There is in youth a warmth of heart, a craving for enthusiasm which are aroused by the slightest breath. As the Nabob spoke, de Géry felt his suspicions vanishing and all his sympathy reviving with an infusion of pity. No, surely that man was no vile knave, but a poor deluded mortal whose fortune had gone to his head, like a wine too powerful for a stomach that has long slaked its thirst with water. Alone in the midst of Paris, surrounded by enemies and sharpers, Jansoulet reminded him of a pedestrian laden with gold passing through a wood haunted by thieves, in the dark and unarmed. And he thought that it would be well for the protégé to watch over the patron without seeming to do so, to be the clear-sighted Telemachus of that blind Mentor, to point out the pitfalls to him, to defend him against the brigands, in short to assist him to fight in that swarm of nocturnal ambuscades which he felt to be lurking savagely about the Nabob and his millions.
THE JOYEUSE FAMILY.
Every morning in the year, at precisely eight o'clock, a new and almost uninhabited house in an out-of-the-way quarter of Paris was filled with shouts and cries and happy laughter that rang clear as crystal in the desert of the hall.
"Father, don't forget my music."
"Father, my embroidery cotton."
"Father, bring us some rolls."
And the father's voice calling from below:
"Yaia, throw down my bag."