He is too confiding. He
believes those who flatter him, who impose on his good heart. It has
always been so."
"I judge it is so still in the case of Monsieur Dolores, his daughter's
grandfather?" the Big Financier asked quizzically.
"It is so, monsieur," replied M. Fille. "The loss of his daughter shook
him even more than the flight of his wife; and it is as though he could
not live without that scoundrel near him--a vicious man, who makes
trouble wherever he goes. He was a cause of loss to M. Barbille years ago
when he managed the ash-factory; he is very dangerous to women--even now
he is a danger to the future of a young widow" (he meant the widow of
Palass Poucette); "and he has caused a scandal by perjury as a witness,
and by the consequences--but I need not speak of that here. He will do
Jean Jacques great harm in the end, of that I am sure. The very day
Mademoiselle Zoe left the Manor Cartier to marry the English actor, Jean
Jacques took that Spanish bad-lot to his home; and there he stays, and
the old friends go--the old friends go; and he does not seem to miss
them."
There was something like a sob in M. Fille's voice. He had loved Zoe in a
way that in a mother would have meant martyrdom, if necessary, and in a
father would have meant sacrifice when needed; and indeed he had
sacrificed both time and money to find Zoe.
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