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entirely on the pension allowed her

out of the Civil List by Louis XVIII.--an intolerable position. The Hotel
de Grandlieu had been sold by the Republic. It came to Derville's
knowledge that there were flaws in the title, and he thought that it
ought to return to the Vicomtesse. He instituted proceedings for nullity
of contract, and gained the day. Encouraged by this success, he used
legal quibbles to such purpose that he compelled some institution or
other to disgorge the Forest of Liceney. Then he won certain lawsuits
against the Canal d'Orleans, and recovered a tolerably large amount of
property, with which the Emperor had endowed various public
institutions. So it fell out that, thanks to the young attorney's skilful
management, Mme. de Grandlieu's income reached the sum of some
sixty thousand francs, to say nothing of the vast sums returned to her by
the law of indemnity. And Derville, a man of high character, well
informed, modest, and pleasant in company, became the house-friend
of the family.
By his conduct of Mme. de Grandlieu's affairs he had fairly earned the
esteem of the Faubourg Saint-Germain, and numbered the best families
among his clients; but he did not take advantage of his popularity, as an
ambitious man might have done. The Vicomtesse would have had him
sell his practice and enter the magistracy, in which career advancement
would have been swift and certain with such influence at his disposal;
but he persistently refused all offers. He only went into society to keep
up his connections, but he occasionally spent an evening at the Hotel de
Grandlieu. It was a very lucky thing for him that his talents had been
brought into the light by his devotion to Mme. de Grandlieu, for his
practice otherwise might have gone to pieces. Derville had not an
attorney's soul. Since Ernest de Restaud had appeared at the Hotel de
Grandlieu, and he had noticed that Camille felt attracted to the young
man, Derville had been as assiduous in his visits as any dandy of the
Chausee-d'Antin newly admitted to the noble Faubourg. At a ball only
a few days before, when he happened to stand near Camille, and said,
indicating the Count:
"It is a pity that yonder youngster has not two or three million francs, is
it not?"

"Is it a pity? I do not think so," the girl answered. "M. de Restaud has
plenty of ability; he is well educated, and the Minister, his chief, thinks
well of him. He will be a remarkable man, I have no doubt. 'Yonder
youngster' will have as much money as he wishes when he comes into
power."
"Yes, but suppose that he were rich already?"
"Rich already?" repeated Camille, flushing red. "Why all the girls in
the room would be quarreling for him," she said, glancing at the
quadrilles.
"And then," retorted the attorney, "Mlle. de Grandlieu might not be the
one towards whom his eyes are always turned? That is what that red
color means! You like him, do you not? Come, speak out."
Camille suddenly rose to go.
"She loves him," Derville thought.
Since that evening, Camille had been unwontedly attentive to the
attorney, who approved of her liking for Ernest de Restaud. Hitherto,
although she knew well that her family lay under great obligations to
Derville, she had felt respect rather than real friendship for him, their
relation was more a matter of politeness than of warmth of feeling; and
by her manner, and by the tones of her voice, she had always made him
sensible of the distance which socially lay between them. Gratitude is a
charge upon the inheritance which the second generation is apt to
repudiate.

"This adventure," Derville began after a pause, "brings the one
romantic event in my life to my mind. You are laughing already," he
went on; "it seems so ridiculous, doesn't it, that an attorney should
speak of a romance in his life? But once I was five-and-twenty, like
everybody else, and even then I had seen some queer things. I ought to
begin at the beginning by telling you about some one whom it is
impossible that you should have known. The man in question was a

usurer.
"Can you grasp a clear notion of that sallow, wan face of his? I wish the
Academie would give me leave to dub such faces the lunar type. It was
like silver-gilt, with the gilt rubbed off. His hair was iron- gray, sleek,
and carefully combed; his features might have been cast in bronze;
Talleyrand himself was not more impassive than this money- lender. A
pair of little eyes, yellow as a ferret's, and with scarce an eyelash to
them, peered out from under the sheltering peak of a shabby old cap, as
if they feared