Page:Victor Hugo - Notre-Dame de Paris (tr. Hapgood, 1888).djvu/316

40 ""

Dom Claude turned pale again, and the scholar pursued carelessly.

"And that word below it, graved by the same hand, Ἀνάγνεία, signifies 'impurity.' You see that people do know their Greek."

And the archdeacon remained silent. This Greek lesson had rendered him thoughtful.

Master Jehan, who possessed all the artful ways of a spoiled child, judged that the moment was a favorable one in which to risk his request. Accordingly, he assumed an extremely soft tone and began,—

"My good brother, do you hate me to such a degree as to look savagely upon me because of a few mischievous cuffs and blows distributed in a fair war to a pack of lads and brats, quibusdam marmosetis? You see, good Brother Claude, that people know their Latin."

But all this caressing hypocrisy did not have its usual effect on the severe elder brother. Cerberus did not bite at the honey cake. The archdeacon's brow did not lose a single wrinkle.

"What are you driving at?" he said dryly.

"Well, in point of fact, this!" replied Jehan bravely, "I stand in need of money."

At this audacious declaration, the archdeacon's visage assumed a thoroughly pedagogical and paternal expression.

"You know, Monsieur Jehan, that our fief of Tirechappe, putting the direct taxes and the rents of the nine and twenty houses in a block, yields only nine and thirty livres, eleven sous, six deniers, Parisian. It is one half more than in the time of the brothers Paclet, but it is not much."

"I need money," said Jehan stoically.

"You know that the official has decided that our twenty-one houses should be moved full into the fief of the Bishopric, and that we could redeem this homage only by paying the reverend bishop two marks of silver gilt of the price of six livres parisis. Now, these two marks I have not yet been able to get together. You know it."