"The bandits whom the abbe keeps in pay and drink have their useful side, have they? Prove that, if you please."
"Let the circumstance arise, monseigneur, and you will be very glad to have these bandits under your hand."
"You advise me, then, to be reconciled to the abbe?" said Fouquet, ironically.
"I advise you, monseigneur, not to quarrel with a hundred or a hundred and twenty loose fellows, who, by putting their rapiers end to end, would form a cordon of steel capable of surrounding three thousand men."
Fouquet darted a searching glance at Gourville, and passing before him,--"That is all very well; let M. l'Abbe Fouquet be introduced," said he to the footman. "You are right, Gourville."
Two minutes after, the Abbe Fouquet appeared in the doorway, with profound reverence. He was a man of from forty to forty-five years of age, half churchman, half soldier,--a spadassin grafted upon an abbe; upon seeing that he had not a sword by his side, you might be sure he had pistols. Fouquet saluted him more as elder brother than as a minister.
"What can I do to serve you, monsieur l'abbe?" said he.
"Oh! oh! how coldly you speak to me, brother!"
"I speak like a man who is in a hurry, monsieur."
The abbe looked maliciously at Gourville, and anxiously at Fouquet, and said, "I have three hundred pistoles to pay to M. de Bregi this evening. A play debt, a sacred debt."
"What next?" said Fouquet bravely, for he comprehended that the Abbe Fouquet would not have disturbed him for such a want.
"A thousand to my butcher, who will supply no more meat."
"Next?"
"Twelve hundred to my tailor," continued the abbe; "the fellow has made me take back seven suits of my people's, which compromises my liveries, and my mistress talks of replacing me by a farmer of the revenue, which would be a humiliation for the church."
"What else?" said Fouquet.
"You will please to remark," said the abbe, humbly, "that I have asked nothing for myself."
"That is delicate, monsieur," replied Fouquet; "so, as you see, I wait."
"And I ask nothing, oh! no,--it is not for want of need, though, I assure you."
The minister reflected for a minute. "Twelve hundred pistoles to the tailor; that seems a great deal for clothes," said he.