“My wife complains of you,” said he to Octave, looking back, after going down three stairs. “Call in and have a chat with her now and then.”
Madame Juzeur detained the young man a moment.
“And I, how you neglect me! I thought you loved me a little. When you come, I will let you taste a liquor from the West Indies, oh! something delicious!”
Octave at length entered the warehouse. The first person he beheld, seated at the cashier’s desk, was Madame Josserand under arms, polished up and laced, and her hair already done. Close beside her, Berthe, who had no doubt come down in haste, in the charming deshabille of a dressing-gown, appeared to be very excited. But they stopped talking on catching sight of him, and the mother looked at him with a terrible eye.
“So, sir,” said she, “it is thus that you love the firm? You enter into the plots of my daughter’s enemies.”
He wished to defend himself, and state the facts of the case. But she prevented him from speaking, she accused him of having spent the night with the Duveyriers, looking for the will, to insert all sorts of things in it. And, as he laughed, asking what interest he could have had in doing such a thing, she resumed:
“Your own interest, your own interest. In short! sir, you should have hastened to inform us, as God was good enough to make you a witness of the occurrence. When one thinks that, had it not been for me, my daughter might still have been in ignorance of it! Yes, she would have been despoiled, had I not run down-stairs the moment I heard the news. Eh! your interest, your interest, sir, who knows? Though Madame Duveyrier is very faded, yet some people, not over particular, may still find her good enough, perhaps.”
“Oh! mamma!” said Berthe, “Clotilde, who is so virtuous!” But Madame Josserand shrugged her shoulders pityingly.
“Pooh! you know very well people will do anything for money!” Octave was obliged to relate to them all the circumstances of the attack. They exchanged glances: as the mother said, there had evidently been maneuvers. Clotilde was really too kind to wish to spare her relations’ emotions! However, they let the young man start on his work, though still having their doubts as to his conduct in the matter. Their lively explanation continued:
“And who will pay the fifty thousand francs agreed upon in the contract?” said Madame Josserand. “We are not likely to see a single one of them when he is dead and buried.”