In some other respects, however, advancing age seemed to
have improved rather than deteriorated him in personal
appearance. His complexion looked healthier, his expression
cheerfuller, his eyes brighter than they had ever been of late
years. He walked, too, with a brisker step than the step of old
times in the police office; and his dress, although it certainly
did not look like the costume of a man in affluent circumstances,
was cleaner and far more nearly worn than ever it had been in the
past days of his political employment at Paris.
He sat down alone in the inn parlor, and occupied the time, while
his hostess had gone to fetch the half-bottle of wine that he
ordered, in examining a dirty old card which he extricated from a
mass of papers in his pocket-book, and which bore, written on it,
these lines:
"When the troubles are over, do not forget those who remember you
with eternal gratitude. Stop at the first post-station beyond
Meaux, on the high-road to Paris, and ask at the inn for Citizen
Maurice, whenever you wish to see us or to hear of us again."
"Pray," inquired Lomaque, putting the card in his pocket when the
Widow Duval brought in the wine, "can you inform me whether a
person named Maurice lives anywhere in this neighborhood?"
"Can I inform you?" repeated the voluble widow. "Of course I can!
Citizen Maurice, and the citoyenne, his amiable sister--who is
not to be passed over because you don't mention her, my honest
man--lives within ten minutes' walk of my house.
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