"CHER PETIT MARQUIS,—It is an age since I have seen you. No doubt my humble soirees are too dull for a beau seigueur so courted. I forgive you. Would I were a beau seigneur at your age! Alas! I am only a commonplace man of business, growing old, too. Aloft from the world in which I dwell, you can scarcely be aware that I have embarked a great part of my capital in building speculations. There is a Rue de Louvier that runs its drains right through my purse. I am obliged to call in the moneys due to me. My agent informs me that I am just 7000 louis short of the total I need—all other debts being paid in—and that there is a trifle more than 7000 louis owned to me as interest on my hypotheque on Rochebriant: kindly pay into his hands before the end of this week that sum. You have been too lenient to Collot, who must owe you more than that. Send agent to him. Desole to trouble you, and am au desespoir to think that my own pressing necessities compel me to urge you to take so much trouble. Mais que faire? The Rue de Louvier stops the way, and I must leave it to my agent to clear it.
"Accept all my excuses, with the assurance of my sentiments the most
cordial. PAUL LOUVIER."
Alain tossed the letter to De Finisterre. "Read that from the best fellow in the world."
The Chevalier laid down his cigarette and read. "Diable!" he said, when he returned the letter and resumed the cigarette—"Diable! Louvier must be much pressed for money, or he would not have written in this strain. What does it matter? Collot owes you more than 7000 louis. Let your lawyer get them, and go to sleep with both ears on your pillow."
"Ah! you think Collot can pay if he will?"
"Ah! foi! did not M. Gandrin tell you that M. Collot was safe to buy your wood at more money than any one else would give?"
"Certainly," said Alain, comforted. "Gandrin left that impression on my mind. I will set him on the man. All will come right, I dare say; but if it does not come right, what would Louvier do?"
"Louvier do!" answered Finisterre, reflectively. "Well do you ask my opinion and advice?"
"Earnestly, I ask."
"Honestly, then, I answer. I am a little on the Bourse myself—most Parisians are. Louvier has made a gigantic speculation in this new street, and with so many other irons in the fire he must want all the money he can get at. I dare say that if you do not pay him what you owe, he must leave it to his agent to take steps for announcing the sale of Rochebriant. But he detests scandal; he hates the notion of being severe; rather than that, in spite of his difficulties, he will buy Rochebriant of you at a better price than it can command at public sale. Sell it to him. Appeal to him to act generously, and you will flatter him. You will get more than the old place is worth. Invest the surplus —live as you have done, or better—and marry an heiress. Morbleu! a Marquis de Rochebriant, if he were sixty years old, would rank high in the matrimonial market. The more the democrats have sought to impoverish titles and laugh down historical names, the more do rich democrat fathers-in-law seek to decorate their daughters with titles and give their grandchildren the heritage of historical names. You look shocked, pauvre anti. Let us hope, then, that Collot will pay. Set your dog— I mean your lawyer—at him; seize him by the throat!"