Unfortunately, Vaudrey was rather skittish on these particular questions, besides he was informed on the matter. He felt his flesh creep while Molina was speaking. Just before, on seeing the banker's card, the idea of the money of which the fat man was one of the incarnations, had suddenly dawned upon him as a hope. Who knows? By Molina's aid, he might, perhaps, free himself from anxiety about the Gochard bill of exchange!—But from the minister's first words, although the banker could not get to the point, intimidated as he was by Sulpice's honest look, it was clear that Vaudrey surmised some repugnant suggestions in the hesitating words of this man.
What! Molina hesitating? He did not go straight to the point, squarely, according to his custom, Molina the illustrious Tumbler? Eh! no! the intentionally cold bearing of the minister decidedly discomposed him. Vaudrey's glance never wandered from his for a moment. When the promoter pronounced the word Bourse, a disdainful curl played upon Sulpice's lips, but not a word escaped him. Molina heard his own voice break the silence of the ministerial cabinet and he felt himself entangled. He came to propose a combination, a bonus, and he did not suspect that Vaudrey would refuse to have a hand in it. And here, this devilish minister appeared not to understand, did not understand, perhaps, or else he understood too well. Molina was not accustomed to such hard-of-hearing people. With his fat hand, he had dropped into the hands of senators and ministers of the former régime, a sum for which the only receipt given was a smile. He was accustomed to the style of conversation carried on by hints and ended between intelligent people by a shake of the hand, that in which some bits of paper rested: bank-notes or paid-up shares. And this Vaudrey knew nothing! So he felt himself obliged to explain himself clearly, to stoop to dotting every i, at the risk of being shown out of doors.
Molina was too shrewd to run this risk. He would return at another time, seeing that the minister turned a deaf ear, but pécaïre! he sweat huge drops in seeking roundabout phrases, this man who never minced his words and habitually called things by their proper names. Was the like ever seen! A pettifogger from Grenoble to floor Salomon Molina!
"It made me warm," said the money-maker, on leaving the cabinet, "but, deuce take it! I'll have my revenge. One is not a minister always. You shall pay me dearly, my little fellow, for that uncomfortable little time."
Vaudrey had thoroughly understood the matter, but he did not intend to allow it to be seen that he did. That was a simpler way. He had not had to dismiss the buyer of consciences; he had enjoyed his embarrassment and that was sufficient.
"What, however, if I had spoken to him of money before he had shown his hand! If I had accepted from him—!" he said to himself.
He shuddered at the thought as he had previously done while Molina was talking to him. A single imprudence, a single confidence might easily have placed him under the hand of this fat man. He must, however, find some solution. The days were rolling away and the bills signed for Marianne would in a very short time reach maturity.
"When I think that this Molina could in one day enable me to gain three times this sum."
Salomon had just told him: "To forestall the news on the Bourse is sometimes worth gold ingots!" A forestaller! As well say the revelation of a State secret, base speculation, almost treachery! And yet on hearing these words that covered up an insult, he had not even rung for the messenger to show Molina out, but had striven to comprehend nothing!
As the result of this conversation, he felt uncomfortable. The man had left an odor of pollution, as it were, behind him.