. "Am I dead, or am I alive?"

"I hope, monsieur," the attorney went on, "that you will follow my
advice. Your cause is mine. You will soon perceive the interest I take
in your situation, almost unexampled in judicial records. For the moment
I will give you a letter to my notary, who will pay to your order fifty
francs every ten days. It would be unbecoming for you to come here to
receive alms. If you are Colonel Chabert, you ought to be at no man's
mercy. I shall record these advances as a loan; you have estates to
recover; you are rich."

This delicate compassion brought tears to the old man's eyes. Derville
rose hastily, for it was perhaps not correct for a lawyer to show
emotion; he went into the adjoining room, and came back with an unsealed
letter, which he gave to the Colonel. When the poor man held it in his
hand, he felt through the paper two gold pieces.

"Will you be good enough to describe the documents, and tell me the name
of the town, and in what kingdom?" said the lawyer.

The Colonel dictated the information, and verified the spelling of the
names of places; then he took his hat in one hand, looked at Derville,
and held out the other--a horny hand, saying with much simplicity:

"On my honor, sir, after the Emperor, you are the man to whom I shall
owe most. You are a splendid fellow!"

The attorney clapped his hand into the Colonel's, saw him to the stairs,
and held a light for him.

"Boucard," said Derville to his head clerk, "I have just listened to a
tale that may cost me five and twenty louis. If I am robbed, I shall not
regret the money, for I shall have seen the most consummate actor of the
day."

When the Colonel was in the street and close to a lamp, he took the two
twenty-franc pieces out of the letter and looked at them for a moment
under the light. It was the first gold he had seen for nine years.

"I may smoke cigars!" he said to himself.

About three months after this interview, at night, in Derville's room,
the notary commissioned to advance the half-pay on Derville's account to
his eccentric client, came to consult the attorney on a serious matter,
and began by begging him to refund the six hundred francs that the old
soldier had received.

"Are you amusing yourself with pensioning the old army?" said the
notary, laughing--a young man named Crottat, who had just bought up
the office in which he had been head clerk, his chief having fled in
consequence of a disastrous bankr