. Thus
everything about the house was extremely seemly. And a great many
persons maintained that her friendship with the Baron was entirely
innocent, supporting the view by the gentleman's mature age, and
ascribing to him a Platonic liking for Madame Marneffe's pleasant wit,
charming manners, and conversation--such a liking as that of the late
lamented Louis XVIII. for a well-turned note.

The Baron always withdrew with the other company at about midnight,
and came back a quarter of an hour later.

The secret of this secrecy was as follows. The lodge-keepers of the
house were a Monsieur and Madame Olivier, who, under the Baron's
patronage, had been promoted from their humble and not very lucrative
post in the Rue du Doyenne to the highly-paid and handsome one in the
Rue Vanneau. Now, Madame Olivier, formerly a needlewoman in the
household of Charles X., who had fallen in the world with the
legitimate branch, had three children. The eldest, an under-clerk in a
notary's office, was object of his parents' adoration. This Benjamin,
for six years in danger of being drawn for the army, was on the point
of being interrupted in his legal career, when Madame Marneffe
contrived to have him declared exempt for one of those little
malformations which the Examining Board can always discern when
requested in a whisper by some power in the ministry. So Olivier,
formerly a huntsman to the King, and his wife would have crucified the
Lord again for the Baron or for Madame Marneffe.

What could the world have to say? It knew nothing of the former
episode of the Brazilian, Monsieur Montes de Montejanos--it could say
nothing. Besides, the world is very indulgent to the mistress of a
house where amusement is to be found.

And then to all her charms Valerie added the highly-prized advantage
of being an occult power. Claude Vignon, now secretary to Marshal the
Prince de Wissembourg, and dreaming of promotion to the Council of
State as a Master of Appeals, was constantly seen in her rooms, to
which came also some Deputies--good fellows and gamblers. Madame
Marneffe had got her circle together with prudent deliberation; only
men whose opinions and habits agreed foregathered there, men whose
interest it was to hold together and to proclaim the many merits of
the lady of the house. Scandal is the true Holy Alliance in Paris.
Take that as an axiom. Interests invariably fall asunder in the end;
vicious natures can always agree.

Within three