CHAPTER VII.
A LODGING-HOUSE.The Passage de la Brasserie, a dark street, narrow, and but little known, although situated in the centre of Paris, runs at one end into the Rue Traversière St. Honoré, and at the other into the Cour St. Guillaume.
Towards the middle of this damp thoroughfare, muddy, dark, and unwholesome, and where the sun but rarely penetrates, there was a furnished house (commonly called a garni, lodging-house, in consequence of the low price of the apartments). On a miserable piece of paper might be read, “Chambers and small rooms furnished.” To the right hand, in a dark alley, was the door of a store, not less obscure, in which constantly resided the principal tenant of this garni.
Father Micou was ostensibly a dealer in old metal (“marine stores”), but secretly purchas
