After that I heard from some one else (for M. Brodard and his ideas were becoming famous) that the opposition had finally caught him in a legal technicality, something connected with his campaign for tearing down the miserable old disease-soaked medieval hovels where many poor people lived in Morvilliers. The proprietors of the threatened rookeries chipped in together, hired expensive expert legal advice, and finally, to their immense satisfaction, succeeded in getting a tiny sentence of imprisonment, for defamation of their characters, inflicted on M. Brodard. He was kept in jail for two weeks, I believe, which was a fortnight of pure glory. All his humble adherents, hundreds of them, came tramping in to see him from all the region round, bringing tribute. His “cell” was heaped with flowers, he fared on the finest game and fattest poultry, and ... what pleased him vastly more ... the fiery editorials which he sent out from his prison about the infamy of wretched lodgings for poor families were noticed and reprinted everywhere in France, where the circumstances of his grotesque imprisonment were known. The condemnation which his opponents meant to be a crushing disgrace turned out an apotheosis. He enjoyed every moment of it and emerged from his two weeks vacation, ruddier, stronger, in higher spirits than ever, his name shining with the praise of generous-hearted men all over the country. He cocked his hat further over one ear than ever and strode off home. You could fairly see the sparks fly from beneath his feet. * * * * * * * The morning after his release from prison, news came from Fressy that old M. Duval had died of apoplexy. Well, what of that? Ah, what of that ...? He had willed his whole fortune to M. Brodard, and it seemed he was frightfully rich: it came to more than three million francs. * * * * * * * Oh, yes, he took it. Of course he did. You knew he would. What else would you have had him do? It’s all very well to have abstract ideas about the absurdity and iniquity of inheritance; but when your own daughters ... and your own wife ... expect so confidently.... Mme. Brodard, you see ... he was devoted to his wife who had so faithfully made the best of homes for him; and to his daughters whom he loved so dearly.... Can’t you see the astounded radiance of their faces at the news? And they’d already been sacrificed so many years for his ideas.... _Ideas!_ What do you suppose he could do but accept it? * * * * * * *