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Updated: May 2, 2025
Mascarin pricked up his ears, feeling that his patience was about to meet its reward. "Can you tell me the gentleman's name, to whom Madame said all this?" asked he. "Not I. The others called him 'The painter." This explanation did not satisfy Mascarin. "Look here, my good girl," said he, "try and find out the fellow's name. I think he is an artist who owes me money." "All right!
The name of Catenac seemed to irritate Mascarin so much, that calm, and self-contained as he usually was, he pulled off his cap and dashed it on his desk. "Are you speaking seriously?" said he angrily. "Why should I not be in earnest?" Mascarin removed his glasses, as though without them he could the more easily peer into the depths of the soul of the man before him.
"M. de Breulh takes his dismissal easily enough," observed Mascarin. "He was not dismissed; it was he that wrote and broke off the engagement."
"I am not so well off as you; and besides," he continued in a low voice, as though speaking to himself, "I have certain ties which you do not possess." For the first time during this interview a cloud spread over the doctor's countenance. "Great Heavens!" said he, "and I was depending on you for three thousand francs, which I require urgently." Mascarin smiled slyly at the doctor's uneasiness.
I can tell you that the account of the deed was written under the dictation of Caroline Schimmel," broke in Mascarin. "This unlucky woman started for Havre, intending to sail for the United States, but she got no further than that seaport town, for the good looks and the persuasive tongue of a sailor induced her to alter her plans.
"Well, I will give you a fourth of the dowry, and on the day of my marriage will hand you a cheque for that amount." Paul now imagined that he saw how matters worked. "If I marry Flavia," thought he, "I shall have to share her dowry with these highly respectable gentlemen." The offer made by the Marquis did not, however, seem to please Mascarin. "That is not what we want," said he.
Mascarin was no longer the plotter consulting with his confederates; he was the master issuing his orders to his subordinates. He had now taken from a box some of those square pieces of pasteboard, which he spent his time in reading over.
Hortebise, who had addressed Mascarin so familiarly by his Christian name of Baptiste, was about fifty-six years of age, but he carried his years so well, that he always passed for forty-nine. He had a heavy pair of red, sensual-looking lips, his hair was untinted by gray, and his eyes still lustrous.
"By the system which I have adopted," resumed Mascarin, "the wealthy and respectable man is as strictly watched in his own house as is the condemned wretch in his cell; for no act of his escapes the eyes of the servants whom we have placed around him. He can hardly even conceal his thoughts from us. Even the very secret that he has murmured to his wife with closed doors reaches our ears."
"My dear boy," said Mascarin, "let me present you to one of my oldest and best friends." Then, turning to Catenac, he added: "I wish to ask you to help and assist my young friend here. Paul Violaine is a good fellow, who has neither father nor mother, and whom we are trying to help on in his journey through life."
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