Their natures were shrivelled and harsh, hardened by toil, by
privation, by the remembrance of their sufferings during a long and
cruel apprenticeship to life. Neither of them complained of their
trials. They were not so much implacable as impracticable in their
dealings with others in misfortune. To them, virtue, honor, loyalty,
all human sentiments consisted solely in the payment of their bills.
Irritable and irritating, without feelings, and sordid in their
economy, the brother and sister bore a dreadful reputation among the
other merchants of the rue Saint-Denis. Had it not been for their
connection with Provins, where they went three or four times a year,
when they could close the shop for a day or two, they would have had
no clerks or young women. But old Rogron, their father, sent them all
the unfortunate young people of his neighborhood, whose parents wished
to start them in business in Paris. He obtained these apprentices by
boasting, out of vanity, of his son's success. Parents, attracted by
the prospect of their children being well-trained and closely watched,
and also, by the hope of their succeeding, eventually, to the
business, sent whichever child was most in the way at home to the care
of the brother and sister. But no sooner had the clerks or the young
women found a way of escape from that dreadful establishment than they
fled, with rejoicings that increased the already bad name of the
Rogrons. New victims were supplied yearly by the indefatigable old
father.

From the time she was fifteen, Sylvie Rogron, trained to the simpering
of a saleswoman, had two faces,--the amiable face of the seller, the
natural face of a sour spinster. Her acquired countenance was a
marvellous bit of mimicry. She was all smiles. Her voice, soft and
wheedling, gave a commercial charm to business. Her real face was that
we have already seen projecting from the half-opened blinds; the mere