ne. Here is my offer--to pay M.
Sechard's debts _and_ six thousand francs, and another three thousand
francs in bills at twelve and fifteen months," he added. "That will be
quite enough risk to run.--We have a balance of twelve thousand francs
against Metivier. That will make fifteen thousand francs.--That is all
that I would pay for the secret if I were going to exploit it for
myself. So this is the great discovery that you were talking about,
Boniface! Many thanks! I thought you had more sense. No, you can't
call this business."

"The question for you," said Petit-Claud, undismayed by the explosion,
"resolves itself into this: 'Do you care to risk twenty thousand
francs to buy a secret that may make rich men of you?' Why, the risk
usually is in proportion to the profit, gentlemen. You stake twenty
thousand francs on your luck. A gambler puts down a louis at roulette
for a chance of winning thirty-six, but he knows that the louis is
lost. Do the same."

"I must have time to think it over," said the stout Cointet; "I am not
so clever as my brother. I am a plain, straight-forward sort of chap,
that only knows one thing--how to print prayer-books at twenty sous
and sell them for two francs. Where I see an invention that has only
been tried once, I see ruin. You succeed with the first batch, you
spoil the next, you go on, and you are drawn in; for once put an arm
into that machinery, the rest of you follows," and he related an
anecdote very much to the point--how a Bordeaux merchant had ruined
himself by following a scientific man's advice, and trying to bring
the Landes into cultivation; and followed up the tale with
half-a-dozen similar instances of agricultural and commercial failures
nearer home in the departments of the Charente and Dordogne. He waxed
warm over his recitals. He would not listen to another word.
Petit-Claud's demurs, so far from soothing the stout Cointet, appeared
to irritate him.

"I would rather give more for a certainty, if I made only a small
profit on it," he said, looking at his brother. "It is my opinion that
things have gone far enough for business," he concluded.

"Still you came here for something, didn't you?" asked Petit-Claud.
"What is your offer?"

"I offer to release M. Sechard, and, if his plan succeeds, to give him
thirty per cent of the profits," the stout Cointet answered briskly.

"But, monsieur," objected Eve, "how should we live while the
experiments were being made? My h