GRAIN. Citizen Prosper, don't look upon me as a swindler. I am a man of honor. If I tell you that I was imprisoned, 'tis the complete truth. [HOST looks at him suspiciously.] GRAIN (pulling a paper out of his pocket). Here, Citizen Prosper, you can see from this that I was let out yesterday afternoon at four o'clock. HOST. After two years' imprisonment! Zounds, 'tis genuine! GRAIN. Were you all the time doubting it, then. Citizen Prosper? HOST. What did you do to get two years? GRAIN. I would have been hanged; but I was lucky enough to be still half a child when I killed my poor aunt. HOST. Nay, fellow, how can a man kill his own aunt? GRAIN. Citizen Prosper, I would never have done it if my aunt had not deceived me with my best friend. HOST. Your aunt? GRAIN. That's it--she was dearer to me than aunts usually are to their nephews. The family relations were peculiar--it made me embittered, most embittered. May I tell you about it? HOST. Go on telling--perhaps you and I will be able to do business together. GRAIN. My sister was but half a child when she ran away from home--and whom do you think she went with? HOST. 'Tis difficult to guess. GRAIN. With her uncle. And he left her in the lurch--with a child-- HOST. A whole one, I hope. GRAIN. 'Tis indelicate of you, Citizen Prosper, to jest about such things. HOST. I'll tell you what, Shrieking Pumice-stone, you--your family history bores me. Do you think I'm here to listen to every Tom, Dick, or Harry o' a ragamuffin telling me whom he has killed? What's all that go to do with me? I take it you wish something of me. GRAIN. Ay, truly. Citizen Prosper; I've come to ask you for work. HOST (sarcastically). I would have you mark that there are no aunts to murder in my place--this is a house of entertainment. GRAIN. Oh, I found the once quite enough. I want to become a respectable member of society--I was recommended to come to you. HOST. By whom, if I may ask? GRAIN. A charming young man whom they put in my cell three days ago. Now he's alone. His name's Gaston!... and you know him. HOST. Gaston! Now I know why I've missed him for three evenings. One of my best interpreters of pickpockets. He told yarns--ah! it made 'em split their sides. GRAIN. Quite so. And now they've nabbed him. HOST. Nabbed--what do you mean? He didn't really steal I suppose. GRAIN. Yes, he did. But it must have been the first time, for he seems to have gone about it with incredible clumsiness. Just think of it--(confidentially)--just made a grab at the pocket of a lady in the Boulevard des Capucines, and pulled out her purse--an absolute amateur. You inspire me with confidence, Citizen Prosper, and so I'll make a confession to you. There was a time when I, too, transacted little bits of business of that sort, but never without my dear father. When I was still a child, when we all lived together, when my poor aunt was still alive--