There was a pause during which M. Raindal gravely lit his cigar, the red and gold paper band of which he had not dared to remove. He was, moreover, affected by the majestic aspect of the dining-room. The ceilings were as high as those of a museum gallery; the windows were enormous. On all the walls hung old tapestries with fading scenes, emphasized at intervals by antique chiseled copper ornaments. M. de Meuze himself, despite his brown coat and his big meerschaum pipe, well fitted into the atmosphere of high elegance which the surrounding objects gave to the room. "Well, M. Raindal, what is your news?" he said between two puffs. "Well, Monsieur le Marquis! Nothing of importance!" Cyprien replied with embarrassment. M. de Meuze stared at him out of his piercing little green eye. "I wager you came to talk business with me." Cyprien grinned but did not deny it. "Ah ha!" the marquis exclaimed victoriously. "What did I say?... I felt that at once.... I have but one eye but I can see as well as if I had two...." Coquettishly he caressed the white wings of his whiskers and, going to the window, lifted up a curtain. "Do you see? You must admit that for a first-floor apartment, mine enjoys a fine view.... The house of our lords is in full sight...." Through the white-barred windows Cyprien saw the Place de Palais Bourbon and in front of the ancient door a little soldier dreaming near his sentry box, holding his rifle at attention. Cyprien said sneeringly: "Ah! it is there that our lords of the cheque-book dwell." "Yes, M. Raindal, right there ... the door facing us! This window will be worth much on the first day of the riots.... But we are gossiping. I was forgetting the object of your visit.... What was it?... You came for the mines, didn't you?" Cyprien agreed that this was the case. He had come under the seal of secrecy--for, of course, no one, not even his brother, should know of his attempt--and after serious consideration. "Quite so," the marquis interrupted. "I guessed as much.... Will you please come this way.... We shall be more at ease to talk." They passed into the other room, a vast cabinet furnished in Eastern style with scimitars and carbines inlaid with mother-of-pearl in panoplies. He went on: "So you wish to join the party? Nothing easier.... I am going to write to M. Pums now and, unless you inform him to the contrary, you must go and see him to-morrow about three at the Bank of Galicia, 72 rue Vivienne.... Will this do?..." He sat down at his huge table and added, while he wrote the note: