The notary himself, by courtesy, was appointed executor. To him Pons left a picture of price, such a thing as the law permits a notary to receive. Trognon went out and came upon Mme. Cibot in the salon.
"Well, sir, did M. Pons remember me?"
"You do not expect a notary to betray secrets confided to him, my dear," returned M. Trognon. "I can only tell you this—there will be many disappointments, and some that are anxious after the money will be foiled. M. Pons has made a good and very sensible will, a patriotic will, which I highly approve."
La Cibot's curiosity, kindled by such words, reached an unimaginable pitch. She went downstairs and spent the night at Cibot's bedside, inwardly resolving that Mlle. Remonencq should take her place towards two or three in the morning, when she would go up and have a look at the document.
Mlle. Brisetout's visit towards half-past ten that night seemed natural enough to La Cibot; but in her terror lest the ballet-girl should mention Gaudissart's gift of a thousand francs, she went upstairs with her, lavishing polite speeches and flattery as if Mlle. Heloise had been a queen.
"Ah! my dear, you are much nicer here on your own ground than at the theatre," Heloise remarked. "I advise you to keep to your employment."
Heloise was splendidly dressed. Bixiou, her lover, had brought her in his carriage on the way to an evening party at Mariette's. It so fell out that the first-floor lodger, M. Chapoulot, a retired braid manufacturer from the Rue Saint-Denis, returning from the Ambigu-Comique with his wife and daughter, was dazzled by a vision of such a costume and such a charming woman upon their staircase.
"Who is that, Mme. Cibot?" asked Mme. Chapoulot.
"A no-better-than-she-should-be, a light-skirts that you may see half-naked any evening for a couple of francs," La Cibot answered in an undertone for Mme. Chapoulot's ear.
"Victorine!" called the braid manufacturer's wife, "let the lady pass, child."