The editor of “The Pilot” started back. “What!” he exclaimed, “draw the fingers of the law into my own business! You don’t think of it! Besides, what good would that do me? I have no proofs of my allegations. Do you suppose that Thaller has not taken his precautions, and tied my hands? No, no! without Favoral there is nothing to be done.”
“Do you suppose, then, that you could induce him to surrender himself?”
“No, but to furnish me the proofs I need, to send Thaller where they have already sent that poor Jottras.”
And, becoming more and more excited,
“But it is not in a month that I should want those proofs,” he went on, “nor even in two weeks, but to-morrow, but at this very moment. Before the end of the week, Thaller will have wound up the operation, realized, Heaven knows how many millions, and put every thing in such nice order, that justice, who in financial matters is not of the first capacity, will discover nothing wrong. If he can do that, he is safe, he is beyond reach, and will be dubbed a first-class financier. Then to what may he not aspire! Already he talks of having himself elected deputy; and he says everywhere that he has found, to marry his daughter, a gentleman who bears one of the oldest names in France,—the Marquis de Tregars.”
“Why, this is the Marquis de Tregars!” exclaimed Maxence, pointing to Marius.
For the first time, M. Saint Pavin took the trouble to examine his visitor; and he, who knew life too well not to be a judge of men, he seemed surprised.
“Please excuse me, sir,” he uttered with a politeness very different from his usual manner, “and permit me to ask you if you know the reasons why M. de Thaller is so prodigiously anxious to have you for a son-in-law.”
“I think,” replied M. de Tregars coldly, “that M. de Thaller would not be sorry to deprive me of the right to seek the causes of my father’s ruin.”
But he was interrupted by a great noise of voices in the adjoining room; and almost at once there was a loud knock at the door, and a voice called,