s. His nearest living
relative was his sister, the widow Mirailhe.

The widow resided principally at Toulouse. Her time in that city was
mainly occupied in winding up the business affairs of her deceased
husband, which had remained unsettled for a considerable period after
his death, through delays in realizing certain sums of money owing to
his representative. The widow had been left very well provided
for--she was still a comely, attractive woman--and more than one
substantial citizen of Toulouse had shown himself anxious to persuade
her into marrying for the second time. But the widow Mirailhe lived on
terms of great intimacy and affection with her brother Siadoux and his
family; she was sincerely attached to them, and sincerely unwilling, at
her age, to deprive her nephews and nieces, by a second marriage, of
the inheritance, or even of a portion of the inheritance, which would
otherwise fall to them on her death. Animated by these motives, she
closed her doors resolutely on all suitors who attempted to pay their
court to her, with the one exception of a master-butcher of Toulouse,
whose name was Cantegrel.

This man was a neighbour of the widow's and had made himself useful by
assisting her in the business complications which still hung about the
realization of her late husband's estate. The preference which she
showed for the master-butcher was thus far of the purely negative kind.
She gave him no absolute encouragement; she would not for a moment
admit that there was the slightest prospect of her ever marrying him;
but, at the same time, she continued to receive his visits, and she
showed no disposition to restrict the neighborly intercourse between
them, for the future, within purely formal bounds. Under these
circumstances, Saturnin Siadoux began to be alarmed, and to think it
time to bestir himself. He had no personal acquaintance with
Cantegrel, who never visited the village; and Monsieur Chaubard to whom
he might otherwise have applied for advice, was not in a position to
give an opinion; the priest and the master-butcher did not even know
each other by sight. In this difficulty, Siadoux bethought himself of
inquiring privately at Toulouse, in the hope of discovering some
scandalous passages in Cantegrel's early life which might fatally
degrade him in the estimation of the widow Mirailhe. The
investigation, as usual in such cases, produced rumors and reports in
plenty, the greater part of which d