"The Moutonnets are all the same, from father to son. When we are owed anything we are pitiless. Listen. There is an honest fellow who owed Moutonnet & Son one hundred and sixty francs; my grandfather put him in prison, and there he has been for the three generations, and he has just died there. I calculated that, during the thirty years he was there, he cost us twelve thousand francs; but we maintained the principle. But I beg your pardon for keeping you with all this nonsense; and here is a new customer for you."
"Ah!" said the host, "it is Captain la Jonquiere himself. Captain," continued he, "some one is waiting for you."
The captain entered suspiciously—he had seen some strange, and, he thought, sinister faces about.
Dubois saluted him politely.
La Jonquiere asked the host if the friend he had expected had arrived.
"No one but monsieur. However, you lose nothing by the exchange, since one was to fetch away money, and the other brings it."
La Jonquiere, surprised, turned to Dubois, who repeated the same story he had told to the host, and with such success that La Jonquiere, calling for wine, asked Dubois to follow him into his room.
Dubois approached the window, and quietly tapped on it with his fingers.
"But shall I not be in the way in your room?" asked Dubois.
"Not at all, not at all—the view is pleasant—as we drink we can look out and see the passers-by: and there are some pretty women in the Rue des Bourdonnais."