The Three Cities Trilogy: Paris, Volume 1 by Émile Zola
page 36 of 138 (26%)
page 36 of 138 (26%)
![]() | ![]() |
|
"Ah! it's you, Duthil," said the Baron, rising. "Have you read this?" And
he showed the new comer the "Voix du Peuple," which he was folding up to replace it in his pocket. "Why yes, I've read it. It's amazing. How can Sagnier have got hold of the list of names? Has there been some traitor?" The Baron looked at his companion quietly, amused by his secret anguish. Duthil, the son of a notary of Angouleme, almost poor and very honest, had been sent to Paris as deputy for that town whilst yet very young, thanks to the high reputation of his father; and he there led a life of pleasure and idleness, even as he had formerly done when a student. However, his pleasant bachelor's quarters in the Rue de Suresnes, and his success as a handsome man in the whirl of women among whom he lived, cost him no little money; and gaily enough, devoid as he was of any moral sense, he had already glided into all sorts of compromising and lowering actions, like a light-headed, superior man, a charming, thoughtless fellow, who attached no importance whatever to such trifles. "Bah!" said the Baron at last. "Has Sagnier even got a list? I doubt it, for there was none; Hunter wasn't so foolish as to draw one up. And then, too, it was merely an ordinary affair; nothing more was done than is always done in such matters of business." Duthil, who for the first time in his life had felt anxious, listened like one that needs to be reassured. "Quite so, eh?" he exclaimed. "That's what I thought. There isn't a cat to be whipped in the whole affair." He tried to laugh as usual, and no longer exactly knew how it was that he |
|