But Cerizet had positively declined them, on the ground that he ran risks of a nature to become a possible cause of dispute with associates.
"I could only," he said to Cadenet, "take them at six per cent interest, and you can do better than that in your own business.

We will go into partnership later, if you like, in some serious enterprise, some good opportunity which may require, say, fifty thousand francs.

When you have got that sum to invest, let me know, and we'll talk about it." Cerizet had only suggested the affair of the house to Theodose after making sure that among the three, Madame Poiret, Cadenet, and himself, it was impossible to raise the full sum of one hundred thousand francs.
The "lender by the little week" was thus in perfect safety in his den, where he could even, if necessity came, appeal to the law.

On certain mornings there might be seen as many as sixty or eighty persons, men as often as women, either in the wine-shop, or the alley, or sitting on the staircase, for the distrustful Cerizet would only admit six persons at a time into his office.

The first comers were first served, and each had to go by his number, which the wine-merchant, or his shop-boy, affixed to the hats of the man and the backs of the women.