Louis de Bressieux was in fact standing at an angle of the château, intently considering--so it seemed, at all events--the detail of the decoration of a window on the ground floor. He had not yet changed his hunting costume, and the visor of his velvet cap concealed his eyes. Beside him stood a man of small stature, thick-set, with hair once red, now turning gray,--one of those men whose crabbed countenance leads one at a glance to judge them to be very frank and downright. His gleaming eyes, shifting and impenetrable, indicated that he concealed many complexities behind the rough bonhomie of his manners. He was Landri's former tutor, promoted twelve years before to the rank of general factotum, which was not likely to be a sinecure with the very large income of the Marquis de Claviers, and his expenditures, which, alas! were much larger. He called him, it will be remembered, "my good Chaffin," as he said "my good Jaubourg," and "the worthy Bressieux." A learned connoisseur of human nature has said: "He who does not make up his mind to be a dupe will never be magnanimous"; and the admirable Marquis de Claviers-Grandchamp was truly magnanimous. How surprised he would have been if, at the moment when he called to Bressieux, one of those modern machines--the objects of his half-sincere, half-simulated aversion--had been at hand to record and transmit to him the conversation which his sudden arrival had interrupted! "The affair must be settled within ten days, at the latest," Bressieux was saying. "The two American dealers are to sail December eighth. I know them. They won't postpone their sailing. They want to carry the tapestries with them. If the thing drags, they'll back out. The other dealers haven't the means to make up the whole amount. In that case it's a public sale, with all its risks. Everybody will know that the marquis is embarrassed. You won't find the four millions. It's in his interest that I speak to you." "And it's his interest that I have in mind, no less," replied Chaffin. "Four millions? The debts would be paid,--the largest ones,--and perhaps he would consent to cut down his establishment. But he won't allow me to mention the subject. I didn't dare even to show him the summonses last week. He refuses to acknowledge, what he is well aware of, however, that he is ruined. The idea that I, who know how attached he is to this whole château,--he wouldn't let so much as a cup be sold,--should suggest to him to sell everything at one stroke, tapestries, furniture, portraits!" "But is he absolutely driven to such a sale, or is he not?" "He is." "Has he any way whatever of escaping it?" "He has not, unless millions should fall from the sky." "Or a friend, Jaubourg, for example, should leave him his fortune?" insinuated Bressieux.