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I went to see my old master, in whose office Mongenod and I had studied law; he was now my counsel. When I told him about my loan to Mongenod and the manner in which I had acted, 'What! he cried, 'one of my old clerks to behave in that way! You ought to have put him off till the next day and come to see me.
If my angel would like absolution for some of our little sins, she will try to find out the facts of the case by sending for Mongenod, the banker, and questioning him, with the dexterity that characterizes her, as to the father's fortune? Monsieur Mignon, formerly colonel of cavalry in the Imperial guard, has been for the last seven years a correspondent of the Mongenods.
We obtain from them all the sums we need. Not very long ago Madame Mongenod admitted to me that she had sold her hair, as I suspected, for twelve francs to buy bread. She gives me now twenty-four cords of wood a year for my poor people, in exchange for the half cord which I once sent her." "This explains to me your relations with the house of Mongenod," said Godefroid, "and your fortune."
During the short time that Madame de la Chanterie's arm rested upon his as they walked to the carriage, Godefroid could not escape the glamour of the words: "Your account is for sixteen hundred thousand francs!" words said by Louis Mongenod to the woman whose life was spent in the depths of the cloisters of Notre-Dame.
Your property is in the hand of Messieurs Mongenod; here is a cheque for the amount. Now then, release me as guardian, and sign the accounts, and also this receipt," he added, taking the papers from Monsieur Heron and handing them to Baruch. "As for you, Francois Hochon, you owe me money instead of having any to receive," said the old man, looking at his other grandson.
Here is a list of the items, continued Bordin, showing me a paper from which he read the total, 'Seventeen thousand francs in coin; a sum with which a house could be bought that would bring in two thousand francs a year. After replacing the list in the case, Bordin gave me a note for a sum equivalent to a hundred louis in gold, with a letter in which Mongenod admitted having received my hundred louis, on which he owed interest.
We are going to buy a house; and I mean to open a banking business between Paris and North America, so as to leave it to this fellow here, he added, showing me his eldest son, who was fifteen years old. We spent the rest of the day together and went to the play; for Mongenod and his family were actually hungry for the theatre.
One evening Monsieur Mongenod came himself, and Godefroid noticed that he showed to Monsieur Alain a certain filial familiarity added to the profound respect which he testified to the three other lodgers of Madame de la Chanterie. On that evening the banker merely put a few matter-of-fact questions to Godefroid: "Was he comfortable?
I had, in a secret hiding-place, two hundred louis d'or, an enormous hoard at that time; for they were worth I couldn't now tell you how many hundred thousand francs in assignats. Mongenod and I had studied at the same collage, that of Grassins, and we had met again in the same law-office, that of Bordin, a truly honest man.
'So now I am all right, I said to Bordin. 'He cannot deny the debt, replied my old master; 'but where there are no funds, even the king I should say the Directory can't enforce rights. I went home. Believing that I had been robbed in a way intentionally screened from the law, I withdrew my esteem from Mongenod, and resigned myself philosophically.
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