ext for staying in the room. "You have come
here to cut the ground from under the feet of--Good! _a man warned_ is a
man armed."

"Stop!" cried Godefroid, placing himself between the Vauthier and the
door. "Look here, what interest have you in the matter?"

"Gracious!" said the old woman, eyeing Godefroid cautiously, "you're a
bold one, anyhow."

She went to the door of the outer room and bolted it; then she came back
and sat down on a chair beside the fire.

"On my word of honor, and as sure as my name is Vauthier, I took you
for a student until I saw you giving your wood to that old Bernard. Ha!
you're a sly one; and what a play-actor! I was so certain you were a
ninny! Look here, will you guarantee me a thousand francs? As sure as
the sun shines, my old Barbet and Monsieur Metivier have promised me
five hundred to keep my eyes open for them."

"They! five hundred francs! nonsense!" cried Godefroid. "I know their
ways; two hundred is the very most, my good woman, and even that is only
promised; you can't assign it. But I will say this: if you will put me
in the way to do the business they want to do with Monsieur Bernard I
will pay you four hundred francs. Now, then, how does the matter stand?"

"They have advanced fifteen hundred francs upon the work," said Madame
Vauthier, making no further effort at deception, "and the old man has
signed an acknowledgment for three thousand. They wouldn't do it under
a hundred per cent. He thought he could easily pay them out of his book,
but they have arranged to get the better of him there. It was they who
sent Cartier here, and the other creditors."

Here Godefroid gave the old woman a glance of ironical intelligence,
which showed her that he saw through the role she was playing in
the interest of her proprietor. Her words were, in fact, a double
illumination to Godefroid; the curious scene between himself and the
gardener was now explained.

"Well," she resumed, "they have got him now. Where is he to find three
thousand francs? They intend to offer him five hundred the day he puts
the first volume of his book into their hands, and five hundred for each
succeeding volume. The affair isn't in their names; they have put
it into the hands of a publisher whom Barbet set up on the quai des
Augustins."

"What, that little fellow?"

"Yes, that little Morand, who was formerly Barbet's clerk. It seems they
expect a good bit of money out of the affair."

"There's a good bit