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I wish to question that woman myself. I want to be quite certain on the matter." In spite of the lapse of fifteen years Broquette's nurse-office in the Rue Roquepine had remained the same as formerly, except that Madame Broquette was dead and had been succeeded by her daughter Herminie.
"One can see that Monsieur le Docteur knows his business," Madame Broquette allowed herself to say, with a flattering smile. "I don't often have such pearls. But she has only just arrived, otherwise she would probably have been engaged already. I can answer for her as I could for myself, for I have put her out before."
Since the girl had gone upstairs a fearful tumult had arisen on the upper floors, whence also a vile smell descended. Some dispute, some battle, seemed to be in progress. There were shouts and howls, followed by a furious exchange of vituperation. "Pray excuse me," at last exclaimed Monsieur Broquette; "my wife will receive you in a minute."
Having opened a door which communicated with the common room, Madame Broquette, assuming the most noble airs, leisurely introduced the pick of her nurses, in groups of three, each with her infant in her arms.
At this moment Madame Broquette very amiably asked the visitors into her office. After long reflection, the old gentleman had gone off without selecting any nurse, but saying that he would return some other time. "There are folks who don't know their own minds," said Madame Broquette sententiously. "It isn't my fault, and I sincerely beg you to excuse me, doctor.
All at once Monsieur Broquette darted forward, though whence he had come it was hard to say. At all events, he had seen Boutan, who was a client that needed attention. "Is my wife busy, then?" said he. "I cannot allow you to remain waiting here, doctor. Come, come, I pray you."
It was kept by Madame Broquette, a woman of forty, with a dignified if somewhat blotched face, who was always very tightly laced in a faded silk gown of dead-leaf hue.
But if she represented the dignity and fair fame of the establishment in its intercourse with clients, the soul of the place, the ever-busy manipulator, was her husband, Monsieur Broquette, a little man with a pointed nose, quick eyes, and the agility of a ferret.
Madame Broquette, who, without presuming to interfere with a doctor, had retained her majestic air which so fully proclaimed the high respectability of her establishment, now turned towards her daughter: "Herminie, go to see if Madame Couteau is still there."
Moreover, M. Broquette, her father, though now more than five-and-seventy, secretly remained the all-powerful, energetic director of the place, discharging all needful police duties, drilling new nurses like recruits, remaining ever on the watch and incessantly perambulating the three floors of his suspicious, dingy lodging-house. La Couteau was waiting for Mathieu in the doorway.
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