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"My dear M. Le Merquier," said he with his engaging, good-natured voice, "I have a Virgin of Tintoretto's just the size of your panel." Impossible to read anything in the eyes of the lawyer, this time hidden under their overhanging brows. "Permit me to hang it there, opposite your table. That will help you to think sometimes of me."
"And to soften the severities of my report, too, sir?" cried Le Merquier, formidable and upright, his hand on the bell. "I have seen many shameless things in my life, but never anything like this. Such offers to me, in my own house!" "But, my dear colleague, I swear to you "
"Ah, M. le Duc, how it cheers me to hear you speak thus! I was beginning to lose all confidence. My enemies are so powerful. And a piece of bad luck into the bargain. Do you know that it is Le Merquier himself who is charged with the report on my election?" "Le Merquier? The devil!"
"At any rate," said a handsome man with a bad feminine face, "he has not proved where our accusations were false." The old woman, hearing that, wrenched herself through the crowd, and facing Moessard said: "What he did not say I will. I am his mother, and it is my duty to speak." She stopped to seize Le Merquier by the sleeve, who was escaping: "Wicked man, you must listen, first of all.
As he crossed the Salle des Pas-Perdus, he caught sight of the financier chatting in a corner with Le Merquier, the examiner; he passed quite near them, and looked at them with a triumphant air which made people wonder: "What is the meaning of this?"
And you can imagine with what ardent curiosity that worldly assembly regarded this quondam odalisk turned fervent Catholic, as she advanced escorted by a man with a livid countenance like that of some spectacled sacristan, Maitre le Merquier, deputy of Lyons, Hemerlingue's man of business, who accompanied the baroness whenever the baron "was somewhat indisposed," as on this evening.
I only ask you, my dear colleague, absolute silence; for the rest, I rely on your justice and your loyalty." He rose, ready to go, and Le Merquier did not move, still asking the green curtain in front of him, as if seeking inspiration for his answer there. At last he said: "It shall be as you desire, my dear colleague. This confidence shall remain between us.
"Listen." It was the echo of his laughter sent back to them from the depths of a vault, as if the idea of Le Merquier having a conscience moved even the dead to mirth. "Suppose we walk a little," said he, "it begins to be chilly on this bench."
As he walked through the Salle des Pas-Perdus, he saw the financier talking in a corner with Le Merquier, the judge of his election, passed close by them and stared at them with a triumphant air which made them wonder: "What in God's name has happened to him?"
They said in the committee-rooms that Le Merquier had completed his report, a masterpiece of logic and ferocity, that it meant an invalidation, and that he was bound to carry it with a high hand unless Mora, so powerful in the Assembly, should himself intervene and give him his word of command.
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