There were other causes for uneasiness in the family. The works at Golden Bay were now finished, and for the last week they had been testing the apparatus, with the most deplorable results. Lazare was obliged to confess that he had made some serious mistakes in several portions of it. He thereupon set off to Paris to consult his master, Herbelin, and came back in a very discouraged frame of mind. Everything would have to be made over again. The celebrated chemist had introduced great improvements into his method, which necessitated many alterations in the appliances. But then the sixty thousand francs were entirely spent, and Boutigny absolutely refused to advance another sou. From morning till night he talked sarcastically and bitterly of the foolish squandering of money over fads, with the pertinacity of a practical man whose warning has turned out correct. Lazare felt inclined to murder him. But what troubled him more than anything else was the thought of Pauline's thirty thousand francs lying lost in that abyss of disaster. His honour and pride revolted against the idea. It was impossible to think of it. More money must be got somewhere. They could not abandon an undertaking which would surely bring them millions eventually. 'Don't make yourself unhappy about it,' said his mother, as she saw him becoming quite ill with the worry of obtaining more capital. 'We haven't got so low yet as not to be able to raise a few thousand-franc notes.' Madame Chanteau was working out a plan of her own. The idea of a marriage between Pauline and Lazare struck her as being very feasible and desirable. There was only some nine years' difference between their ages, and that was a thing one saw every day. A marriage, too, would be such a convenient way of settling matters. Lazare would be working for his wife, and need not trouble himself any further about the debt; moreover, he would be able to take from Pauline's fortune whatever further sums he wanted. At the bottom of her heart, it is true, Madame Chanteau felt some trifling scruples about the course she meditated, having a lurking fear of the possibility of an utter catastrophe, and the complete ruin of her ward. But she pooh-poohed the idea of such an ending to the great scheme. Wasn't it beyond doubt that Lazare was a very clever fellow who knew perfectly well what he was doing? He would make Pauline very wealthy one of these days, and it was really she who would benefit by the marriage. It mattered nothing that Lazare was without fortune at present. He was a fortune in himself.