But Providence had some spite against them.
Marcel, a short time afterwards, led them to Victor’s room and showed them at the bottom of his chest of drawers a twenty-franc piece. The youngster had asked him to get the change of it.
Where did it come from? No doubt it was got by a theft committed while they were going about as engineers. But in order to restore it they would require to know the person; and if some one came to claim it they would look like accomplices.
At length, having sent for Victor, they ordered him to open his drawer: the napoleon was no longer there. He pretended not to understand. A short time before, however, they had seen it, this very coin, and Marcel was incapable of lying. This affair had revolutionised Pécuchet so much that he had, since morning, kept in his pocket a letter for Bouvard:
“Sir,—Fearing lest M. Pécuchet may be ill, I have recourse to your kindness——”
“Whose is the signature, then?”
“Olympe Dumouchel, née Charpeau.”
She and her husband were anxious to know in which bathing-place—Courseulles, Langrune, or Lucques—the best society was to be found, which was least noisy, and as to the means of transport, the cost of washing, etc.
This importunity made them angry with Dumouchel; then weariness plunged them into deeper despondency.
They went over all the pains that they had taken—so many lessons, precautions, torments!