"Lieutenant Ferguzon bade me not lose it, and I have taken great care of it."
"Lieutenant Ferguzon is the most farseeing man of my acquaintance. Array yourself as a tax-collector and take the commission with you."
Barrabas went out, and returned ten minutes later, completely transformed.
He found Cauvignac dressed wholly in black, and looking enough like a court officer to deceive anybody.
They went together to the attorney's quarters. Master Rabodin lived in a third-floor apartment, consisting of a reception-room, an office, and a closet. There were other rooms, no doubt, but as they were not open to clients we will say nothing about them.
Cauvignac passed through the reception-room, left Barrabas in the study, cast a sympathetic glance in passing at the two clerks who were pretending to write busily while playing at marelle, and entered the sanctum sanctorum.
Master Rabodin was sitting in front of a desk so laden with papers that the respectable attorney seemed to be literally buried up in writs and records and judgments. He was a tall, gaunt, sallow man, clad in a black coat which fitted as closely to his body as an eel's skin. When he heard Cauvignac's footsteps, he straightened up his long, bent backbone, and raised his head, which then appeared above the breastwork by which he was surrounded.
For an instant Cauvignac thought that he had discovered the basilisk, an animal regarded as fabulous by modern scientists, so brightly did the attorney's little eyes shine with the ominous glitter of avarice and cupidity.
"Monsieur," said Cauvignac, "I ask your pardon for calling upon you without previous appointment; but," he added with his most charming smile, "it is a privilege of my office."