But to send a
child away to be nursed means almost certain death; and as for the nurse
in the house, that is a shameful transaction, a source of incalculable
evil, for both the employer's child and the nurse's child frequently die
from it."
Just then the doctor's brougham drew up outside the nurse-agency in the
Rue Roquepine.
"I dare say you have never been in such a place, although you are the
father of five children," said Boutan to Mathieu, gayly.
"No, I haven't."
"Well, then, come with me. One ought to know everything."
The office in the Rue Roquepine was the most important and the one with
the best reputation in the district. It was kept by Madame Broquette, a
woman of forty, with a dignified if somewhat blotched face, who was
always very tightly laced in a faded silk gown of dead-leaf hue. But if
she represented the dignity and fair fame of the establishment in its
intercourse with clients, the soul of the place, the ever-busy
manipulator, was her husband, Monsieur Broquette, a little man with a
pointed nose, quick eyes, and the agility of a ferret. Charged with the
police duties of the office, the supervision and training of the nurses,
he received them, made them clean themselves, taught them to smile and
put on pleasant ways, besides penning them in their various rooms and
preventing them from eating too much.
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