Baron Bourlac immediately resolved to go straight to Barbet. The former publisher lived in the rue Saint-Catherine d’Enfer, and it took him a quarter of an hour to reach the house. “Ah! I suppose you have come to get that bill of sale,” said Barbet, replying to the salutation of his victim. “Here it is.” And, to Baron Bourlac’s great astonishment, he held out the document, which the baron took, saying,-- “I do not understand.” “Didn’t you pay me?” said the usurer. “Are you paid?” “Yes, your grandson took the money to the sheriff this morning.” “Then it is true you made a seizure at my house yesterday?” “Haven’t you been home for two days?” asked Barbet. “But an old magistrate ought to know what a notification of arrest means.” Hearing that remark, the baron bowed coldly to Barbet and returned home, thinking that the policemen whom Nepomucene had pointed out must have come for the two impecunious authors on the upper floor. He walked slowly, lost in vague apprehensions; for, in spite of the explanation he gave himself, Nepomucene’s words came back, and seemed to him more and more obscure and inexplicable. Was it possible that Godefroid had betrayed him? XIX. VENGEANCE The old man walked mechanically along the rue Notre-Dame des Champs, and entered the house by the little door, which he noticed was open. There he came suddenly upon Nepomucene. “Oh, monsieur, come quick! they are taking Monsieur Auguste to prison! They arrested him on the boulevard; it was he they were looking for; they have examined him.” The old man bounded like a tiger, rushed through the house with the speed of an arrow, and reached the door on the boulevard in time to see his grandson getting into a hackney-coach with three men. “Auguste,” he said, “what does all this mean?” The poor boy burst into tears and fainted away. “Monsieur, I am the Baron Bourlac, formerly attorney-general,” he said to the commissary of police, whose scarf now attracted his eye. “I entreat you to explain all this.” “Monsieur, if you are Baron Bourlac, two words will be enough. I have just examined this young man, and he admits--” “What?” “The robbery of four thousand francs from Doctor Halpersohn!” “Is that true, Auguste?” “Grandpapa, I sent him as security your diamond snuff-box. I did it to save you from going to prison.” “Unhappy boy! what have you done? The diamonds are false!” cried the baron; “I sold the real ones three years ago!” The commissary of police and his agents looked at each other. That look, full of many things, was intercepted by Baron Bourlac, and seemed to blast him. “Monsieur,” he said to the commissary, “you need not feel uneasy; I shall go myself to the prefect; but you are witness to the fact that I kept my grandson ignorant of the loss of the diamonds. Do your duty; but I implore you, in the name of humanity, put that lad in a cell by himself; I will go to the prison. To which one are you taking him?”