“She was the handsomest girl in London. Drunk with gin, she killed her lover in a fit of jealousy. The lover was a wretch of whom the London police are well quit, and this woman was packed off to Paris for a time to let the matter blow over. The hussy was well brought up--the daughter of a clergyman. She speaks French as if it were her mother tongue. She does not know, and never will know, why she is here. She was told that if you took a fancy to her she might fleece you of millions, but that you were as jealous as a tiger, and she was told how Esther lived.” “But supposing Nucingen should prefer her to Esther?” “Ah, it is out at last!” cried Carlos. “You dread now lest what dismayed you yesterday should not take place after all! Be quite easy. That fair and fair-haired girl has blue eyes; she is the antipodes of the beautiful Jewess, and only such eyes as Esther’s could ever stir a man so rotten as Nucingen. What the devil! you could not hide an ugly woman. When this puppet has played her part, I will send her off in safe custody to Rome or to Madrid, where she will be the rage.” “If we have her only for a short time,” said Lucien, “I will go back to her----” “Go, my boy, amuse yourself. You will be a day older to-morrow. For my part, I must wait for some one whom I have instructed to learn what is going on at the Baron de Nucingen’s.” “Who?” “His valet’s mistress; for, after all, we must keep ourselves informed at every moment of what is going on in the enemy’s camp.” At midnight, Paccard, Esther’s tall chasseur, met Carlos on the Pont des Arts, the most favorable spot in all Paris for saying a few words which no one must overhear. All the time they talked the servant kept an eye on one side, while his master looked out on the other. “The Baron went to the Prefecture of Police this morning between four and five,” said the man, “and he boasted this evening that he should find the woman he saw in the Bois de Vincennes--he had been promised it----” “We are watched!” said Carlos. “By whom?” “They have already employed Louchard the bailiff.” “That would be child’s play,” replied Carlos. “We need fear nothing but the guardians of public safety, the criminal police; and so long as that is not set in motion, we can go on!” “That is not all.” “What else?” “Our chums of the hulks.--I saw Lapouraille yesterday----He has choked off a married couple, and has bagged ten thousand five-franc pieces--in gold.” “He will be nabbed,” said Jacques Collin. “That is the Rue Boucher crime.” “What is the order of the day?” said Paccard, with the respectful demeanor a marshal must have assumed when taking his orders from Louis XVIII.