Monsieur du Harpin

Monsieur du Harpin is a wealthy Parisian usurer whose household sermons about honesty conceal a career of theft. He employs Therese, then retaliates when she refuses to steal for him by planting a diamond and accusing her of robbery. His role in her story makes him an early, defining example of a social order in which a man’s reputation and property outweigh a poor woman’s testimony.

Identity and Household

Monsieur du Harpin lives in a third-floor apartment on rue Quincampoix with a woman he calls his wife, described as at least as wicked as he is. He has grown rich not only by lending money against collateral but also by stealing public property when he believes he can do so safely. His apparent position as a respectable employer masks an economy built on fraud and the exploitation of others.

The household’s austerity is both conspicuous and revealing. Therese is offered three ounces of bread a day, river water, an old dress every eighteen months, and three crowns at the end of a year, conditional on satisfactory service and thrift. The couple avoid ordinary expenses with calculated ingenuity: they use street-lamp light, do not use linen, save crumbs and scraps for a Sunday meal, and wear shoes reinforced with iron. Therese is even required to scrape plaster from an unpapered room, sieve it, and use the powder on her employers’ wigs and hair. The details make their professed virtue of economy look less like modest living than a discipline imposed on a servant, alongside an appetite for acquiring wealth from other people.

The Theft He Proposes

Monsieur du Harpin knows that a solitary, well-to-do neighbor owns valuable belongings, including a gold box worth fifty or sixty louis. He regrets that the box had been sold rather than retained, and devises a theft to recover it. Instead of carrying out the plan himself, he assigns it to Therese, supplying two lock picks: one for the neighbor’s front door and one for the secretary where the box is kept. In return, he promises her an additional crown for two years.

To make the proposal sound principled, he argues that robbery helps counter inequality in the distribution of property, that punishment is uncommon, and that some societies honor theft as a demonstration of courage and skill. He also assures Therese that his influence will protect her if she is caught. His reasoning transforms self-interest into a general theory and attempts to make his servant bear the risk. Therese refuses, points out that he is corrupting an employee, and observes that the tools he has given her could be turned against him. He retreats into the claim that he was merely testing her, a pretext she does not believe.

Retaliation and Wrongful Conviction

After Therese rejects the plan, Monsieur du Harpin conceals his resentment for more than a month. He waits until the end of her second year in his service, then arrives at her room with four watchmen and accuses her of stealing a diamond worth a thousand crowns. The diamond is found in her mattress. Despite Therese’s protest that he knows she did not steal it, the search and the employer’s accusation are treated as decisive; she is seized and taken to prison.

The accusation turns Monsieur du Harpin’s authority as an employer into a weapon. Therese tries to explain that his charge is revenge for her refusal and that he is concealing his own criminal traffic. The court instead accepts the reputation he has cultivated: he has been known for twenty years as a man of integrity and, in the eyes of those judging her, is incapable of such wrongdoing. Her poverty and lack of protection compound the effect of his standing. She is swiftly convicted because the stolen object is found in her room, while her account of the person who planted it is dismissed as recrimination.

Narrative Significance

Monsieur du Harpin’s episode establishes a recurring reversal in Therese’s misfortunes: conduct that would ordinarily count as honesty or resistance becomes the occasion for punishment. He first invites her to share his crime, then uses the very trust and dependence created by her employment to make her appear guilty. The stolen diamond is not simply evidence in a case; it is a planted object that makes his false account easier to credit than her truthful one.

His case also introduces the book’s critique of justice as a system shaped by reputation, wealth, and access to influence. Monsieur du Harpin’s long-established public image protects him from suspicion, while Therese’s destitution makes guilt seem plausible to the authorities. The contrast is especially sharp because his domestic language elevates probity and sober labor even as his prosperity depends on theft. His brief appearance therefore has consequences well beyond his household: his retaliation sends Therese toward imprisonment and reveals how easily an influential wrongdoer can turn the law against a vulnerable person.