Spring approached; one day Dominique, who had gone out to endeavor to persuade an attorney to follow up one of the lawsuits of Létorière, came back with a face at once radiant and astonished; the apprentice Kraft followed him, bringing carefully an immense basket filled with the rarest fruits and flowers. On a little paper attached by a pin to a magnificent pine-apple, were written these words: "_To Monsieur the Marquis of Létorière._" After having admired this charming gift, with almost childish curiosity, and vainly seeking to learn from whom it came, for an unknown man had left the basket with the porter, the Marquis replaced the address with the following:--"_To my good friends Landry and his wife_," and told Kraft to carry as his gift the fruit and flowers to Master Landry. "Tell them I do not know whence this gift comes, but it is the first and only thing I have to offer them, and I send it to them as a proof of my eternal gratitude." Some days after, he had another surprise. In a beautiful little writing-desk left at the porter's by one of the boys of Bordier, the celebrated worker in ebony, the Marquis found this note: "Your heart tells you truly that some one is interested in you. That is well. Send these two letters as addressed." In one compartment of the desk Létorière found two sealed letters. One was addressed: _To Monsieur Landry, tailor, at The Golden Scissors._ The other: _To Mons. Buston, attorney to the Castle._ This gentleman, the lawyer engaged in the Marquis's lawsuit, had hardly been willing to take any steps for fear of not being paid for his services. Létorière and Dominique looked at each other in amazement. "What did I tell you?" cried the ex-professor; "will you believe me now? will you defy your destiny? I have always told you that you would have nothing to envy in the son of Clinias!" Surprised at this incident, whose consequences he could not foresee, the Marquis begged Dominique to deliver the attorney's letter, and sent Master Landry's by the porter. An hour after, the tailor, Madelaine, and the apprentice were at the feet of the young gentleman. "Thanks to you, Monsieur the Marquis, I have the patronage of Monseigneur the Duke of Bourbon!" cried Landry. "It is a clear and net profit of six thousand livres a year! Behold me, in future, a rich man!" "Thanks to you, Monsieur the Marquis, our neighbor Mathurin, who got from us all our custom, will burst with envy," said Madelaine. "Thanks to you, Monsieur the Marquis, Dame Madelaine, angry at seeing our customers leave us, will give me no more cuff's!" said Martin Kraft. "My friends," replied Létorière, "I am extremely pleased at what has happened to you; but I declare to you, that unfortunately I have had nothing to do with it."