Category: Novels
Towards three o’clock in the afternoon of one October day in the year 1844, a man of sixty or thereabouts, whom anybody might have credited with more than his actual age, was walking along the Boulevard des Italiens with his head bent down, as if he were tracking some one. The...
In spite of all that the doctor could say, La Cibot had no belief in this wear and tear of the nervous system by the humoristic. She was a woman of the people, without experienc...
4. Chapter 4“Eh! by the mark!” cried Pons with enthusiasm. “There is a mark on every one of those exquisite masterpieces. Frankenthal ware is marked with a C and T (for Charles Theodore) in...
12. Chapter 12The windows were hung with the richest Venetian brocade; the most splendid carpets from the Savonnerie covered the parquetry flooring. The frames of the pictures, nearly a hundr...
21. Chapter 21Mme. de Marville’s reception of him assured Fraisier that M. Leboeuf had kept his promise made to Mme. Vatinelle and spoken favorably of the sometime attorney at Mantes. Amelie’...
22. Chapter 22At midnight poor Schmucke sat in his easy-chair, watching with a breaking heart that shrinking of the features that comes with death; Pons looked so worn out with the day’s exer...
18. Chapter 18La 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...
20. Chapter 20“There are masterpieces yonder!” said Magus, indicating the salon, every bristle of his white beard twitching as he spoke. “But the riches are here! And what riches! Kings have...
14. Chapter 14“Be fair, sonnies,” quoth she, “and judge for yourselves how I am placed. These ten years past I have been wearing my life out for these two old bachelors yonder, and neither or...
16. Chapter 16It may be remembered that before M. Camusot de Marville came to Paris, he was President of the Tribunal of Mantes for five years; and not only was his name still remembered ther...
23. Chapter 23The beadle of Saint-Francois, Cantinet by name, at one time a retail dealer in glassware, lived in the Rue d’Orleans, next door to Dr. Poulain and under the same roof. Mme. Cant...
13. Chapter 13“Good. You take me for a servant, do you, a common servant, as if I hadn’t no heart! Goodness me! for eleven years you do for two old bachelors, you think of nothing but their c...
9. Chapter 9In the Presidente’s eyes, the reason given by Brunner was simply an excuse, there was something else behind; but, at the same time, the fact that the marriage was broken off was...
17. Chapter 17“Oh, well, let _me_ take care of you and tell you what to do; for if you go on like this, I shall have both of you laid up on my hands, you see. To my little way of thinking, we...
15. Chapter 15In the sitting-room La Cibot explained her position with regard to the pair of nutcrackers at very considerable length. She repeated the history of her loan with added embellish...
24. Chapter 24“Every day we receive orders from families to arrange all formalities,” continued he of the black coat, thus encouraged by Remonencq. “In the first moment of bereavement, the he...
5. Chapter 5Both of them were proud of a life lived in open day, of the esteem in which they were held for six or seven streets round about, and of the autocratic rule permitted to them by...
26. Chapter 26In practice Schmucke was a philosopher, an unconscious cynic, so greatly had he simplified his life. Two pairs of shoes, a pair of boots, a couple of suits of clothes, a dozen s...
25. Chapter 25“He is an agent for a firm of monumental stone-masons. He would like an order for a tomb, on which he proposes to put three sculptured marble figures--Music, Painting, and Sculp...
11. Chapter 11The belief of the occult science is far more widely spread than scholars, lawyers, doctors, magistrates, and philosophers imagine. The instincts of the people are ineradicable....
3. Chapter 3Pons, as a rule, only went to his theatre towards eight o’clock, when the piece in favor came on, and overtures and accompaniments needed the strict ruling of the baton; most mi...
6. Chapter 6The hero of the promised story was a German of that particular type in which the sombre irony of Goethe’s Mephistopheles is blended with a homely cheerfulness found in the roman...
7. Chapter 7Camusot was not exactly master in his own house; but this time his remonstrance was so well founded in law and in fact, that his wife and daughter were forced to acknowledge the...
10. Chapter 10The doctor’s profound indifference to the fate of a poor patient had suddenly given place to a most tender solicitude when he saw that the speculator was serious, and that there...
8. Chapter 8Pons and Schmucke, on their side, cleaned, swept, and dusted Pons’ museum rooms and furniture with the agility of sailors cleaning down a man-of-war. There was not a speck of du...
1. Chapter 1Towards three o’clock in the afternoon of one October day in the year 1844, a man of sixty or thereabouts, whom anybody might have credited with more than his actual age, was wa...
2. Chapter 2People used to play at Royalty then as they play nowadays at parliament, creating a whole host of societies with presidents, vice-presidents, secretaries and what not--agricultu...
27. Chapter 27“It will be done in three days. The summons will come down upon him while he is stupefied with grief, for the poor soul regrets Pons and is taking the death to heart.”