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Updated: May 24, 2025
"My dear Monsieur Birotteau, I take too great an interest in you," said the stout draper, entering the room, "we have known each other too long, for we were both elected judges at the same time, not to tell you that a man named Bidault, called Gigonnet, a usurer, has notes of yours turned over to his order, and marked 'not guaranteed, by the house of Claparon.
On receiving his share of this extortion Cerizet said to himself: "There's three thousand to make Cerizet clear out." Cerizet then returned to the notary and said: "Claparon is a scoundrel, monsieur; he has received fifteen thousand francs from the proposed purchaser of your house, who will now, of course, become the owner.
"Yes," said Mongenod, "it seems impossible to believe what has happened, unless we believe that concealed behind Gigonnet there are certain bankers who want to strangle the speculation in the lands about the Madeleine." "What has happened is what happens always to those who go out of their proper business," said Claparon, hastily interrupting Mongenod.
"If you are able to get ten thousand francs out of your bourgeois you can surely get fifteen," said Cerizet. "For thirty thousand I'm your man. Frankness for frankness, you know." "You ask the impossible," replied Theodose. "At this very moment, if you had to do with Claparon instead of with me, your fifteen thousand would be lost, for Thuillier is to-day the owner of that house."
The fate of Charles Claparon would be, if du Tillet's scheme ended in bankruptcy, a swift deliverance to the tender mercies of Jews and Pharisees; and he well knew it. But to a poor devil who was despondently roaming the boulevard with a future of forty sous in his pocket when his old comrade du Tillet chanced to meet him, the little gains that he was to get out of the affair seemed an Eldorado.
Du Tillet knew very well what it was, for the Kellers had made inquiries of Claparon, who by referring them to du Tillet had demolished the past reputation of the poor man. Though quickly checked, the tears on Cesar's face spoke volumes.
"Faith!" said Claparon, "children do tyrannize over us over our hearts, I mean. Mine makes me furious; he has nearly ruined me, and now I won't have anything to do with him it's a sort of independence. Well, he is the happier for it, and so am I. That fellow was partly the cause of his mother's death.
I owe this little trick to my friend Claparon, who left me to bear the whole weight of the trouble about his stock-company, in which we were tricked by Conture, and I hope you may never be in that man's skin!" he added, infernal hatred flashing from his worn and withered eyes.
The pupils of Cesar's eyes dilated so enormously that he saw only red flames. "Your hundred thousand francs in his hands, my hundred thousand for his practice, a hundred thousand from Claparon, there's three hundred thousand francs purloined, not to speak of other thefts which will be discovered," exclaimed the young notary. "Madame Roguin is not to be counted on.
Roguin was so long connected with you, that perhaps out of decent feeling he may have paid them over to Claparon, and you will escape! But, no! what a fool I am! He has carried off Claparon's money as well! Happily, Claparon had only paid over, to my care, one hundred thousand francs. I gave them to Roguin just as I would give you my purse, and I have no receipt for them.
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