As he uttered these words, the usually mild, resigned expression of the lapidary's countenance was exchanged for a look of gloomy energy, while a slight suffusion coloured the ordinarily pale features of the agitated man, as, rising abruptly from the pallet beside which he had been sitting, he began to pace the miserable apartment with hurried steps; and, spite of the deformed and attenuated appearance of poor Morel, his attitude and action bespoke the noblest, purest indignation. "I am not ill-disposed towards any man," cried he, at length, pausing of a sudden; "and never, to my knowledge, harmed a human being. But, I tell you, when I think of this notary, I wish him--ah! I wish him--as much wretchedness as he has caused me." Then pressing both hands to his forehead, he murmured, in a mournful tone: "Just God! what crime have I committed that a hard fate should deliver me and mine, tied hand and foot, into the power of such a hypocrite? Have his riches been given him only to worry, harass, and destroy those his bad passions lead him to persecute, injure, and corrupt?" "That's right! that's right!" said Madeleine; "go on abusing him. You will have done yourself a great deal of good, shall you not, when he puts you in prison, as he can do any day, for that promissory note of 1,300 francs on which he obtained judgment against you? He holds you fast as a bird at the end of a string. I hate this notary as badly as you do; but since we are so completely in his power, why you should--" "Let him ruin and dishonour my child, I suppose?" burst from the pale lips of the lapidary, with violent and impatient energy. "For heaven's sake, Morel, don't speak so loud; the children are awake, and will hear you." "Pooh, pooh!" returned Morel, with bitter irony; "it will serve as a fine example for our two little girls. It will instruct them to expect that, one of these days, some villain or other like the notary may take a fancy to them,--perhaps the same man; and then, I suppose, you would tell me, as now, to be careful how I offended him, since he had me in his power. You say, if I displease him, he can put me in prison. Now, tell the truth: you advise me, then, to leave my daughter at his mercy, do you not?" And then, passing from the extreme of rage at the idea of all the wickedness practised by the notary to tender recollections of his child, the unhappy man burst into a sort of convulsive weeping, mingled with deep and heavy sobs, for his kindly nature could not long sustain the tone of sarcastic indignation he had assumed.