The good old man lived in the Rue du Bercail,
in a house with a steep-pitched roof. There was a little paved
courtyard in front, where the rose-bushes grew and clambered up to the
windows of the upper story. Behind lay a little country garden, with
its box-edged borders, shut in by damp, gloomy-looking walls. The
prim, gray-painted street door, with its wicket opening and bell
attached, announced quite as plainly as the official scutcheon that "a
notary lives here."
It was half-past five o'clock in the afternoon, at which hour the
old man usually sat digesting his dinner. He had drawn his black
leather-covered armchair before the fire, and put on his armor, a
painted pasteboard contrivance shaped like a top boot, which protected
his stockinged legs from the heat of the fire; for it was one of the
good man's habits to sit for a while after dinner with his feet on the
dogs and to stir up the glowing coals. He always ate too much; he was
fond of good living. Alas! if it had not been for that little failing,
would he not have been more perfect than it is permitted to mortal man
to be? Chesnel had finished his cup of coffee. His old housekeeper had
just taken away the tray which had been used for the purpose for the
last twenty years. He was waiting for his clerks to go before he
himself went out for his game at cards, and meanwhile he was thinking
--no need to ask of whom or what.
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