As soon as Schmucke had dismissed La Cibot, Pons turned to the ballet-girl. “Dear child, I can trust no one else to find me a notary, an honest man, and send him here to make my will to-morrow morning at half-past nine precisely. I want to leave all that I have to Schmucke. If he is persecuted, poor German that he is, I shall reckon upon the notary; the notary must defend him. And for that reason I must have a wealthy notary, highly thought of, a man above the temptations to which pettifogging lawyers yield. He must succor my poor friend. I cannot trust Berthier, Cardot’s successor. And you know so many people--” “Oh! I have the very man for you,” Heloise broke in; “there is the notary that acts for Florine and the Comtesse du Bruel, Leopold Hannequin, a virtuous man that does not know what a _lorette_ is! He is a sort of chance-come father--a good soul that will not let you play ducks and drakes with your earnings; I call him _Le Pere aux Rats_, because he instils economical notions into the minds of all my friends. In the first place, my dear fellow, he has a private income of sixty thousand francs; and he is a notary of the real old sort, a notary while he walks or sleeps; his children must be little notaries and notaresses. He is a heavy, pedantic creature, and that’s the truth; but on his own ground, he is not the man to flinch before any power in creation.... No woman ever got money out of him; he is a fossil pater-familias, his wife worships him, and does not deceive him, although she is a notary’s wife.--What more do you want? as a notary he has not his match in Paris. He is in the patriarchal style; not queer and amusing, as Cardot used to be with Malaga; but he will never decamp like little What’s-his-name that lived with Antonia. So I will send round my man to-morrow morning at eight o’clock.... You may sleep in peace. And I hope, in the first place, that you will get better, and make charming music for us again; and yet, after all, you see, life is very dreary--managers chisel you, and kings mizzle and ministers fizzle and rich fold economizzle.--Artists have nothing left _here_” (tapping her breast)--“it is a time to die in. Good-bye, old boy.” “Heloise, of all things, I ask you to keep my counsel.” “It is not a theatre affair,” she said; “it is sacred for an artist.” “Who is your gentleman, child?” “M. Baudoyer, the mayor of your arrondissement, a man as stupid as the late Crevel; Crevel once financed Gaudissart, you know, and a few days ago he died and left me nothing, not so much as a pot of pomatum. That made me say just now that this age of ours is something sickening.” “What did he die of?”