Penny Blood Serial Cover — page 37: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

4 ALFRED DE ROSANN. 29 The gray dawn of morning found him still at his labours, and La Motte still by his side. At length the task was completed—De Rosann rose from the chair on which he had sate for hours, and hurried to his bed, where a deep sleep soon overtook him. La Motte retired as silently as he was able, and regained his own dwelling with a fiendish satisfaction pictured on his countenance. : There is in Paris a discounter for almost every re- spective trade jor profession. The same money- broker, who negotiates the bills of general merchants, will not look at paper bearing the name of a book- seller or a goldsmith; and he that cashes the accept- ances of the latter, does not trouble himself with the affairs of the former. The usurers and bankers only, with very few exceptions, undertake general dis- counts; thus, the grocer, the baker, the printer, the tailor, &c., have each his separate man of business for all bill transactions. But the proprietors of great mercantile establishments do not give themselves the trouble to go or send to the office of the broker; they are waited upon by their discounters every morning - at an early hour. It was therefore with the greatest facility that La Motte obtained cash for the bills of exchange fabricated by De Rosann at his instigation; and as he was cautious enough to discount them in separate sums with at least half-a-dozen agents, the large amount did not excite the slightest suspicion. At a late hour De Rosann awoke with a sick head- ache. He had buta faint impression of the transac- tions of the preceding evening; he remembered that he had drawn up a quantity of bills, to assist his part- ner as he had promised during the day, and he rose with the impression that La Motte had written at least the half of them. He did not however experi- ence the slightest uneasiness—not a suspicion entered his mind—he knew that it was common to accept promissory notes by procuration for a correspondent —and he placed implicit reliance on the integrity of - La Motte. © 9* COMmmcoookxs