"How is Mariette?" asked Philippe, moved at his recollections.
"She is getting ready for the opening of the new theatre."
"It would cost her little trouble to get my sentence remitted," said
Philippe. "However, as she chooses!"
After a meagre dinner, given by Desroches who boarded his head-clerk,
the two lawyers put the political convict in the diligence, and wished
him good luck.
CHAPTER XIV
On the second of November, All-Souls' day, Philippe Bridau appeared
before the commissary of police at Issoudun, to have the date of his
arrival recorded on his papers; and by that functionary's advice he
went to lodge in the rue l'Avenier. The news of the arrival of an
officer, banished on account of the late military conspiracy, spread
rapidly through the town, and caused all the more excitement when it
was known that this officer was a brother of the painter who had been
falsely accused. Maxence Gilet, by this time entirely recovered from
his wound, had completed the difficult operation of turning all Pere
Rouget's mortgages into money, and putting the proceeds in one sum, on
the "grand-livre." The loan of one hundred and forty thousand francs
obtained by the old man on his landed property had caused a great
sensation,--for everything is known in the provinces. Monsieur Hochon,
in the Bridau interest, was much put about by this disaster, and
questioned old Monsieur Heron, the notary at Bourges, as to the object
of it.
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