were matchless. I had enough to last me for years on their chance of
winning--of course they would win. But you may recollect when we parted
that I was troubled,--creditors' bills before me--usurers' bills too,--
and you, my dear Louvier, pressed on me your purse, were angry when I
refused it. How could I accept? All my chance of repayment was in the
speed of a horse. I believed in that chance for myself; but for a
trustful friend, no. Ask your own heart now,--nay, I will not say
heart,--ask your own common-sense, whether a man who then put aside your
purse--spendthrift, _vaurien_, though he might be--was likely to steal or
accept a woman's jewels. Va, mon pauvre Louvier, again I say, 'Fors non
mutat genus.'"

Despite the repetition of the displeasing patrician motto, such
reminiscences of his visitor's motley character--irregular, turbulent,
the reverse of severe, but, in its own loose way, grandly generous and
grandly brave--struck both on the common-sense and the heart of the
listener; and the Frenchman recognized the Frenchman. Louvier doubted
De Mauleon's word no more, bowed his head, and said, "Victor de Mauleon,
I have wronged you; go on."

"On the day after you left for Aix came that horse-race on which my all
depended: it was lost. The loss absorbed the whole of my remaining
fortune; it absorbed about twenty thousand francs in excess, a debt of
honour to De N., whom you called my friend. Friend he was not; imitator,
follower, flatterer, yes. Still I deemed him enough my friend to say to
him, 'Give me a little time to pay the money; I must sell my stud, or
write to my only living relation from whom I have expectations.' You
remember that relation,--Jacques de Mauleon, old and unmarried. By De
N.'s advice I did write to my kinsman. No answer came; but what did come
were fresh bills from creditors. I then calmly calculated my assets.