“Speak out, monsieur.” Mme. de Marville spoke frigidly, scanning Fraisier as she spoke with a sagacious eye.
“Madame, your eminent capacity is known to me; I was once at Mantes. M. Leboeuf, President of the Tribunal, is acquainted with M. de Marville, and can answer inquiries about me—”
The Presidente’s shrug was so ruthlessly significant, that Fraisier was compelled to make short work of his parenthetic discourse.
“So distinguished a woman will at once understand why I speak of myself in the first place. It is the shortest way to the property.”
To this acute observation the lady replied by a gesture. Fraisier took the sign for a permission to continue.
“I was an attorney, madame, at Mantes. My connection was all the fortune that I was likely to have. I took over M. Levroux’s practice. You knew him, no doubt?”
The Presidente inclined her head.
“With borrowed capital and some ten thousand francs of my own, I went to Mantes. I had been with Desroches, one of the cleverest attorneys in Paris, I had been his head-clerk for six years. I was so unlucky as to make an enemy of the attorney for the crown at Mantes, Monsieur—”
“Olivier Vinet.”
“Son of the Attorney-General, yes, madame. He was paying his court to a little person—”