“We are not millionaires,” said fat Cointet; “we do not discount bills for amusement. We should think ourselves well off if we could pay ready money for our bits of accounts for rags, and we still give bills to our dealer.” “The experiment ought to be tried first on a much larger scale,” the tall Cointet said coldly; “sometimes you try a thing with a saucepan and succeed, and fail utterly when you experiment with bulk. You should help your son out of difficulties.” “Yes; but when my son is at liberty, would he take me as his partner?” “That is no business of ours,” said the fat Cointet. “My good man, do you suppose that when you have paid some ten thousand francs for your son, that there is an end of it? It will cost two thousand francs to take out a patent; there will be journeys to Paris; and before going to any expense, it would be prudent to do as my brother suggests, and make a thousand reams or so; to try several whole batches to make sure. You see, there is nothing you must be so much on your guard against as an inventor.” “I have a liking for bread ready buttered myself,” added the tall Cointet. All through that night the old man ruminated over this dilemma--“If I pay David’s debts, he will be set at liberty, and once set at liberty, he need not share his fortune with me unless he chooses. He knows very well that I cheated him over the first partnership, and he will not care to try a second; so it is to my interest to keep him shut up, the wretched boy.” The Cointets knew enough of Séchard senior to see that they should hunt in couples. All three said to themselves--“Experiments must be tried before the discovery can take any practical shape. David Séchard must be set at liberty before those experiments can be made; and David Séchard, set at liberty, will slip through our fingers.” Everybody involved, moreover, had his own little afterthought. Petit-Claud, for instance, said, “As soon as I am married, I will slip my neck out of the Cointets’ yoke; but till then I shall hold on.” The tall Cointet thought, “I would rather have David under lock and key, and then I should be master of the situation.” Old Séchard, too, thought, “If I pay my son’s debts, he will repay me with a ‘Thank you!’” Eve, hard pressed (for the old man threatened now to turn her out of the house), would neither reveal her husband’s hiding-place, nor even send proposals of a safe-conduct. She could not feel sure of finding so safe a refuge a second time. “Set your son at liberty,” she told her father-in-law, “and then you shall know everything.” The four interested persons sat, as it were, with a banquet spread before them, none of them daring to begin, each one suspicious and watchful of his neighbor. A few days after David went into hiding, Petit-Claud went to the mill to see the tall Cointet.