iot go with his nephew."

"But that big brute won't mince matters," remonstrated Flore; "he'll
call things by their right names."

"Listen to me," said Maxence in a harsh voice. "Do you think I've
not kept my ears open, and reflected about how we stand? Send to Pere
Cognette for a horse and a char-a-banc, and say we want them instantly:
they must be here in five minutes. Pack all your belongings, take Vedie,
and go to Vatan. Settle yourself there as if you mean to stay; carry off
the twenty thousand francs in gold which the old fellow has got in his
drawer. If I bring him to you in Vatan, you are to refuse to come back
here unless he signs the power of attorney. As soon as we get it I'll
slip off to Paris, while you're returning to Issoudun. When Jean-Jacques
gets back from his walk and finds you gone, he'll go beside himself, and
want to follow you. Well! when he does, I'll give him a talking to."

CHAPTER XV

While the foregoing plot was progressing, Philippe was walking arm in
arm with his uncle along the boulevard Baron.

"The two great tacticians are coming to close quarters at last," thought
Monsieur Hochon as he watched the colonel marching off with his uncle;
"I am curious to see the end of the game, and what becomes of the stake
of ninety thousand francs a year."

"My dear uncle," said Philippe, whose phraseology had a flavor of his
affinities in Paris, "you love this girl, and you are devilishly right.
She is damnably handsome! Instead of billing and cooing she makes you
trot like a valet; well, that's all simple enough; but she wants to see
you six feet underground, so that she may marry Max, whom she adores."

"I know that, Philippe, but I love her all the same."

"Well, I have sworn by the soul of my mother, who is your own sister,"
continued Philippe, "to make your Rabouilleuse as supple as my glove,
and the same as she was before that scoundrel, who is unworthy to have
served in the Imperial Guard, ever came to quarter himself in your
house."

"Ah! if you could do that!--" said the old man.

"It is very easy," answered Philippe, cutting his uncle short. "I'll
kill Max as I would a dog; but--on one condition," added the old
campaigner.

"What is that?" said Rouget, looking at his nephew in a stupid way.

"Don't sign that power of attorney which they want of you before the
third of December; put them off till then. Your torturers only want it
to enable them to sell the fifty thousand a y