“He is in Paris,” said Corentin positively. “There is a touch of Spanish genius of the Philip II. type in all this; but I have pitfalls for everybody, even for kings.”
Five days after the nabob’s disappearance, Madame du Val-Noble was sitting by Esther’s bedside weeping, for she felt herself on one of the slopes down to poverty.
“If I only had at least a hundred louis a year! With that sum, my dear, a woman can retire to some little town and find a husband——”
“I can get you as much as that,” said Esther.
“How?” cried Madame du Val-Noble.
“Oh, in a very simple way. Listen. You must plan to kill yourself; play your part well. Send for Asie and offer her ten thousand francs for two black beads of very thin glass containing a poison which kills you in a second. Bring them to me, and I will give you fifty thousand francs for them.”
“Why do you not ask her for them yourself?” said her friend.
“Asie would not sell them to me.”
“They are not for yourself?” asked Madame du Val-Noble.
“Perhaps.”