“Money down?”
“No: that would have been impossible. The king did not wish, or rather M. Mazarin did not wish, to have the appearance of removing those two gentlemen, who had sprung from the barricades; he permitted them therefore, to make certain extravagant conditions for their retirement.”
“What were those conditions?”
“Tremble...three years’ income for the good-will.”
“The deuce! so that the one hundred and fifty thousand francs have passed into their hands.”
“Precisely so.”
“And beyond that?”
“A sum of one hundred and fifty thousand francs, or fifteen thousand pistoles, whichever you please, in three payments.”
“Exorbitant.”
“Yes, but that is not all.”