"Why, really, he did not seem even to notice that I was there; but, if he had, I should have taken care how I took any notice of him. He is the _bete noire_ of the whole prison, and some day or other they'll play him a slippery trick; and, _pardieu!_ I have no wish to come in for my share of what may befall him." "You're right." "It would interfere with my pleasures, for my walk with the prisoners is really a pleasure to me; only these ruffians have no great opinion of me morally. You see, my accusation of a simple breach of trust is contemptible in the eyes of these out-and-outers; and they look on me as a nobody." "Why, really, with such criminals you are--" "A mere chicken, my dear fellow. But do not forget my commissions." "Make your mind easy, general. First, Mlle. Alexandrine; second, the fish-pie and basket of wine; third, the old cognac of 1817, the ground coffee, and the eider-down quilt; you shall have it all. Is there anything else?" "Yes, I forgot. You know the address of M. Badinot?" "The agent? Yes." "Well, be so kind as to call on him, and say that I rely on his friendship to find me a barrister such as my case requires, and that I shall not stand for forty or fifty pounds." "I'll see M. Badinot, depend upon it, general; and all your commissions shall be attended to this evening, and to-morrow you shall receive all you wish for. So good day, and a happy meeting to us soon, _mon general_." "Good-bye, my worthy friend!" And the prisoner quitted the parlour at one door, and the visitor by the other. * * * * * Let us now compare the crime of Pique-Vinaigre with that of M. Boulard, the _huissier_. Compare the beginning of the two, and the reasons, the necessities, which impelled them to evil. Compare, too, the punishment which awaited them respectively. The one, driven by his hunger and need, robs. He is apprehended, judged, and sentenced to fifteen or twenty years of hard labour and exposure. Property is sacred, and he who, in the night, breaks for plunder should undergo sacred punishment. But ought not the well-informed, intelligent, rich man who robs--not to satisfy hunger, but his caprices or gambling in the stocks--to be punished? Yet for the public spoliator there is two months' imprisonment; for the relapsed convict twenty years' hard labour and exposure. What can we add to these facts, which speak for themselves? * * * * * The old turnkey kept his word; and when Boulard left the parlour, Germain entered, and Rigolette was only separated from him by a light wire grating. CHAPTER VIII. FRANCOIS GERMAIN.