"I now walk the streets in safety under the very noses of my old enemies, the police; I come to you and I ask, 'How do you like your old uncle?'"
"You deceived me completely, my Gaillard," Tournay confessed; "but tell me this. You said you were still residing at 15 Rue des Mathurins. May I ask in what capacity? As cat?"
"Having little money, I must earn some more in order to live. I went to my dear friend, the theatre director, just as I am, and asked him to employ me about the theatre in any capacity. He did not recognize me, and putting his hand in his pocket, brought out a piece of forty sous."
"'Sorry, my poor fellow, but I have no place for you. Take this.'"
"I would trust my manager with my life, so I leaned forward to his ear. 'I am Gaillard, hunted, proscribed, but always your old friend Gaillard. Call me Citizen Michelet.' He gave me a look for which I could have taken him to my heart, there in his bureau, and hugged him.
"'Citizen Michelet,' he said, 'there is a place of a doorkeeper which you can have. The pay is small, fifteen francs the week, but it may suffice your needs.' I knew it was five francs more than old Gaspard received,—the doorkeeper who drank himself to death,—and I took the place gladly. When one is old, my nephew, one does not despise even fifteen francs," and Gaillard looked pathetically into Tournay's face. "Now I sit every evening at the stage door of the theatre and see the familiar faces pass in and out. They do not recognize me; but they are beginning to address kindly nods and occasional words to old Michelet.
"I found a vacant room to let on the ground floor of No. 15 Rue des Mathurins, so I took the lodging and live there quietly. I am on the best of terms with the gendarmes, and I talk with them out of my window, where we exchange pinches of snuff and other like civilities."
"My dear friend"—began Tournay.
"You might as well call me uncle," interrupted Gaillard, "to accustom yourself to it, for under this guise I shall visit you again."
"My dear uncle, it is like a draught of wine to a thirsty man to hear you talk. It is like a ray of sunshine to see your wrinkled old face."