“I know it does.”

“So that you can be as rich as I am, and, indeed more rich, whenever you like, by the same means.”

“But your rents,—do you lay them by?”

“What do you think of a chest concealed in a wall?”

“I never made use of such a thing.”

“Then you must have some confidant, some safe man of business who pays you interest at a fair rate.”

“Not at all.”

“Good heavens! what do you do with it, then?”

“I spend all I have, and I only have what I spend, my dear D’Artagnan.”

“Ah that may be. But you are something of a prince, fifteen or sixteen thousand livres melt away between your fingers; and then you have expenses and appearances——”