokes his nose into everything. It appears _the Rougets_
are highly flattered by the letter. Madame came and told me so. Oh! she
had on such a dress! I never saw anything so handsome in my life. Two
diamonds in her ears!--two diamonds that cost, Vedie told me, three
thousand francs apiece; and such lace! rings on her fingers, and
bracelets! you'd think she was a shrine; and a silk dress as fine as an
altar-cloth. So then she said to me, 'Monsieur is delighted to find
his sister so amiable, and I hope she will permit us to pay her all the
attention she deserves. We shall count on her good opinion after the
welcome we mean to give her son. Monsieur is very impatient to see his
nephew.' Madame had little black satin slippers; and her stockings! my!
they were marvels,--flowers in silk and openwork, just like lace, and
you could see her rosy little feet through them. Oh! she's in high
feather, and she had a lovely little apron in front of her which, Vedie
says, cost more than two years of our wages put together."

"Well done! We shall have to dress up," said the artist laughing.

"What do you think of all this, Monsieur Hochon?" said the old lady when
Gritte had departed.

Madame Hochon made Agathe observe her husband, who was sitting with
his head in his hands, his elbows on the arms of his chair, plunged in
thought.

"You have to do with a Maitre Bonin!" said the old man at last. "With
your ideas, young man," he added, looking at Joseph, "you haven't force
enough to struggle with a practised scoundrel like Maxence Gilet. No
matter what I say to you, you will commit some folly. But, at any rate,
tell me everything you see, and hear, and do to-night. Go, and God be
with you!