"
Birotteau's will!
"That is true," said Monsieur de Bourbonne, closing his snuff-box with
a gesture the significance of which it is impossible to render, for it
was a language in itself. "But writing is always dangerous," he added,
putting his snuff-box on the mantelpiece with an air and manner that
alarmed the vicar.
Birotteau was so bewildered by the upsetting of all his ideas, by the
rapidity of events which found him defenceless, by the ease with which
his friends were settling the most cherished matters of his solitary
life, that he remained silent and motionless as if moonstruck,
thinking of nothing, though listening and striving to understand the
meaning of the rapid sentences the assembled company addressed to him.
He took the paper Monsieur Caron had given him and read it, as if he
were giving his mind to the lawyer's document, but the act was merely
mechanical. He signed the paper, by which he declared that he left
Mademoiselle Gamard's house of his own wish and will, and that he had
been fed and lodged while there according to the terms originally
agreed upon. When the vicar had signed the document, Monsieur Caron
took it and asked where his client was to send the things left by the
abbe in her house and belonging to him. Birotteau replied that they
could be sent to Madame de Listomere's,--that lady making him a sign
that she would receive him, never doubting that he would soon be a
canon.
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