Bixiou. “Pray, who would regret it? Not you, certainly, for you will be made under-head-clerk and du Bruel head of the bureau. Monsieur Baudoyer gets the division.”
Fleury. “I’ll bet a hundred francs that Baudoyer will never be head of the division.”
Vimeux. “I’ll join in the bet; will you, Monsieur Poiret?”
Poiret. “I retire in January.”
Bixiou. “Is it possible? are we to lose the sight of those shoe-ties? What will the ministry be without you? Will nobody take up the bet on my side?”
Dutocq. “I can’t, for I know the facts. Monsieur Rabourdin is appointed. Monsieur de la Billardiere requested it of the two ministers on his death-bed, blaming himself for having taken the emoluments of an office of which Rabourdin did all the work; he felt remorse of conscience, and the ministers, to quiet him, promised to appoint Rabourdin unless higher powers intervened.”
Bixiou. “Gentlemen, are you all against me? seven to one,—for I know which side you’ll take, Monsieur Phellion. Well, I’ll bet a dinner costing five hundred francs at the Rocher de Cancale that Rabourdin does not get La Billardiere’s place. That will cost you only a hundred francs each, and I’m risking five hundred,—five to one against me! Do you take it up?” [Shouting into the next room.] “Du Bruel, what say you?”
Phellion [laying down his pen]. “Monsieur, may I ask on what you base that contingent proposal?—for contingent it is. But stay, I am wrong to call it a proposal; I should say contract. A wager constitutes a contract.”
Fleury. “No, no; you can only apply the word ‘contract’ to agreements that are recognized in the Code. Now the Code allows of no action for the recovery of a bet.”
Dutocq. “Proscribe a thing and you recognize it.”