relation, it was said, of
a Parisian artist. It was with the express condition that nothing was to
be exhibited in Plassans, that everything was to be sent to a distance.
But the result was disastrous; the merchant was frightened by the
strangeness of the design, and by the fantastic boldness of the
execution, and he declared that they would never sell. This threw her
into despair; great tears welled her eyes. Of what use was she? It was
a grief and a humiliation to be good for nothing. And the servant was
obliged to console her, saying that no doubt all women were not born for
work; that some grew like the flowers in the gardens, for the sake
of their fragrance; while others were the wheat of the fields that is
ground up and used for food.

Martine, meantime, cherished another project; it was to urge the doctor
to resume his practise. At last she mentioned it to Clotilde, who at
once pointed out to her the difficulty, the impossibility almost, of
such an attempt. She and Pascal had been talking about his doing so only
the day before. He, too, was anxious, and had thought of work as the
only chance of salvation. The idea of opening an office again was
naturally the first that had presented itself to him. But he had been
for so long a time the physician of the poor! How could he venture now
to ask payment when it was so many years since he had left off doing so?
Besides, was it not too late, at his age, to recommence a career? not to
speak of the absurd rumors that had been circulating about him, the name
which they had given him of a crack-brained genius. He would not find a
single patient now, it would be a useless cruelty to force him to make
an attempt which would assuredly result only in a lacerated heart and
empty hands. Clotilde, on the contrary, had used all her influence to
turn him from the idea. Martine comprehended the reasonableness of these
objections, and she too declared that he must be prevented from running
the risk of so great a chagrin. But while she was speaking a new idea
occurred to her, as she suddenly remembered an old register, which she
had met with in a press, and in which she had in former times entered
the doctor's visits. For a long time it was she who had kept the
accounts. There were so many patients who had never paid that a list
of them filled three of the large pages of the register. Why, then, now
that they had fallen into misfortune, should they not ask from these
people the money wh