Elizabeth had no desire to go into such an unsavoury question. This horrid old woman rather frightened her; but, such had been her distress and fears since she had been a prisoner, that it was a relief not to be quite alone; to have even this old creature to speak to was better than solitary confinement.
In her character of old jail-bird, Mother Toulouche made herself quickly at home.
"Moved to-morrow, they say I'm to be! Pity! At bottom you're not one of the scurvy sort, but you must be here to play spy on me, for all that!... When do you go out? Are you long for Saint Lago?" Alas, how could Elizabeth tell?
"I like being a barrister," thought Fandor, as he entered Saint Lazare. "For the last hour I have felt a different person, much more serious, more sure of myself, not to say, more eloquent!... I must be eloquent, since I have succeeded in persuading my friend, Maître Dubard, to get himself appointed officially as Mademoiselle Dollon's counsel; then to obtain a permit of communication, and to hand this same permit over to me, so that his identification papers, safely tucked away in my portfolio, make of me the most indisputable of Maîtres Dubard!"
Fandor might well congratulate himself! By means of this ruse—his own idea—he was enabled to see Elizabeth, not in the prison parlour, but in a special cell, and without a witness. As Fandor crossed the threshold of the sordid building, he said to himself:
"I am Maître Dubard, visiting his client, in order to prepare her defence!"
He easily accomplished the necessary formalities, and, at last, he saw himself being conducted by a morose warder to a little parlour, scantily furnished with a table and a few stools.
"Please be seated, maître," said the surly fellow. "I'll fetch your client along!"