"You did well,édé Madame Potrelle; let Bribri run about a little, if you wish."
"You see, monsieur, my cats are well brought up; they ain't capable of forgetting themselves, no matter where they be."
The concierge opened her apron entirely, and a small black and white cat escaped from its folds and scuttled under a piece of furniture.
"Well," I said, "have you seen Madame Landernoy?"
"Yes, monsieur; when she found out that you'd given me more money than she'd put in her bill, she wouldn't take it, and she almost got mad with me. It was no use for me to say: 'The gentleman always pays that price;' she said that didn't make any difference to her. The only way I could make her take the money was to tell her that you had other work for her to do and she could let it go on that.--Well! on my word! there he is on the couch now! Bribri! you mustn't get upon that, you scamp!"
"We will see, when it comes to paying for the waistcoats. Poor girl! what noble pride! what an upright soul! And this is the sort of woman that men take pleasure in defiling!"
"Nothing, Madame Potrelle. Here are the material, the linings, and the pattern. Take them all, and please accept this for your trouble."
I slipped five francs into the concierge's hand; she made some objection to taking it, declaring that whatever she did for her tenant she did unselfishly. I succeeded without too much difficulty in removing her scruples. She took the material; but the next thing was to capture Bribri, who had established himself under a sofa and refused to come out at all, or came out only to run under something else. It seemed to me that he showed much agility for a cripple.
Madame Potrelle made the circuit of my salon several times on all fours. At last, by rolling a ball of paper across the floor, we succeeded in enticing and catching Bribri, whom his mistress replaced in her apron, saying reprovingly:
"You ain't been a good boy; you shan't go out again for six weeks.--Adieu, monsieur! you haven't got any other word to send to my tenant?"
"Tell her that I am very fond of children, and that I would like to kiss her daughter."
"Ah! if she could hear you, monsieur, I'll bet that she'd hold her little Marie up to you right away. But you won't let three months go by without coming again, will you, monsieur?"