"'I should be at your mercy,' she said, breaking in upon me, disgust
in her gesture.

"Now that we had spoken frankly, I made up my mind to save the family
from impending destitution. I resolved to strain the law at need to
gain my ends, and this was what I did. I sued the Comte de Restaud for
a sum of money, ostensibly due to Gobseck, and gained judgment. The
Countess, of course, did not allow him to know of this, but I had
gained on my point, I had a right to affix seals to everything on the
death of the Count. I bribed one of the servants in the house--the man
undertook to let me know at any hour of the day or night if his master
should be at the point of death, so that I could intervene at once,
scare the Countess with a threat of affixing seals, and so secure the
counter-deed.

"I learned later on that the woman was studying the Code, with her
husband's dying moans in her ears. If we could picture the thoughts of
those who stand about a deathbed, what fearful sights should we not
see? Money is always the motive-spring of the schemes elaborated, of
all the plans that are made and the plots that are woven about it! Let
us leave these details, nauseating in the nature of them; but perhaps
they may have given you some insight into all that this husband and
wife endured; perhaps too they may unveil much that is passing in
secret in other houses.

"For two months the Comte de Restaud lay on his bed, alone, and
resigned to his fate. Mortal disease was slowly sapping the strength
of mind and body. Unaccountable and grotesque sick fancies preyed upon
him; he would not suffer them to set his room in order, no one could