erfumery."

"Well, my beauty, yes! Your furniture is ordered; our improvements begin
to-morrow, and are superintended by an architect recommended to me by
Monsieur de la Billardiere."

"My God!" she cried, "have pity upon us!"

"But you are not reasonable, my love. Do you think that at thirty-seven
years of age, fresh and pretty as you are, you can go and bury yourself
at Chinon? I, thank God, am only thirty-nine. Chance opens to me a fine
career; I enter upon it. If I conduct myself prudently I can make an
honorable house among the bourgeoisie of Paris, as was done in former
times. I can found the house of Birotteau, like the house of Keller,
or Jules Desmartes, or Roguin, Cochin, Guillaume, Lebas, Nucingen,
Saillard, Popinot, Matifat, who make their mark, or have made it, in
their respective quarters. Come now! If this affair were not as sure as
bars of gold--"

"Sure!"

"Yes, sure. For two months I have figured at it. Without seeming to do
so, I have been getting information on building from the department of
public works, from architects and contractors. Monsieur Grindot, the
young architect who is to alter our house, is in despair that he has no
money to put into the speculation."

"He hopes for the work; he says that to screw something out of you."

"Can he take in such men as Pillerault, as Charles Claparon, as Roguin?
The profit is as sure as that of the Paste of Sultans."

"But, my dear friend, why should Roguin speculate? He gets his
commissions, and his fortune is made. I see him pass sometimes more full
of care than a minister of state, with an underhand look which I don't
like; he hides some secret anxiety. His face has grown in five years to
look like that of an old rake. Who can be sure that he won't kick over
the traces when he gets all your property into his own hands. Such
things happen. Do we know him well? He has only been a friend for
fifteen years, and I wouldn't put my hand into the fire for him. Why! he
is not decent: he does not live with his wife. He must have mistresses
who ruin him; I don't see any other cause for his anxiety. When I am
dressing I look through the blinds, and I often see him coming home in
the mornings: where from? Nobody knows. He seems to me like a man who
has an establishment in town, who spends on his pleasures, and Madame on
hers. Is that the life of a notary? If they make fifty thousand francs a
year and spend sixty thousand, in twenty years they will get to th