Verneuil's, or the prefecture, or the receiver-general's, and the
Count had come to his providence, the notary. He had only to show
himself to carry the day.

"Well, what is it, M. le Comte? What has happened?" the old man would
ask, with a tremor in his voice.

On great occasions Victurnien would sit down, assume a melancholy,
pensive expression, and submit with little coquetries of voice and
gesture to be questioned. Then when he had thoroughly roused the old
man's fears (for Chesnel was beginning to fear how such a course of
extravagance would end), he would own up to a peccadillo which a bill
for a thousand francs would absolve. Chesnel possessed a private
income of some twelve thousand livres, but the fund was not
inexhaustible. The eighty thousand francs thus squandered represented
his savings, accumulated for the day when the Marquis should send his
son to Paris, or open negotiations for a wealthy marriage.

Chesnel was clear-sighted so long as Victurnien was not there before
him. One by one he lost the illusions which the Marquis and his sister
still fondly cherished. He saw that the young fellow could not be
depended upon in the least, and wished to see him married to some
modest, sensible girl of good birth, wondering within himself how a
young man could mean so well and do so ill, for he made promises one
day only to break them all on the next.

But there is never any good to be expected of young men who confess
their sins and repent, and straightway fall into them again. A man of
strong character only confesses his faults to himself, and punishes
himself for them; as for the weak, they drop back into the old ruts