(I will tell you afterwards how I came to know all these particulars so well.) "After Clement's return, on two succeeding days, from his dangerous search, without meeting with any good result, Jacques entreated Monsieur de Crequy to let him take it in hand.

He represented that he, as gardener for the space of twenty years and more at the Hotel de Crequy, had a right to be acquainted with all the successive concierges at the Count's house; that he should not go among them as a stranger, but as an old friend, anxious to renew pleasant intercourse; and that if the Intendant's story, which he had told Monsieur de Crequy in England, was true, that mademoiselle was in hiding at the house of a former concierge, why, something relating to her would surely drop out in the course of conversation.

So he persuaded Clement to remain indoors, while he set off on his round, with no apparent object but to gossip.
"At night he came home,--having seen mademoiselle.

He told Clement much of the story relating to Madame Babette that I have told to you.

Of course, he had heard nothing of the ambitious hopes of Morin Fils,--hardly of his existence, I should think.