Whether it was that the narcotic had ceased to operate, or that the noise going on about Toupillier put an end to his sleep, he now opened his eyes and cast around him the glance of a man who endeavors to remember where he is; then, seeing his precious cupboard open, he found in the emotion that sight produced the strength to cry out two or three times, “Help! help! robbers!” in a voice that was loud enough to rouse the house.

“No, Toupillier,” said the little old man; “you have not been robbed; I came here in time to prevent it; nothing has been taken.”

“Why don’t you arrest that villain?” shouted the old pauper, pointing to Cerizet.

“Monsieur is not a thief,” replied the old man.  “On the contrary, he came up with me to lend assistance.”  Then, turning to Cerizet, he added, in a low voice:  “I think, my good friend, that we had better postpone the interview I desire to have with you until to-morrow.  Come at ten o’clock to the adjoining house, and ask for Monsieur du Portail.  After what has passed this evening, there will, I ought to warn you, be some danger to you in not accepting this conference.  I shall find you elsewhere, infallibly; for I have the honor to know who you are; you are the man whom the Opposition journals were accustomed to call ‘the courageous Cerizet.’”

In spite of the profound sarcasm of this remark, Cerizet, perceiving that he was not to be treated more rigorously than Madame Cardinal, felt so pleased with this conclusion that he promised, very readily, to keep the appointment, and then slipped away with all the haste he could.

CHAPTER XVI

DU PORTAIL

The next day Cerizet did not fail to appear at the rendezvous given to him.  Examined, at first, through the wicket of the door, he was admitted, after giving his name, into the house, and was ushered immediately to the study of Monsieur du Portail, whom he found at his desk.

Without rising, and merely making a sign to his guest to take a chair, the little old man continued the letter he was then writing.  After sealing it with wax, with a care and precision that denoted a nature extremely fastidious and particular, or else a man accustomed to discharge diplomatic functions, du Portail rang for Bruneau, his valet, and said, as he gave him the letter:—­

“For the justice-of-peace of the arrondissement.”

Then he carefully wiped the steel pen he had just used, restored to their places, symmetrically, all the displaced articles on his desk, and it was only when these little arrangements were completed that he turned to Cerizet, and said:—­

“You know, of course, that we lost that poor Monsieur Toupillier last night?”

“No, really?” said Cerizet, putting on the most sympathetic air he could manage.  “This is my first knowledge of it.”

“But you probably expected it.  When one gives a dying man an immense bowl of hot wine, which has also been narcotized,—­for the Perrache woman slept all night in a sort of lethargy after drinking a small glass of it,—­it is evident that the catastrophe has been hastened.”