"What! the money is stolen?"

"Yes, sharping is done here, and I have been taught to help. I share in
their ill-gotten gains because I have not the strength of mind to refuse.
My landlady and two or three women of the same sort pluck the pigeons.
The business does not suit me, and I am thinking of leaving it. Sooner or
later I shall kill or be killed, and either event will be the death of
me, so I am thinking of leaving this cutthroat place as soon as
possible."

"I advise you--nay, I bid you do so by all means, and I should think you
had better be gone to-day than to-morrow."

"I don't want to do anything suddenly, as M. le Noir is a gentleman and
my friend, and he thinks me a cousin to this wretched woman. As he knows
nothing of the infamous trade she carries on, he would suspect something,
and perhaps would leave her after learning the reason of my departure. I
shall find some excuse or other in the course of the next five or six
days, and then I will make haste and return to you."

The Lambertini thanked me for coming to dinner in a friendly manner, and
told me that we should have the company of Mdlle. de la Meure and her
aunt. I asked her if she was still satisfied with my friend "Sixtimes,"
and she told me that though the count did not always reside on his manor,
she was for all that delighted with him; and said she,

"I am too good a monarch to ask too much of my vassals."

I congratulated her, and we continued to jest till the arrival of the two