By seven next morning Lisbeth had driven in a hackney coach to the
Quai de la Tournelle, and stopped the vehicle at the corner of the Rue
de Poissy.
"Go to the Rue des Bernardins," said she to the driver, "No. 7, a
house with an entry and no porter. Go up to the fourth floor, ring at
the door to the left, on which you will see 'Mademoiselle Chardin
--Lace and shawls mended.' She will answer the door. Ask for the
Chevalier. She will say he is out. Say in reply, 'Yes, I know, but
find him, for his _bonne_ is out on the quay in a coach, and wants to
see him.'"
Twenty minutes later, an old man, who looked about eighty, with
perfectly white hair, and a nose reddened by the cold, and a pale,
wrinkled face like an old woman's, came shuffling slowly along in list
slippers, a shiny alpaca overcoat hanging on his stooping shoulders,
no ribbon at his buttonhole, the sleeves of an under-vest showing
below his coat-cuffs, and his shirt-front unpleasantly dingy. He
approached timidly, looked at the coach, recognized Lisbeth, and came
to the window.
"Why, my dear cousin, what a state you are in!"
"Elodie keeps everything for herself," said Baron Hulot. "Those
Chardins are a blackguard crew.
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