“I tell you you’re having me,” roared M. Gournay-Martin. “I’m letting you have a magnificent car for which I paid thirteen hundred pounds for eight hundred! It’s scandalous the way you’ve beaten me down!” “No, no,” protested M. Charolais. He seemed frightened out of his life by the vehemence of the big man. “You wait till you’ve seen how it goes,” said M. Gournay-Martin. “Eight hundred is very dear,” said M. Charolais. “Come, come! You’re too sharp, that’s what you are. But don’t say any more till you’ve tried the car.” He turned to his chauffeur, who stood by watching the struggle with an appreciative grin on his brown face, and said: “Now, Jean, take these gentlemen to the garage, and run them down to the station. Show them what the car can do. Do whatever they ask you—everything.” He winked at Jean, turned again to M. Charolais, and said: “You know, M. Charolais, you’re too good a man of business for me. You’re hot stuff, that’s what you are—hot stuff. You go along and try the car. Good-bye—good-bye.” The four Charolais murmured good-bye in deep depression, and went off with Jean, wearing something of the air of whipped dogs. When they had gone round the corner the millionaire turned to the Duke and said, with a chuckle: “He’ll buy the car all right—had him fine!” “No business success of yours could surprise me,” said the Duke blandly, with a faint, ironical smile. M. Gournay-Martin’s little pig’s eyes danced and sparkled; and the smiles flowed over the distended skin of his face like little ripples over a stagnant pool, reluctantly. It seemed to be too tightly stretched for smiles. “The car’s four years old,” he said joyfully. “He’ll give me eight hundred for it, and it’s not worth a pipe of tobacco. And eight hundred pounds is just the price of a little Watteau I’ve had my eye on for some time—a first-class investment.” They strolled down the terrace, and through one of the windows into the hall. Firmin had lighted the lamps, two of them. They made but a small oasis of light in a desert of dim hall. The millionaire let himself down very gingerly into an Empire chair, as if he feared, with excellent reason, that it might collapse under his weight. “Well, my dear Duke,” he said, “you don’t ask me the result of my official lunch or what the minister said.” “Is there any news?” said the Duke carelessly. “Yes. The decree will be signed to-morrow. You can consider yourself decorated. I hope you feel a happy man,” said the millionaire, rubbing his fat hands together with prodigious satisfaction. “Oh, charmed—charmed,” said the Duke, with entire indifference. “As for me, I’m delighted—delighted,” said the millionaire. “I was extremely keen on your being decorated. After that, and after a volume or two of travels, and after you’ve published your grandfather’s letters with a good introduction, you can begin to think of the Academy.”