and the overflowing glass cabinets. Rich and velvety carpets over
which had passed many generations, covered all the compartments. Showy
curtains, not finding a vacant frame in the salons, adorned the doors
leading into the kitchen. The wall mouldings gradually disappeared
under an overlay of pictures, placed close together like the scales of
a cuirass. Who now could accuse Desnoyers of avarice? . . . He was
investing far more than a fashionable contractor would have dreamed of
spending.

The underlying idea still was to acquire all this for a fourth of its
price--an exciting bait which lured the economical man into continuous
dissipation. He could sleep well only when he had driven a good bargain
during the day. He bought at auction thousands of bottles of wine
consigned by bankrupt firms, and he who scarcely ever drank, packed his
wine cellars to overflowing, advising his family to use the champagne as
freely as ordinary wine. The failure of a furrier induced him to buy for
fourteen thousand francs pelts worth ninety thousand. In consequence,
the entire Desnoyers family seemed suddenly to be suffering as
frightfully from cold as though a polar iceberg had invaded the avenida
Victor Hugo. The father kept only one fur coat for himself but ordered
three for his son. Chichi and Dona Luisa appeared arrayed in all kinds
of silky and luxurious skins--one day chinchilla, other days blue fox,
marten or seal.

The enraptured buyer would permit no one but himself to adorn the
walls with his new acquisitions, using the hammer from the top of a
step-ladder in order to save the expense of a professional picture
hanger. He wished to set his children the example of economy. In his
idle hours, he would change the position of the heaviest pieces of
furniture, trying every kind of combination. This employment reminded