e Lycee Condorcet, one of the three clever Froments who
had there rendered the name famous. But his only desire had been to act
as his father's faithful servant, the arm that forges, the embodiment of
the manual toil by which conceptions are realised. And, a giant of three
and twenty, ever attentive and courageous, he was likewise a man of
patient, silent and sober nature.

On catching sight of Pierre he quivered with anxiety and sprang forward.
"Father is no worse?" he asked.

"No, no. But he read in the papers that story of a bradawl found in the
Rue Godot-de-Mauroy, and it made him anxious, because the police may make
a perquisition here."

Thomas, his own anxiety allayed, began to smile. "Tell him he may sleep
quietly," he responded. "To begin with, I've unfortunately not yet hit on
our little motor such as I want it to be. In fact, I haven't yet put it
together. I'm keeping the pieces at our house, and nobody here knows
exactly what I come to do at the factory. So the police may search, it
will find nothing. Our secret runs no risk."

Pierre promised to repeat these words to Guillaume, so as to dissipate
his fears. However, when he tried to sound Thomas, and ascertain the
position of affairs, what the factory people thought of the discovery of
the bradawl, and whether there was as yet any suspicion of Salvat, he
once more found the young man taciturn, and elicited merely a "yes" or a
"no" in answer to his inquiries. The police had not been there as yet?
No. But the men must surely have mentioned Salvat? Yes, of course, on
account of his Anarchist opinions. But what had Grandidier, the master,
said, on returning from the investigating magistrate's? As for that
Thomas knew nothing. He had not seen Grandidier that day.

"But here he comes!" the young man added. "Ah! poor fellow, his wife, I
fancy, had another attack this morning."

He alluded to a frightful story which Guillaume had already recounted to
Pierre. Grandidier, falling in love with a very beautiful girl, had
married her; but for five years now she had been insane: the result of
puerperal fever and the death of an infant son. Her husband, with his
ardent affection for her, had been unwilling to place her in an asylum,
and had accordingly kept her with him in a little pavilion, whose
windows, overlooking the courtyard of the factory, always remained
closed. She was never seen; and never did he speak of her to anybody. It
was said that she was usually l