He held out his hand to him. But Saccard stood shivering. He was thinking that if Monsieur Béraud Du Châtel had not been bent low by the tragic grief of Renée's shame, he would at a glance, and without an effort, have seen through Madame Sidonie's machinations. The latter, after having brought her brother and Aunt Élisabeth together, had prudently made herself scarce. She had not even gone to the wedding. He made a point of being very frank with the old man, having read in his look his surprise at finding his daughter's seducer to be a little ugly fellow forty years old. The newly married couple were obliged to pass the first nights at the Béraud mansion. A month before, Christine had been sent away, so that the child of fourteen should have no suspicion of the drama that was being enacted in that house as serene and undisturbed as a cloister. When she returned home, she gazed with astonishment at her sister's husband, whom she also thought old and ugly. Renée was the only one who did not seem to notice either her husband's age or his sorry appearance. She treated him without contempt as without affection, with an absolute tranquillity through which occasionally gleamed a touch of ironical disdain. Saccard strutted about and made himself at home, and really, thanks to his frankness and good spirits, he little by little won the friendship of one and all. When they took their departure to occupy a superb suite of apartments in a new house in the Rue de Rivoli, Monsieur Béraud Du Châtel's look no longer displayed any astonishment, and little Christine romped with her brother-in-law as with an old friend. Renée was at that time four months gone in the family way; her husband was on the point of sending her into the country, when, in accordance with Madame Sidonie's prophecy, she had a miscarriage. She had laced herself up so tightly to hide her condition, which, moreover, disappeared beneath the fulness of her skirts, that she was obliged to keep her bed for several weeks. He was delighted with the adventure; fortune was at length smiling upon him; he had made a golden bargain, a magnificent dowry, a wife lovely enough to have him decorated in six months, and not the least encumbrance. He had been paid two hundred thousand francs to give his name to a fœtus which the mother would not even look at. From that moment his thoughts lovingly lingered on the plots of ground at Charonne. But for the time being he was giving all his attention to a speculation which was to form the basis of his fortune. Notwithstanding the high position of his wife's family, he did not at once resign his post at the Hôtel de Ville. He talked of work on hand to be finished, and of some other occupation to be sought for. The truth was he wished to remain till the end on the battle-field where he was playing his first cards. He was so to say at home, and could cheat more at his ease.