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They had no rent to pay and no expenses for firing; Cibot's earnings amounted on an average to seven or eight hundred francs, add tips at New Year, and the pair had altogether in income of sixteen hundred francs, every penny of which they spent, for the Cibots lived and fared better than working people usually do. "One can only live once," La Cibot used to say.
Cibot's remark, "that we will talk the thing over; and if the good shentleman will take an annuity, of fifty thousand francsh, I will shtand a hamper of wine, if " "Fifty thousand francs!" interrupted the doctor; "what are you thinking about? Why, if the good man is so well off as that, with me in attendance, and Mme.
"Oh, it is the nutcracker!" said one, "the musician, you know " "Who can the pall-bearers be?" "Pooh! play-actors." "I say, just look at poor old Cibot's funeral. There is one worker the less. What a man! he could never get enough of work!" "He never went out." "He never kept Saint Monday." "How fond he was of his wife!" "Ah! There is an unhappy woman!"
I had rather die outright than be crippled." La Cibot crawled downstairs, clinging to the banisters, and writhing and groaning so piteously that the tenants, in alarm, came out upon their landings. Schmucke supported the suffering creature, and told the story of La Cibot's devotion, the tears running down his cheeks as he spoke.
"Wipe your tears; they do me honor; this is my reward," said La Cibot, melodramatically. "There isn't no more disinterested creature on earth than me; but don't you go into the room with tears in your eyes, or M. Pons will be thinking himself worse than he is." Schmucke was touched by this delicate feeling. He took La Cibot's hand and gave it a final squeeze.
He took La Cibot's hand and clasped it to his breast. When he looked up, there were tears in his eyes. "There, that will do, Papa Schmucke; how funny you are! This is too bad. I am an old daughter of the people my heart is in my hand. I have something here, you see, like you have, hearts of gold that you are," she added, slapping her chest. "Baba Schmucke!" continued the musician. "No.
Poulain came to lend himself so readily to the farce of La Cibot's illness and recovery. Greed of every kind, ambition of every nature, is not easy to hide.
"Ah!" cried La Cibot, "whatever you do will be right; I trust in you and your heart. Let us never talk of this again; you make me feel ashamed, my cherub. Think of getting better, you will outlive us all yet." Profound uneasiness filled Mme. Cibot's mind. She cast about for some way of making the sick man understand that she expected a legacy.
Schmucke meanwhile went back to his friend Pons with the news that Cibot was dying, and Remonencq gone in search of M. Trognon, the notary. Pons was struck by the name. It had come up again and again in La Cibot's interminable talk, and La Cibot always recommended him as honesty incarnate.
"And now," he continued, "I shall go to consult the only man that knows, our Jew, a good sort of Jew that did not ask more than fifteen per cent of us for his money." Remonencq had read La Cibot's heart. To will is to act with women of her stamp.
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