inside that cupboard. Ah! the Jesuits, the Jesuits! They have devoured
me, they are devouring me still, they will leave nothing of me at last,
neither flesh nor bone."

Then, in a halting voice, he related the story of his life, beginning
with his youth, which had opened so hopefully. He belonged to the petty
provincial nobility, and had been dowered with a fairly large income,
besides a keen, supple intelligence, which looked smilingly towards the
future. Nowadays, he would assuredly have been a prelate, on the road to
high dignities, but he had been foolish enough to speak ill of the
Jesuits and to thwart them in two or three circumstances. And from that
moment, if he were to be believed, they had caused every imaginable
misfortune to rain upon him: his father and mother had died, his banker
had robbed him and fled, good positions had escaped him at the very
moment when he was about to occupy them, the most awful misadventures had
pursued him amidst the duties of his ministry to such a point indeed,
that he had narrowly escaped interdiction. It was only since Cardinal
Boccanera, compassionating his bad luck, had taken him into his house and
attached him to his person, that he had enjoyed a little repose. "Here I
have a refuge, an asylum," he continued. "They execrate his Eminence, who
has never been on their side, but they haven't yet dared to attack him or
his servants. Oh! I have no illusions, they will end by catching me
again, all the same. Perhaps they will even hear of our conversation this
evening, and make me pay dearly for it; for I do wrong to speak, I speak
in spite of myself. They have stolen all my happiness, and brought all
possible misfortune on me, everything that was possible, everything--you
hear me!"

Increasing discomfort was taking possession of Pierre, who, seeking to
relieve himself by a jest, exclaimed: "Come, come, at any rate it wasn't