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She tried to assume an innocent, dignified attitude; but he seized her by the arm with such force that Frantz's words came to her mind: "It will kill him perhaps, but he will kill you first." As she was afraid of death, she allowed herself to be led away without resistance, and had not even the strength to lie. "Where are we going?" she asked, in a low voice. Risler did not answer.
During the silence that followed, they heard the sound of wheels in the garden, and two great furniture vans stopped at the door. "I beg your pardon," said Risler, "but I must leave you a moment. Those are the vans from the public auction rooms; they have come to take away my furniture from upstairs." "What! you are going to sell your furniture too?" asked Madame Fromont.
Fromont attempted to speak, but a gesture from his wife restrained him, and Risler continued: "I am no longer your partner, Georges. I am once more the clerk that I never should have ceased to be. From this day our partnership articles are cancelled. I insist upon it, you understand; I insist upon it.
It keeps me awake. And afterward, through the day, I have mamma's piano and her scales tra, la la la! If the music were only worth listening to!" Risler has taken the wise course. He does not say a word until he sees that she is beginning to calm down a little, when he completes the soothing process with compliments. "How pretty we are to-day! Are we going out soon to make some calls, eh?"
Thereupon, when the blue-lined carriage drove up to the door of the theatre, she began to reflect, for the first time, that, when all was said, Claire had stolen her place and that she would be justified in trying to recover it. After his marriage Risler had given up the brewery.
"Stop her, stop her! Risler, Planus, I implore you! In pity's name do not let her go in this way," cried Claire. Planus stepped toward the door. Risler detained him. "I forbid you to stir! I ask your pardon, Madame, but we have more important matters than this to consider. Madame Risler concerns us no longer.
"Frantz! my Frantz!" cried the old strolling player in a melodramatic voice, clutching the air convulsively with his hands. After a long and energetic embrace he presented his guests to one another. "Monsieur Robricart, of the theatre at Metz. "Monsieur Chaudezon, of the theatre at Angers. "Frantz Risler, engineer." In Delobelle's mouth that word "engineer" assumed vast proportions!
And what an event in the factory! Madame Fromont was informed at once. "Madame, Madame! Monsieur Risler is going out!" Claire looked at him from her window, and that tall form, bowed by sorrow, leaning on Sigismond's arm, aroused in her a profound, unusual emotion which she remembered ever after. In the street people bowed to Risler with great interest. Even their greetings warmed his heart.
At last one day Sidonie entered that paradise of which she had heretofore caught only a glimpse. Madame Fromont, to whom Risler often spoke of her little neighbor's beauty and intelligence, asked him to bring her to the children's ball she intended to give at Christmas. At first Monsieur Chebe replied by a curt refusal.
Risler timidly ventured to ask. "Why a shop? why a shop?" repeated M. Chebe, red as an Easter egg, and raising his voice to its highest pitch. "Why, because I'm a merchant, Monsieur Risler, a merchant and son of a merchant. Oh! I see what you're coming at. I have no business. But whose fault is it?
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