"She is capable of anything!" said Pons, without attempting to conceal all his abhorrence at the sound of her name. "It is true, Schmucke ought to have some trustworthy person."
"M. Duplanty and I have been thinking about you both—"
"Ah! thank you, I had not thought of that."
"—And M. Duplanty suggests that you should have Mme. Cantinet—"
"Oh! Mme. Cantinet who lets the chairs!" exclaimed Pons. "Yes, she is an excellent creature."
"She has no liking for Mme. Cibot," continued the doctor, "and she would take good care of M. Schmucke—"
"Send her to me, M. Duplanty . . . send her and her husband too. I shall be easy. Nothing will be stolen here."
Schmucke had taken Pons' hand again, and held it joyously in his own. Pons was almost well again, he thought.
"Let us go, Monsieur l'Abbe," said the doctor. "I will send Mme. Cantinet round at once. I see how it is. She perhaps may not find M. Pons alive."
While the Abbe Duplanty was persuading Pons to engage Mme. Cantinet as his nurse, Fraisier had sent for her. He had plied the beadle's wife with sophistical reasoning and subtlety. It was difficult to resist his corrupting influence. And as for Mme. Cantinet—a lean, sallow woman, with large teeth and thin lips—her intelligence, as so often happens with women of the people, had been blunted by a hard life, till she had come to look upon the slenderest daily wage as prosperity. She soon consented to take Mme. Sauvage with her as general servant.