I can make out
why folks who eat nothing but bread and the odds and ends of vegetables,
bits of carrots, turnips, and such things, which they get at the
back-doors of restaurants,--yes, monsieur, I assure you I came one day
on the little fellow filling an old handbag,--well, I want to know why
such persons spend nearly forty francs a month on flowers. They say the
old man's pension is only three thousand francs."

"At any rate," said Godefroid, "it is not your business to complain if
they ruin themselves in flowers."

"That's true, monsieur,--provided they pay me."

"Bring your bill to me."

"Very good, monsieur," said the gardener, with a tinge of respect.
"Monsieur no doubt wants to see the mysterious lady."

"My good friend," said Godefroid, stiffly, "you forget yourself. Go home
now and bring fresh plants for those you are to take away. If you can
also supply me with good cream and fresh eggs I will take them, and I
will go this morning and take a look at your establishment."

"It is one of the finest in Paris, monsieur. I exhibit at the
Luxembourg. My garden, which covers three acres, is on the boulevard,
behind the garden of La Grande-Chaumiere."

"Very good, Monsieur Cartier. You are, I see, much richer than I. Have
some consideration for us, therefore. Who knows how soon we may have
mutual need of each other?"

The gardener went away, much puzzled as to who and what Godefroid might
be.

"And yet I was once just like that," thought Godefroid, blowing his
fire. "What a fine specimen of the bourgeois of to-day!--gossiping,
inquisitive, crazy for equality, jealous of his customers, furious at
not knowing why a poor sick woman stays in her room without being seen;
concealing his wealth, and yet vain enough to betray it when he thinks
it will put him above his neighbor. That man ought to be the lieutenant
of his company. I dare say he is. With what ease he plays the scene
of Monsieur Dimanche! A little more and I should have made a friend of
Monsieur Cartier."

The old man broke into this soliloquy, which proves how Godefroid's
ideas had changed in four months.

"Excuse me, neighbor," said Monsieur Bernard, in a troubled voice; "I
see you have sent that gardener away satisfied, for he bowed civilly to
me on the landing. It seems, young man, as if Providence had sent you to
me at the very moment when I was about to succumb. Alas! the hard talk
of that man must have shown you many things! It is true that I