book on public financiering--or anything else, no matter what--which
would give him that celebrity, I ought also to think of the other
matter, his property--it would be absurd to expect you to give him
this house--"

"For my brother? Why, I'd put it in his name to-morrow," cried
Brigitte. "You don't know me."

"I don't know you thoroughly," said la Peyrade, "but I do know things
about you which now make me regret that I did not tell you the whole
affair from its origin; I mean from the moment when I conceived the
plan to which Thuillier will owe his nomination. He will be hunted
down by envy and jealousy, and the task of upholding him will be a
hard one; we must, however, get the better of his rivals and take the
wind out of their sails."

"But this affair," said Brigitte, "what are the difficulties?"

"Mademoiselle, the difficulties lie within my own conscience.
Assuredly, I could not serve you in this matter without first
consulting my confessor. From a worldly point of view--oh! the affair
is perfectly legal, and I am--you'll understand me?--a barrister
inscribed on the panel, that is, member of a bar controlled by the
strictest rules. I am therefore incapable of proposing an enterprise
which might give occasion for blame. In the first place, I myself
don't make a penny by it."

Brigitte was on thorns; her face was flaming; she broke her wool,
mended it, broke it again, and did not know which way to look.