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Updated: June 17, 2025
In answer to his gentle ring, a little old woman opened the door, and giving him a rapid look, said briefly: "Monsieur is inexorable: he won't see any doctor whatever." She was going to shut the door in his face, when Ramin quickly interposed, under his breath, with "I am not a doctor." She looked at him from head to foot. "Are you a lawyer?" "Nothing of the sort, my good lady."
"We will not cry any more," said little Ramin, who though only twelve years of age, was yet the oldest of the captives, and recognized as their captain and leader. "We will not cry any more, for our tears give pleasure to our enemies. Let us be cheerful, and that perhaps will vex them. To spite them, and show how little we think of our hunger, let us sing a jolly song."
What between opening and shutting them for the next quarter of an hour, he at length induced Monsieur Ramin to offer him seven thousand francs. "Very well, Ramin, agreed," he quietly said; "you have made an unconscionable bargain." To this succeeded a violent fit of coughing.
"Make my will?" indignantly exclaimed the old man; "make my will? what do you mean, sir? do you mean to say I am dying?" "Heaven forbid!" piously ejaculated Ramin. "Then why do you ask me if I had been making my will?" angrily resumed the old man. He then began to be extremely abusive. When money was in the way, Monsieur Ramin, though otherwise of a violent temper, had the meekness of a lamb.
Oh, sir, if you have any influence with us, do, pray do, tell us how wicked it is to die without making one's will or confessing one's sins." "I shall go up this very evening," ambiguously replied Monsieur Ramin. He kept his promise, and found Monsieur Bonelle in bed, groaning with pain, and in the worst of tempers.
The agreement was signed on the following day, to the indignation of old Marguerite, and the mutual satisfaction of the parties concerned. Every one admired the luck and shrewdness of Ramin, for the old man every day was reported worse; and it was clear to all that the first quarter of the annuity would never be paid.
"What!" asked Bonelle, looking at him very fixedly. "My dear friend, I mistook; I meant two thousand francs per annum," hurriedly rejoined Ramin. Monsieur Bonelle closed his eyes, and appeared to fall into a gentle slumber. The mercer coughed; the sick man never moved. "Monsieur Bonelle." No reply. "My excellent friend." Utter silence. "Are you asleep?" A long pause.
Monsieur Bonelle did not trouble himself with useless remonstrances, but when his annuity was refused, employed such good legal arguments, as the exasperated mercer could not possibly resist. Ten years have elapsed, and MM. Ramin and Bonelle still live on. For a house which would have been dear at fifty thousand francs, the draper has already handed over seventy thousand.
Not before getting out of doors did I become conscious of the ingratitude of my heart, and the thought of the unmerited happiness that had become mine a fortnight earlier again won the mastery in me. In Stettin I found drinking, gambling friends. William Ramin took occasion to say, apropos of a remark about reading the Bible, "Tut!
"Yes, but I may be carried off one of these days," quietly observed the old man, evidently wishing to turn the chance of his own death to account. "Indeed, and I hope so," muttered the mercer, who was getting very ill-tempered. "You see," soothingly continued Bonelle, "you are so good a man of business, Ramin, that you will double the actual value of the house in no time.
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