trousers for less than a hundred francs? What are three louis a
day to a man who hires a box for first performances at the opera,
to a man who gambles and gives expensive suppers, to a man who
drives out with yellow-haired demoiselles, and who owns a race-
horse? Measuring his purse and his ambition, M. Wilkie discovered
that he should never succeed in making both ends meet. "How do
other people manage?" he wondered. A puzzling question! Every
evening a thousand gorgeously apparelled gentlemen, with a cigar
in their mouth and a flower in their button-hole, may be seen
promenading between the Chaussee d'Antin and the Faubourg
Montmartre. Everybody knows them, and they know everybody, but
how they exist is a problem which it is impossible to solve. How
do they live, and what do they live on? Everybody knows that they
have no property; they do nothing, and yet they are reckless in
their expenditures, and rail at work and jeer at economy. What
source do they derive their money from? What vile business are
they engaged in?

However, M. Wilkie did not devote much time to solving this
question. "My relatives must wish me to starve," he said to
himself. "Not I--I'm not that sort of a person, as I'll soon let
them know." And thereupon he wrote to M. Patterson. By return of
post that gentleman sent him a cheque for one thousand francs--a
mere drop in the bucket. M. Wilkie felt indignant and so he wrote
again. This time he was obliged to wait for a reply. Still at
last it came. M. Patterson sent him two thousand francs, and an
interminable epistle full of reproaches. The interesting young
man threw the letter into the fire, and went out to hire a
carriage by the month and a servant.