eemed always to be looking at some hell over your
shoulder. He also promoted companies, and the Comte de Verneuil, an
Anglo-French financier, stood ever by his elbow, using him as his tool
and dupe and drawer in general of chestnuts from the fire. The Comte
wanted to marry Joanna, "which was absurd, seeing that I was his rival,"
said Paragot simply.

One of Mr. Rushworth's companies failed. Mr. Rushworth's fashionable
clients grew alarmed. He gave a party in honour of Joanna's engagement
and invited all his clients. Ugly rumours spread among the guests. The
presage of disaster was in the air. Paragot began to suspect the truth.
It was a hateful party. The band in the garden played selections from
"Orphee aux Enfers," and the mocking refrain accompanied the last words
he was to have with Joanna. The Comte de Verneuil called him aside,
explained Rushworth's position. Ten thousand pounds of his clients'
money which he held in trust had gone in the failure of the company. If
that amount was not at his disposal the next morning, he was finished,
snuffed out. It appeared that no one in Paris or London would lend him
the money, his credit being gone. Unless M. de Nerac could find the ten
thousand pounds there was the gaol yawning with horrible certainty for
M. de Nerac's prospective father-in-law. As Paragot's patrimony,
invested in French government securities, was not a third of this sum,
he could do nothing but wring his hands in despair and call on
Providence and the Comte de Verneuil. The former turned a deaf ear. The
latter declared himself a man of business and not a philanthropist; he
was ready however to purchase an option on the young lady's affections.
Did not M. de Nerac know what an option was? He would explain. He
drafted the famous contract. In return for Paragot's signature he would
hand him a cheque drawn in favour of Simon Rushworth.

"_Nom de Dieu!_" cried Paragot, banging the marble table, with his fist,
"Do you see in what a vice he held me? He was a devil, that man! The
only human trait about him was a passion for rare apes of which he had a
collection at Nevers. Thank Heaven they are dead! Thank Heaven he is
dead! Thank Heaven he lost most of the money for which he preyed on his
kind. He was a vulture, a scaly-headed vulture. He was the carrion kite
above every rotten financial concern in London and Paris. That which
went near to ruin my poor vain fool of a father-in-law filled his
bulging pockets. I ha