Marta, in a soft and implacable voice, and with such malicious glances that Mr.Gould's best friends advised him earnestly to attempt no bribery to get the matter dropped.

It would have been useless.

Indeed, it would not have been a very safe proceeding.
Such was also the opinion of a stout, loud-voiced lady of French extraction, the daughter, she said, of an officer of high rank (_officier superieur de l'armee_), who was accommodated with lodgings within the walls of a secularized convent next door to the Ministry of Finance.
That florid person, when approached on behalf of Mr.Gould in a proper manner, and with a suitable present, shook her head despondently.

She was good-natured, and her despondency was genuine.

She imagined she could not take money in consideration of something she could not accomplish.