When at length it was evidently impossible to borrow any longer, whether because the amount of the debt was now so greatly increased, or because Castanier was unable to pay the large amount of interest on the aforesaid sums of money, the cashier saw bankruptcy before him. On making this discovery, he decided for a fraudulent bankruptcy rather than an ordinary failure, and preferred a crime to a misdemeanor. He determined, after the fashion of the celebrated cashier of the Royal Treasury, to abuse the trust deservedly won, and to increase the number of his creditors by making a final loan of the sum sufficient to keep him in comfort in a foreign country for the rest of his days. All this, as has been seen, he had prepared to do. Aquilina knew nothing of the irksome cares of this life; she enjoyed her existence, as many a woman does, making no inquiry as to where the money came from, even as sundry other folk will eat their buttered rolls untroubled by any restless spirit of curiosity as to the culture and growth of wheat; but as the labor and miscalculations of agriculture lie on the other side of the baker’s oven, so beneath the unappreciated luxury of many a Parisian household lie intolerable anxieties and exorbitant toil. While Castanier was enduring the torture of the strain, and his thoughts were full of the deed that should change his whole life, Aquilina was lying luxuriously back in a great armchair by the fireside, beguiling the time by chatting with her waiting-maid. As frequently happens in such cases the maid had become the mistress’ confidant, Jenny having first assured herself that her mistress’ ascendency over Castanier was complete. “What are we to do this evening? Leon seems determined to come,” Mme. de la Garde was saying, as she read a passionate epistle indited upon a faint gray notepaper. “Here is the master!” said Jenny. Castanier came in. Aquilina, nowise disconcerted, crumpled up the letter, took it with the tongs, and held it in the flames. “So that is what you do with your love-letters, is it?” asked Castanier. “Oh goodness, yes,” said Aquilina; “is it not the best way of keeping them safe? Besides, fire should go to fire, as water makes for the river.” “You are talking as if it were a real love-letter, Naqui----” “Well, am I not handsome enough to receive them?” she said, holding up her forehead for a kiss. There was a carelessness in her manner that would have told any man less blind than Castanier that it was only a piece of conjugal duty, as it were, to give this joy to the cashier, but use and wont had brought Castanier to the point where clear-sightedness is no longer possible for love. “I have taken a box at the Gymnase this evening,” he said; “let us have dinner early, and then we need not dine in a hurry.” “Go and take Jenny. I am tired of plays. I do not know what is the matter with me this evening; I would rather stay here by the fire.”