And directly afterwards there was an explosion. Then the house suddenly
sank into death-like silence. All that could be heard was the voice of
Madame in the office, as, in a very dignified manner, she kept on
praising her goods.
"Well, my friend," said Boutan to Mathieu, while they walked up and down
the passage, "all this, the material side of things, is nothing. What you
should see and know is what goes on in the minds of all these people. And
note that this is a fair average place. There are others which are real
dens, and which the police sometimes have to close. No doubt there is a
certain amount of supervision, and there are severe regulations which
compel the nurses to bring certificates of morality, books setting forth
their names, ages, parentage, the situations they have held, and so on,
with other documents on which they have immediately to secure a signature
from the Prefecture, where the final authorization is granted them. But
these precautions don't prevent fraud and deceit of various kinds. The
women assert that they have only recently begun nursing, when they have
been doing it for months; they show you superb children which they have
borrowed and which they assert to be their own.
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