To cap it all Rap, in accordance with his habitual good manners, opened the door without knocking, his eyes becoming glued to my pile of ducats. Then he cried out in a voice like a yelp:
"Aha! I've caught you. Will you persist in telling me now, Mr
Painter, that you're short of money?…"
And his claw-like fingers advanced with that nervous trembling that the sight of gold always arouses in misers.
For a few seconds I stood there stupefied.
The memory of all the open snubs that this individual had inflicted on me, his covetous gaze, his insolent smile, everything about him exasperated me. In a single bound I seized him and, pushing him out of my bedroom with both hands, I flattened his nose with the door.
This was all done with the crack and the rapidity of a jack-in-the-box.
But outside the old usurer was shrieking like an eagle:
"I want my money! Thief! I want my money!"
The other tenants were coming out of their rooms and asking questions:
"What's wrong? What's happening?"