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"What! do you mean that you won't be there the day after to-morrow?" cried Potel, interrupting his friend. "Do you wish to be called a coward? and have it said you are running away from Bridau? No, no! The unmounted grenadiers of the Guard can not draw back before the dragoons of the Guard. Arrange your business in some other way and be there!" "One more to send to the shades!" said Max.
"Of a bad action which he could never have committed," answered Madame Hochon. Hearing the words, and seeing the lieutenant of gendarmes, who at this moment entered the room accompanied by the two gentlemen, Agathe fainted away. "There now!" said Monsieur Hochon to his wife and Gritte, "carry off Madame Bridau; women are only in the way at these times.
The last edition of the works of Canalis, printed on vellum, royal 8vo, from the press of Didot, with illustrations by Bixiou, Joseph Bridau, Schinner, Sommervieux, etc., is in five volumes, price, nine francs post-paid. This letter fell like a cobble-stone on a tulip.
The guests were Monsieur Heron, the four witnesses, Messieurs Mignonnet, Carpentier, Hochon, and Goddet, the mayor and the curate, Agathe Bridau, Madame Hochon, and her friend Madame Borniche, the two old ladies who laid down the law to the society of Issoudun.
Joseph Bridau grew pale as death, and collected all his strength to walk onward. "After all," he said, "I am innocent. Go on!" Poor artist! he was forced to bear his cross. Amid the hooting and insults and threats from the mob, he made the dreadful transit from the place Misere to the place Saint-Jean.
As old Doctor Rouget, the father of Jean-Jacques and Madame Bridau, advanced in years, he began to perceive the nonentity of his son; he then treated him harshly, trying to break him into a routine that might serve in place of intelligence. He thus, though unconsciously, prepared him to submit to the yoke of the first tyranny that threw its halter over his head.
The old lady now told her granddaughter to leave her alone with Madame Bridau and Joseph until the arrival of visitors. "For," she said, turning to the Parisians, "I know my Issoudun by heart; we shall have ten or twelve batches of inquisitive folk here to-night."
The ardent and disinterested love of citizen Bridau gave carte blanche to the perfidious doctor, who made the most of his son-in-law's blindness, as the following history will show.
Alas, friends," he added, in a tone which left his three companions in doubt whether he was jesting or speaking seriously, "give a man over to a vice and you'll get rid of him. Didn't Hugo say: 'She loved a ball, and died of it'? So it is. My grandmother loved the lottery. Old Rouget loved a loose life, and Lolotte killed him. Madame Bridau, poor woman, loved Philippe, and perished of it.
"I claim the second toast," said Mignonnet, as he rose. "Let us drink to those who attempted to restore his son!" Every one present, except Maxence Gilet, bowed to Philippe Bridau, and stretched their glasses towards him. "One word," said Max, rising.
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