“I have been the Prefet of Police myself; I think you perfectly right,” said the old man quietly to the functionary who stood before him in his judicial majesty, and who answered with a significant shrug.

“But allow me, without any attempt to justify myself, to point out that you do not know me at all,” Peyrade went on, with a keen glance at the Prefet.  “Your language is either too severe to a man who has been the head of the police in Holland, or not severe enough for a mere spy.  But, Monsieur le Prefet,” Peyrade added after a pause, while the other kept silence, “bear in mind what I now have the honor to telling you:  I have no intention of interfering with your police nor of attempting to justify myself, but you will presently discover that there is some one in this business who is being deceived; at this moment it is your humble servant; by and by you will say, ’It was I.’”

And he bowed to the chief, who sat passive to conceal his amazement.

Peyrade returned home, his legs and arms feeling broken, and full of cold fury with the Baron.  Nobody but that burly banker could have betrayed a secret contained in the minds of Contenson, Peyrade, and Corentin.  The old man accused the banker of wishing to avoid paying now that he had gained his end.  A single interview had been enough to enable him to read the astuteness of this most astute of bankers.

“He tries to compound with every one, even with us; but I will be revenged,” thought the old fellow.  “I have never asked a favor of Corentin; I will ask him now to help me to be revenged on that imbecile money-box.  Curse the Baron!—­Well, you will know the stuff I am made of one fine morning when you find your daughter disgraced!  —­But does he love his daughter, I wonder?”

By the evening of the day when this catastrophe had upset the old man’s hopes he had aged by ten years.  As he talked to his friend Corentin, he mingled his lamentations with tears wrung from him by the thought of the melancholy prospects he must bequeath to his daughter, his idol, his treasure, his peace-offering to God.

“We will follow the matter up,” said Corentin.  “First of all, we must be sure that it was the Baron who peached.  Were we wise in enlisting Gondreville’s support?  That old rascal owes us too much not to be anxious to swamp us; indeed, I am keeping an eye on his son-in-law Keller, a simpleton in politics, and quite capable of meddling in some conspiracy to overthrow the elder Branch to the advantage of the younger.—­I shall know to-morrow what is going on at Nucingen’s, whether he has seen his beloved, and to whom we owe this sharp pull up.—­Do not be out of heart.  In the first place, the Prefet will not hold his appointment much longer; the times are big with revolution, and revolutions make good fishing for us.”

A peculiar whistle was just then heard in the street.

“That is Contenson,” said Peyrade, who put a light in the window, “and he has something to say that concerns me.”