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Rh myself? And at this very minute, isn't the disaster that is striking you carrying me down with you? You must be mad, or very brazen, to look to me again!"

"Nevertheless, you had better get busy, sir … Or perhaps you would rather be known as the father-in-law of an insolvent man? But you haven't finished reading those letters. Please continue. You will see that it merits at least some reflection … Admit that it's not my fault. The failure of Smithson and Co., of New York! Such a well-established bank! Who could have foreseen that? And those copper mines at Sgreveness; the shares have dropped to twenty below par! But it was not I who persuaded you into it! Be fair, and remember your confidence in that little engineer, your brother genius, who offered to let you in on the business!…"

"Keep quiet!" interrupted Dobouziez. "For heaven's sake, stop! What about those wild speculations in coffee that swallowed up your wife's dowry in less than four days? I suppose you went into them on my advice, too! And that gamble in the public funds, in which you made use of Dupoissy! Maybe you think that the fellows on the Exchange are stupid enough to suppose for one minute that the hundred or two hundred thousand francs above the market paid by that lamb, who never had any wool of his own, came out of his own pocket! And that boot-licking rascal is very quietly letting go of you. You ought to hear how he talks about you behind your back! You have succeeded in nauseating even that nobody! On the exchange he doesn't hesitate to say out loud what he thinks of your new … industry, the emigration agency, which will involve you, in all probability, in trouble with the courts! Shame on you!"