“Very good.  This is the second condition.  You will give me forty-three thousand francs, and pay three thousand only to M. Schmucke; Remonencq will buy four for two thousand francs, and hand over the surplus to me.—­But at the same time, you see my dear M. Magus, I am going to help you and Remonencq to a splendid bit of business—­on condition that the profits are shared among the three of us.  I will introduce you to that lawyer, as he, no doubt, will come here.  You shall make a valuation of M. Pons’ things at the prices which you can give for them, so that M. Fraisier may know how much the property is worth.  But—­not until after our sale, you understand!”

“I understand,” said the Jew, “but it takes time to look at the things and value them.”

“You shall have half a day.  But, there, that is my affair.  Talk it over between yourselves, my boys, and for that matter the business will be settled by the day after to-morrow.  I will go round to speak to this Fraisier; for Dr. Poulain tells him everything that goes on in the house, and it is a great bother to keep that scarecrow quiet.”

La Cibot met Fraisier halfway between the Rue de la Perle and the Rue de Normandie; so impatient was he to know the “elements of the case” (to use his own expression), that he was coming to see her.

“I say!  I was going to you,” said she.

Fraisier grumbled because Elie Magus had refused to see him.  But La Cibot extinguished the spark of distrust that gleamed in the lawyer’s eyes by informing him that Elie Magus had returned from a journey, and that she would arrange for an interview in Pons’ rooms and for the valuation of the property; for the day after to-morrow at latest.

“Deal frankly with me,” returned Fraisier.  “It is more than probable that I shall act for M. Pons’ next-of-kin.  In that case, I shall be even better able to serve you.”

The words were spoken so drily that La Cibot quaked.  This starving limb of the law was sure to manoeuvre on his side as she herself was doing.  She resolved forthwith to hurry on the sale of the pictures.

La Cibot was right.  The doctor and lawyer had clubbed together to buy a new suit of clothes in which Fraisier could decently present himself before Mme. la Presidente Camusot de Marville.  Indeed, if the clothes had been ready, the interview would have taken place sooner, for the fate of the couple hung upon its issues.  Fraisier left Mme. Cibot, and went to try on his new clothes.  He found them waiting for him, went home, adjusted his new wig, and towards ten o’clock that morning set out in a carriage from a livery stable for the Rue de Hanovre, hoping for an audience.  In his white tie, yellow gloves, and new wig, redolent of eau de Portugal, he looked something like a poisonous essence kept in a cut-glass bottle, seeming but the more deadly because everything about it is daintily neat, from the stopper covered with white kid to the