Then he held out his moist hand to Rougon and the two others.
Vuillet had settled his little affairs alone.

He had cut his own slice out of the cake, as Felicite would have said.

While peeping through the ventilator of his cellar he had seen the insurgents arrest the postmaster, whose offices were near his bookshop.

At daybreak, therefore, at the moment when Rougon was comfortably seated in the mayor's arm-chair, he had quietly installed himself in the postmaster's office.

He knew the clerks; so he received them on their arrival, told them that he would replace their chief until his return, and that meantime they need be in nowise uneasy.