"If you do not buy my picture, dear benefactor," Jondrette said, "I have no resource remaining, and nothing is left me but to throw myself into the river. When I think that I wished my two daughters to learn how to make paper boxes for new-year's gifts--Well, for that you require a table with a backboard to prevent the glasses falling on the ground, a stove made expressly, a pot with three compartments for the three different degrees of strength which the glue must have, according as it is used for wood, paper, and cloth; a board to cut pasteboard on, a hammer, a pair of pincers, and the deuce knows what, and all that to gain four sous a day! And you must work fourteen hours; and each box passes thirteen times through the hands of the work-girl; and moistening the paper, and not spoiling anything; and keeping the glue hot--the devil! I tell you, four sous a day! How do you expect them to live?" While speaking, Jondrette did not look at M. Leblanc, who was watching him. M. Leblanc's eye was fixed on Jondrette, and Jondrette's on the door, while Marius's gasping attention went from one to the other. M. Leblanc seemed to be asking himself. Is he a lunatic? And Jondrette repeated twice or thrice with all sorts of varied inflections in the suppliant style, "All that is left me is to throw myself into the river! The other day I went for that purpose down three steps by the side of the bridge of Austerlitz." All at once his eyes glistened with a hideous radiance, the little man drew himself up and became frightful, he walked a step toward M. Leblanc, and shouted in a thundering voice,-- "All this is not the question! Do you recognize me?" CHAPTER XX. THE TRAP. The attic door was torn open, and three men in blue cloth blouses and wearing masks of black paper came in. The first was thin, and carried an iron--shod cudgel; the second, who was a species of Colossus, held a butcher's pole-axe by the middle of the handle, with the hatchet down; while the third, a broad-shouldered fellow, not so thin as the first but not stout as the second, was armed with an enormous key stolen from some prison-gate. It seemed as if Jondrette had been awaiting the arrival of these men, and a hurried conversation took place between him and the man with the cudgel. "Is all ready?" asked Jondrette. "Yes," the thin man replied. "Where is Montparnasse?" "That jeune premier has stopped to talk to your eldest daughter." "Is there a coach down there?" "Yes." "With two good horses?" "Excellent." "Is it waiting where I ordered?" "Yes." "All right," said Jondrette.