half a foot high and eight feet square extended from the edge of the
fireplace; on it was fastened a common table and an armchair with a
round cushion covered with green leather. Behind him, Cerizet had
sheathed the walls with planks; also protecting himself with a little
wooden screen, painted white, from the draught between the window and
door; but this screen, made of two leaves, was so placed that the
warmth from the stove reached him. The window had enormous inside
shutters of cast-iron, held, when closed, by a bar. The door commanded
respect by an armor of the same character.

At the farther end of this room, in a corner, was a spiral-staircase,
coming, evidently, from some pulled-down shop, and bought in the rue
Chapon by Cadenet, who had fitted it through the ceiling into the room
in the entresol occupied by Cerizet. In order to prevent all
communication with the upper floors, Cerizet had exacted that the door
of that room which opened on the common landing should be walled up.
The place had thus become a fortress. The bedroom above had a cheap
carpet bought for twenty francs, an iron bedstead, a bureau, three
chairs, and an iron safe, made by a good workman, which Cerizet had
bought at a bargain. He shaved before a glass on the chimney-piece; he
owned two pairs of cotton sheets and six cotton shirts; the rest of
his visible wardrobe was of the same character. Cadenet had once seen
Cerizet dressed like a dandy of the period; he must, therefore, have
kept hidden, in some drawer of his bureau, a complete disguise with
which he could go to the opera, see the world, and not be recognized,
for, had it not been that Cadenet heard his voice, he would certainly
have asked him who he was.

What pleased the clients of this man most was his joviality and his
repartees; he talked their language. Cadenet, his two shop-men, and